News at Eleven: In both instances, one of the biography's great

strengths is that [Edna] O'Brien approaches the other artist not as a subject--as a scholar would--but as a character, which is what any great novelist--as she surely is--would do. Thus, while the poems themselves hardly make an appearance in this life of Byron, O'Brien has copiously mined his correspondence, particularly the incomparable love letters, and the diaries of his last--and, one senses, most important--lover, Teresa Guiccioli, the Italian countess with whom he finally found the contentment that accompanied the composition of his masterpiece, "Don Juan." As O'Brien writes, "for all his swagger and bravado, Byron's real theme was love."

from Los Angeles Times: 'Byron in Love: A Short Daring Life' by Edna O'Brien

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