Talk:Lord Byron

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Byron and Greek Love

I'm weeding out some referenced material from Greek love. Contributors here might find a use for all or some of it as it's about Byron and it isn't all about 'Greek love'. I mysellf doubt whether Byron ever actually used the phrase 'Greek love', otherwise the passage would quote it. It's a term used by Crompton (I'd be happy to be corrected about this).McOoee (talk) 21:55, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

In describing homoerotic aspects of Byron's life and work, Louis Crompton uses the umbrella term "Greek love" to cover literary and cultural models of homosexuality from classical antiquity as a whole, both Greek and Roman, as received by intellectuals, artists, and moralists of the time. To those such as Byron who were steeped in classical literature, the phrase "Greek love" evoked pederastic myths such as Ganymede and Hyacinthus, as well as historical figures such as the political martyrs Harmodius and Aristogeiton, and Hadrian's beloved Antinous; Byron refers to all these stories in his writings. He was even more intimate with the classical tradition of male love in Latin literature, and quoted or translated homoerotic passages from Catullus, Horace, Virgil, and Petronius, whose name "was a byword for homosexuality in the eighteenth century." In Byron's circle at Cambridge, "Horatian" was a code word for "bisexual." Byron's library in England included Latin editions of Xenophon, Athenaeus, Catullus, Virgil, Horace, Tibullus, Propertius, Petronius, and Martial, and English translations of Anacreon, Herodotus, Lucretius, Juvenal, and Tacitus, all of whose works contain passages referring to the homosexual practices of their time.

Byron's "Ode 3" was an imitation of Anacreon, in the playful mode of erotic verse directed in antiquity at both women and boys. In his youth, Byron was also drawn to heroic love between men, particularly Vergil's account of the tragic bond between Nisus and Euryalus in Book 9 of the Aeneid, which Byron paraphrased in Hours of Idleness. Crompton connects Byron's interest in the Nisus and Euryalus narrative to a real-life relationship between the poet, as an aristocratic patron, and John Edlestone, a young man from a humble background who was two years Byron's junior.

In one of Byron's adaptations of a classical poem on the love of boys, he omits Catullus's addressee, the youth Juventius, and titled the poem "To Ellen":

Line	Byron, "To Ellen"	Line	Catullus, Carmen 48
1	Oh! might I kiss those eyes of fire,	1	Juventius, your honeyed eyes, Mellitos oculos tuos, Iuuenti,
2	A million scarce would quench desire;	3	with as many as three hundred thousand kisses usque ad milia basiem trecenta
3	Still, would I steep my lips in bliss,	2	(if anyone should allow me to kiss them), si quis me sinat usque basiare,
4	And dwell an age on every kiss;
5	Nor then my soul should sated be,	4	may I not ever seem to be sated, nec numquam uidear satur futurus,
6	Still, would I kiss, and cling to thee;
7	Nought should my kiss from thine dissever,	5	not even if more abundant than grain for harvest non si densior aridis aristis
8	Still, would we kiss, and kiss for ever.	6	our crop of kisses should be. sit nostrae seges osculationis.

The Death of Hyacinth (ca. 1801) in Apollo's arms, by a painter contemporary with Byron, Jean Broc

At this point in his life, Byron "for more than a year … had been exchanging chaste kisses with a boy at Cambridge he had fallen in love with." As the poet approached his 21st birthday, when he would accede to the House of Lords, his interests became wholly heterosexual and even "hectic" in the pursuit of women. His male relationships seem to have revived when he left England, but even in his correspondence, Byron and his friends resorted to the code of classical allusions, in one piece of correspondence referring with elaborate puns to "Hyacinths" who might be struck by coits, as the mythological Hyacinthus was accidentally felled while throwing the discus with Apollo.

Linkrot: "On the trail of the real Lord Byron" has died...

...unfortunately the ref is used a great number of times (about 18) in the article. I've found the article on Highbeam (preview only, subscription required) but I don't know what is to be done from this point. --bodnotbod (talk) 14:44, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

"Lord" Byron's Racism

Hey fellow wikis, I was hoping some folks might help me compile a section in the main article on Byron's racism and anti-Semitism. I know he was an Orientalismist (i.e., a racist) and that he fought to kill a lot of Turkish Muslims so I'm thinking folks could find some of that material in his writings that is racist and post it here. The quote I found is in Bertrand Russell's History of Western Philosophy, p683, which is anti-Semitic and which Russell puts in context of 20th century Europe. Thanks! Teetotaler 17 August, 2012 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.57.126.238 (talk) 08:43, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

Some white person deleted this so I'm putting it back up with reference. (South Carolina sucks!)

