Book Reviews

Lord Byron and Newstead - John Beckett (with Sheila Aley)
Byron’s Romantic Celebrity Industrial Culture and the Hermeneutic of Intimacy - Tom Mole
The Letters of John Murray to Lord Byron - edited by Andrew Nicholson

Recommended Reading

Editions Biographies Specialist Studies Criticism Allied Subjects Movies

Editions

A caveat: Never take anything an editor says on trust, always cross-check! Editors are strange people!

Byron's Bulldog, The letters of John Cam Hobhouse to Lord Byron
Peter W. Graham
Published by: Ohio 1984
Indispensable. Hobhouse was Byron's best friend, and these letters provide a vital running commentary on their relationship and Byron's life. Those bits of Hobhouse's diary which relate to Byron will be found edited on the Internet at www.Hobby-O.com
ISBN 0-8142-0367-1

Letters and Journals
R. E. Prothero
Published by: John Murray 1898-1904
Indispensable because, though his texts are cut and polished, Prothero's notes are much more thorough than those of later editions.

Letters and Journals of Lord Byron
Leslie A. Marchand
Published by: John Murray 1973-94
Indispensable. Byron was the finest and funniest letter-writer ever, and this edition presented his letters uncut for the first time. But always cross-refer to the previous item! A selection was made in 1982 as Selected Letters and Journals of Lord Byron.
ISBN 0-7195-3974-9

Lord Byron The Complete Miscellaneous Prose
Andrew Nicholson
Published by: O.U.P. 1991
Indispensable. Everything Byron wrote which is neither poetry, drama, nor letters. The annotation is of great density.
ISBN 0-19-818543-X

Lord Byron the Complete Poetical Works
Jerome J. McGann and Barry Weller
Published by: O.U.P. 1980-93
Indispensable. The most thorough edition yet of Byron's poetry. Always check it against Coleridge's Edwardian edition, however. The thematic index by Carole B. Pearson in the seventh volume is a vital study aid. Later condensed as The Oxford Poetry Library Byron.
ISBN 0-19-282267-5

Lord Byron: Don Juan
Steffan Steffan and Pratt
Published by: Penguin 1973
A modernised text but still a useful edition, with good notes.
ISBN 0-14-0422216-1

Lord Byron: Selected Poems
Susan J. Wolfson and Peter J Manning
Published by: Penguin 1996
Using the 1832 text of John Wright, this is a useful companion to the previous volume.
ISBN 0-14-042381-8

Poetry
E. H. Coleridge
Published by: John Murray London 1898-1904
Indispensable. Still a very good edition a century later.

The Letters of John Murray to Lord Byron
Andrew Nicholson
Liverpool University Press 2007
A vitally important addition to Byron scholarship, this edition of Byron's publisher's letters adds a whole new dimension to our understanding of the poet's relationship with the London literary establishment and with English culture in general.
ISBN 978-1-84631-069-0

Biographies

Byron A Literary Life
Franklin, Caroline
Published by: St. Martin's Press 2000
Professionally done study of Byron's relationship with his publishers, and so on.
ISBN 0-333-67664-5

Byron, Life and Legend
MacCarthy, Fiona
Published by: John Murray 2002
Well-researched and entertaining, but not as ground-breaking and revelatory as the publicity suggested. Ignores the poetry as far as can be done.
ISBN 0-7195-5621-X

Byron: a Biography
Marchland, Leslie A.
Published by: Alfred Knopf 1957
Indispensable. Still the best biography of Byron, not superseded. Needs reading along with the next item.

Byron: a Portrait
Marchand, Leslie A.
Published by: John Murray 1971
A different and shorter version of Byron's life by Marchand. Hints at the bisexuality which in 1957 could not be mentioned.
ISBN 0-7195-2245-5

Conversations of Lord Byron
Lady Blessington
Published by: ed. E.J. Lovell, Princeton 1969
Indispensable. Blessington may have passed off some of her opinions as Byron's, but this remains a vital portrait, done from the life. Expertly edited.

Conversations of Lord Byron
Medwin, Thomas
Published by: ed. E.J. Lovell, Princeton 1966
Indispensable. Notorious but often-quoted, Medwin's Conversations are here edited with every known note from the scores of people who disagreed with him.

His Very Self and Voice
Lovell jr. Ernest J
Published by: Macmillan 1954
Indispensable collection of anecdotes about and conversations with Byron, done by as many people as possible who knew him. Voluminous and fascinating.

