42 The Rice Institute Pamphlet
others as a poet of reform. But does he not also have a phi-
losophy which is characteristic of our time?
An article entitled “Byron in Our Day” appeared in 1907,
and I assume that each generation has thought of Byron as
having aspects peculiarly suited to its own age. The reason
for this fact is, I suppose, that basic human problems, hopes,
and desires are, like the abbé’s book, “indissoluble and
eternal.” The poet or dramatist who treats these social prob-
lems is not writing for his own, but for all ages. Thus we can,
in one very real sense, speak of “Byron in Our Day” and
present evidence substantiating the fact that his doctrines
are as suitable to 1949 or 1950 as they were to 1907, or, for
that matter, 1812 or 1823.
But do we not have more reason for opening our Byron?
Are not his ideas on freedom, tyranny, slavery, and oppression
applicable to this day of the United Nations Organization
with its Declaration of Human Rights? Now, when “free-
dom from oppression” and “human rights” are key phrases,
Byron speaks to us again; and there are indications that we
are turning to him with new interest and understanding. We
may laugh at the aspects of musical comedy heroism in his
life, or at his clever satire of current social, economic, and
political questions; but we can also be strengthened by the
fact that his hopes for tire future of man were the same as
ours, and that he was unrelenting in his efforts to help secure
the freedom he advocated. Shades of the Byronic hero have
haunted the poet from the time of the publication of the
Turkish Tales to the present. They have colored our reading
of Childe Harold and other poems and have influenced our
attitude toward his life and its achievements on behalf of
humanity. To see Byron only in terms of the Byronic hero,
however, is to take a fleeting glimpse of him. Other glimpses
reveal the subjectivism caused by the personal tragedy of