New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1898-06-05
BYRON DEPENDED.
A REPLY TO MR. LIONEL JOHNSON

TO the Editor OF The Tribune.
Sir: AS an ardent admirer OF the scholarly
book reviews OF The Tribune, which have read
now for many years allow me to enter milo
protest against estimate Of Byron and his
works which appeared in your issue OF last Sum
day. In the article In question you express
among others. the following opinions. "Despic-
able that is the word for him (Byron) and it il
no Philstine Puritanism that speaks. Tho
vulgar arstocrat, the insOlent plebeian. thae
Byron was. looks ludicrous BY the side OF his
great contemporaries. Wordsworth. so impaS-
Eoned awful and august: Shelley and Keats:
. . how does Byron show By these? Ito
did thing well: he rid the world OF a cad
by dying soldier But Byron tho
poet? Emphatically he was not poet; not II
Shakespeare and Milton are poets lie was
magnificent satirist. But the Byron Oh
love lyrics and tragedies and romantic tales ia
4 poet OF infinite tediousness in execrable verse.
. And he is not read; no one now reads
lara or 'Parisna' The Giaour. or The
Corsair' or The Bride OF Abydos or The
Siegr OF Corinth.' The Island. or the weary
weary plays. They are dead and past resur-
rection."
Now, "a to the despicabeness Of Byron's char
acter | presume that there are none so rasn
as to hold up the English poet as model to DO
patterned after. yet is il not true that intel"
lectual productions, whether OF a literary nature
or otherwise should be judged solely on their
merits and with absolute disregard OF the char
acter OF their authors! was not ShakesPeare
a poachcr Bernardin de St Pierre bertine,
Francis Bacon n bribe-taker. and Edgar Allan
Poe a drunkard? Is there not reason TO believe
that the private life OF Arstophanes was not
all that II should have been, and that Horace
and Cicero were notorious proligates? Even
King David. by his own confession was not
irreproaChabe, and the same IL true OF Balzac,
Hugo and many other men OF genius Willingly
admit that a knowledge Of such facts as these
is essential II one would have proper compre-
henson OF the poet or author as a man. but as
a criterion for the determination OF the literary
value of his work fail to see its worth.
You say that Byron "emphatcally was not
poet" and that such poems as Lara Inc
Giaour" etc. are no longer read. as being in
nnitely tedious" and in "execrabe verse" Doubt
less they contain much mawkish sentiTnentahty
which the world has .ong since outgrown. !
think however you will freely acknowledge thar
even these unread works contain many splen-
did passages az witness the thirty-fve lines IN
"The Giaour" beginning:
He who hath bent him DER the dead
Ere the first day of death is fed
and the stirring apostrophe to Greece in The
same poem:
"Clime Of the unforgotten brave,
Whose land from plain to mountain cave,
Was Freedoms home or Glory's grave!
Shrine OF the mighty! can it be,
That this is all remains OF thee? etc. y
n Byron's tragedies are in "execrable verse;"
what shall we say of "Manfred'-that poem
which excited the profound admiration of even
Goethe-or, IL Byron Is mot poet, in the
fullest sense Of the word, in what category shall
or the fourth canto OF "Childe HAROLD? There
Is unauestionaby much OF truth in your opinion
that Byron wrote great quantity OF trash the
Hours OF Idleness." for example, but Is not
the same true OF almost any poet, even or the
august Wordsworth himself? Byron had faults
OF character, many and grave, and his poetical
genius doubtless had its limitations; yet while
the man let US not endeavor to
underrate the many splendid works with which
the poet has enriched English literature for all
time to come HAMILTON w. SWIFT
Syracuse May 26 1898
1.-THE remarks to which our correspondent
takes exception were quoted, as Indicated n VIA