Ireland's Minstrel, A Life of Tom Moore
Linda Kelly
Published by: I.B.Tauris 2006
Excellent new biography of Byron’s closest poetical friend.
ISBN 9 781845 112523

Lord Byron Accounts Rendered
Langley Moore, Doris
Published by: John Murray 1974
Indispensable study of Byron's finances and the way their ups-and-downs affected him psychologically.
ISBN 0-7195-3095-4

Lord Byron's Life in Italy
Teresa Guiccioli
Published by: Delaware University Press 2005
After lying in manuscript for a century, this biographical study by one of the most important women in Byron’s life has at last been translated and edited.
ISBN 0 87413 716 0

Robert Southey: Entire Man of Letters
W.A.Speck
Published by: Yale University Press 2006
Excellent new biography of Byron’s deadliest poetical enemy.
ISBN 0 300 11681 0

The Making of the Poets: Byron and Shelley in their Time
Gilmour, Ian
Published by: Chatto and Windus 2002
Detailed and interesting study of the parallel lives of the two poets, which, however, stops just before they meet. We look forward to the second part.
ISBN 0-701-17110-3

Byron and Newstead The Aristocrat and the Abbey
Beckett, John
Delaware 2001
Indispensable study of Byron's relationship with his family estate, with much original detail and insight.

Byron's European Reception
Richard Cardwell (ed.)
Thoemmes 2005
His impact on European literature was immense, equalled only by that of Sir Walter Scott. Here, a team of international scholars chart it in two volumes, from Scandinavia down to Georgia and Portugal.

Kindred Brutes: Animals in Romantic-Period Writing
Kenyon Jones, Christine
Ashgate 2001
Extremely thorough study of the romantic poets and their relationships and attitudes to animals, with much emphasis, naturally, on Byron. Never attempted before.

Specialist Studies

Byron and Newstead The Aristocrat and the Abbey
Beckett, John
Published by: Delaware 2001
Indispensable study of Byron's relationship with his family estate, with much original detail and insight.
ISBN 0-87413-751-9

Byron's European Reception
Richard Cardwell (ed.)
Published by: Thoemmes 2005
His impact on European literature was immense, equalled only by that of Sir Walter Scott. Here, a team of international scholars chart it in two volumes, from Scandinavia down to Georgia and Portugal.
ISBN 0 8264 6844 6

Kindred Brutes: Animals in Romantic-Period Writing
Kenyon Jones, Christine
Published by: Ashgate 2001
Extremely thorough study of the romantic poets and their relationships and attitudes to animals, with much emphasis, naturally, on Byron. Never attempted before.
ISBN 0-7546-0332-6

Criticism

Byron A Poet Before His Public
Martin, Philip W
Cambridge 1982
Its arguments about the quality of Byron's poetry have to be faced.

Byron and Regency England
Graham, Peter
Virginia 1990
Places Byron's work skilfully in its social and historic context.

Byron the Poet
Joseph, M. K.
London: Gollancz 1964
This is still an excellent study, very sympathetic and open-minded for its time. Well worth hunting for.

Byron, Poetics and History
Stabler, Jane
C.U.P. 2002
Once you've got past the opening theoretical chapter (actually, you can skip it) this is a very close and individual study, especially of Don Juan.

Byron: A Critical Study
Rutherford, Andrew H.
Oliver and Boyd, 1962
The only study which my Leavisite tutor could recommend to me when I asked him. He hadn't read it, but he'd heard it was very respectable.

Byron: Don Juan
Barton, Anne
C.U.P. 1992
Expert introduction to Byron's greatest poem, ideal for starters-out.

Byron's Politics
Kelsall, Malcolm
Harvester 1987
The only serious examination of this theme so far.

Don Juan and Other Poems
Beatty, Bernard
Penguin 1987
An excellent introduction to Byron's poetry for sixth-formers and undergraduates.

Lord Byron
Graham, Peter W.
Twayne Publishers 1998
Another excellent introductory study, ideal for beginners.

The Literary Relationship of Lord Byron & Thomas Moore
Vail, Jeffery
Johns Hopkins, 2001
A much-needed study of Byron's relationship with the Irish poet. Makes much clear which was not so before.