"Belief in blood and race is naturally associated with anti-Semitism. ...[T]he suggestion that the capitalist world is governed by Jews... is expressed by Byron..."

Then Russell (the best!) quotes one of "Lord" Bygone's mediocre offerings: "Who hold the balance of the world? Who reign O'er conquerers, whether loyalist or liberal? ...Jew Rothschild".

Russell concludes: "The verse is perhaps not every musical, but the sentiment is quite of our time, and has been re-echoed by all of Byron's followers." (p683)

Living lean and mean. Teetotaler

Again and again some white person has undone my attempts to discuss the important addition of a section in the main article discussing a simpleton such as "Lord" Byron's racism and simple ignorance and bigotry. Bertrand Russell's (praise be to him) references a poem by Byron called "Dan Juan" which uses the words "Jew" and "Jews" in a racist way. The poem is available at the Gutenberg Project:

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/21700/21700-h/21700-h.htm

I was first tipped off to "Lord" Byron's simplicity by reading Russell but also by Edward Said's masterful work, "Orientalism" which puts Byron in context of the other conformists that he sought to emulate.

Looks like we've got an editing war but luckily I have the facts and moral authority on my side.

Lean and Mean. -Teetotaler

Teetotaler

I'm not going to deny Lord Byron (by the way he was legitimately a Lord so you don't need to put quotation marks around his name) was a racist, pretty much everyone was back then. But to help you out he references to Jews in the poem Don Juan only eight times.

Once about how a Jew and a priest take the mistresses of Don Jose when he dies;

Once as a Psalm 137:1 reference ("So Juan wept, as wept the captive Jews/By Babel's waters");

Several about money lending (due to racism prohibiting Jews from many professions at the time when Byron was alive) was a well known profession that Jews families owned. This is probably where the only offensive quotes can come from due to Byron not hiding his distaste of money lending:

"Of any creditors the worst a Jew it is,/And that 's their mode of furnishing supply:/In my young days they lent me cash that way,/Which I found very troublesome to pay."

"They are young, but know not youth—it is anticipated;/Handsome but wasted, rich without a sou;/Their vigour in a thousand arms is dissipated;/ Their cash comes from, their wealth goes to a Jew" This is basicly about how young men will squander their fortunes and get into debt.

"Who hold the balance of the world? Who reign/O'er congress, whether royalist or liberal?/Who rouse the shirtless patriots of Spain?/(That make old Europe's journals squeak and gibber all.)/Who keep the world, both old and new, in pain/Who make politics run glibber all?/The shade of Buonaparte's noble daring?-/Jew Rothschild, and his fellow-Christian, Baring." basicly saying bankers rule the world.;

and lastly when mentioning the different groups of people buying slaves ("But for the destiny of this young troop {of slaves},/How some were bought by pachas {meaning Pashas}, some by Jews").

Hope this helps. (P.S. Not only white people want to defend Byron, his flaws a very talented poet. For example I like Byron and I'm not white.) DSQ (talk) 10:43, 11 November 2012 (UTC)

Also, Byron wrote the lyrics of Hebrew Melodies (including "She Walks In Beauty") for the Jewish composer Isaac Nathan. Michaelpeverett (talk) 12:44, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

"The Byron's Stone"?

A picture in the article is captioned "The Byron's Stone in Tepelene, Albania". Is the name of the monument really prefixed with the definite article (i.e., "the")? Was Lord Byron ever called "the Byron"? I can see "the Byron Stone" or "the Byrons' Stone" (referring to multiple Byrons)--or, what seems most plausible, "Byron's Stone". (A Google search proved fruitless.) Urgos (talk) 02:30, 17 November 2012 (UTC)

Poem written after swimming from Sestos to Abydos?

It's on WikiSource but I think it ought to be mentioned here [[1]]--187.232.249.144 (talk) 21:25, 9 December 2012 (UTC)

Adaptations and references

Would anyone mind if I rearranged and subdivided some of the content in the 'adaptations' section? At the moment it's chronological, which is a decent way to go, but it might make more sense to divide it by media, and whether he's referenced in a work, or features in it. I'm also intrigued at how often he's portrayed as a vampire - does this itself deserve some commentary? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fulleraaron (talk • contribs) 11:45, 19 January 2013 (UTC)

Origin of Name

I read somewhere that Lord Byron's ancestry was Norman, his ancestors coming to England with William the Conqueror. The original name was de Burun, anglicized later to Byron. Any truth to this?98.170.198.158 (talk) 22:51, 13 October 2013 (UTC)

I believe there is an error in the description of the Lord Byron portrait that hangs in Athens, I believe that he is dressed in traditional GREEK attire NOT Albanian.124.187.116.251 (talk) 05:29, 25 March 2015 (UTC)

