Lord Byron chased women (and men), lived extravagantly, was constantly in debt, traveled all over Europe, and died at the tender age of 36 after joining the Greeks in their war for independence from the Ottoman Empire. Oh yeah, and in the middle of all that, he wrote one of the most famous Romantic poems: Don Juan.

Byron had a short life, but boy did he live it to the fullest. He's one of the giants of Romanticism, and is as famous for his crazy life as he is for his great poetry. Byron gave us the notion of the "Byronic hero." You know you're good when you have a literary term named after you.

Don Juan (1819)

If the name "Don Juan" evokes a whole host of associations—heartthrob, lover, heart-breaker, skirt-chaser—that's largely thanks to Byron's famous poem by the same name. Byron didn't invent Don Juan—there were legends and stories about him way before Byron came along and wrote about him. But Byron made Don Juan world-famous. And the cool thing is, this is a Romantic poem that actually deals with romance. As in, the romance of lovers. Thank you Byron for giving us the great romantic poem of Romanticism.

Childe Harold's Pilgrimage (1812-1818)

Byron's other great work tells the story of a young man who travels through foreign lands (similar to what Byron himself did, of course). Childe Harold's Pilgrimage gives us a perfect example of the "Byronic hero": The smart, handsome, moody protagonist who doesn't really respect figures of authority. Sound a little like Byron himself? That's because the poem is semi-autobiographical.

Chew on This

We have to thank Byron for writing romantic poems that are, actually, about romance. But even when he's writing about a woman, he can't help but talk about nature. See how love is figured in terms of natural imagery in his poem "She Walks in Beauty."

Here's an example of the rowdy "Byronic hero," Childe Harold, from the first canto of Childe Harold's Pilgrimage. The quote is the fourth from the top.