All at sea: Byron as a nautically-minded landlubber 

All at sea: Byron as a nautically-minded landlubber, a talk by Miranda Seymour, author of In Byron's Wake, on Thursday 17 October at 5 pm.

Although he claimed to enjoy swimming as much as lovemaking, Byron was the odd one out in a naval family. Admirals and captains litter the Byron family tree. Byron’s own personal hero among them was ‘Foulweather Jack’, the intrepid great-uncle whose doomed voyage on the Wager provided some grim details for Don Juan’s nautical adventures. In this talk Miranda Seymour will explore Byron’s own love affair with the sea, from the boats he enjoyed making as a child, to his hero-worship of Admiral Byron, to his use of John Byron’s adventures for Don Juan, to his personal delight in the Bolivar, the fancy yacht Lord Byron kept at Genoa and sold to the fathomlessly wealthy Lord Blessington. Seymour will also focus on Byron’s beguiling and tragically short-lived grandson, Byron Ockham, who crossed the world as a fourteen-year-old midshipman and later worked in Brunel’s shipyard. Rebellious young Viscount Ockham, it’s fair to guess, would have been as much adored by his grandfather as he was by Ada Lovelace (his despairing mother) and by Byron’s widow, the sea-loving Annabella Milbanke. 

Admission is Free but booking is required due to the limited number of seats (write to info@keats-shelley-house.org). Entry from 4:45 p.m. onwards.

MIRANDA SEYMOUR, celebrated as a biographer, novelist, memoir writer and critic, has been a visiting professor at Nottingham Trent University. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. She is the author of the award-winning memoir, In My Father’s House. Her many acclaimed biographies include: A Ring of Conspirators, an innovative study of Henry James and his literary circle; Ottoline Morrell: Life on a Grand Scale; Robert Graves: Life on the Edge; Mary Shelley; In Byron’s Wake, The Bugatti Queen and I Used to Live Here Once: The Haunted Life of Jean Rhys.