Claire Clairmont and the Shelleys (Magill’s Literary Annual 1991-2005)
At a glance:
- Author: Robert Gittings, Jo Manton
- First Published: 1992
- Type of Work: Literary biography
- Time of Work: 1798-1879
- Setting: England, Italy, Austria, Russia, Germany, and France
- Principal Characters: Claire Clairmont, William Godwin, Mary Godwin Shelley, George Gordon, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Percy Florence Shelley, Allegra, Jane St. John Shelley
- Genres: Nonfiction, Biography
- Subjects: France or French people, Love or romance, Nineteenth century, England or English people, Austria or Austrians, Italy or Italians, Germany or German people, Romanticism, Russia or Russian people
- Locales: France, England, Germany, Italy, Russia, Austria
In December, 1826, Claire Clairmont wrote to Jane Williams Hogg,
I am unhappily the victim of a happy passion. I had one—like all things perfect in its kind it was fleeting and mine only lasted ten minutes but those ten minutes have discomposed the rest of my life. The passion, God knows for what cause…disappeared, leaving no trace whatever behind it, except my heart wasted and ruined as if it had been scorched by a thousand lightnings.
The happy passion to which Claire refers was her love for George Gordon, Lord Byron, whom she had sought out in 1816. Byron at...
[The entire page is 1941 words long]
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