George Gordon Byron (1788-1824).
I had a dream, which was not all a dream.
The bright sun was extinguish'd, and the stars
Did wander darkling in the eternal space,
Rayless, and pathless, and the icy earth
Swung blind and blackening in the moonless air;
Morn came and went--and came, and brought no day,
And men forgot their passions in the dread
Of this their desolation; and all hearts
Were chill'd into a selfish prayer for light:
And they did live by watchfires--and the thrones,
The palaces of crowned kings--the huts,
The habitations of all things which dwell,
Were burnt for beacons; cities were consum'd,
And men were gather'd round their blazing homes
To look once more into each other's face;
Happy were those who dwelt within the eye
Of the volcanos, and their mountain-torch:
A fearful hope was all the world contain'd;
Forests were set on fire--but hour by hour
They fell and faded--and the crackling trunks
Extinguish'd with a crash--and all was black.
The brows of men by the despairing light
Wore an unearthly aspect, as by fits
The flashes fell upon them; some lay down
And hid their eyes and wept; and some did rest
Their chins upon their clenched hands, and smil'd;
And others hurried to and fro, and fed
Their funeral piles with fuel, and look'd up
With mad disquietude on the dull sky,
The pall of a past world; and then again
With curses cast them down upon the dust,
And gnash'd their teeth and howl'd: the wild birds shriek'd
And, terrified, did flutter on the ground,
And flap their useless wings; the wildest brutes
Came tame and tremulous; and vipers crawl'd
And twin'd themselves among the multitude,
Hissing, but stingless--they were slain for food.
And War, which for a moment was no more,
Did glut himself again: a meal was bought
With blood, and each sate sullenly apart
Gorging himself in gloom: no love was left;
All earth was but one thought--and that was death
Immediate and inglorious; and the pang
Of famine fed upon all entrails--men
Died, and their bones were tombless as their flesh;
The meagre by the meagre were devour'd,
Even dogs assail'd their masters, all save one,
And he was faithful to a corse, and kept
The birds and beasts and famish'd men at bay,
Till hunger clung them, or the dropping dead
Lur'd their lank jaws; himself sought out no food,
But with a piteous and perpetual moan,
And a quick desolate cry, licking the hand
Which answer'd not with a caress--he died.
The crowd was famish'd by degrees; but two
Of an enormous city did survive,
And they were enemies: they met beside
The dying embers of an altar-place
Where had been heap'd a mass of holy things
For an unholy usage; they rak'd up,
And shivering scrap'd with their cold skeleton hands
The feeble ashes, and their feeble breath
Blew for a little life, and made a flame
Which was a mockery; then they lifted up
Their eyes as it grew lighter, and beheld
Each other's aspects--saw, and shriek'd, and died--
Even of their mutual hideousness they died,
Unknowing who he was upon whose brow
Famine had written Fiend. The world was void,
The populous and the powerful was a lump,
Seasonless, herbless, treeless, manless, lifeless--
A lump of death--a chaos of hard clay.
The rivers, lakes and ocean all stood still,
And nothing stirr'd within their silent depths;
Ships sailorless lay rotting on the sea,
And their masts fell down piecemeal: as they dropp'd
They slept on the abyss without a surge--
The waves were dead; the tides were in their grave,
The moon, their mistress, had expir'd before;
The winds were wither'd in the stagnant air,
And the clouds perish'd; Darkness had no need
Of aid from them--She was the Universe.
Darkness is a poem written by Lord Byron in July 1816.
Background[]
1816 was known as the Year Without a Summer because Mount Tambora had erupted in the Dutch East Indies the previous year, casting enough ash in to the atmosphere to block out the sun and cause abnormal weather across much of northeast America and northern Europe. This pall of darkness inspired Byron to write his poem.
Literary critics were initially content to classify it as a "last man" poem, telling the apocalyptic story of the last man on earth. More recent critics have focused on the poem's historical context, as well as the anti-biblical nature of the poem, despite its many references to the Bible.
