BYRONS “DON JUAN” – A REALISTIC NOVEL IN VERSE.

Byron dedicates the poem to the Poet Laureate, Robert Southey; satirizes Southey and the other Lake Poets for their politics, pretentions and verse; and insults the Foreign Secretary, Castlereagh. Don Juan is born to Don Jose and Donna Inez; his education. Don Alfonso discovers his wife, Julia, and 16-year old Juan; Don Juan is sent traveling to escape the scandal.

The Sultan's latest wife, Gulbeyaz, sees Juan on the slave block and anonymously purchases him. Her servant, Baba, conducts Juan to her palace disguised as a girl. Juan spurn's Gulbeyaz' advances which are interrupted by the arrival of the Sultan. Juan, still disguised, is led back to the seraglio with the rest of the female slaves. His disguise is not discovered, but several of the harem vie for the opportunity to share their beds, and Dudù prevails. Gulbeyaz is informed and summons Juan and Dudù in a rage. The action jumps to preparation for the Russian attack on the Turkish fortress of Ismail. Juan, disguised as an English mercenary, and his companions are brought to the Russian general, Suwarrow. Ismail is attacked and taken. Juan saves a young orphaned girl, Leila. Juan comes to St Petersburgh with news of the victory, and attracts the attentions of Catherine the Great. Catherine sends Don Juan ambassador to England. Leila accompanies him. Juan arrives in England. Leila's education is entrusted to Mrs. Pinchbeck. Lord Henry and Lady Adeline Amundeville invite Juan to their country seat. Juan rides to the hounds, and begins to spend time with Lady Adeline. Lady Adeline tries to arrange a match for Juan, but does not approve when Aurora Raby catches his eye. Lord Henry holds court, and Juan meets a ghost.

Don Juan is the last great work of Byron the poem reports 6 major adventures. The beginning of the novel shows that Byron has changed his artistic method. It’s not typical of Romanticism to show the background of the character, his childhood. The mystery was supposed to cover the past of the romantic hero. In the first two cantos we can see that Byron pays much attention to details, describing shipwreck and characters. The intention of the novel seems to bring it closer to Ch’s Cant. Tales and Tom Jones. It is a human comedy, which changes with time, but in fact remains the same. In this respect Byron employs traveling and adventure to give us a series of different situation. These different parts are united by the central character. But he’s not in the center of the plot. Our attention slips past him. We are interested in the people he meets. Byron’s tone differs sharply when he deals with different characters. This quality makes the novel sound dramatic. Byron himself comes to the proscenium and addresses public directly. Occasionally he sentimentalizes, but more often he mocks, even at his main hero.

OVERVIEW: This long, digressive satiric poem is a loose narrative held together only by the hero, Don Juan, and the narrator, Byron himself, who maintains a mocking, ironic relationship with the story. Byron claimed that he had no plot in mind as he wrote the poem, and he continued to add episodes as long as he lived, completing sixteen cantos before his death. He began the poem in 1818 in Italy during a period of wild self-indulgence and profligacy. The first two cantos were published in 1819. Like many satires, it was criticized by some as being immoral.

STYLE:an eight-line iambic pentameter stanza with the rhyme scheme ab ab ab cc. The final two lines of each stanza form a couplet, which Byron frequently uses for a punch line or comic wind-up. Byron also creates comic effects with his use of forced rhymes ("new one" . . . "Juan") and rhymes of two or three syllables ("intellectual" . . . "henpeckedy you all"). The poem's light tone suggests that Byron does not take the characters and events seriously; the language is colloquial, conversational, and slangy.

THE DON JUAN CHARACTER. Certain incidents and characters are drawn from Byron's life, but he is not Don Juan. He names his hero after the most notorious lover and seducer of women in European literature. Originally a villain in a Spanish story, Don Juan had become the archetype of the heartless, remorseless seducer. The Don Juan character represents a merely physical desire divorced from any spiritual or even humane feelings. Ironically, Byron gives the name of this cold and callous stock character to his own, more modest hero. Byron's young lover is, at first, simple and naive. Every woman who meets him finds him charming; thus he has not need for force, treachery, or the seductive arts. Byron projects his own, more worldly personality as the narrator.

Date: 2016-01-05; view: 1913