8 July: Boreham on Percy Bysshe Shelley

A Poet's Pyre
Today marks the anniversary of the most moving drama in our literary history—the tragic death of Shelley. Of Shelley it may safely be said that most men are slow in acquiring an appreciation of him. His gorgeous imagery dazzles us. We are appalled by what some have described as his monotony of splendour. In the presence of Shelley we feel as we feel in the presence of some artistic triumph, the delicate technique of which we are not skilled to understand. We feel as we feel when listening to some musical masterpiece, the glories of which our untutored ears but faintly discern. Yet, just as we have often found it a valuable education to the eye to compel it to feast upon the noble canvas until its mystic beauties have broken upon us, and just as we have found it an excellent training to the ear to listen to the superb strains until we have begun to realise their intrinsic charm, so we have found it an enrichment both to heart and to mind to concentrate upon the stately minstrelsies of Shelley until the stanzas that at first seemed hopelessly beyond us, have begun to yield to our sluggish souls their choicest treasure.

In Shelley's case this intellectual and spiritual discipline is rendered less irksome by the personal magnetism of the man himself. Although his escutcheon is blotted by many of the irregularities that were the vogue of his day, it is impossible to stand unaffected by the charm that he perpetually radiates. As Principal Fairbairn says of him, he so feels the joy of existence that he carries his own skylark singing within his breast. He was born on Aug. 4, 1792. Less than thirty years later, on July 8, 1822, he was drowned in the Gulf of Spezzia. Yet, though so young, he had tasted life to the full and had found it good.

The Reckless Soul That Scorns All Consequence
The adventure that ended in his death reflected with remarkable precision the spirit of his life. It mirrored, as perfectly as any one episode could possibly do, his boyish recklessness, his knightly gallantry, and his uncalculating devotion to his friends. Leigh Hunt was coming from England to visit him, and Shelley, ever restless and impetuous, could not wait with folded hands for his arrival. Laughing at the perils that he courted, he set sail to meet his friend. That closing scene is tragically familiar. The seafaring men about the quay warned him that a storm was brewing; experienced sailors told him that it was madness to trust himself to a treacherous sea in an open boat, but nothing would dissuade him. An hour or two after his departure, a fierce squall swept the gulf, fishing-boats eager for shelter, came scudding under bare poles into the harbour, and, when the horizon cleared, Shelley's boat was nowhere to be seen. It was dredged up, months afterwards, from the bottom of the bay. Eleven days after the disaster, the poet's body was tossed up by the waves.

Like Homer and Dante and Milton, Shelley was moved to his loftiest lays by the poignant emotions awakened by the political excitements of his time. He was born when the French Revolution was at its height. The September massacres took place while he was lying in his cradle. During his boyhood, men were surveying the wreckage of that world-shaking convulsion, much as a crowd gapes at the blackened scene of a recent fire. The most convincing picture of Shelley that has come down to us is the picture of his participation in these noisy and exciting discussions. We see him at nineteen; he is just about six feet in height; he is slim, agile, and sinewy; his complexion is fresh and freckled; his huge shock of wavy brown hair makes his small round head look massive and imposing; his deep blue eyes, large and mild as stags' eyes, beam with an earnestness which, under the influence of passion, flames with enthusiasm. His voice, never melodious, and invariably high-pitched, becomes at times a positive screech. These political debates fired his very soul. They awoke his first burning desire for self-expression and prompted his earliest poems.

Poet Salutes Poet With A Pillar Of Flame
The scene that we commemorate today crowns the epic of a knightly life. Byron maintained that Shelley was not only the perfect poet, but the most finished gentleman of his period. Shelley's body was found by his friend Trelawny. Trelawny had served under Nelson and was himself one of the most colourful figures of that dramatic age. On discovering the dead poet, Trelawny resolved to commit the remains to an impressive funeral pyre. Collecting iron bars for the furnace, fuel for the fire, and oil and wine for the anointing of the body, he arranged a scene on that Italian beach that is as vivid and as memorable as anything in our history.

Byron, a lonely watcher, stood with head reverently bowed on a neighbouring sand dune. He looked on, he says, as long as he could; and then, his emotions mastering him, he turned sadly away, plunged into the sea and swam out to his yacht, anchored a hundred yards out in the bay. When the flames died down, and the smouldering heap could be approached, the heart alone remained unconsumed. Trelawny devoutly lifted it and gathered together the ashes. The heart he presented to Mrs. Shelley; the ashes were laid with those of Keats in the little English cemetery at Rome, a resting-place so beautiful that Shelley himself said of it that it was enough to make one fall in love with death. So fell the curtain on a drama—rich in pathos and chivalry and noble music—that becomes increasingly impressive as the generations pass. It was said of Keats that he ensphered himself in thirty perfect years and died not young; much the same tribute may be paid to Shelley.

F W Boreham

Image: Percy B Shelley