Lord Byron Essay, Research Paper

Lord Byron wrote a long poem, published in cantos, about a pilgrim named

Childe Harold who he modeled after himself. The journeys he goes on are

similar to the ones Lord Byron encounters in his lifetime. The speaker in

Lord Byron?s ?Childe Harold?s Pilgrimage? is Childe Harold. In Canto IV,

he begins by discussing his love for nature and goes on to apostrophize the

ocean.

In the first stanza, Childe Harold discusses the beauty he sees in

nature. He finds pleasure and rapture in nature which he compares to a

?society, where none intrudes.? He states that he ?love not man the less,

but nature more? meaning that he does not hate man and turns to nature

for comfort but instead prefers nature to man. He talks about the feelings

he experiences when he is with nature and explains that he does not know

how to express them but at the same time, he cannot conceal his feelings.

Childe Harold begins his apostrophe of the ocean in the second and

third stanzas. The second stanza focuses on how man is unable to control

the ocean. He remarks that ?ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain?

and yet man?s ?control stops with the shore.? Childe Harold uses a simile,

comparing man ?like a drop of rain? falling into the ocean?s depth after the

ocean decides to wreck him. The imagery in this stanza conveys the idea

of a vast endless ocean. Byron chooses his language carefully, using words

like ?watery plain,? ?drop of rain,? and ?bubbling groan.? In the third

stanza, he looks back on his childhood and how he has always viewed the

ocean with joy and glee. He has never feared the ocean and trusts it

wholly. He describes playing in its bubbles and delighting in the ocean?s

breakers and billows.

Byron changes his tone in the fourth stanza and draws back his

earlier emotions. In this stanza, he switches from watery images to fiery

images. He mentions a ?torch,? ?my midnight lamp,? and ?the glow which

in my spirit dwelt.? Childe Harold saddens as he comments on how his

spirit is fading away. The language in this stanza gives the reader a sense

of retraction. The speaker in the poem dies in the last lines while stating

that ?the glow which in my spirit dwelt is fluttering, faint, and low.?

A different narrator takes charge in the last stanza and exclaims a

farewell to the pilgrim Childe Harold. The narrator repeats the word

?farewell? several times and remarks that if the reader must remember

anything, remember not the pilgrim but the moral of his poem. Childe

Harold chose to die in the ocean, which he respected and cherished the

most. He uses the poem to convey the beauty he finds in nature and how

important it is to keep it untouched by man?s ruinous influences.

There are many characteristics of Romanticism that can be found in

Lord Byron?s ?Chile Harold?s Pilgrimage.? He assumes the role of a

Romantic poet by taking the stance of ?a man speaking to men? when he

tells everyone about his love for nature and the ocean. Lord Byron uses a

creative and imaginative way to write his poem beginning with Childe

Harold speaking and then having a different narrator end the poem after

Childe Harold dies. Lord Byron also views nature in a psychological sense

by observing its mysterious forces and how it caused changes. There was a

definite relationship between Childe Harold?s mind and the nature that

surrounded him. Another way this poem resembles others of the Romantic

Period is that it involved a fascination with Childe Harold?s youth and

innocence. He played in the ocean as a child and learned to not fear it.

The poem ?Childe Harold?s Pilgrimage? written by Lord Byron

deserves a rightful place among the other Romantic poems. It expresses

the tie between man, his mind, and nature. The ideas and thoughts man

stumbles across can be obtained through both what is out there in nature

and what is inside his mind. Both of those factors sum up the whole of

Romantic thinking. The moral of Lord Byron?s poem is to leave nature as

unmarked as possible to preserve its beauty and to not fear it but take

pleasure in it.

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