Fiona MacCarthy has overcome this to produce an immaculately researched biography, which is also her refreshing personal view.While biographies of Byron have appeared with regularity since his death in 1824 at age 36, British author MacCarthy's ( William Morris: A Life for Our Time) engrossing, coolly perceptive study of the Romantic poet is notable for its refusal to swoon over Byron's legend-while still attuned to the evolution of his powerful personality and its impact on the world of art and literature. The problem for a biographer is sifting the truth from the sentimental, the self-serving and the spurious. The Byron legend grew to unprecedented proportions after his death in the Greek War of Independence at the age of thirty-six. She tells the full story of their famous disagreement, ending as a rift between them as Byron's poetry became more recklessly controversial.īyron was a celebrity in his own lifetime, becoming a 'superstar' in 1812, after the publication of Childe Harold. While paying due attention to the compelling tragicomedy of Byron's marriage, his incestuous love for his half-sister Augusta and the clamorous attention of his female fans, she gives a new importance to his close male friendships, in particular that with his publisher John Murray. She traces his early travels in the Mediterranean and the East, throwing light on his relationships with adolescent boys - a hidden subject in earlier biographies. She brings a fresh eye to his early years: his childhood in Scotland, embattled relations with his mother, the effect of his deformed foot on his development. Fiona MacCarthy makes a breakthrough in interpreting Byron's life and poetry drawing on John Murray's world-famous archive.
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