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أكـاديـمـي ذهـبـي
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رد: Third Year's Students Come Here To Be One Hand
POETRY
LECTURE TEN
Today we will talk about lord Byron , he is a major poet of the19thc known for his creation of the Byronic hero. He is a talented young man ,created a literary change but he was not accepted by audience, he was criticized because of his liberal ideas and his love for change in ideas and spoken works, his father died when he was 3 years old his mother took care of his education , but she was over protective he attended Harold school a significant school in England, he was excellent in sports although He was born with a club-foot. He is a rebellious character , very proud of himself and a very intelligent student he attended trinity college at Cambridge and he lived a recluse life, he was always in debt he does not know how to manage his expenses because he loved to life an extravagant life he could not afford it , he became one of the members of the house of lords , in which all of his speeches were in favor of freedom and liberty of speech.
As most of the young gentlemen in the 19th c the grand tour was very significant , young men used to go on a tour in the continent, this tour helped young men to gain experience about countries, customs , cultures and different traditions. In 1815 he got married but his marriage was unsuccessful because he had a lot of trouble with his wife and they were separated after one year of their marriage and he had a daughter from his first marriage, the separation between the couple caused a kind of scandal and this was difficult on him so he left the country and never returned he met Shellie then he went to Italy and stayed there until he died in 1824.
What is important about Byron's achievements he wrote English Bards And Scotch Reviewersin in this work he criticized certain writers and he was very harsh in his criticism using his satirical manner and he stated his own opinions about certain methods and values. Unfortunately his work received harsh criticism, during the 19th c literary magazines were very significant, they reviewed his work as scandalous and they attacked him severely and he felt hurt by this kind of criticism and this was what made him leave the country and never return.
Later on he created another great work which was Childe Harold's Pilgrimage the work was a pilgrimage don by a child through his journey he realized several things, the poem received great appraisal when it was published, it was welcomed by the readers and in that work he began to show what is known now as the Byronic hero, in Childe Harold's Pilgrimage he created a hero who was himself a rebel, he is very intelligent , he is out spoken , attractive he tried to go against traditional restrictions of mans freedom , then he wrote Manfred which was a drama in 1817 it was one of the most great plays that were written , this dramatic poem was a kind of an experiment in the legend about the man who wants to know more about what he needs to know.
One of his greatest achievements is Don Juan it received great fame and critical appreciation , many critics considered the poem scandalous , because it talks about love ,sexuality, liberty , freedom, and it attacks the political system.
The poem was written in a very long period of time , he published the first canto in 1819 and it took until 1824 to be finished which is actually the year when he died but the poem did not finish, so what did he do??? He published the first canto but the publisher was afraid to publish this kind of rebellious work, so it was published anonymously with no name of the writer or the publisher.
The work was harshly criticized for some of the scenes it contained, now what is the poem about???
The poem talks about a hero, his name is Don Juan , he was raised by his mother and when he grew up to be 16 years old he fell in love with his mothers friend, her name was Donaliza, she was married to an old man and the love between the two developed and unfortunately they were discovered, the husband was suspicious that his wife has a relation with another man , so one of the scandalous scenes is when we they were alone in the bedroom the husband rushed in with his servants and acquaintance because he wanted to catch his wife red-handed, but she covered herself with the bed sheets and nobody discovered that she was there, when the audience left of course and he discovered Don Juan's shoos when he was kneeling for his wife apologizing, it was a scandalous scene so his mother in order to avoid the scandal she sent him on a ship out of the country and the husband sent his wife to a convent she have to be punished for a period of time she had to become a nun, what happened to the young Don Juan when he went into that ship , the ship sailed and it was wrecked because there was a storm and Don Juan with others were saved, hr reached to Greek he met a young girl and they fell in love together , they both enjoyed love but the father shipped Don jean in one of the ships to Constantinople. He was bought by a sultana he was a slave but he was a young man , handsome and attractive and she became jealous because other women tried to have affairs with him , then she condemns him to death , fortunately he escaped from the penalty and he ran away until he reached Russia , he became a soldier in the army there in Russia the empress was a notorious women know for her relations with other men and she favored him as her lover, then she sent him back to England on a mission. In England he met a lady , whom again he fell in love with her , the story ends here but the poem is not finished , because the poem is not only about love affairs.
