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L-G-0012258654-0035492395.Pdf The Life of Percy Bysshe Shelley BLACKWELL CRITICAL BIOGRAPHIES General Editor: Claude Rawson This acclaimed series offers informative and durable biographies of important authors, British, European, and North American, which will include substantial critical discussion of their works. An underlying objective is to re-establish the notion that books are written by people who lived in particular times and places. This objective is pursued not by programmatic assertions or strenuous point- making, but through the practical persuasion of volumes that offer intelligent criti- cism within a well-researched biographical context. Also in this series The Life of Geoffrey Chaucer The Life of W. B. Yeats Derek Pearsall Terence Brown The Life of Samuel Johnson The Life of Henry Fielding Robert DeMaria Jr. Ronald Paulson The Life of Robert Browning The Life of John Milton Clyde De L. Ryals Barbara K. Lewalski The Life of Joseph Conrad The Life of George Eliot John Batchelor Nancy Henry The Life of William Faulkner The Life of William Shakespeare Richard Gray Lois Potter The Life of Walter Scott The Life of William Wordsworth John Sutherland John Worthen The Life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge The Life of Daniel Defoe Rosemary Ashton John Richetti The Life of Evelyn Waugh The Life of D. H. Lawrence Douglas Lane Patey Andrew Harrison The Life of Thomas Hardy The Life of Robert Frost Paul Turner Henry Hart The Life of Goethe The Life of Percy Bysshe Shelley John R. Williams John Worthen The Life of Céline Nicholas Hewitt The Life of Percy Bysshe Shelley A Critical Biography John Worthen This edition first published 2019 © 2019 John Wiley & Sons Ltd All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, except as permitted by law. Advice on how to obtain permission to reuse material from this title is available at http://www.wiley.com/go/permissions. The right of John Worthen to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with law. Registered Offices John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 111 River Street, Hoboken, NJ 07030, USA John Wiley & Sons Ltd, The Atrium, Southern Gate, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 8SQ, UK Editorial Office The Atrium, Southern Gate, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 8SQ, UK For details of our global editorial offices, customer services, and more information about Wiley products visit us at www.wiley.com. Wiley also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats and by print‐on‐demand. Some content that appears in standard print versions of this book may not be available in other formats. Limit of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty While the publisher and authors have used their best efforts in preparing this work, they make no representations or warranties with respect to the accuracy or completeness of the contents of this work and specifically disclaim all warranties, including without limitation any implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. No warranty may be created or extended by sales representatives, written sales materials or promotional statements for this work. The fact that an organization, website, or product is referred to in this work as a citation and/or potential source of further information does not mean that the publisher and authors endorse the information or services the organization, website, or product may provide or recommendations it may make. This work is sold with the understanding that the publisher is not engaged in rendering professional services. The advice and strategies contained herein may not be suitable for your situation. You should consult with a specialist where appropriate. Further, readers should be aware that websites listed in this work may have changed or disappeared between when this work was written and when it is read. Neither the publisher nor authors shall be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damages, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages. Library of Congress Cataloging‐in‐Publication Data Names: Worthen, John, author. Title: The life of Percy Bysshe Shelley : a critical biography / John Worthen. Description: First edition. | Hoboken, NJ : Wiley-Blackwell, 2019. | Series: Blackwell critical biographies | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Identifiers: LCCN 2018038903 (print) | LCCN 2018038972 (ebook) | ISBN 9781118533963 (Adobe PDF) | ISBN 9781118534038 (ePub) | ISBN 9781118534045 (hardcover) Subjects: LCSH: Shelley, Percy Bysshe, 1792-1822. | Poets, English–19th century–Biography. Classification: LCC PR5431 (ebook) | LCC PR5431 .W67 2019 (print) | DDC 821/.7 [B] –dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018038903 Cover Design: Wiley Cover Image: © John Worthern Set in 10/12pt Bembo by SPi Global, Pondicherry, India 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 for David Ellis Sil. Is’t not so? Fal. ’Tis so. Sil. Is’t so? Why then say an old man can do somwhat. Contents List of Illustrations ix Acknowledgements xi Abbreviations and Texts xiii Foreword xvii Part I Background, Foreground 1792–1811 1 1 A Scholar, a Gentleman, and a Poet 1792 –1810 3 2 ‘Bit’ 1796 –1811 12 3 Panting to Seize the Wings of Morn 1810 –1811 21 4 Printing Freaks 1810 –1811 32 5 The Necessity of Atheism, Expulsion & Debt 1811 43 Part II Lover of Mankind, Democrat & Atheist 1811–1818 55 6 A Shelley Business! 