The Reading Nation in the Romantic Period
William St Clair
Cambridge 2004
Massive account of readership patterns

The Letters of John Murray to Lord Byron
edited by Andrew Nicholson
Liverpool University Press 2007
Much-needed edition of the publisher’s letters to the poet, complementing BLJ

Byron's Romantic Celebrity: Industrial Culture and the Hermeneutic of Intimacy
Tom Mole
Palgrave Macmillan 2007
Very intelligent cultural-materialist analysis

Byron and Orientalism
edited by Peter Cochran
Cambridge Scholars Press, 2006; paperback new edition, 2008
Conference proceedings volume – contains effective demolition of Edward Said, and unpublished and previously unknown letters from Byron’s Turkish friends.

Byron at the Theatre
edited by Peter Cochran
Cambridge Scholars Publications, 2008
Conference proceedings volume – is The Vision of Judgement Byron’s best performance text?

Byron in London
edited by Peter Cochran
Cambridge Scholars Publications, 2008
Conference proceedings volume

“Romanticism” – and Byron
Cambridge Scholars Publications, 2009
Argues that there was no such thing as a Romantic Movement and that if there had been Byron wouldn’t have been part of it. Sketches Byron’s relationships with each “Romantic” writer
ISBN (10): 1-4438-0113-5, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-0113-3

The Gothic Byron
edited by Peter Cochran
Cambridge Scholars Publications 2009
Conference proceedings volume

Byromania and the Birth of Celebrity Culture
Ghislaine McDayter
SUNY Press, 2009
Contains an excellent analysis of the real nature of the Byronic Hero

London Observed
A Polish Philosopher at Large, 1820-4
Krystyn Lach-Szyrma
Edited and annotated by Mona Kedslie McLeod
Published by Signal Books Oxford 2009
Very interesting account of Byron’s London by a Polish traveller

The Palgrave Literary Dictionary of Byron
Martin Garrett
332pp. Palgrave 2010
Exceptionally useful guide

Byron and Bob: the Literary Relationship between Byron and Robert Southey
Cambridge Scholars Publications, 2010
Byron and the man he hated most

Byron and Women [and men]
edited by Peter Cochran
Cambridge Scholars Publications, 2010
Conference proceedings volume – one of the few books to write of Byron’s bisexuality

Byron and Hobby-O, The Relationship between Byron and John Cam Hobhouse
Cambridge Scholars Publications, 2010
Byron and the man who thought he was his best friend

Byron's Religions
edited by Peter Cochran
Cambridge Scholars Publications, 2011
Conference proceedings volume

Byron's Romantic Politics
Cambridge Scholars Publications, 2011
“Does for Byron what The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo does for the Swedish probationary system” – required reading

Joy Unconfined! Lord Byron's Grand Tour Re-Toured
Ian Strathcarron
Signal Books, 2011
Fascinating account of a modern attempt at replicating Byron’s Mediterranean tour

Byron and Italy
Cambridge Scholars Publications, 2012
Thorough account of Byron’s sojourn there

Byron's Poetry
edited by Peter Cochran
Cambridge Scholars Publications, 2012
Conference proceedings volume
“Byron was a master of the adjusted idiom”

Aspects of Byron's Don Juan
edited by Peter Cochran
Cambridge Scholars Publications, 2013
Conference proceedings volume
Excellent account of Don Juan’s relationship with multiple European traditions

BYRON'S WAR
Roderick Beaton
C.U.P. 2013
Award-winning account of Byron’s last expedition

Byron's Ghosts; The Spectral, the Spiritual and the Supernatural
Edited by Gavin Hopps
Liverpol University Press 2013
Argues for the spiritual side of Byron

Byron and Latin Culture
Edited by Peter Cochran
Cambridge Scholars Publications, 2013
Conference proceedings volume: contains excellent account of Don Juan’s relationship with the great Latin poets

Lord Byron's Best Friends: from bulldogs to Boatswain & beyond
Geoffrey Bond
Nick McCann Associates Ltd, 2013
Definitive account of Byron and his irreplaceable dogs

The Burning of Byron's Memoirs and other Papers and Essays
Cambridge Scholars Publications, 2014
Unpublished material from the Newstead Review – plus some new essays. The title essay has never been done so well

Allied Subjects

Augusta Leigh: Byron's Half-Sister, A Biography
Bakewell, Michael and Melissa
Published by: Chatto and Windus, 2000
Useful biography of the most important woman in Byron's life. Slightly depressing for its depiction of the anti-climax that her life was after his death. Doesn't quite explain why he loved her so much (which is admittedly hard).
ISBN 0-1856-1975-4

