Spotlight Author: Lord Byron

Today I depart somewhat from my usual manner of posting, and provide for your edification a piece I wrote as an introduction to an English author of great renown: Lord Byron.  Below the introduction I include his poem "When We Two Parted," as well as a portion of "Mazeppa," which includes one of my favorite Byron quotes (italicized).  I hope by the second piece to lessen the mournful mood "When We Two Parted" may leave you in - an effect I find rather unfortunate, as I wish to share Byron's poetic genius without depressing anybody, myself included!  

Lord Byron's “When We Two Parted”

An Introduction by Caitlin Clancy 

            Born in 1788, George Gordon, the sixth Lord Byron, became a prominent English Romantic satirist and poet.  A handsome and “flamboyant” man, Byron was given to excessive promiscuous behavior, which eventually led to public scandal and his being ostracized** from society.  In 1816, he left England permanently and died in Greece in 1824.  During his life, Byron was characterized by certain rather narcissistic characteristics, including a keen desire for sympathy, a passionate yearning for public notice, and a failure to accept criticism well.  Whatever his character flaws, though, Byron captivated his audience with the image of himself in his writings and with a sharp and honest mind that continuously probed skepticism’s furthest reaches.  His works, encompassing a broad spectrum, include the satirical English Bards and Scotch Reviewers as well as Don Juan, Byron’s masterwork, which reveals his artfulness as a storyteller, his lyrical and cynical qualities, as well as his abhorrence for convention.  This attitude towards convention in particular was prominent among romantics.  While authors of the preceding neoclassic period (roughly 1660-1800) adhered more to traditional forms and held innovation suspect, the romantics reversed this tendency and viewed poetry as a spontaneous endeavor stemming from the author’s emotions and unconfined by strict forms.  Romanticism, unlike neoclassicism, encouraged readers to view the protagonist as the poet himself.  In “When We Two Parted,” for example, one might see the speaker as Byron farewelling the mistress of one of his numerous liaisons.  Additionally, romantic characters were often misfits or outsiders to society, and Byron’s invention, the “Byronic hero,” fits this category: such a hero has a significant crime hidden in his past and is characterized by being solitary, insubordinate, and enigmatic.  Byron’s legacy as a poet, it would seem, both encompassed and surpassed his faults as a man, leading some to place him among the great Romantics.

When we Two parted

WHEN we two parted
In silence and tears,
Half broken-hearted
To sever for years,
Pale grew thy cheek and cold,	5
Colder thy kiss;
Truly that hour foretold
Sorrow to this.
The dew of the morning
Sunk chill on my brow—	10
It felt like the warning
Of what I feel now.
Thy vows are all broken,
And light is thy fame:
I hear thy name spoken,	15
And share in its shame.
They name thee before me,
A knell to mine ear;
A shudder comes o'er me—
Why wert thou so dear?	20
They know not I knew thee,
Who knew thee too well:
Long, long shall I rue thee,
Too deeply to tell.
In secret we met—	25
In silence I grieve,
That thy heart could forget,
Thy spirit deceive.
If I should meet thee
After long years,	30
How should I greet thee?
With silence and tears. (This text may be found at http://www.bartleby.com/101/597.html) From "Mazeppa": ...Up rose the sun; the mists were curled  Back from the solitary world  Which lay around - behind - before;  What booted it to traverse o'er  Plain, forest, river? Man nor brute,  Nor dint of hoof, nor print of foot,  Lay in the wild luxuriant soil;  No sign of travel - none of toll;  The very air was mute:  And not an insect's shrill small horn,  Nor matin bird's new voice was borne  From herb nor thicket. Many a werst,  Panting as if his heart would burst,  The weary brute still staggered on;  And still we were - or seemed - alone:  At length, while reeling on our way,  Methought I heard a courser neigh,  From out yon tuft of blackening firs.  Is it the wind those branches stirs?  No, no! from out the forest prance  A trampling troop; I see them come I  In one vast squadron they advance!  I strove to cry - my lips were dumb.  The steeds rush on in plunging pride;  But where are they the reins to guide?  A thousand horse - and none to ride!  With flowing tail, and flying mane,  Wide nostrils never stretched by pain,  Mouths bloodless to the bit or rein,  And feet that iron never shod,  And flanks unscarred by spur or rod,  A thousand horse, the wild, the free,  Like waves that follow o'er the sea, ... (from http://classiclit.about.com/library/bl-etexts/lbyron/bl-lbyron-mazeppa.htm)

Works Cited (these pertain to the Introduction)

Snyder, Robert Lance. "George Gordon, Lord Byron." Critical Survey Of Poetry, Second Revised Edition (2002): 1. Biography Reference Center. Abbot Vincent Taylor Library. 28 Apr. 2012.