The poem was written only months after the end of Byron's marriage to Anne Isabella Milbanke.
Historical context[]
A diagram of the estimated ash fallout from the 1815 Mount Tambora eruption. Ash clouds traveled much farther.
Byron's poem was written during the Romantic period. During this period, several events occurred which resembled (to some) the biblical signs of the apocalypse. Many authors at the time saw themselves as prophets with a duty to warn others about their impending doom.[1] However, at the same time period, many were questioning their faith in a loving God, due to recent fossil discoveries revealing records of the deaths of entire species buried in the earth.[2]
1816, the year in which the poem was written, was called "the year without summer", as strange weather and an inexplicable darkness caused record-cold temperatures across Europe, especially in Geneva,[3] where Byron claimed to have received his inspiration for the poem, saying he "wrote it... at Geneva, when there was a celebrated dark day, on which the fowls went to roost at noon, and the candles were lighted as at midnight".[4] The darkness was (unknown to those of the time) caused by the volcanic ash spewing from the eruption of Mount Tambora in Indonesia (Vail 184). The search for a cause of the strange changes in the light of day only grew as scientists discovered sunspots on the sun so large that they could be seen with the naked eye.[5] Newspapers such as the London Chronicle reported on the panic:
| “ | The large spots which may now be seen upon the sun's disk have given rise to ridiculous apprehensions and absurd predictions. These spots are said to be the cause of the remarkable and wet weather we have had this Summer; and the increase of these spots is represented to announce a general removal of heat from the globe, the extinction of nature, and the end of the world.[6] | ” |
A scientist in Italy even predicted that the sun would go out on July 18,[7] shortly before Byron's writing of "Darkness". His "prophecy" caused riots, suicides, and religious fervor all over Europe.[8] For example:
| “ | "A Bath girl woke her aunt and shouted at her that the world was ending, and the woman promptly plunged into a coma. In Liege, a huge cloud in the shape of a mountain hovered over the town, causing alarm among the "old women" who expected the end of the world on the eighteenth. In Ghent, a regiment of cavalry passing through the town during a thunderstorm blew their trumpets, causing "three-fourths of the inhabitants" to rush forth and throw themselves on their knees in the streets, thinking they had heard the seventh trumpet."[9] | ” |
This prediction, and the strange behavior of nature at this time, stood in direct contrast with many of the feelings of the age. William Wordsworth, for example, a famous poet of the time, often expresses in his writing a belief in the connection of God and nature for which much of the Romantic Era's poetry is typical. His "Tintern Abbey", for example, says "Nature never did betray / The heart that loved her".[10] His poetry also carries the idea that nature is a kind thing, living in peaceful co-existence with man. He says in the same poem, referring to nature, that "all which we behold / is full of blessings."[11] Even the more frightening Gothic poems of Coleridge, another famous poet of the time, argue for a kind treatment of nature that is only cruel if treated cruelly, as in "Rime of the Ancient Mariner", unlike Byron's sun, which goes out with no human mistreatment mentioned at all.[12]
Criticism and analysis[]
In the past, critics were happy to classify Darkness as a “Last Man” poem, following a general theme of end of the world scenes from the view of the last man on earth. However, recent scholarship has pointed out the poem's lack of any single “Last Man” character.[13]
Biblical imagery[]
