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The Essential Byron
Briefly discusses Byron's life and career, and gathers a selection of his poems, including excerpts from Don Juan
- GenresPoetry
114 pages, Hardcover
First published July 1, 1989
2 people are currently reading
29 people want to read
About the author
Paul Muldoon
159 books111 followersBorn in Northern Ireland, Muldoon currently resides in the US and teaches at Princeton University. He held the chair of Professor of Poetry at Oxford University from 1999 through 2004. In September 2007, Muldoon became the poetry editor of The New Yorker.
Awards:
1992: Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize for Madoc: A Mystery
1994: T. S. Eliot Prize for The Annals of Chile
1997: Irish Times Irish Literature Prize for Poetry for New Selected Poems 1968–1994
2002: T. S. Eliot Prize (shortlist) for Moy Sand and Gravel
2003: Griffin Poetry Prize (Canada) for Moy Sand and Gravel
2003: Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for Moy Sand and Gravel
2004: American Ireland Fund Literary Award
2004: Aspen Prize
2004: Shakespeare Prize
Awards:
1992: Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize for Madoc: A Mystery
1994: T. S. Eliot Prize for The Annals of Chile
1997: Irish Times Irish Literature Prize for Poetry for New Selected Poems 1968–1994
2002: T. S. Eliot Prize (shortlist) for Moy Sand and Gravel
2003: Griffin Poetry Prize (Canada) for Moy Sand and Gravel
2003: Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for Moy Sand and Gravel
2004: American Ireland Fund Literary Award
2004: Aspen Prize
2004: Shakespeare Prize
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
April 16, 2022
“I must own, If I have any fault, it is digression”
Truer words were never spoken. Byron can’t maintain a narrative, not just in his longer poems but also in his shorter ones, without wandering off on a discourse to criticize Robert Southey, William Wordsworth, and other poets of his time. This is just a small collection and some excerpts of his poems, but geez it gets boring hearing someone constantly ragging about how bad other people are. I can’t imagine how irritating the full poems would be.
Truer words were never spoken. Byron can’t maintain a narrative, not just in his longer poems but also in his shorter ones, without wandering off on a discourse to criticize Robert Southey, William Wordsworth, and other poets of his time. This is just a small collection and some excerpts of his poems, but geez it gets boring hearing someone constantly ragging about how bad other people are. I can’t imagine how irritating the full poems would be.
March 19, 2025
Great poetry, but too short (117 pages). This Byron book needed more Byron. I haven't read Don Juan before, and since this only includes a few excerpts from it, I didn't follow the plot (there are no summaries or explanatory notes, just the poems). Beppo is great. Almost every poem has some funny, cheeky turns of phrase.
SPOILER BELOW (for a 200-year-old poem)
The dog-eating and cannibalism part in Don Juan really caught me off guard.
SPOILER BELOW (for a 200-year-old poem)
The dog-eating and cannibalism part in Don Juan really caught me off guard.
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August 2, 2012A short accessible reader, though Muldoon might concentrate too much on Byron's funny slams of other poets.
Enjoyed a number of his final epigramatic couplets, his fundamental lack of reverence, and how in a number of his poems the long digressions are the point--
“Oh! Southey, Southey! cease they varied song! / A Bard may chaunt too often, and too long:”
"I’ve half a mind to tumble down to prose,
But verse is more in fashion—so here goes."
"Translating tongues he knows not even by letter,
And sweating plays so middling, bad were better."
“He had written much blank verse, and blanker prose,
And more of both than any body knows."
On Wordsworth: “’Tis poetry—at least by his assertion”
“I’ve got new mythological machinery
And very handsome supernatural scenery”
Enjoyed a number of his final epigramatic couplets, his fundamental lack of reverence, and how in a number of his poems the long digressions are the point--
“Oh! Southey, Southey! cease they varied song! / A Bard may chaunt too often, and too long:”
"I’ve half a mind to tumble down to prose,
But verse is more in fashion—so here goes."
"Translating tongues he knows not even by letter,
And sweating plays so middling, bad were better."
“He had written much blank verse, and blanker prose,
And more of both than any body knows."
On Wordsworth: “’Tis poetry—at least by his assertion”
“I’ve got new mythological machinery
And very handsome supernatural scenery”
July 8, 2009
He was no Keats, or John Donne for that matter. Perhaps my distaste for him that developed after reading a disfavourable bio has flavored my opinion.
July 18, 2009
I'm a big fan of Lord George Gordon, this is just a very small excerpt of his poems
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews