The two superstars of The Georgian Era.
George Gordon Byron, 6th Baron Byron
Commonly known simply as Lord Byron, was an English poet and a leading figure in the Romantic movement. Byron was celebrated in life for aristocratic excesses including huge debts, numerous love affairs, rumours of a scandalous incestuous liaison with his half-sister, and self-imposed exile. (It has been speculated that he suffered from bipolar I disorder.)
Percy Bysshe Shelley
one of the major English Romantic poets and is critically regarded as among the finest lyric poets in the English language. Considered too radical in his poetry and his political and social views to achieve fame during his lifetime, recognition of his significance grew steadily following his death. Percy Shelley was a key member of a close circle of visionary poets and writers that included Lord Byron; Leigh Hunt; Thomas Love Peacock; and his second wife, Mary Shelley.
You know Mary Shelley, I hope.
Ann Radcliffe
an English author and a pioneer of the Gothic novel. Her style is romantic in its vivid descriptions of landscapes and long travel scenes, yet the Gothic element is obvious through her use of the supernatural. It was her technique of explained Gothicism, the final revelation of inexplicable phenomena, that helped the Gothic novel achieve respectability in the 1790s.
She was inspirational to Austen, Byron, both Shelleys, Poe, and Dickens.
Jane Austen
English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature. Her realism and biting social commentary have gained her historical importance among scholars and critics.