1811 57 7 My New Sister 1811 –1813 67 8 Tan‐yr‐allt 1813 78 9 Queen Mab: Shadows of the Dream 1812 –1813 83 10 A Rash & Heartless Union 1813 –1814 96 11 Mary Godwin 1814 103 12 This is a Vampire 1814 –1815 113 13 Alastor 1815 –1816 124 14 Geneva and Byron 1816 135 15 A Series of Pain 1816 149 16 Drowned, Frozen, Dead 1816 158 17 Laon and Cythna: Writing against Death 1817 167 18 My Country Dear to Me Forever 1817 –1818 180 vii Contents Part III Expatriation 1818–1821 191 19 Italy: As Light in the Sun, Throned 1818 193 20 Flowering Islands 1818 207 21 A Birth in Naples 1818 –1819 222 22 Exceeding Grief: The Cenci 1819 230 23 Prometheus Unbound 1819 240 24 Satiric Reality 1819 248 25 Beam‐Anatomising Prism 1819 –1820 258 26 Harmonious Madness 1820 268 27 Swellfoot the Tyrant 1820 280 28 Epipsychidion v. Flesh & Blood 1820–1821 291 29 Defending Poetry 1821 302 30 This Latest of my Orphans 1821 313 Part IV No Rest or Respite 1821–1822 321 31 Ariel to Miranda 1821 –1822 323 32 To the Villa Magni 1822 335 33 ‘The Triumph of Life’ 1822 342 34 Enchanted Heart 1822 349 35 Upon a Precipice 1822 362 36 Going to Join Friend Plato 1822 370 37 Beyond this Life 379 Notes 393 Bibliography 448 Index 457 viii List of Illustrations 1 Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822), pencil drawing (Pisa 27 November 1821) by Edward Ellerker Williams (1793–1822) (Newman Ivey White, Shelley, New York: Knopf, 1940, Volume II, facing page 524) xviii 2 Elizabeth Shelley [‘Mrs Shelley (So‐called)’] (1763–1846), graphite drawing with pen and brown ink (c.1795) by George Romney (1734–1802) (Yale Center for British Art, Yale Art Gallery Collection, Gift of Mr and Mrs J. Richardson Dilworth, B.A. 1938) 13 3 Percy Bysshe Shelley, tinted drawing (?1802–1804) by Antoine‐Philippe, Duc de Montpensier (1775–1807) (The Bodleian Libraries, The University of Oxford, Shelley Relics 7) 14 4 Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (1797–1851), detail of oil portrait (1839–1840) by Richard Rothwell (1800–1868) (© National Portrait Gallery, London, no. 1235) 104 5 Clara Mary Jane (Claire) Clairmont (1798–1879), oil portrait (Rome 5–6 May 1819) by Amelia Curran (1775–1847), Newstead Abbey NA 271 (public domain) 139 6 George Gordon, Lord Byron (1788–1824), oil portrait (1813) by Richard Westall (1765–1836) (© National Portrait Gallery, London, no. 4243) 140 7 Lateen‐rigged sailing boat, photograph (Lake Geneva c. 1900) (in collection of John Worthen) 143 8 Percy Bysshe Shelley, oil portrait (c. 1829) by George Clint (1770–1854), after Amelia Curran (1819) (© National Portrait Gallery, London, no. 1271) 232 9 Jane Williams Hogg (1798–1884), photograph (c. 1851) (The Bodleian Libraries, The University of Oxford, [Pr] Shelley adds. e. 8 facing page 1244) 305 ix List of Illustrations 10 Edward Ellerker Williams (1793–1822), detail of pencil and crayon self‐portrait (1821–1822) (The Bodleian Libraries, The University of Oxford, [Pr] Shelley adds. e. 7 facing page 736) 306 11 Detail of page of ‘Coliseum’ manuscript (post 1818) (The Bodleian Libraries, The University of Oxford, Shelley adds. c. 4, f. 201v) 333 12 ‘Casa Magni’, watercolour (1879) by Henry Roderick Newman (1833–1918), whereabouts unknown (copyright © City of London, Keats House, Hampstead) 339 13 Final page of manuscript of ‘Bright wanderer’ (1822) (The Bodleian Libraries, The University of Oxford, Oxford, Shelley adds. c. 4, f. 36v) 360 14 Percy Bysshe Shelley, pencil drawing (Pisa 27 November 1821) by Edward Ellerker Williams (Newman Ivey White. Shelley, New York: Knopf, 1940, Volume II, facing page 524) 368 x Acknowledgements I must acknowledge a huge debt to the editors of The Poems of Shelley, The Complete Poetry of Percy Bysshe Shelley, The Bodleian Shelley Manuscripts, and the Shelley vol- umes of The Manuscripts of the Younger Romantics. I am also extremely fortunate in being able to draw on the work of previous Shelley biographers, in particular Newman Ivey White, Richard Holmes and James Bieri. I am grateful to the Bodleian Library for its assistance in my researches, and for granting me permission to use a number of illustrations drawn from its collection. Bruce Barker‐Benfield was wonderfully kind in helping me with his extraordinary knowledge of Shelley and the Shelley archive.
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