Imported Poems

FINALLY!

Sleepywitch, I have to submit a thesis for graduate school, and since I didn't have one lying around the house I got to write one of my own choosing -which excited me, because this paper has been written in my head for some time. You only read part of the chronological part; my approach (which, btw, for me is always a "loose notion" as to how to go about it) included

1) Introducing the topic and defining madness
2) Delineating relevant family history (nature/biology)
3) Delineating environmental history (nurture; life experiences)
4) Explaining how each's disorder affected their lives
a) how their madness benefitted them
b) how their madness destroyed them
5) How madness manifested itself in their work
6) How the legacies of their work reflected the authors themselves

For anyone who has been reading along, here is the last part. For anyone who wishes to read the whole thing, I've posted it here:

http://www.online-literature.com/for...162#post498162

It is remarkable how two individuals, separated by time, literary movements and culture, would nevertheless be united by virtue of their circumstances, and yet Byron and Wilde endured similar childhood experiences, classical Greek education, migrations to England and consequently affliction under English oppression that served to unify them not only in their tastes, but also in their thoughts. Both writers were both closeted homosexuals, although Byron’s rampant homosexuality - like his rampant heterosexuality - was only one byproduct of the hyper-sexuality associated with the manic phase of Bipolar Disorder, while Wilde’s seemed to reflect the narcissism that can often accompany it (note: just as all narcissists are not homosexuals, neither are all homosexuals narcissists). The bard and playwright also shared a predilection for “dandyism”, Greek ideals, and dangerous liaisons, with Byron foraying into incest and Wilde participating in rough trade - but these are merely shallow similarities.
Perhaps the greatest commonality shared between these two lies in their fundamental philosophy, the unique combination of Neo-Hedonism, religion and gothic elements that pervaded their lives and consequently, work. Wilde’s amalgamation of these elements within the symbolic context of his own personality as depicted in “The Picture of Dorian Gray” reflects the natural evolution of Byron’s individual philosophy as manifested in his epic work, “Manfred” - the poem primarily responsible for producing the legacy of “The Byronic Hero”.
In September 1813, Byron penned these words, a theory by which he came to live: “The great object of life is Sensation - to feel that we exist - even though in “pain” - it is this “craving void” which drives us to Gaming - to Battle - to Travel - to intemperate but keenly felt pursuits of every description whose principal attraction is the agitation inseparable from their accomplishment”. For Bryon, the epoch of sensation was the feeling produced through observation of and union with the beautiful and the sublime, both in nature, as demonstrated in his panegyric to the Mediterranean - “Childe Harold‘s Pilgrimage“, and in human face and form, as evinced in many of his love poems. Unfortunately for Byron, giving act to every agreeable impulse resulted in tragedy, most notably incest with his half-sister and his subsequent guilt and exile, events that became content for his Faustian, gothic poem, “Manfred”. In Manfred the protagonist, ridden with remorse, appeals to supernatural spirits for forgiveness and commits suicide when he realizes he cannot alter the past. For the bard, beauty and sensation were forever entwined with love and death, themes that became his legacy via “The Byronic Hero” - the bipolar dark figure of literature, plagued by passion and besieged by guilt, a figure complete with a sadistic superego and a contumacious id, both self-condemning and eternally condemned.
The tyrannical forces of beauty and sensation re-emerged in the Aesthetic and Decadent Movements, albeit in a different form, of which Wilde was the predominant figure. Forsaking the sense of guilt that characterized most of Byron‘s work , Wilde’s particular brand of aesthetic decadence emphasized beauty and sensation to the exclusion of any moral conscience, as exemplified in his Faustian, gothic novel, “The Picture of Dorian Gray”, a book that has been recognized by the psychiatric community as being “The Picture of a Narcissistic Personality”. Not surprisingly the character of Dorian, who is more or less the symbolic personification of Wilde’s own immature ego, lacks sufficient enough resources to act independently on any fundamental level; as a result, he is only propelled into motion by others, specifically Basil and Lord Henry, representing Wilde’s superego and id, respectively. When Basil’s portrait awakens Dorian’s consciousness of his own loveliness and his subsequent vanity, just as Narcissus’ was awakened by his reflection in the pool, he becomes susceptible to Lord Henry‘s toxic advice, which is to pursue beauty and sensation as the primary objects of life (the Id). Consequently Dorian sells his soul for eternal youth, an exchange that leaves him untouched by time but causes the picture (his image) to age. Once he murders Basil - the last remnant of his conscience - he becomes entirely free to violate the principles of God and man, a choice which inevitably leads to his destruction. The Faustian theme culminates in Dorian stabbing his portrait in an attempt to assassinate the reflection of his own soul, an act which unites body and spirit at the moment of death.
Although Wilde proposed that “no artist has ethical sympathies”, Dorian’s downfall clearly signifies Wilde’s awareness that a neo-hedonism devoid of morality destroys, the exact sentiment reflected in Byron’s Manfred. What Byron laid bare in a single protagonist, Wilde had concealed in allegory, transforming contradictory impulses into characters, and demonstrating that Dorian’s narcissistic pathology - his inability to empathize and sympathize, and his apathy towards his own state - did not mitigate his condition nor thwart his fate.
“Manfred” and “Dorian Gray” both idolize beauty and sensation at the expense of their souls, resulting in Faustian-like destruction, and both works juxtapose such gothic elements as supernaturalism and terror with religious sentiments, predestined reprobation (Byron) and Catholic damnation (Wilde). If the poet’s legacy is the bipolar, “Byronic Hero”, then certainly the playwright’s could be called the narcissistic, “Wildean Protagonist“. Though these two literary authors were separated by time and by different disorders, they lived similar lives and produced similar legacies: mythological characters reflecting their own personalities.