I have been reading this amazing, beautifully & brilliantly conceived book: Andrew Stauffer - Byron A Life in Ten Letters. A fabulous way into a life. Every chapter begins with a letter written by Byron. Key moments in his life. The story unfolds effortlessly.
I was totally captivated. Another time and place totally comes alive. It is funny and instructive to find that all the human flaws & frailties were alive then, as they are now. We Human Beings have not really come very far. The life is a long list of and litany of foibles & follies, mad quests, romantic absurdities, tragedy, comedy, outrage, and idiocy too.
Byron spent much his life romancing and pitching the woo to both sexes. With a special emphasis on married women. A lot of huffing & puffing, preening and mopery, chasing & swooning. Such a wild debauch of a life. It's amazing the Poet had the time and the energy to actually write poetry. But he did. Lots of it. And he became famous for writing poetry that fascinated, inspired, entertained and outraged his social peers and the world.
As Lady Caroline Lamb remarked, Byron was "mad, bad and dangerous too know." By the way, so was Lady Caroline. What a combustible couple.
Anyway. A great read. I was often amused, confused, befuddled, inspired and appalled by Lord Byron. I hated to see him meet his untimely end. But, no doubt his life was totally power-packed. He lived it to the fullest. The man, his legend and his poems are still alive today. Amazing.
