two thousand stanzas, with effortless volubility and shifts of mood. The poet who in his brilliant successful youth created the gloomy Byronic hero, in his later and sadder life created a character (not the hero, but the narrator of Don Juan) who is one of the great comic inventions in English literature.
FROM DON JUAN
Fragment1
I would to Heaven that I were so much Clay?
As I am blood?bone?marrow, passion?feeling?
Because at least the past were past away?
And for the future?(but I write this reeling
5 Having got drunk exceedingly to day
So that I seem to stand upon the ceiling)
I say?the future is a serious matter?
And so?for Godsake?Hock2 and Soda water.
From Canto 1
[JUAN AND DONNA JULIA]
I I want a hero: an uncommon want, When every year and month sends forth a new one, Till, after cloying the gazettes with cant, The age discovers he is not the true one; 5 Of such as these I should not cafe to vaunt, I'll therefore take our ancient friend Don Juan, We all have seen him in the pantomime1 Sent to the devil, somewhat ere his time.
5 Brave men were living before Agamemnon2 And since, exceeding valorous and sage, 35 A good deal like him too, though quite the same none; But then they shone not on the poet's page,
1. This stanza was written on the back of a page heimer. of the manuscript of canto 1. For the author's revi- 1. The Juan legend was a popular subject in sions while composing two stanzas of Don Juan, English pantomime. see 'Poems in Process,' in the appendices to this 2. In Homer's Iliad the king commanding the volume. Greeks in the siege of Troy. This line is translated 2. A white Rhine wine, from the German Hoch-from a Latin ode by Horace.
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DO N JUAN, CANTO 1 / 671
And so have been forgotten?I condemn none, But can't find any in the present age Fit for my poem (that is, for my new one); 40 So, as I said, I'll take my friend Don Juan.
6
Most epic poets plunge in 'medias res,'3 (Horace makes this the heroic turnpike road)4 And then your hero tells, whene'er you please, What went before?by way of episode, 45 While seated after dinner at his ease,
Beside his mistress in some soft abode, Palace, or garden, paradise, or cavern, Which serves the happy couple for a tavern.
7 That is the usual method, but not mine? 50 My way is to begin with the beginning; The regularity of my design Forbids all wandering as the worst of sinning, And therefore I shall open with a line (Although it cost me half an hour in spinning) 55 Narrating somewhat of Don Juan's father, And also of his mother, if you'd rather.
8 In Seville was he born, a pleasant city, Famous for oranges and women?he Who has not seen it will be much to pity, 60 So says the proverb?and I quite agree; Of all the Spanish towns is none more pretty, Cadiz perhaps?but that you soon may see:? Don Juan's parents lived beside the river, A noble stream, and call'd the Guadalquivir.
9 65 His father's name was Jose5?Don, of course, A true Hidalgo,0 free from every stain noble man Of Moor or Hebrew blood, he traced his source Through the most Gothic gentlemen of Spain; A better cavalier ne'er mounted horse,
70 Or, being mounted, e'er got down again, Than Jose, who begot our hero, who Begot?but that's to come Well, to renew:
10 His mother was a learned lady, famed For every branch of every science known? 75 In every christian language ever named, With virtues equall'd by her wit alone, She made the cleverest people quite ashamed,
3. Into the middle of things (Latin; Horace's Art 5. Normally 'Jose'; Byron transferred the accent of Poetry 148). to keep his meter. 4. I.e., the smoothest road for heroic poetry.
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672 / GEORGE GORDON, LORD BYRON
And even the good with inward envy groan, Finding themselves so very much exceeded so In their own way by all the things that she did.
11 Her memory was a mine: she knew by heart All Calderon and greater part of Lope,6 So that if any actor miss'd his part She could have served him for the prompter's copy; 85 For her Feinagle's7 were an useless art, And he himself obliged to shut up shop?he Could never make a memory so fine as That which adorn'd the brain of Donna Inez.
12 Her favourite science was the mathematical, 90 Her noblest virtue was her magnanimity, Her wit (she sometimes tried at wit) was Attic8 all, Her serious sayings darken'd to sublimity; In short, in all things she was fairly what I call A prodigy?her morning dress was dimity,0 cotton 95 Her evening silk, or, in the summer, muslin, And other stuffs, with which I won't stay puzzling.
!3
She knew the Latin?that is, 'the Lord's prayer,' And Greek?the alphabet?I'm nearly sure; She read some French romances here and there,
