Byron, GEORGE

GORDON NOEL, LORD, 1788-1824. English poet of commanding fame and influence in his day and for some time after. Unhappy results of heredity and early training placed him in revolt, and he loved to outrage and satirize society. His Hours of Idlene , 1807, was severely criticised, and avenged in English lish Bards and Scotch Reviewers, 1809. His more serious work began with Childe Harold, Cantos I. and II., 1812. Thenceforth during his brief and unhappy life he poured out a flood of splendid verse, ending with Don Juan. His heroes always breathe his own spirit of cynicism and defiance; epic, drama, or lyric are alike tragic, morose, or contemptuous. He remains a picturesque but somber figure, an artist in language, whose ideas are little valued. His death, while aiding the Greeks in their war for freedom, went far to atone for the errors of his life.