Lord Byron, who is personally one of my favorite for the same reason he was most famous in his day, the mere scandal surrounding his name is most fascinating. He was so young but yet so talented. As Dr. Glance discussed in his podcast, Byron was often followed because people believed that he wrote about things that occurred in his own life. He struggled with finances throughout his life but still wanted to live and extravagant lifestyle. His poems were powerful, but the story of Don Juan is what I like best. Don Juan is a story of a true "gigolo." Although it is considered a poem, it is one that reads as a story. The poem is short and full of irony and satire. The plot and irony of this story begins in the first canto. He states:
I want a hero: an uncommon want, ....
I'll therefore take our ancient friend Don Juan
We all have seen him in the pantomine,
Sent to the devil somewhat ere his time.(p.539)
He immediately draws the tension in what the character Don Juan is supposed to be..a hero. He brilliantly ends the stanza with stating that the devil has taken over and you get a sense that something is going to go quite wrong with him. More irony in the story is that the roles of gender are reversed. Normally it is almost always the male who is being portrayed as the villian and the one who seduces the female. In this poem, Don Juan is the innocent victim. He is being chased and seduced by the women. His mother sends him away when he is finally "caught" but this still does not help the situation. Ironically he continues to get entangled with women he is not supposed to, they end up falling for him at first glance and the trouble continues to escalate for Don Juan throughout the poem. This poem deals with many issues that were going on in the Romantic Era.
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Tamica,
ReplyDeleteGlad you enjoyed Byron so much! You do a better job with the poets you like, I think, and here you make several good insights and observations about Don Juan. Keep up the improvement.
I also loved this poem. I found it so interesting the way he tied so many personal experiences into Don Juan. You can get the sense that he was also trying to communicate that he was not the seducer everyone assumed him to be; rather, perhaps he was the victim just as Don Juan was.
ReplyDeleteReally good interpretation of Don Juan. I personally liked Byron as well. His life was so interesting, however this particular poem I struggled with. I do liked how you perceived Byron as Don juan and that Byron was arguing that his indiscretions were because of devilish women seducing him. Very interesting portrayal for the era this poem was written in.
ReplyDeleteThis poem was great but I believe that Don Juan was made that way from Lord Byron, since the legend was before that Don Juan was a womanizer and challenged the mistress's husbands.
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