Percy Bysshe Shelley17921822 Boston College佩尔西·雪莱17921822波士顿学院.pptVIP

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822) Born in Sussex into a wealthy landowning family. Son of an MP. Eldest of six children. 1804: Attends Eton. Called “mad Shelley” by his classmates. 1810: Oxford University; friendship with Hogg. Immerses himself in philosophy; becomes vegetarian. 1811: Expelled from Oxford for publishing and circulating his pamphlet “The Necessity of Atheism.” Percy Bysshe Shelley 1811: Elopes with 16yr. old Harriet Westbrook. 1812: In Ireland, urges Catholic emancipation and justice for the poor. Writes Queen Mab. Meets William Godwin. 1814: Elopes with Mary, Godwin and Wollstonecraft’s daughter. Writes Alastor. 1816: Geneva circle with Byron. Begins Prometheus Unbound. Mary writes Frankenstein. Harriet drowns herself. Friendship with Leigh Hunt editor of The Examiner. Meets John Keats. Shelley: Major Works 1816-17: “Hymn to Intellectual Beauty”; “Mont Blanc” 1819: Completes Prometheus Unbound; The Cenci; The Mask of Anarchy about the Peterloo Massacre; A Philosophical View of Reform; Ode to the West Wind. 1820-22: To a Sky-Lark; Adonais (an elegy for Keats.) Defence of Poetry (published posthumously in 1840); The Triumph of Life. 1822: Drowns at sea at the age of 29. * * * * * He was not made to endure the rough and boisterous pastime of Eton, and his shy and gentle nature was glad to escape far away to muse over strange fancies; for his mind was reflective, and teeming with deep thought. His lessons were childs play to him.... His love of nature was intense, and the sparkling poetry of his mind shone out of his speaking eyes when he was dwelling on anything good or great. He certainly was not happy at Eton, for his was a disposition that needed especial personal superintendence to watch and cherish and direct all his noble aspirations and the remarkable tenderness of his heart. He had great moral courage and feared nothing but what was base, and false, and low.