17th May 2017

Lord Byron: The Major Works - George Gordon Byron, Jerome J. McGann

In secret we met
In silence I grieve,
That thy heart could forget,
Thy spirit deceive.

 

George Gordon Byron

 

May 17, 1824: Before dying in Greece, Lord Byron entrusted a friend with his memoirs. Other friends, worried that the memoirs would be scandalous, fought to destroy the manuscript—190 years ago today, they succeeded, tearing it up and burning it in the office of Byron's publisher.