Elizabeth and Georgiana: The Duke of Devonshire & his Two Duchesses
Chapman, Caroline and Jane Dormer
Published by: John Murray 2002
Useful follow-up to Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire. The Duke himself remains a shadowy figure.
ISBN 0-7195-6-44-6

George III: A Personal History
Hibbert, Christopher
Published by: Viking 1998
Up-to-date intimate biography of old "What-what?" himself. Entertaining.
ISBN -670-86941-4

Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire
Foreman, Amanda
Published by: Harper Collins 1998
Needs no introduction here, but the book provides a vital picture of the doomed and deranged Whig party in the generation preceding Byron's attachment to it.
ISBN 0-00-255668-5

In Byron's Shadow: Modern Greece in the English and American Imagination
Roessel, David
Published by: Oxford 2002
Thorough and colourful analysis of the way Byron's supposed depiction of Greece affected everyone's attitude to that country throughout the nineteenth century.
ISBN 0-19-514386-9

Lady Caroline Lamb a biography
Douglass, Paul
Published by: Palgrave 2004
At last a balanced biography of Byron’s short-term lover: should be read alongside the same author’s skilfully-selected edition
ISBN 1-4039-6605-2

'The Whole Disgraceful Truth' - Selected letters of Lady Caroline Lamb
Douglass, Paul
Published by: Palgrave / MacMillan 2006
ISBN 1-4039-6958-2

Last of the Dandies: The Scandalous Life and Escapades of Count D'Orsay
Foulkes, Nick
Published by: Little, Brown, 2003
Long-overdue biography of the bisexual dilettante who captured Byron's imagination at Genoa in 1823. Byron was, it seems, "a lively, scrawny little man," who wrote "much of Don Juan" on board the Bolivar. Look at the last four words!
ISBN 0-316-85549-9

Napoleon: His Wives and Women
Hibbert, Christopher
Published by: Harper Collins 2002
Functions as a useful biography of the Emperor himself.
ISBN 0-00-257-092

Prince of Europe: The Life of Charles Joseph de Ligne (1735-1814)
Mansel, Philip
Published by: Weidenfeld and Nicholson 2003
Friend of Madame de Staël. Heterosexual but proseltyzed for pederasty. An early apologist for Zoroastrianism, but at the end a Catholic. Rich, but broke. You can see why Annabella wanted his autograph. Excellent biography of the man referred to at Don Juan VII, 33, 7-8 (the one at VIII, 10, 1 is his son).
ISBN 1-84212-731-4

Pushkin
Binyon, T. J.
Published by: Harper Collins 2002
Highly-regarded and much-awarded biography of the poet who owed more to Byron than did any other. A fascinating but dispiriting picture of the way a brutal and stupid society oppresses an insecure and volatile genius.
ISBN 0-00-215-084-0

The Flame of Freedom: The Greek War of Independence 1821-1833
Brewer, David
Published by: John Murray 2001
Vivid and economical account of the historical event, the mythology surrounding which lured Byron to his death.
ISBN 0-7195-5447-0

The Unruly Queen: The Life of Queen Caroline
Fraser, Flora
Published by: Macmillan 1996
Informative study of George IV's unhappy but outrageous consort.
ISBN 0-333-57294-7

Movies

There are no good films about Byron, though there are more featuring him than there are about all the rest of the English "romantic" poets put together.

Bride of Frankenstein
has him in an early sequence which is often cut from the print.

Byron
with Jonny Lee Miller, beats all the rest of the Byron movies hands down.

Byron, Ballad of a Demon
with Manos Vakousis, set in Missolonghi, is long, and incomprehensible as a depiction of how he died.

Gothic
with Gabriel Byrne, is a fun exercise in bad taste, but don't expect to learn anything about Byron from it.

Haunted Summer
with Philip Anglim, is the best movie of the lot, though its Byron is a phallocentric bully.

Lady Caroline Lamb
with Richard Chamberlain, is grossly inaccurate, and does scant justice to either Him or Her.

Pandemonium
Makes a change by making Wordsworth the bad guy and Byron a goody.

Rowing with the wind
with Hugh Grant, is dreadful, and now only available in a cut version which makes the plot hard to follow.

The Bad Lord Byron
with Dennis Price, would be the best if it didn't lumber itself with an absurd narrative apparatus set in an celestial court.