Chapter XLV: Letter 437: To Mr. Murray

"Ravenna, July 6. 1821.

"In agreement with a wish expressed by Mr. Hobhouse, it is my
determination to omit the stanza upon the _horse of Semiramis_ in
the fifth Canto of Don Juan. I mention this in case you are, or
intend to be, the publisher of the remaining Cantos.

"At the particular request of the Contessa G. I have promised _not_
to continue Don Juan. You will therefore look upon these three
Cantos as the last of the poem. She had read the two first in the
French translation, and never ceased beseeching me to write no more
of it. The reason of this is not at first obvious to a superficial
observer of FOREIGN manners; but it arises from the wish of all
women to exalt the sentiment of the passions, and to keep up the
illusion which is their empire. Now Don Juan strips off this
illusion, and laughs at that and most other things. I never knew a
woman who did _not_ protect _Rousseau_, nor one who did not dislike
De Grammont, Gil Bias, and all the comedy of the passions, when
brought out naturally. But 'king's blood must keep word,' as
Serjeant Bothwell says."

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LETTER, 438. TO MR. MURRAY.

"July 14. 1821.

"I trust that Sardanapalus will not be mistaken for a _political_
play, which was so far from my intention, that I thought of nothing
but Asiatic history. The Venetian play, too, is rigidly historical.
My object has been to dramatise, like the Greeks (a _modest_
phrase), striking passages of history, as they did of history and
mythology. You will find all this very _un_like Shakspeare; and so
much the better in one sense, for I look upon him to be the _worst_
of models[40], though the most extraordinary of writers. It has
been my object to be as simple and severe as Alfieri, and I have
broken down the _poetry_ as nearly as I could to common language.
The hardship is, that in these times one can neither speak of kings
nor queens without suspicion of politics or personalities. I
intended neither.

"I am not very well, and I write in the midst of unpleasant scenes
here: they have, without trial or process, banished several of the
first inhabitants of the cities--here and all around the Roman
states--amongst them many of my personal friends, so that every
thing is in confusion and grief: it is a kind of thing which cannot
be described without an equal pain as in beholding it.

"You are very niggardly in your letters.

"Yours truly,

"B."

[Footnote 40: In venturing this judgment upon Shakspeare, Lord Byron but followed in the footsteps of his great idol Pope. "It was mighty simple in Rowe," says this poet, "to write a play now professedly in Shakspeare's style, that is, professedly in the style of a bad age."--Spence, sect. 4. 1734-36. Of Milton, too, Pope seems to have held pretty nearly the same opinion as that professed by Lord Byron in some of these letters. See, in Spence, sect. 5 1737-39, a passage on which his editor remarks--"Perhaps Pope did not relish Shakspeare more than he seems to have done Milton."]

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