"George Gordon Noel Byron Byron, 6th Baron." Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6Th Edition (2010): 1. Biography Reference Center. Abbot Vincent Taylor Library. 28 Apr. 2012.

 “Recollections of the Life of Lord Byron, from the Year 1808 to the End of 1814 by R. C. Dallas; Correspondence of Lord Byron with a Friend; Including His Letters to His Mother; In 1809, 1810, and 1811 by Byron; Journal of the Conversations of Lord Byron; Noted during a Residence with His Lordship at Pisa, in the Years 1821 and 1822 by Thomas Medwin.” North American Review 21.49 (Oct. 1825): 300-359. JSTOR. Abbot Vincent Taylor Library. 30 Apr. 2012.

Abrams, M. H. A Glossary of Literary Terms, Sixth Edition. Fort Worth: Harcourt, 1993. 125-129. Print. 

Thoroughly Puzzled Yet? =)

1C.

Stem for a neck

Bit for a tail

Fire for its breath

What is it?

2C. 

Wooden body

Sheets on top

Not a bed

Not a cot

What is it?

Answers may be found, as is customary, on the corresponding page so entitled. 

For Your Puzzling Pleasure...

I present: Riddles!  Answers, as ever, to be found on the appropriately named page above.  Good luck!

1B. 

Four legs, no feet.

One back, one seat.

No head, all dead.

What am I?

2B.

Circle body,

Soft but thin,

Hide like rubber,

Heart like tin.

What is it?

3B.

I am bound, but not imprisoned.

I have leaves, but never grow.

I say much, but am silent.

I hold thoughts, but cannot know.

What am I?

(Also, for those of you who are regular readers of The Crusader, I do admit that some of the riddles that may appear on my blog will occasionally also feature in that publication at an earlier or later date.  While this is not true of the March paper, I thought I ought to include the disclaimer to forestall any disgruntled remarks.)

A Literary Look at: Chiasmus!

If someone walked up to you in a supermarket and suddenly said, "Chiasmus!", it seems to me you might reasonably (though not quite accurately) respond with something like, "Gesundheit!"  -- Am I wrong?  

Well.  Anyway.  Chiasmus:  I'll wager you've never heard of this little literary gadget.  It's dashed useful, though, which is why I'd like to introduce it to you.  One of my favorite rhetorical figures, chiasmus is so named because it, according to Merriam-Webster, is "an inverted relationship between the syntactic elements of parallel phrases" (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/chiasmus).  More simply put, it's language in the shape of an "x."  Think a-b-b-a, if that helps -- I love chocolate, and chocolate loves me (for example).  Not to get too bogged down in grammatical details (which has a nasty habit of making people stop reading an otherwise decent blog...), I here present a smattering of thoughts regarding chiasmus and what it can do, which, I hope, will spark a bit of interest in you for this splendid tool of language.  Without further ado:

Warping With Words

By Caitlin Clancy

Copyright 2011

To turn backwards and forwards, to right and reverse, and thereby to challenge the mind, engaging the intellect in a search for truth – this is power of chiasmus.   A daring device, chiasmus bends the brain and compels contemplation. In the Encomium of Helen, for example, Gorgias uses chiasmus to posit that “it is an equal mistake to blame the praisable and praise the blamable” (75).  This sentence requires one to ponder, however briefly, in order to apprehend its full meaning.  By “praisable,” does Gorgias mean “able to be praised” or “worthy of praise” (75)?  And what of “blamable” (Gorgias 75)?  The power of chiasmus rests in its ability to cause men to think and seek some degree of truth.  The best kind of chiasmus will point to Truth itself.

