Book contents
- Byron in Context
- Byron in Context
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Illustrations
- Contributors
- Chronology
- Abbreviations and Note on the Text
- Introduction
- Part I Life and Works
- Part II Political, Social and Intellectual Transformations
- Part III Literary Cultures
- Part IV Reception and Afterlives
- Chapter 31 Contemporary Critical Reception to 1824
- Chapter 32 Byron, Radicals and Reformers
- Chapter 33 European Reception
- Chapter 34 Recollections, Conversations and Biographies
- Chapter 35 Posthumous Reception and Reinvention to 1900
- Chapter 36 Popular Culture
- Chapter 37 Byron Now
- Further Reading
- Index
Chapter 36 - Popular Culture
from Part IV - Reception and Afterlives
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 04 October 2019
- Byron in Context
- Byron in Context
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Illustrations
- Contributors
- Chronology
- Abbreviations and Note on the Text
- Introduction
- Part I Life and Works
- Part II Political, Social and Intellectual Transformations
- Part III Literary Cultures
- Part IV Reception and Afterlives
- Chapter 31 Contemporary Critical Reception to 1824
- Chapter 32 Byron, Radicals and Reformers
- Chapter 33 European Reception
- Chapter 34 Recollections, Conversations and Biographies
- Chapter 35 Posthumous Reception and Reinvention to 1900
- Chapter 36 Popular Culture
- Chapter 37 Byron Now
- Further Reading
- Index
Summary
Lord Byron’s contemporaries frequently noted (and often lamented) his popular appeal, which had made him, according to one reviewer of Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage III, a “remarkable phenomenon of the time” (RR 1966). By the time Manfred appeared in June 1817, the “remarkable phenomenon” had grown into a disturbing frenzy, affecting not only readers but also members of the public without direct knowledge of Byron’s literary works. “There is a moral disease abroad,” another critic wrote, “contagious and pretty prevalent, that may be termed the Byromania” (RR 1223). People infected by the “Byromania” simply could not get enough of the poet, with those severely afflicted sending him fan letters in droves. But Byromania – a condition often associated with indiscriminating and frantic female fans who, some complained, read Byron’s poems for all the wrong reasons – is not limited to his original audience. Much like Jane Austen’s famous “Janeites,” Byron’s admirers and readers from the Romantic period onward have created and consumed a wide variety of printed materials and other Byron-related artifacts, or Byroniana, evidencing Byromania’s multimedia impact. From books to beard oil, films to figurines, statues to soup bowls, Byron and the forms of the Byronic hero that he popularized have consistently pervaded popular culture since he catapulted to fame following the publication of Childe Harold I–II in 1812. Byron’s popular reception history reveals itself most strikingly through a methodology that looks beyond the literary and printed to the variety of quirky and kitsch, serious and sensational, digital and decorative adaptations indebted to his life and works. Though the specific forms that Byroniana takes have changed over time, clear trends emerge that demonstrate how and why Byron has fascinated popular audiences so intensely and for so long.
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- Byron in Context , pp. 297 - 304Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2019