Lord Byron WHEN WE TWO PARTED poem analysis | Accentual Verse, Rhythm & Form | ROMANTICISM POETRY

Analysis of Romantic poet Lord Byron’s poem When We Two Parted, focusing on Byron’s use of accentual verse in the poem’s form & how the rhythm helps us understand the poem’s meaning (vis-à-vis public “shame” & private “silence”). Lord Byron WHEN WE TWO PARTED poem analysis & close reading.
The video:
- Starts by outlining some biographical background details & historical contexts of When We Two Parted (Lord Byron, Lady Frances Wedderburn Webster, Duke of Wellington, public rumours, & the Websters’ libel case
- Close reads & summarises the poem
- Analyses Lord Byron’s use of rhythm in the poem, especially in his use of accentual verse (including its definition)
- Considers the withdrawn stanza (which explicitly mentions Fanny) examining what it adds to the poem’s tone
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[@DrOctaviaCox]

*** Please excuse the banging sounds of the building work going on in the background ***

[@Jablicek]

Couldn't hear it over the sound of my neighbours having another conservatory added. :)

[@DrOctaviaCox]

@@Jablicek Ha! That'll drown it out!

[@dorothywillis1]

I didn't notice it, but I do want to take the opportunity to mention that, at least in places, the video was out of sync just a bit. I know you want your productions to be first-rate!

[@DrOctaviaCox]

@@dorothywillis1 Thanks for letting me know Dorothy. I am trying to improve the tech side of things.

[@katelouise9361]

@@DrOctaviaCox hey I just wanted to let you know as well when you put "analysis" in the bottom right corner of the thumbnail, the time stamp covers the "ysis" and just leaves the unsavoury first half. Hope that's helpful to know! Love your videos :)

[@jolieonetoo]

The historical context was really important here. Byron could be thought almost petulant in his attempt not to be upstaged by Wellington in matters of conquest of the virtue of the fairer sex. If, as your information suggests, his relationship with Fanny was merely platonic, but Wellington is mentioned publicly as receiving greater favours from the lady, then this must cut deep into the over-inflated ego of Lord Byron. How can he redress the balance when his notoriety as "mad, bad and dangerous to know" is diminished by being overshadowed by a successor in Fanny's affections? I feel that this is, in fact, the whole reason for the poem. Byron wants to make public that he knew her first and that she is not worth knowing now. In this way he pulls the rug out from under Wellington and pushes him back down the pecking order of the shockingly romantic blades of the day. Moreover, he does it with, as you pointed out, great wordskill and audible punch. Byron is showing off as only he can .

[@DrOctaviaCox]

Oh yes, definitely showing off! Showing off that he was 'there' first with Fanny. And then subsequently showing off his linguistic skills in describing their relationship.

[@nastyaissor7825]

Sounds like someone you don't want to piss off. He will always get his "revenge", very skillfully and elegantly. What a dangerous man!

[@nicoleallen3079]

It sounds like he’s trying to create his own drama. I wonder if anyone would have known if he didn’t write about it. How he wrote is incredibly fascinating. I would have never noticed the actual breakdown, just noticed the feel.

[@DrOctaviaCox]

Ha! - yes, publishing a poem about your own "silence" regarding an affair cannot be anything other than deliberately provocative, surely?

[@RaysDad]

I can imagine Lord Byron chuckling and admiring his own wit as he wrote this poem. Fanny and Lord Byron probably exploited each other to add to their naughty reputations. "Any publicity is good publicity!"

[@DrOctaviaCox]

Well Bryon certainly enjoyed courting it! One might almost say, he flirted with publicity.

[@robertgainer1395]

Considering the fourth stanza was originally unpublished, we are fortunate it was not lost and has been reunited to the poem. I read the poem without it as well as with it, and the significance of that stanza on the way the poem reads is major. If it is true to say that ‘Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned’, then I feel this is evidence that snubbing Byron’s ego also came close to such a fiery vengeance.

[@rmarkread3750]

Thank you! This was my introduction to this poem; it nourished and delighted me. It has been said that content should dictate form. On that level, each of Lord Byron's stressed syllables seems like the jab of a pen (or a knife?) by a bitter, vindictive man. This being my first exposure to the poem, perhaps my response might seem too vehement, but I've seldom felt such perfectly phrased cruelty before.

[@DrOctaviaCox]

Beautifully put! - I too find it to be a cruel poem. As you say, so brutally cutting!

[@Tevildo]

A very good point about the rhythm - it's very easy to force the emphasis to fit the "expected" meter, but reading the words naturally, by breaking the rhythm, makes us concentrate on the words that Byron considers important - "cold" and "long". The reason for his resentfulness and the sincerity of it, perhaps?

[@DrOctaviaCox]

Oh yes, I think he really did resent it when women went off _him_ - how very dare they! It's an odd paradox to condemn a person simultaneously for being too cold on the one hand and too warm (shall we say) on the other - and yet Byron manages it.

[@vickinoeske1154]

Thank you for the poem's breakdown, especially the rhythm, something I've never considered.

[@DrOctaviaCox]

My pleasure!

