 |
surfresearch.com.au
byron : childe harold, 1911 |
| home | catalogue | history | references | appendix |
|
Illustrated with a photograph from the surfing photographer, A. R. Gurrey, Jr., whose work was reproduced in many early editions of The Mid-Pacific Magazine.
The poem also appeared in A.R. Gurrey Jr.'s
Surf
Riders of Hawaii.
A.R. Gurrey Jr., Honolulu, 1911-1914,
page 3.
The Byron quotation
was followed two issues later (Volume 2 Number 4) with a poem by John
M. Giles titled Surfing.
See:
1911 John M.
Giles : Surfing (a poem).
Extract from The Mid-Pacific Magazine,
Volume 2, Number 4, October,1911, pages a and b.
George Gordon
Byron
"George Gordon Byron
(22 January 1788 – 19 April 1824) was celebrated in life for aristocratic
excesses including huge debts, numerous love affairs, and self-imposed
exile."
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord_Byron
"In 1810, Byron swam
across the Hellespont (the Dardanelles), at the narrowest point a little
over 1 kilometer across.
His inspiration
was the Greek myth of Leander who every night swam the straits to see his
lover, Hero, who would hold a torch from atop a tower, to light his way.
During a violent
storm Leander drowned and, witnessing his death, Hero threw herself from
the tower into the sea."
- http://www.readytogoebooks.com/LB-Swim-P67.html
Childe Harold's
Pilgrimage
"Childe Harold's
Pilgrimage was published in 1818 (text on Wikisource) was published
between 1812 and 1818 and is dedicated to "Ianthe", the term of endearment
he used for Charlotte Harley (the artist Francis Bacon's great-great-grandmother).
The poem describes
the travels and reflections of a world-weary young man who, disillusioned
with a life of pleasure and revelry, looks for distraction in foreign lands;
in a wider sense, it is an expression of the melancholy and disillusionment
felt by a generation weary of the wars of the post-Revolutionary and Napoleonic
eras.
The title comes
from the term childe, a medieval title for a young man who was a
candidate for knighthood.
The selected passage
is from Canto IV, Stanza 184."
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Childe_Harold%27s_Pilgrimage
Additional Source Documents
1765 John Byron
: Tuamotus and the Gilbert Islands
Extracts from Byron
in Hawkesworth: Voyages in the Southern Hemisphere, (1773), Volume
1?
1825 Lord Byron
: Liliah and Floatboards.
Extracts from Voyage
of the 'H.M.S. Blonde' to the Sandwich Islands in the Years 1825-26.
John Murray, Albemable
Street, London. 1826. Pages 97, 137 and 138, 166, 206 to 209.
 |
And I have loved
thee, Ocean! and my joy
Of youthful sports
was on thy breast, to be
Borne, like thy
bubbles, onward; from a boy
I wantoned with
thy breakers, - they come to me
Were a delight;
and if the freshening sea.
Made them a terror,
t'was a pleasing fear;
For I was as
it, were a child of thee,
And trusted to
thy billows far and near,
And laid my hand
upon thy mane,
As I do here.
|
The Mid-Pacific Magazine Published by Alexander Hume Ford, Honolulu, Territory of Hawaii, Volume 2, Number 2, August,1911, frontpiece. |
| home | catalogue | history | references | appendix |