Byron and the Forms of Thought

An Open Access edition of this book is available on the Liverpool University Press website and the OAPEN library. Byron and the Forms of Thought is a major new study of Byron as a poet and thinker. While informed by recent work on Byrons philosophical contexts, the book questions attempts to describe Byron as a philosopher of a particular kind. It approaches Byron, rather, as a writer fascinated by the different ways of thinking philosophy and poetry are taken to represent. After an Introduction that explores Byrons reception as a thinker, the book moves to a new reading of Byrons scepticism, arguing for a close proximity, in Byrons thought, between epistemology and poetics. This is explored through readings of Byrons efforts both as a philosophical poet and writer of critical prose. The conclusions reached form the basis of an extended reading of Don Juan as a critical narrative that investigates connections between visionary and political consciousness. What emerges is a deeply thoughtful poet intrigued and exercised by the possibilities of literary form.