Byron also uses the hellish biblical language of the apocalypse to carry the real possibility of these events to his readers. The whole poem can be seen as a reference to Matthew 24:29: “the sun shall be darkened.” In line 32 it describes men “gnash[ing] their teeth” at the sky, a clear biblical parallel of hell.[14] Vipers twine “themselves among the multitude, / Hissing."[15] Two men left alive of “an enormous city” gather “holy things” around an altar, “for an unholy usage”—to burn them for light. Seeing themselves in the light of the fire, they die at the horror of seeing each other “unknowing who he was upon whose brow Famine had written Fiend."[16] In this future, all men are made to look like fiends, emaciated, dying with “their bones as tombless as their flesh."[17] They also act like fiends, as Byron says: “no love was left,”[18] matching the biblical prophecy that at the end of the world, “the love of many shall wax cold."[19] In doing this, Byron is merely magnifying the events already occurring at the time. The riots, the suicides, the fear associated with the strange turn in the weather and the predicted destruction of the sun, had besieged not only people's hope for a long life, but their beliefs about God's creation and about themselves as well. By bringing out this diabolical imagery, Byron is communicating that fear: that God is not in nature or in us; that he is not at all; that “Darkness [or nature] had no need / of aid from them—She was the universe.”[20]
Byron's pessimistic views continue, as he mixes Biblical language with the apparent realities of science at the time. As Paley points out, it is not so much significant that Byron uses Biblical passages as that he deviates from them to make a point.[21] For example, the thousand-year peace mentioned in the book of Revelation as coming after all the horror of the apocalypse does not exist in Byron's “Darkness.” Instead, “War, which for a moment was no more, / Did glut himself again.”[22] In other words, swords are only beaten temporarily into plowshares, only to become swords of war once again. Also, the fact that the vipers are “stingless”[23] parallels the Biblical image of the peace to follow destruction: “And the sucking child shall play in the whole of the asp.”[24] In the poem, though, the snake is rendered harmless, but the humans take advantage of this and the vipers are “slain for food.” Paley continues, saying “associations of millennial imagery are consistently invoked in order to be bitterly frustrated."[25]
It is also a book written by John Saul.
See also[]
"Darkness" by Lord Byron (read by Tom O'Bedlam)
References[]
- Gordon, George. “Darkness.” The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Stephen Greenblatt. 8th ed. Vol. D. New York, London: Norton, 2006. 614-6.
- “Introduction.” The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Stephen Greenblatt. 8th ed. Vol. D. New York, London: Norton, 2006. 1-22.
- Paley, Morton D. "Envisioning Lastness: Byron's 'Darkness,' Campbell's 'the Last Man,' and the Critical Aftermath." Romanticism: The Journal of Romantic Culture and Criticism 1 (1995): 1-14.
- Schroeder, Ronald A. "Byron's 'Darkness' and the Romantic Dis-Spiriting of Nature." Approaches to Teaching Byron's Poetry. Ed. Frederick W. Shilstone. New York: Mod. Lang. Assn. of Amer, 1991. 113-119.
- Vail, Jeffrey. "'the Bright Sun was Extinguis'd': The Bologna Prophecy and Byron's 'Darkness'." Wordsworth Circle 28: 183-92.
- Wordsworth, William. “Lines: Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey. . .” The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Stephen Greenblatt. 8th ed. Vol. D. New York, London: Norton, 2006. 258-62.
- ---.“I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud.” The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Stephen Greenblatt. 8th ed. Vol. D. New York, London: Norton, 2006. 305-6.
Notes[]
- ↑ Introduction, 7
- ↑ Gordon 614
- ↑ Paley, 2
- ↑ Paley, 3
- ↑ Vail, 184
- ↑ qtd. in Vail 184
- ↑ Vail 183
- ↑ Vail 186
- ↑ qtd. in Vail 186
- ↑ ll. 122-123
- ↑ qtd. in Schroeder 116
- ↑ Schroeder, 116
- ↑ Schroeder 117
- ↑ see Matt 24:51
- ↑ ll. 35-37
- ↑ ll. 55-69
- ↑ ll. 45
- ↑ ll. 41
- ↑ see Matt 24:12
- ↑ ll. 81-82
- ↑ pg. 6
- ↑ ll. 38-39
- ↑ ll. 37
- ↑ Paley 6
- ↑ Paley, 6
External links[]
- Text
- "Darkness" in English Poetry II: From Collins to Fitzgerald, Harvard Classics
- About
- "Darkness" in Lord Byron's Poems Study Guide
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