Percy Bysshe Shelley: Difference between revisions

English Romantic poet (1792–1822)

Percy Bysshe Shelley ( BISH;^[1][2] 4 August 1792 – 8 July 1822) was a British writer who is considered one of the major English Romantic poets.^[3][4] A radical in his poetry as well as in his political and social views, Shelley did not achieve fame during his lifetime, but recognition of his achievements in poetry grew steadily following his death, and he became an important influence on subsequent generations of poets, including Robert Browning, Algernon Charles Swinburne, Thomas Hardy, and W. B. Yeats.^[5] American literary critic Harold Bloom describes him as “a superb craftsman, a lyric poet without rival, and surely one of the most advanced sceptical intellects ever to write a poem.”

Shelley’s reputation fluctuated during the 20th century, but in recent decades he has achieved increasing critical acclaim for the sweeping momentum of his poetic imagery, his mastery of genres and verse forms, and the complex interplay of sceptical, idealist, and materialist ideas in his work.^[6][7] Among his best-known works are “Ozymandias” (1818), “Ode to the West Wind” (1819), “To a Skylark” (1820), the philosophical essay “The Necessity of Atheism” (1811), which his friend T. J. Hogg may have co-authored, and the political ballad “The Mask of Anarchy” (1819). His other major works include the verse drama The Cenci (1819) and long poems such as Alastor, or The Spirit of Solitude (1815), Julian and Maddalo (1819), Adonais (1821), Prometheus Unbound (1820)—widely considered his masterpiece—Hellas (1822), and his final, unfinished work, The Triumph of Life (1822).

Shelley also wrote prose fiction and a quantity of essays on political, social, and philosophical issues. Much of this poetry and prose was not published in his lifetime, or only published in expurgated form, due to the risk of prosecution for political and religious libel.^[8] From the 1820s, his poems and political and ethical writings became popular in Owenist, Chartist, and radical political circles,^[9] and later drew admirers as diverse as Karl Marx, Mahatma Gandhi, and George Bernard Shaw.^[9][10][11]

Shelley’s life was marked by family crises, ill health, and a backlash against his atheism, political views, and defiance of social conventions. He went into permanent self-exile in Italy in 1818 and over the next four years produced what Zachary Leader and Michael O’Neill call “some of the finest poetry of the Romantic period”.^[12] His second wife, Mary Shelley, was the author of Frankenstein. He died in a boating accident in 1822 at the age of 29.

Early life and education[edit]

Shelley was born on 4 August 1792 at Field Place, Warnham, West Sussex, England.^[13][14] He was the eldest son of Sir Timothy Shelley (1753–1844), a Whig Member of Parliament for Horsham from 1790 to 1792 and for Shoreham between 1806 and 1812, and his wife, Elizabeth Pilfold (1763–1846), the daughter of a successful butcher.^[15] He had four younger sisters and one much younger brother. Shelley’s early childhood was sheltered and mostly happy. He was particularly close to his sisters and his mother, who encouraged him to hunt, fish and ride.^[16][17] At age six, he was sent to a day school run by the vicar of Warnham church, where he displayed an impressive memory and gift for languages.^[18]

In 1802 he entered the Syon House Academy of Brentford, Middlesex, where his cousin Thomas Medwin was a pupil. Shelley was bullied and unhappy at the school and sometimes responded with violent rage. He also began suffering from the nightmares, hallucinations and sleep walking that were to periodically affect him throughout his life. Shelley developed an interest in science which supplemented his voracious reading of tales of mystery, romance and the supernatural. During his holidays at Field Place, his sisters were often terrified at being subjected to his experiments with gunpowder, acids and electricity. Back at school he blew up a paling fence with gunpowder.^[19][20]

In 1804, Shelley entered Eton College, a period which he later recalled with loathing. He was subjected to particularly severe mob bullying which the perpetrators called “Shelley-baits”.^[21] A number of biographers and contemporaries have attributed the bullying to Shelley’s aloofness, nonconformity and refusal to take part in fagging. His peculiarities and violent rages earned him the nickname “Mad Shelley”.^[22][23] His interest in the occult and science continued, and contemporaries describe him giving an electric shock to a master, blowing up a tree stump with gunpowder and attempting to raise spirits with occult rituals.^[24] In his senior years, Shelley came under the influence of a part-time teacher, Dr James Lind, who encouraged his interest in the occult and introduced him to liberal and radical authors. Shelley also developed an interest in Plato and idealist philosophy which he pursued in later years through self-study.^[25][26] According to Richard Holmes,…