Byron is a great satirist. The Augustan age is essentially an age of satire and Byron, too, has his fascination for satires. In his poetry Byron has satirised love, war, women, politicians, English society and even his own contemporaries. While satirising them, he has used different techniques. To understand Byron’s poetic technique it is essential that we should compare it with that of Dryden and Pope. Like all other satirists, Byron, too uses certain devices to achieve his characteristic effect. The satires of Dryden and Pope have monotithic structure – monolithic in the sense that they never digress. But Byron is always digressive. There is too much of digression in his satires. But Byron’s satires are certainly not dull, and it is because of his digressions. It is the satiric spirit only that links him with the Augustan tradition. The models of Dryden and Pope are the Latin satirists – Horace and Juvenal, but the models of Byron are the Romantic Italian satirists Pulci and Casti. The present paper is an attempt at exploring Byron’s technique in his poetry
Associate Professor, Dept. of English Nalanda College, Biharsharif, Nalanda
