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Read Ebook: The Works of Lord Byron. Vol. 5 Poetry by Byron George Gordon Byron Baron Coleridge Ernest Hartley Editor
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Ebook has 277 lines and 216897 words, and 6 pages
OF VOL. V
SARDANAPALUS: A TRAGEDY.
THE TWO FOSCARI: AN HISTORICAL TRAGEDY.
CAIN: A MYSTERY.
HEAVEN AND EARTH; A MYSTERY.
WERNER; OR, THE INHERITANCE: A TRAGEDY.
THE DEFORMED TRANSFORMED: A DRAMA.
THE AGE OF BRONZE; OR, CARMEN SECULARE ET ANNUS HAUD MIRABILIS.
THE ISLAND; OR, CHRISTIAN AND HIS COMRADES.
SARDANAPALUS
A TRAGEDY.
All that can be affirmed with any certainty is that within twenty years of the death of Asurbanipal, the Assyrian Empire passed into the hands of the Medes; but there is nothing to show whether the period of decay had already set in before the close of his reign, or under which of his two successors, ?sur-etil-il?ni or Sin-?ar-i?kun, the final catastrophe took place .
The character of Myrrha, which bears some resemblance to Aspasia, "a native of Phocea in Ionia--the favourite mistress of Cyrus" , was introduced partly to pacify the Countess Guiccioli, who had quarrelled with him for maintaining that "love was not the loftiest theme for true tragedy," and, in part, to prove that he was not a slave to his own ideals, and could imagine and delineate a woman who was both passionate and high-minded. Diodorus records the exploits of Myrina, Queen of the Amazons, but it is probable that Byron named his Ionian slave after Mirra, who gives her name to Alfieri's tragedy, which brought on a convulsive fit of tears and shuddering when he first saw it played at Bologna in August, 1819 .
THE ILLUSTRIOUS GOETHE
SARDANAPALUS.
PREFACE
In publishing the following Tragedies I have only to repeat, that they were not composed with the most remote view to the stage. On the attempt made by the managers in a former instance, the public opinion has been already expressed. With regard to my own private feelings, as it seems that they are to stand for nothing, I shall say nothing.
For the historical foundation of the following compositions the reader is referred to the Notes.
The Author has in one instance attempted to preserve, and in the other to approach, the "unities;" conceiving that with any very distant departure from them, there may be poetry, but can be no drama. He is aware of the unpopularity of this notion in present English literature; but it is not a system of his own, being merely an opinion, which, not very long ago, was the law of literature throughout the world, and is still so in the more civilised parts of it. But "nous avons chang? tout cela," and are reaping the advantages of the change. The writer is far from conceiving that any thing he can adduce by personal precept or example can at all approach his regular, or even irregular predecessors: he is merely giving a reason why he preferred the more regular formation of a structure, however feeble, to an entire abandonment of all rules whatsoever. Where he has failed, the failure is in the architect,--and not in the art.
In this tragedy it has been my intention to follow the account of Diodorus Siculus; reducing it, however, to such dramatic regularity as I best could, and trying to approach the unities. I therefore suppose the rebellion to explode and succeed in one day by a sudden conspiracy, instead of the long war of the history.
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
MEN.
PANIA.
ZAMES.
SFERO.
BALEA.
WOMEN.
SCENE.--A Hall in the Royal Palace of Nineveh.
SARDANAPALUS.
-- When they shine on my grave I shall know neither.
The hour is still our own--our power the same-- The night the same we destined. He hath changed 330 Nothing except our ignorance of all Suspicion into such a certainty As must make madness of delay.
Not a mere pillar formed of cloud and flame, A beacon in the horizon for a day, And then a mount of ashes--but a light 440 To lesson ages, rebel nations, and Voluptuous princes. Time shall quench full many A people's records, and a hero's acts; Sweep empire after empire, like this first Of empires, into nothing; but even then Shall spare this deed of mine, and hold it up A problem few dare imitate, and none Despise--but, it may be, avoid the life Which led to such a consummation.
FOOTNOTES:
?????' ??????' ?? ?? ????? ??? ????? ????? ?????????.
"What once I gorged I now enjoy, And wanton Lusts me still employ; All other things by Mortals prized Are left as dirt by me despised."
The MS. inserts--
About two miles and a half.
End of Act fifth.--B. Ravenne. May 27^th^ 1821. Mem.--I began the drama on the 13th of January, 1821, and continued the two first acts very slowly and at long intervals. The three last acts were written since the 13th of May, 1821 .
THE TWO FOSCARI:
AN HISTORICAL TRAGEDY.
The younger of the "Two Foscari" was a man of some cultivation, a collector and student of Greek manuscripts, well-mannered, and of ready wit, a child and lover of Venice, but indifferent to her ideals and regardless of her prejudices and restrictions. He seems to have begun life in a blaze of popularity, the admired of all admirers. His wedding with Lucrezia Contarini was celebrated with a novel and peculiar splendour. Gorgeous youths, Companions of the Hose , in jackets of crimson velvet, with slashed sleeves lined with squirrel fur, preceded and followed the bridegroom's train. A hundred bridesmaids accompanied the bride. Her dowry exceeded 16,000 ducats, and her jewels, which included a necklace worn by a Queen of Cyprus, were "rich and rare." And the maiden herself was a pearl of great price. "She behaved," writes her brother, "and does behave, so well beyond what could have been looked for. I believe she is inspired by God!"
After his son's death, the aged Doge, now in his eighty-fifth year, retired to his own apartments, and refused to preside at Councils of State. The Ten, who in 1446 had yielded to the Doge's plea that a father fretting for an exiled son could not discharge his public duties, were instant that he should abdicate the dukedom on the score of decrepitude. Accounts differ as to the mode in which he received the sentence of deposition. It is certain that he was compelled to abdicate on Sunday morning, October 23, 1457, but was allowed a breathing-space of a few days to make his arrangements for quitting the Ducal Palace.
On Monday, October 24, the Great Council met to elect his successor, and sat with closed doors till Sunday, October 30.
On Sunday, October 30, Pasquale Malipiero was declared Doge, and two days after, All Saints' Day, at the first hour of the morning, Francesco Foscari died. If the interval between ten o'clock on Sunday night and one o'clock on Tuesday morning disproves the legend that the discrowned Doge ruptured a blood-vessel at the moment when the bell was tolling for the election of his successor, the truth remains that, old as he was, he died of a broken heart.
"If," argued Heber, "there ever existed in nature a case so extraordinary as that of a man who gravely preferred tortures and a dungeon at home, to a temporary residence in a beautiful island and a fine climate; it is what few can be made to believe, and still fewer to sympathize with."
It was, no doubt, with reference to these criticisms that Byron told Medwin that it was no invention of his that the "young Foscari should have a sickly affection for his native city.... I painted the men as I found them, as they were--not as the critics would have them.... But no painting, however highly coloured, can give an idea of the intensity of a Venetian's affection for his native city."
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
MEN.
WOMAN.
SCENE--The Ducal Palace, Venice.
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