The poem is significant because it talks about a character , the Byronic hero, not only this but the poem is a representative of different societies, it reflects them , things about war, about love and sexuality, it also talks about honesty , integrity , politics , religion, all of these issues are there in the poem.
If we look at the poem and why it has been rejected by the viewers , because it was a shocking one but the poem in its self is a vey cynical and satirical one. In the poem we have variety of incidents we have variety of mood , different characters, we could see the narrator of the poem of course and we could feel the presence of the poet himself commenting on the incidents that are there so the poem is a universal one in its collection of varied things , we could see Byron's comments on love , on selfishness, on integrity and on many other values .
What is significant about his poem is the Byronic hero, who is the Byronic hero??? What are the characteristics of the Byronic hero ???
The Byronic hero is a character who became very famous in the romantic period but if you look at certain traits you will find that the Byronic hero is there in different works of art in earlier times .
Lord Byron borrowed many character traits from different works of literature , but the most important thing about the Byronic hero , that this hero does not have heroic virtue , usually a hero has certain characteristics ex. The fairy queen for Spenser it was an epic and some critics consider Don Juan as an epic , so in the fairy queen there is a story about knights one of these knights is the red crossed knight , he is a hero that represent holiness, but the Byronic hero does not have this heroic virtue the Byronic hero most of the time is considered as a rebel a against restraints, he sometimes have some dark qualities he is intellectual ,hypersensitive , has great self-respect, but the problem is that he is always an outcast isolated from society, he is moody by nature very passionate, sensitive, arrogant and very conscious of himself most of the time he rejects the moral codes of society, he has a sense of guilt because he travels a lot and most of his relations ends in a disaster.
The modern readers think that hr represents modern aspects of our modern time. The poem is composed in 17 cantos talking about the story of the character it is like novel in a verse or as an out biographical poem, the poem has many realistic portrays of the society of certain behavior and events. Unfortunately the work was not cause of the death complete because of the death of Byron in 1824.
Byron in creating his work he created a narrator who will narrate the episode of Don Juan but we could feel the presence of the poet , Byron in his poem has lots of themes which love and sexuality is one of them and this is what caused the scandal ,theme of religion , restraint of freedom of speech, injustice to weak people in society, themes about the dark side of man, the harsh political system forced on society.
The poet uses very simple language mostly colloquial, Byron discovered in reading Italian literary works that they made a blend in the language of literature by inserting the colloquial language and Byron liked the idea and did the same in his poem, he also used his satirical tone to criticize the society of Don Juan
How did Byron structured his poem???
He thought that he is working with a great poem but he does not have a plan , but he thought of writing an epic , which is a long narrative poem, where there are heroes and one main hero, characters and many episodes , it must have a great poetic elevated language , but as a romantic poet he does not want to follow the traditional rules of writing an epic usually an epic starts in the middle of things like paradise lost part one, but Byron wanted to innovate another style so he began his epic from the beginning, which is to tell the story of Don Juan from the very beginning.
Canto one talks about his birth-child education – youth- his love relation with Donaliza – his escape by the ship.
In an epic there is usually a dedication and we have one here and it is a dedication to Robert Stewart a very famous poet he was called the poet laureate.
CANTO THE FIRST.[14]
I.
I WANT a hero: an uncommon want,
When every year and month sends forth a new one,
Till, after cloying the gazettes with cant,
The age discovers he is not the true one;
Of such as these I should not care to vaunt,
I'll therefore take our ancient friend Don Juan--
We all have seen him, in the pantomime,[15]
Sent to the Devil somewhat ere his time.
The poet here wants to talk about what kind of hero he wants to talk about , he wants an un common hero an extraordinary hero, as if there is a hero every moth which actually not correct heroes are not that many the hero is in a great search for a hero , he looks through all the magazines in search of that hero the more he searches for a hero he is not satisfied he did not find what he is really searching for after this exhausting search he chose the character of Don Juan, what is known about Don Juan that he has been sent to the devil before his time, which means that this is a queer character to use. This character don't have all the qualities of a hero but we will see why Byron chose him.