[@catherinelincoln9830]

I love this poem--and your comments! I'm struck by the power of single syllable words, almost all Anglo-Saxon origin, very few French or Latin derived. It reminded me of another poem about an angry breakup-"Since there's no help, come let us kiss and part, nai I have done you'll get no more of me!" BTW, the Duke of Wellington's flirtation with Lady Fanny was partly his preference for young Anglo-Irish aristocrats. Lady Fanny gave her son the middle name Byron...😏

[@kathleenfleming7519]

I feel as if I wasted my time in English Literature class in college. We parroted the poems- but never went over meter, rhythm, etc. Thank you for helping me better understand poetry.

[@DrOctaviaCox]

It's my pleasure, Kathleen. I'm glad you found it illuminating.

[@crabbytemptations1771]

I went to comprehensive school, did my GCSEs in 2000. We didn't even study poetry, aside from a few modern poems we had in our literature 'anthology' that weren't my cup of tea. I've had to start from scratch but it's been a wonderful adventure hearing poets like Byron for the first time. Thanks for the channel Dr Cox, just discovered it and instantly subscribed.

[@vickinoeske1154]

Well, well. Lord Byron is rather cheeky concerning Fanny when he was a player.

[@DrOctaviaCox]

Well, indeed!

[@dorothywillis1]

I want to thank you for these videos. It's been 50 years, without exaggeration, since I had the fun of participating in close reading in my advanced classes at UCLA. I appreciate having my attention drawn to the technical details of the poem, revealing that Byron was much more serious about his poetry than his public persona would imply. Unfortunately I was unable to really appreciate the poem when I first read it because I knew too much about its author. I found myself thinking, "Oh, come on! Look who's talking!" I think he was wise to omit the fourth stanza, as IMO it is weak, with a pettish tone, and four stanzas are enough to cover his topic. It also reveals him, not as a free spirit, but as the stuffiest of Victorians before there was such a thing. The thought of what he would have become had he lived is interesting. I am sure he would have seen himself as Steerforth and wept over that character's fate while highly approving the dreary fate of Little E'mly.

[@DrOctaviaCox]

Ha! - I like your description of Byron as a pre-Victorian stuffy Victorian rather than a free spirit. He seems to have applied completely different rules to himself and others (especially women). He could say and do what he liked, but not others! He was incredibly disdainful, for instance, of Lady Caroline Lamb's representation of him in her novel _Glenarvon_ (1816), in which he is cast as a sort of vampire figure who drains women of their lifeblood. Not wholly unlifelike you might say.

[@Tevildo]

A twentieth-century critic wrote "Byron would be forgotten today if he had lived to be an old gentleman with side-whiskers, writing very long, very able letters to 'The Times' on the repeal of the Corn Laws." Despite his reputation, it's not difficult to envision him in that role.

[@DrOctaviaCox]

@@Tevildo Ha! - rather Wordsworthian then? Wordsworth moved from being a young radical in the 1790s to 'an old gentleman with side-whiskers' type in the Victorian period.

[@dorothywillis1]

@@Tevildo Dying young was definitely a great career move for Byron! Growing old is a mistake for a poet.

[@amybee40]

@@dorothywillis1 Poets get more famous after they die, so the smart ones hurry up and do it.

[@CaroleMcDonnell]

one of my favorite poems by Lord Byron.

[@DrOctaviaCox]

It's a fascinating poem.

[@charlychips]

Simply love your channel.

[@jeka8826]

To me, "long LONG shall I RUE thee" sounds exactly like "they KNOW not I KNEW thee". I don't see any confusion on the accent there at all. Similarly, "and cold COLDer thy KISS" is very close to "foretold SORRow to THIS"; that rhythm would have been clear if he had put his line breaks in a different place. That choice of line breaks is what pulls my attention. I wonder why he chose to rhyme "cold" with "foretold" and make a reader stumble over the rhythm, rather than finding a rhyme for "cheek" or "kiss" and ending each line there to make the rhythm clear and easy. We know he was perfectly capable of the latter, so it seems writing the former must have been a conscious decision with a purpose in mind.

[@DrOctaviaCox]

That's a really fascinating point about the rhyme of "cold" and "foretold", and that being a conscious decision. Perhaps the implication is that her "cold[ness]" at that hour "foretold" _his_ coldness now in "this" hour which brings about her present "sorrow"? So, her past coldness has brought his present coldness back upon herself ... ?

[@matthewdavies269]

Really appreciate your videos. I’ve watched your Keats ones - are you planning to cover more of his work? Such as “I stood tiptoe upon a little hill…” and “What is more gentle than a wind in summer?”. Btw I really liked all your background info about Shelly’s England poem, it was a great insight into history through the context of a poem and poet

[@crabbytemptations1771]

It was surprisingly hard to find the deleted stanza online. It's a pity as it's a great stanza, albeit very mean

[@elmerl.fairbank7778]

The metrics are very reminiscent of a limerick. This gives me an insight into just what might have been going through his mind.

