Childe Harold's Pilgrimage by J.M.W. Turner, 1823.

Childe Harold's Pilgrimage is a lengthy narrative poem by the English poet George Gordon, Lord Byron, published between 1812 and 1818. The poem describes the travels and reflections of a world-weary young man who, disillusioned with a life of pleasure and revelry, looks for distraction in foreign lands; in a wider sense, it is an expression of the melancholy and disillusionment felt by a generation weary of the wars of the post-Revolutionary and Napoleonic eras. The title comes from the term childe, a medieval title for a young man who was a candidate for knighthood. Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (830x463, 28 KB) Title:Childe Harolds Pilgrimage by J.M.W. Turner. ... Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (830x463, 28 KB) Title:Childe Harolds Pilgrimage by J.M.W. Turner. ... J. M. W. Turner, English landscape painter The fighting Temeraire tugged to her last berth to be broken up, painted 1839. ... A narrative poem is an extended poem which tells a story. ... Lord Byron, English poet Lord Byron (1803), as painted by Elisabeth Vigee-Lebrun George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron, (January 22, 1788 – April 19, 1824) was the most widely read English language poet of his day. ... 1812 was a leap year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar). ... 1818 (MDCCCXVIII) is a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar or a common year starting on Saturday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar. ... The Napoleonic Era is a period in the History of France and Europe. ... In the Middle Ages, a childe was the eldest son of a nobleman who had not yet attained to knighthood, or had not yet won his spurs. ... The Middle Ages formed the middle period in a traditional schematic division of European history into three ages: the classical civilization of Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and modern times. ... A statue of an armoured knight of the Middle Ages For the chess piece, see knight (chess). ...

The poem is quite autobiographical, as Byron freely admitted, and is based upon his travels through the Mediterranean and Aegean Sea between 1809 and 1811. Despite the fact that Byron did not think the poem was all that good, feeling it revealed too much of himself, it was an instant sensation when published by John Murray, and made Byron famous in England practically overnight. Women, especially, swooned over the poem, fascinated by the character of Childe Harold, his foreboding, and his nameless vices. Lord Byron quickly became the darling of the influential female aristocrats of the day; they recognized bits of Childe Harold in him, and he felt compelled to live up to this reputation. Composite satellite image of the Mediterranean Sea. ... For the ship Aegean Sea, see Aegean Sea (oil spill) The Aegean Sea (Greek: Αιγαίο Πέλαγος, Aeyéo Pélagos; Turkish: Ege Denizi) is a sea arm of the Mediterranean Sea located between the southern Balkan and Anatolian peninsulas, i. ... 1809 was a common year starting on Sunday (see link for calendar). ... 1811 was a common year starting on Tuesday (see link for calendar). ... John Murray is a British publishing house, renowned for the roster of authors it has published in its history, including Jane Austen, Lord Byron and Charles Darwin. ...

The work introduced the concept of the Byronic hero, which is still somewhat popular today and shows up in novels, films and plays on a regular basis. The Byronic hero is usually described as an outsider, and with a contradictory nature; sometimes cruel, sometimes kind, devoted but unfaithful, and never contented, but eternally seeking out new sensations. This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... A novel is an extended work of written, narrative, prose fiction, usually in story form; the writer of a novel is a novelist. ... Film is a term that encompasses motion pictures as individual projects, as well as the field in general. ... A play (noun) is a common literary form, usually consisting chiefly of dialog between characters, and usually intended for performance rather than reading. ...

It has four cantos written in Spenserian stanzas, which consists of eight iambic pentameter lines followed by one alexandrine (a twelve syllable iambic line), and rhyme pattern ABABBCBCC. A canto is a significant section of a long poem or the highest part in a piece of choral music. ... The Spenserian stanza is a fixed verse form invented by Edmund Spenser for his epic poem The Faerie Queene. ... An iamb is a metrical foot used in various types of poetry. ... In poetry, a pentameter is a line of verse consisting of five metrical feet: Be what you can if thus your heart so deem, For more the man will less the foible seem. ... An alexandrine is a line of poetic meter. ... A rhyme is a repetition of identical or similar sounds in two or more different words and is most often used in poetry. ...

Childe Harold became a vehicle for Byron's own beliefs and ideas; indeed in the preface to book three Byron acknowledges the fact that his hero is just an extension of himself. By masking himself behind a literary artifice, Byron was able to achieve what critic Jerome McGann depicts as "man's greatest tragedy is that he can conceive of a perfection which he cannot attain".

Though the original poem contained a number of risqué passages, such as mentions of pederasty among the Albanians, these were mostly suppressed, either by his own hand or at the time of publication.^[1]
The term pederasty or paederasty embraces a wide range of erotic practices between adult males and adolescent boys. ...

Influence

The mood of the poem inspired Harold en Italie by the French Romantic composer Hector Berlioz. Harold in Italy (Op. ... Hector Louis Berlioz (December 11, 1803 – March 8, 1869) was a French Romantic composer best known for the Symphonie fantastique, first performed in 1830, and for his Grande Messe des Morts (Requiem) of 1837, with its tremendous resources that include four antiphonal brass choirs. ...

Notes

External links

• Childe Harold's Pilgrimage Full Text