Lord Byron Dies
Lord Byron, the prominent British poet and cultural figure, died on April 19, 1824, at the age of 36 in Greece. Born George Gordon Noel Byron on January 22, 1788, he rose to fame as a celebrated writer and a complex character, becoming both a hero to the Greeks and a controversial figure in his homeland. Byron's early life was marked by hardship, including familial abandonment and poverty, but he later inherited the title of Baron and attended prestigious schools, leading to a successful literary career. His works, particularly "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage" and "Don Juan," featured the Byronic hero, a character archetype defined by deep emotional turmoil and a sense of alienation.
In 1823, inspired by the Greek struggle for independence from Ottoman rule, Byron dedicated himself to supporting the Greek cause, raising funds and organizing military efforts. He traveled to Greece where he joined the rebel forces, but succumbed to fever shortly after his arrival. Byron's death was felt profoundly across Europe and is often regarded as a pivotal moment that marked the end of the Romantic literary period. He left behind an enduring legacy through his poetry and the impact of his life on literature and culture.
On this Page
Lord Byron Dies
Lord Byron Dies
On April 19, 1824, the British author George Gordon Noel Byron (often called Lord Byron, since he was the sixth Baron Byron of Rochdale) died in Greece at the age of 36. In his short, turbulent life he had become an accomplished poet and an international celebrity, a hero to the Greeks though a reprobate to many of his own countrymen.
Byron was born in London, England, on January 22, 1788. His father had already abandoned his mother, a half-mad Scottish heiress, after running through most of her money. Byron's early years were therefore spent in poverty in Aberdeen, where his mother had family. When his great-uncle William, the fifth Baron Byron, died in 1798, the boy inherited the title and some lands, as well as a dilapidated mansion called New-stead. Now a young lord, he was sent to a good school and to Cambridge University. Attempts were made to fix his club foot, but he continued to limp and was self-conscious about it. However, in the course of his schooling he became a passable amateur boxer and a good swimmer. Upon turning 21 he acquired a seat in the House of Lords.
In 1807, while still at Cambridge, Byron published a collection of juvenile poems, Hours of Idleness, which received a scathing notice in the Edinburgh Review. Stung, Byron replied with English Bards and Scotch Reviewers (1809), a satirical attack on the entire literary establishment. Having thus gained public attention and made a number of enemies besides, he set off on a grand tour that took him through Spain, Portugal, Italy, and the Balkans. He fell in love with Greece and was keenly aware of the contrast between the country's glorious past and its inglorious present under Ottoman rule. Inspired by the legend of Leander, a Greek youth who was said to have swum the Hellespont (a strait that connects the Sea of Marmara with the Aegean), Byron swam its swift and dangerous waters himself in 1810.
He returned to England with a head full of exotic adventures and the first two cantos of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, a long narrative poem based largely upon his travels. The poem was an overnight sensation, both for its lush descriptions of historic places and for its central figure, the prototypical Byronic hero: by turns melancholy and defiant, he is a young man alienated from the rest of the world by his stormy emotions and a mysterious dark secret in his past. This sort of character is a recurring figure in Byron's works, which during this period included The Giaour (1813), The Bride of Abydos (1813), Lara (1814), and The Corsair (1814). The poet also maintained a busy social life and developed a reputation for wild and sometimes caddish behavior. However, he was admired, especially on the continent, as a rebel against convention and an outspoken foe of tyranny.
The year 1816 marked a turning point in Byron's life. After a brief marriage to a high-minded young lady ended in divorce and scandal, with intimations that he had committed incest with his half-sister, Byron found himself a social pariah, shunned where he had once been lionized. He left England in voluntary exile and never returned. He traveled first to Switzerland, where he stayed with the Shelleys and wrote The Prisoner of Chillon, a dramatic monologue about the fate of a political prisoner, as well as another canto of Childe Harold, and then moved on to Italy. There he settled near Venice and then Pisa in 1821.
Byron's years in Italy may have been the happiest of his life. They were certainly productive: He finished Childe Harold, composed several verse dramas, and then began a comic epic, Don Juan, that is generally considered his masterpiece, mixing satire, romance, personal asides, and inventive rhymes with enormous verve and versatility (he had completed 16 cantos of this when he died). He developed a permanent relationship with a young married woman and through her family got involved in Italy's underground independence movement.
In 1823 the Greek leader Prince Mavrocordatos appealed to Byron for help in the desperate struggle to free Greece from Ottoman rule. Byron responded with generosity and enthusiasm. He procured a ship to go to Greece himself, raised and equipped a small regiment, and poured much of his personal fortune into arms and supplies for the rebels. He arrived in Greece in the autumn of 1823. Byron and his party made their way with difficulty to the rebel encampment at Missolonghi, arriving there in late December. The Greek leaders had quarreled among themselves, and Byron worked hard to resolve differences and coordinate resources so that an attack could be launched on the Turkish-held port of Lepanto. The attack was imminent when the poet was stricken with fever. He died on April 19, 1824, after a few days of delirium.
The news of Byron's death traveled across Europe like a shock wave. To many, his passing marked the end of an era. (Indeed, students of English literature consider the Romantic period to have ended with his death.) Byron was survived by his ex-wife, Anne Isabella Milbanke Byron, and their daughter, Augusta Ada, who proved to be a mathematical prodigy; a computer language (ADA) is named for her.