BYRON: the poetry of politics and the politics of poetry
The 39th International Byron Conference

1-6 July 2013, King’s College London, Strand Campus

Call for papers

This conference will examine Byron’s engagement with politics in the widest sense: as a poet, as a member of the House of Lords, as a commentator on his time, and latterly as a would-be revolutionary.

Academic sessions might include:

Byron and the politics of culture
Political style in Byron’s writing
Byron and the politics of the ‘Other’
Byron and the politics of emergent nations (Italy, Greece, the Americas)
Byron and the House of Lords
Byron and Napoleon
Byron as social satirist
Byron and revolution
Byron as liberal and/or libertine
Byron and religion
Byron and social class
Byron and gender/sexual politics
Byron and British political parties
Byron and imperialism
Byron and celebrity
Byron’s posthumous political influence
The ‘Byron legend’ (construction and/or appropriation)
‘Words and things’ (literature versus action in Byron’s life and work)

Proposals for papers on these and other aspects of Byron and politics, or the politics of Byron’s poetry, are welcome. Please send 250-word proposals by 28 February 2013 to byron.conference@kcl.ac.uk.