Public domain photo of Lord Byron

George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788-1824)

A selective list of online literary criticism for the nineteenth-century Romantic poet Lord Byron, with links to reliable biographical and introductory material and signed, peer-reviewed, and scholarly literary criticism.

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Introduction & Biography

"Lord Byron (George Gordon)." Poetry Foundation. An extended introduction to Byron, and excerpts from his poems. Biography, publication of English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, The Giaour, The Corsair, Parisina, Hebrew Melodies, Manfred, Beppo, relationship with the Shelleys, the Byronic Hero, and more.

"George Gordon Byron." A brief biography and introduction to Byron, and text for some of his most famous poems. Academy of American Poets.

"Poet's Corner - Lord Byron." A short introduction to Byron from educational publisher Gale/Cengage.

Kelsall, Malcolm. "George Gordon, Lord Byron." 8 Jan. 2001. Literary Encyclopedia. Eds. Robert Clark, Emory Elliott, Janet Todd. An introduction to Byron, from a database that provides signed literary criticism by experts in their field, and is available to individuals for a reasonably-priced subscription [subscription service].

Literary Criticism

Elfenbein, Andrew. "Paranoid Poetics: Byron, Schreber, Freud." Romanticism on the Net 23 (Aug. 2001).

Elfenbein, Andrew. A review of two Byron publications: Andrew Elfenbein's Byron and the Victorians (1995); and Donald A. Low (ed.), Byron: Selected Poetry and Prose (1995). Review by Matthew Scott in Romanticism on the Net 3 (Aug. 1996).

Garofalo, Daniela. "Political seductions: the show of war in Byron's Sardanapalus." On Byron's dramatic tragedy Sardanapalus, and the Napoleonic wars. Criticism Winter 2002.

George, Laura. "Reification and the Dandy: Beppo, Byron, and other Queer Things." Special issue on Queer Romanticism, Romanticism on the Net 36-37 (2004-2005).

Goldberg, Brian. "Byron, Blake, and Heaven" [and William Blake]. Romanticism on the Net 27 (August 2002).

Goldweber, David E. "Byron, Catholicism, and Don Juan XVII." Renascence Spring 1997 [first half of article only].

Gross, Jonathan David. Byron: The Erotic Liberal. Reviewed by G. Todd Davis in Romanticism on the Net 25 (Feb. 2002).

Jones, Christine. "'When this world shall be former': Catastrophism as imaginative theory for the younger Romantics." Romanticism on the Net 24 (Nov. 2001).

LaChance, Charles. "Don Juan, 'a problem, like all things.'" Papers on Language and Literature Summer 1998 [first half of article only].

McGann, Jerome. Byron and Romanticism (Cambridge UP 2002). Reviewed at Romantic Circles.

Richardson, Alan. A preview of Chapter 8, "Byron and the Theatre," in The Cambridge Companion to Byron (2004) [preview].

Rosa, George M. "Byron, Mme de Stael, Schlegel, and the religious motif in Armance." Comparative Literature 46, 4 (Fall 1994).

Stabler, Jane. A review of Jane Stabler's Byron, Poetics and History. (Cambridge UP 2002). Reviewed by Jonathan Sachs, Romanticism on the Net 38-39 (May-Aug. 2005).

Stauffer, Andrew M. "Romantic Anger and Byron's Curse." On anger as a poetic stance in Byron's work. Romantic Circles.

Stein, Atara. "Immortals and Vampires and Ghosts, Oh My!: Byronic Heroes in Popular Culture." On the continuing influence of the Byronic hero. Romantic Circles, 2002.

Vail, Jeffrey W. The Literary Relationship of Lord Byron and Thomas Moore (John Hopkins UP 2001). Reviewed by William Brewer in Romanticism on the Net 26 (May 2002).

Walker, David. "'People's Ancestors are History's Game': Byron's Don Juan and Russian History." Studies in the Literary Imagination (2003) [subscription service].

Whissel, Cynthia. "'Tis more than what is called mobility': Structure and a Development towards Understanding in Byron's Don Juan." Romanticism on the Net 13 (Feb. 1999).

Web Sites, Bibliography, Texts

Romanticism on the Net. Ed. Michael Eberle-Sinatra. An international, peer-reviewed electronic journal devoted to British Romantic studies, an impressive scholarly enterprise that has been making essays freely available since 1996.

Romantic Circles. Eds. Neil Fraistat, Steven E. Jones, and Carl Stahmer. "A refereed scholarly website devoted to the study of Romantic-period literature and culture." An innovative publication on topics in Romanticism.

"A Romantic Natural History." Ed. Ashton Nichols. The relationships between literary works and natural history in the century before Darwin, with articles on Byron and other Romantics.

The International Byron Society contains some brief articles and an annotated bibliography.

Goode, Clement Tyron (ed.) George Gordon, Lord Byron: A Comprehensive, Annotated Research Bibliography of Secondary Materials in English 1973-1994. Reviewed in Romanticism on the Net by Andrew Nicholson.

Performing Byron's Don Juan, a project involving high school students, organized by Professor Jonathan Gross.

The Atlantic Monthly from 1857 to 1901 can be browsed (there is no search function) at a site provided by Cornell U. A patient researcher will find early reviews of Byron and other 19th-century authors in the archives.

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