Byron

One of the great literary biographies of our time - Independent on Sunday

The best book I’ve read for ages is Fiona MacCarthy’s … biography of Byron … Immaculately written, freshly researched, moving and only moderately filthy - Daily Telegraph

Deserves to be the definitive single-volume biography of Byron for many years to come - Observer

This book is a flawless triumph … The key to the book’s success is [MacCarthy’s] intelligent awareness of the overwhleming immportance of sex, in human life generally, in Byron’s life particularly - Country Life

MacCarthy makes it extravagantly clear why men and women once worshipped at Byron’s feet, and still worship at his grave - Mail on Sunday

It is hard to imagine any need for another full-scale biography … MacCarthy is good not just at the great sweep of [Byron’s] story but also at the little details that bring whole cultures to life - Mail on Sunday

Sparkling … MacCarthy succeeds brilliantly in offering an account that is not only impeccably researched but also presented in the sort of pacy, racy style that Byron himself might have appreciated - Daily Telegraph

A magisterial account of Byron’s life as a poet, public figure and serial shagger, this 674- page biography is both scholarly and readable … MacCarthy also pays due attention to the poetry, and charts his posthumous influence on figures as diverse as Disraeli, Oscar Wilde and W H Auden - Irish Independent

Fiona MacCarthy is one of the best known biographers in Britain, establishing her reputation with her widely acclaimed and controversial life of Eric Gill. Her magisterial biography of William Morris, won the Wolfson History Prize and her life of Edward Burne-Jones won the James Tait Black Biography Prize.

Fiona is a Senior Fellow of the Royal College of Art, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and an Hon. Fellow of Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford. In 2009 she was appointed OBE for services to literature.