George Byron Gordon

Why does it redirect here? Is it in any way his name? Srnec (talk) 14:11, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

It was probably made as a redirect from common misspelling. - Mtmelendez ^(Talk) 20:33, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

Or, it might have something to do with the statement:

In order to claim his second wife's estate in Scotland, Byron's father took the additional surname "Gordon", becoming "John Byron Gordon", and he was occasionally styled "John Byron Gordon of Gight". Byron himself used this surname for a time and was registered at school in Aberdeen as "George Byron Gordon"

in the Early life section. Fat&Happy (talk) 21:21, 8 March 2014 (UTC)

"God spoke to the world in Armenian"

The section of the article dealing with Byron's time in Italy presently states: "Intrigued by the language and its efficacy as a spoken tongue, Byron affirmed in his memoirs that 'God spoke to the world in Armenian.'" The article has no citation for this quote (the larger paragraph cites a 1976 article Template:Hy icon in the Soviet Armenian Encyclopedia that does not mention the quote), so I propose removing this sentence unless a citation to a reliable source can be found. I suspect that this quote is apocryphal. I have searched around quite a bit on the internet and looked through some of Byron's biographies and collections of letters and diaries but have not been able to find it in his writings or the published words of anyone who knew him. It is a bold statement so I would expect that it would be included in some of those sources. On the internet it always seems be quoted without a source (except for this Wikipedia article itself), sometimes with the companion statement "Armenian is the language to speak with God", which is occasionally incorrectly appended to an excerpt from Byron's initially-unpublished preface to A Grammar, Armenian and English that ends "and perhaps their language only requires to be more studied to become more attractive." I did find one mention of "Armenian is the language to speak with God" in a 2001 article in the newspaper The Guardian, but it also had no citation and the author is a theatre director and playwright rather than a journalist, so I don't know what to make of that. Of course, it is not inconceivable that Byron could have made such a statement, as it seems to be in line with Mekhitarist beliefs that Adam and God spoke with each other in Armenian since the Garden of Eden was in Armenia, and Byron did seem to be influenced by Mekhitarist interpretations of the Bible (for example, he apparently agreed that Paradise was in Armenia), but I cannot find any proof that he actually said or wrote "God spoke to the world in Armenian." Ketone16 (talk) 22:48, 13 September 2014 (UTC)

"Major poems"

I've retitled this section "Selected shorter lyric poems". "Major" usually connotes a work of significant length or of key importance in the development of poet's career. That's misleading for these poems; they are just a handful of the hundreds of short lyrics that Byron churned out. Since Wikipedia isn't in the anthology business, it would probably be better to delete this section altogether and replace it with a more objective category, for example a list of his "well-known" short poems - which would include "She Walks in Beauty" and "We'll go no more a-roving" and nothing much else. Michaelpeverett (talk) 13:04, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

@Michaelpeverett: Great call! Though I am not familiar in how this list was created, generally these lists of less lengthy literary works (such as poems or short stories) are created ad-hoc as Wikipedia articles are created (see whats available for Byron at Category:Poetry by Lord Byron). If you have an awareness of the scholarship for these "well-knowns" and could provide WP:Verification that they are in fact well know: that would be an awesome way to improve this article. Let me know if you need any help developing that content! Sadads (talk) 16:46, 22 December 2014 (UTC)

@Sadads: OK I'll see what I can do. Michaelpeverett (talk) 13:36, 23 December 2014 (UTC)

@Sadads: I've now changed the selection, omitting juvenilia and adding some well-known pieces that were missing.Michaelpeverett (talk) 19:10, 7 January 2015 (UTC)

makes no sense

"His fascination was so great that he even considered a replacement of the Cain story of the Bible with that of the legend of Armenian patriarch Haik" When an author "replaces" something, he usually rewrites part of a work of his own. Byron didn't own the Bible so he couldn't possibly replace anything in it. Go back to your source and re-do the translation to make sense in English. Another one: "When the famous Danish sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen heard about Byron's heroics in Greece, he voluntarily resculpted his earlier bust of Byron in Greek marble" Now of course he did it voluntarily, not under the lash. If you mean he did it without asking for remuneration from the original sponsor or soliciting donations to support him during the time he did it, say so. But if you mean he did it without prompting from anybody else, you want to say "spontaneously". Just because your source uses a specific word doesn't mean you should use it -- in fact you should NOT copy your source's wording unless you enclose it in quotes. Since Lady Caroline Lamb's characterization of Byron is NOT written on his tombstone, calling it an epitaph isn't good writing. Glenarvon: I've read it, it depicts Lord Ruthven as sinister. Seedy means down and out and therefore looking in ill health and being poorly dressed. 108.18.136.147 (talk) 19:10, 16 March 2015 (UTC)