Defending the Devil: The Image of Lord Byron

Draft of Paper given at Byron and Modernity Conference, Vancouver, BC, 2007

2010

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2012

Author of the most influential long poem of its era (Childe Harold's Pilgrimage) and the funniest long poem in European literature (Don Juan), Lord Byron was also the literary superstar of Romanticism, whose effect on nineteenth-century writers, artists, musicians and politiciansbut also everyday readers-was second to none. His poems seduced and scandalized readers, and his life and legend were correspondingly magnetic, given added force by his early death in the Greek War of Independence. This introduction compresses his extraordinary life to manageable proportions, and gives readers a firm set of contexts in the politics, warfare and Romantic ideology of Byron's era. It offers a guide to the main themes in his wide-ranging oeuvre, from the early poems that made him famous (and infamous) overnight, to his narrative tales, dramas and the comic epic left incomplete at his death.

Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences, 2011

The quest for liberty in Lord Byron's poetry is a polemical issue because most critics have termed it nihilistic and satanic simply because the poet and his protagonists question Christian revelation and man-made laws. This article sets out to show that although Lord Byron and the Byronic hero as can be seen in the different poems do question Christian revelation and flout a number of generally accepted moral values, they do so in an attempt to find answers, which might help the individual to understand the universe, and be of help to the rest of mankind. The desire for liberty becomes the basic inspirational force, where conflict and warfare are justifiable pathways to the desired end. This paper also looks at the quest for liberty in Byron's poetry from the perspective of the heroes' ideals, justified by human nature and references to mythical rebels. Contrary to the generally accepted critical opinion that Lord Byron's quest for liberty is essentially egocentric, this article seeks to show that the quest for liberty is the Byronic creed and the only constant element in the poet's ambiguous life alongside the detestation of cant. The article argues that the Byronic hero's deconstruction of philosophical and sociopolitical ideals does not result from the poetic persona's lawlessness as generally assumed, but from an innate justifiable call for change, first for the individual and then for the common good. Related to his search for liberty, there are a lot of polemical issues around Byron's notion of the ideal, which are partly addressed in this paper.

SocArXiv Papers., 2023

Satan, the 'ruler of the powers of the air' of Ephesians 2:2, is undoubtedly the tragic hero (in the sense employed by Aristotle in his Poetics) of Milton's epic poem, Paradise Lost. Blake, Byron and Shelley saw him quite differently, perceiving the heroism, but transforming the tragedy, and, instead of seeing hubris ('overweening pride'), Promethean defiance, of which they fully approved.

This Dissertation is centred on the concept of the Devil, from the springboard of the Baudelaire phrase "The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist". From this it maps out a progression of the Devil as perceived from Biblical tradition, taking the route through the seminal work of Dante (Chapter 1), his influence on Milton; Milton (Chapter 2) and his influence on everybody else (Chapter 3). The progression moves through the Romantic symbolizing of the Devil and how this shaped the twentieth century and contemporary interpretations, concluding with an insight into the lynchpin of the Baudelaire quotation and its permeation into contemporary culture.

Philosophical Approaches to the Devil (2016)

In Romanticism, Satan became a figure of philosophical investigation and experimentation, in which various poets incorporated his figure as a representation of moral ambivalence. In various Romantic works, the Devil incorporates the basic theme of human desire. Therefore, it becomes necessary to explore the Devil throughout Romanticism as representative of human conflicts and complexities. Through the lens of such influential works as Nietzsche’s Daybreak (1881), and On the Genealogy of Morals (1887), this chapter will discuss the extent to which Romanticism transformed the Devil into a redemptive, heroic figure, against God as a religious tyrant. Discussing Romantic works including William Blake’s The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1793), Percy Shelley’s Queen Mab: A Philosophical Poem (1813), and Lord Byron’s Cain: A Mystery (1821), this chapter will illustrate how the Devil, far from being the personification of evil, was instead posited as an essential, if not experimental figure of human psychology.

Romantic textualities, 2023

The Heythrop Journal, 2014

Journal of Language Teaching and Research, 2011

This paper offers a politico-religious reading of Manfred that demonstrates how the Byronic hero is shown as the symbol of rebellion against the tyrannical government and its institutions. The paper traces the movement from symbolic presentation to Byron's rejection of resigning to supernatural powers. Byron accused his own countrymen of arraying their strength in the side of tyranny and stated that freedom could be possible when the powerful obstacles, thrones and courts were removed. Ultimately the paper aims at exploring all possible political meanings of the play in the light of Byron's political and religious beliefs.