The book is comparative in strategy, aligning two poets who deeply admired each other's work and who were, the one after the other, the most famous poets writing in English at the beginning of the nineteenth century. In the period examined by Oliver, Byron succeeded his 'buon camerado' (Don Juan, XII. 16), Sir Walter Scott, asthe first poet of renown with his Childe Harold's Pilgrimage cantos 1 and 2 as well as the subsequent Eastern tales, The Giaour, The Corsair, Lara. The book proceeds in largely chronological order, beginning with an introduction on the concept of borders andthe territorial ambiguities they organize, followed by four chapters. The first two chapters discuss Scott's Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, The Lay of the Last Minstrel (1805), The Lady of the Lake (1810) and Rokeby (1813). Chapters three and four are devoted to Byron, moving from Harold to the Eastern tales with a closing look at The Island.
LoC Classification |
PR5343.S3 .O45 2005 |
LoC Control Number |
2005047461 |
Dewey |
821/.709353 |
Nationality |
British |
No. of Pages |
241 |
Height x Width |
9.1
inch |
|
|
Conflict |
19th Century misc |
|
Susan Oliver's study of Scott and Byron's poetical engagement with borders, both actual and metaphorical, and the people living around them, emphasises reciprocal literary influences and attitudes toward cultural instability.