Like any tool, though, chiasmus can be corrupted.  When used with the fallacy of equivocation, chiasmus conceals rather than reveals.  Instead of illuminating, such chiasmus confuses.  Related to this is Gorgias’ declaration that: “[i]t is the duty of one and the same man both to speak the needful rightly and to refute (the unrightfully spoken” (75).  Equivocation in any circumstance fails to “speak the needful rightly” and thus goes beyond dishonesty, neglecting the “duty…to refute (the unrightfully spoken” (Gorgias 75).  But equivocation has another fault: theft.  By confusing the meaning of terms, equivocation can make it appear that one has won an argument when, in reality, one has simply avoided the matter at hand.  Hence, deliberate equivocation sins both against others, by withholding knowledge to which they have a right (“You shall not steal”), and against truth (“You shall not bear false witness”) (Exodus 20:15-16).  To avoid this double trap and use chiasmus – and all rhetoric – well, we must beware of warping truth with words used equivocally.  We must scrutinize closely whether we are wording clever twists or merely twisting clever words.  

Works Cited

Gorgias. “Encomium of Helen.” The Belmont Abbey College Reader. Ed. Angela

Mitchell Miss. Boston: Bedford/ St. Martin’s, 2012. 75. Print.

The Holy Bible: Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition. London, Eng.: Oxford UP,                        1966. Print. 

Poem: The Raid of the Weigh

+JMJ

Complete with Unsolicited Authorial NOTES (Needless & Otherwise Tedious Explanatory Stuff) below! Enjoy...

The Raid of the Weigh

By Caitlin Clancy

Copyright 2012

Like thoughts unthinkable

They broke upon the shore

Like steel unbreakable

They swelled the fearsome roar

In salt-waves and the hide

Of lifeless forest beasts

They struck upon the town

And sunk in to their feasts

Revelry waxed raucous

The world began to spin

The new wine soon

Would take its toll

And wrap the night back in

Where lay in sleep

The sober few

Who alone could tell

The exploits and

The solemn still

Of one long ending spell –

Late up came

The midnight moon and

Later yet the dawn,

Where rested in the meadow still

A tawny-golden fawn;

The shouting of the night

Gave place unto the day

Where none were left

Save one weak slave –

The mem’ry of the Weigh.

Notes:

 This poem is the story of a town, called the Weigh, which is raided by Norse or Germanic savages (hence the hides) from the seacoast (hence the waves).  They take the town and feast all night, and in the morning, only one slave is left who made it out alive (in my imagination, at least, he’s made it out to the meadow outside the town), making him the last person who remembers the town and its people.  Hence, he is the “mem’ry of the Weigh.”  Also, the “one long ending spell” could be a number of things I expect, but I was thinking primarily of the night of feasting which, though long and perhaps spell-like to those in it, is ending as dawn approaches.  The fawn is just an aid to help convey the image of the meadow (and, I confess, the meter...).

Poem: Recollection

In light of the recent March for Life, an annual peaceful protest against abortion, I have elected to draw out this poem which seemed appropriate for the occasion. (For the record, let it be here established that I am heartily and unabashedly pro-life).  I offer some thoughts here, mostly in the form of a lament, and dedicate them to those many infants who lost their lives, as well as to the thousands of wounded men and women who are their parents.  

Recollection

By Caitlin Clancy

Remember the little ones –

They are come and gone.

A red wave took them.

We hardly knew then.

We hardly knew them.

We did not know them,

Before they had gone.

They were taken in silence.

They were taken in fear.

Why did we not know them?

They were so dear.

Remember the speechless ones

Whose lives ebbed out.

Whose forms are lost to us.

Whose forms are lost to us.

Whose place is lost to us,

Except in doubt.

Remember us weeping ones

On the soundless shore.

Rememb’ring them now.

Rememb’ring them now.

We had forgotten them,

But forget no more.

The dark is behind us;

Before us, the day –

The road may be broken,

But such was our way.

Remember the little ones,

The lost but free.

Remember the little ones.

Remember our precious ones.

Remember our little ones –

Children of the sea.

Riddle Me This...

1A.

My ever-changing form changes not.

I devour yet am unconsumed.

I am many-tongued, yet a mute.

I am divided only to multiply.

What am I?

 2A.

I whisper without words

I whistle without a tune

I blow without a mouth

I touch without a hand.

What am I? 

Answers may be found on the "Answers" page.  Enjoy!