Byron’s Influence in Stoppard’s Arcadia
Byron's influence in Stoppard's "Arcadia"
Tom Stoppard's plays are famous for their status not simply as enjoyable works of drama, but also for the philosophical and historical introspection they provoke in the viewer. They can be read on two levels, both as dramas and as tracts. In Stoppard's "Arcadia" this bi-lateral kind of reading is also evident in the constructed two-fold structure of the play itself. The play is set in an English country manor house where two levels of action take place, the action of the present day, and the action set in 1809.
At first, the play centers on Septimus, a tutor of the wealthy daughter Thomasina, progeny of Lady Croom. However, after a quick ...
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the play is set, Lord Byron was perhaps one of the most famous of the Romantic poets, known in the words of Lady Caroline Lamb as "mad, bad, and dangerous to know." Byron was not simply a stylistic innovator in verse and poetic form. He was also the first modern celebrity, known for his colorful personal life that he dramatized in verse. His tumultuous relationship with Caroline Lamb was commemorated in the scathing "When We First Parted." His longest poem was "Don Juan," a catalogue of the young Don who was still so innocent at the poem's time period that he could not understand his mysterious attraction to women, even though they were falling in love at his feet at his every turn. Later, Byron, quite cognizant of his own sexual prowess, was to flee the country and his pregnant, young wife. He lived in Italy for a time before finally leaving to fight for freedom in Greece and to die in self-imposed exile. Byron idealized Greece, partly because of ancient, classical Greek ...
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At the time, there was a growing break between perfectly symmetrical and orderly classical forms in art and a more irregular 'picaresque' style that was supposed to reflect the disorderly nature of humanity. The continuing parallel debate in the mathematics establishment over chaos theory underlines the presence of chaos in all facets of human existence and the human experience. Byron's own irregular personal life, combined with his creations of new verse forms and new subjects of verse demonstrates the fundamentally more comprehensive nature of irregular artistic forms and the emotional truth of chaos theory. "The freaky stuff," according to Septimus, is turning out to be the real ...
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"Byron’s Influence in Stoppard’s Arcadia." Essayworld.com. October 12, 2015. Accessed April 25, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Byrons-Influence-in-Stoppards-Arcadia/105068.
"Byron’s Influence in Stoppard’s Arcadia." Essayworld.com. October 12, 2015. Accessed April 25, 2024. http://www.essayworld.com/essays/Byrons-Influence-in-Stoppards-Arcadia/105068.
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