The Private Life of Lord Byron

Antony Peattie

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Hardback

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English

Unbound Digital
01 November 2023

Biography; Biography: literary; Literary studies: poetry & poets

The great Romantic poet Lord Byron starved himself compulsively for most of his life. His behaviour mystified his friends and other witnesses, yet he never imagined he was ill. Instead, he rationalised his behaviour as a fight for spiritual freedom and made it the cornerstone of his heroic ideal, which was central to his work and to his life and his death.

This fresh biographical study aims to explore neglected or misunderstood aspects of Lord Byron’s private life to illuminate his writing, his affairs with women, his passion for Napoleon and his conflicted friendships with Coleridge and Shelley. This in turn leads to a new understanding of his masterpiece, Don Juan. July 15, 2019 marked the 200th anniversary of its first publication.

Antony Peattie situates these patterns of behaviour in a vividly rendered contemporary world, culminating in Byron’s last days in Greece, where he tried to starve himself into heroic leadership but damaged his constitution, resulting in his death at the age of thirty-six.

'The received image of Byron as a rakish bon vivant is decisively reframed in a biography exploring his personal foibles…Peattie’s book is the portrait of an elusive, paradoxical man, a poet who thought that words were as expendable as breath, a narcissist who disliked himself and a celebrity who laughed at his own publicity.' — The Guardian

By: Antony Peattie
Imprint: Unbound Digital
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 240mm, Width: 176mm,
ISBN: 9781783524266
ISBN 10: 178352426X
Pages: 528
Publication Date: 01 November 2023
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Antony Peattie's first job after leaving university was correcting the English translation of Byron's Italian letters. As publications editor at Welsh National Opera he edited programmes and interpreted for Romanian, German and Italian directors and designers. He left to help launch Opera Now magazine before going freelance, devising Opera Bites for Glyndebourne, supertitles for Scottish Opera and surtitles for the Royal Opera. With Lord Harewood he edited the latest edition of Kobbe's Complete Book of Opera.He has lectured on Byron at the National Portrait Gallery and at Tate Britain and contributed to Oxford's Food Symposium on 'Byron, Bread and Butter'. He is now Web Master for www.howard-hodgkin.com. He lives in London.

Reviews for The Private Life of Lord Byron

The received image of Byron as a rakish bon vivant is decisively reframed in a biography exploring his personal foibles...Peattie's book is the portrait of an elusive, paradoxical man, a poet who thought that words were as expendable as breath, a narcissist who disliked himself and a celebrity who laughed at his own publicity. --The Guardian