Percy Bysshe Shelley

1
Percy Bysshe Shelley
This is Percy
This is Mary

• A man bullied for his looks

2
Facts of Life

• Bullied all through school and university
• Led to his obsession with reading, rumored to be
  16 hours a day
• Unpopular with both students and teachers (he
  never attended class)
• Published poetry and periodicals while still in
  school
• Was expelled from school because of a poem he
  wrote

3
On the move

• Moved away from England at 19 to get married ( to
  16 year old Harriet).
• Wanted an open marriage, but his wife wouldnt
  allow it moved to Ireland
• Unhappy with his marriage, Shelley would leave
  his wife and child to visit friends
• Fell in love with Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin,
  daughter of Mary Wollstonecraft, womens rights
  activist

4
Influences

• Abandons his pregnant wife and child to run away
  with Mary. They had only been married three
  years.
• Deeply influenced by William Blakes poetry
• Met Lord Byron through Marys step-sister both
  men influenced each others work
• Shelley tried to gain custody of his children,
  whose mother had killed herself. He lost and
  they were given to foster parents

5
A tragic end

• In 1822, Shelley and a friend went sailing off
  the northwestern coast of Italy.
• A storm caught them by surprise, capsized the
  boat, and both men drowned.
• Shelley was only 30 years old.

6
Messages of his poetry

• Idealism
• Nonconformity
• Opposition to all injustice
• Change the world through love, imagination, and
  poetry
• Too radical for most romantics
• Vegetarianism