[@raehoward66]

What fun, I have never sought out analysis of poetry and here I am! With that said, my impression of what Byron is doing is to downplay "the affair" with ridiculousness. Every line is so over the top, I get the feeling he was trying to be a champion for Lady Frances and her husband by making fun of the idea of the affair in this exaggeration of a faux relationship while she was 7 months pregnant. Also, I hear mocking of the idea that women who have had relations outside of marriage and the societal punishments that go along with it are justified. I am comfortable with how off-my-rocker I could be in this conclusion. Or, he could be a narcissistic man-child oozing with privilage. I prefer to think the former.

[@kazz254]

Sounds like his ego was bruised. Story as old as time- men may do as they want and recover without much effort, but a woman once ruined , has no hope for recovery .

[@DrOctaviaCox]

Indeed - and in writing "the woman once falling | Forever must fall" Byron is himself contributing to that idea.

[@amybee40]

@@DrOctaviaCox I feel like, not merely contributing, he is using it as a threat. "If our relationship is made public too, you are the only one who will suffer for it."

[@markteltscher9746]

@Dr Octavia Cox I would like to send some paid work your way. Please can you post an email address where I can contact you?

[@Natopera]

The more I read of Byron the less I like him. Your videos on the other hand are awesome!

[@DrOctaviaCox]

He's a fascinating character I think - but yes deeply flawed and tricky. Thank you very much for your support! - I'm glad you like my videos.

[@Amcsae]

Wonderful video! I especially loved the part where you clapped along, as I've heard/read about "stressed syllables" in poetry before, but didn't really understand it. That helped so much!

[@DrOctaviaCox]

Oh good! My pleasure - I'm glad you found it helpful. I find it to be, generally, a helpful technique to try and clap stresses out loud whenever I'm investigating rhythm in poetry. I think it's something to do with physicalising it. It also helps to highlight more clearly when there are oddities or unusual parts of the meter.

[@Jablicek]

Right, I've had a think and decided that Byron wasn't particularly nice to his ex-lovers.

[@DrOctaviaCox]

Ha! - no indeed!

[@DrOctaviaCox]

What are your thoughts on Byron’s poem When We Two Parted?

[@CaroleMcDonnell]

Dang, he was petty! He's a poet i always liked and pitied, even so i always felt if i knew him i would just want to slap some sense into his pretentiousness. reminds me of a very immature college kid being way too indulgent of his schadenfreude.

[@bonniehagan9644]

The cadence is quite bouncy and dance like, so I definitely concur with the mockery angle. However, I wonder if it's not a bit of a facade. A sort of laughing public face while inwardly aching. I'm greatly enjoying your channel. Thank you!

[@stephenkoritta9656]

Stunning analysis! Sends me off to my day in a contemplative mood.

[@DrOctaviaCox]

Oh, thank you. I hope you enjoy your contemplative day.

[@stephenkoritta9656]

@@DrOctaviaCox as you clapped along to the metre, I couldn't help but remember Robin Williams line from Dead Poet's Society. "I like Byron. I'd give him a 42 but I can't dance to him." Obviously they've never read this one. 😉

[@HRJohn1944]

Loved this, but I thought that you were a bit soft on Byron, who is essentially saying "It's my job to dump the woman, not the woman's to dump me". Love his poetry, but he was a disgusting MCP ("Man's love is of man's life a thing apart/Tis woman's whole existence....."). And I've learned a few new words - can't wait for an excuse to use "epizeuxis" (what is the technical term - apart from "windbaggery" - for Neil Kinnock's "..a Labour council - A LABOUR council - ...."?).

[@DrOctaviaCox]

Ha! - thank you. Epizeuxis can be used to describe phrases too.

[@janpsillos5513]

To bad Fanny didn't write one about a little winky.

[@kirstena4001]

Could the 'doubly undone' be a rather snide reference as well to her clothes being 'undone'? If his relationship with Fanny was not physical, he could be highlighting the difference between their 'pure' affair of the heart, and this more sordid affair. So she is 'undone' spiritually/socially, but also literally...

[@nastyaissor7825]

Fantastic as always! Can I express a hope to hear more on the subject?

[@DrOctaviaCox]

Thank you very much for your support! Is that more on Byron or more on rhythm .. ?

[@nastyaissor7825]

@@DrOctaviaCox everything! Especially Byron

[@DrOctaviaCox]

@@nastyaissor7825 Ha! - noted.

[@esdraspinto6301]

you are such a clever woman! I loved learn this poem from you

[@lismarcel]

Byron had a tendency to call the kettle black... I'm writing a lesson on Ada Lovelace and I'm happy because it will give an opportunity to rant about him, haha

[@tangiblethursday]

This poem makes me hate Byron. If I heard a dude talking about a woman like this in real life I would probably slap him.

[@terrikennedy3088]

... coordinating drapery and blouse, very tastefully done.

[@TheJimbaHut]

Accentual verse is sadly underrated. Thank you.

[@myrtle1234]

One hopes that the metrics on this site are correctly reporting the view count on your content. Some of the videos on this channel have five commercials per thirty-five minute segment. It’s by far the most I’ve ever seen. Your contributions are certainly lucrative for someone.

[@amybee40]

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