5:
Brave men were living before Agamemnon[22]
And since, exceeding valorous and sage,
A good deal like him too, though quite the same none;
But then they shone not on the poet's page,
And so have been forgotten:--I condemn none,
But can't find any in the present age
Fit for my poem (that is, for my new one);
So, as I said, I'll take my friend Don Juan
The speaker is trying to show why he chose this character, first he talks about brave men who lived before Agamemnon , one of the great warriors it is the choice of the poet to create a hero out of an ordinary man , there were great heroes but they were not chosen by the poet to talk about their great deeds therefore they were forgotten , the idea here is what makes a man famous an immortal , is through the work of art , he is trying to justify his choice that he has searched and searched but have not find any hero to fit his poem and the idea in his mind so he has chosen Don Juan and notice that he describes him as his friend which means he is closer to his own personal traits .
6.
Most epic poets plunge _"in medias res"_[23]
(Horace makes this the heroic turnpike road),
And then your hero tells, whene'er you please,
What went before--by way of episode,
While seated after dinner at his ease,
Beside his mistress in some soft abode,
Palace, or garden, paradise, or cavern,
Which serves the happy couple for a tavern.
Look how cynical he is he says that most of the poets start their epics in the middle of things and he mentioned Horace as an example and other poets did the same thing , the epic usually starts with details from the middle of things , and then the hero starts to narrate going back to the beginning, he is making fun of the way of writing from the middle of things he connected it as if two couples are sitting talking and enjoying on their sofa listening to the story he is making fun of the writers who instead create new things they imitate each other .
7.
That is the usual method, but not mine--
My way is to begin with the beginning;
The regularity of my design
Forbids all wandering as the worst of sinning,
And therefore I shall open with a line
(Although it cost me half an hour in spinning),
Narrating somewhat of Don Juan's father,
And also of his mother, if you'd rather.
Look how cynical and satirical he is he says all poets follow the same method by starting from the middle of things but he says this does not work for me , I will be innovated , look at the use of the pronoun " mine " to show his identity s a poet as if he is going to change the tradition method of epics by starting from the beginning of the episode so his design is not going to show the wandering unless he goes back to the beginning of the incident and he considers it the worst sin, his line that he is going to begin with as if took him for an hour of spinning as if he is going in circles, which makes him dizzy of course he is being sarcastic , he will start with the family of Don Juan , why???
Because he wants to foreshadows the inherited characteristics of Don Juan that he inherited from his mother and father to show the origin of Don Juan , "if you'd rather" he is being cynical.
8.
In Seville was he born, a pleasant city,
Famous for oranges and women,--he
Who has not seen it will be much to pity,
So says the proverb[24]--and I quite agree;
Of all the Spanish towns is none more pretty,
Cadiz perhaps--but that you soon may see;--
Don Juan's parents lived beside the river,
A noble stream, and called the Guadalquivir.
So he starts from the beginning by telling in which city the family lived in and that is Seville , Don Juan is Spanish by birth the city of Seville was known of women and rich fruits , if you do not visit the city I pity you , this is not the writers words but a proverbمثل يعني زي ما نقول ما شفتيه يوووووه اجل فاتك نص عمرك the city is pretty Cadiz may be beautiful you see it to judge for yourself, the family house is beside the river, they were from the noble heritage called Guadalquivir.
9.
His father's name was José-_Don_, of course,--
A true Hidalgo, free from every stain
Of Moor or Hebrew blood, he traced his source
Through the most Gothic gentlemen of Spain;
A better cavalier ne'er mounted horse,
Or, being mounted, e'er got down again,
Than José, who begot our hero, who
Begot--but that's to come----Well, to renew
Spanish and Mexican names they have Don at the beginning of their names , look how cynical he is when he talks about the characters , he started by talking about the father his name is Don José , a true Hidalgo , a man of nobility but not a high rank of nobility , this man has a kind of a pure blood he does not have roots of Moor or Hebrew , he is a cavalier , like a knight but he has never been on a back of a horse , very sarcastic, he is the father of our hero .
The poet is using simple colloquial language the poem is written in stanza form but has rhyme, this is an Italian stanza that is used by very few poets like Spenser which is called ottavarima which is 8 lines ab ab ab ended with a couplet cc with a rhyming scheme this stanza form enabled Byron to write with complete liberty about his poem so the choice of stanza was very helpful .
He continued publishing the cantos of course the first as we said was published anonymously ,he continued publishing it until the 16 canto and he died before completing the work.
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