Now, I know a lot of people who don’t really read. Boys and Girls don’t seem to really read much these days, having been seduced by the joys of getting their cathartic kicks from the shores of Jersey and the gratuitous cum dumpster that is contemporary American television. A lot of you may be wondering: “What? You, the editor of a blog masquerading as some kind of ‘online magazine’ with vague literary pretentions, were the kid in year five sitting there in the corner reading the big fucking book? What are you, some kind of fucking nerd? Where’s the football and the obsessive athletic-excellence we expect of you?”

Now, to be honest I was never bad at sports and I’ve always somewhat enjoyed friendly low-key casual violence, but what I was always really good at was sitting down and churning through the pages of Japanese historical epics, and classic American fiction like John Candy tore through toilet paper after a ‘hogie’ binge. Since, I don’t know how to write to, about, or even properly referencing, anything that is of interest to a real woman, imma try and bring you lads over to the amazing world of the Literary Badass, in the hope that you’ll get off your lazy tv-obsessed ass and into a good book.

Miyamoto Musashi – Musashi by Eji Yoshikawa

Musashi is the samurai film, and by logical extension that means he was the first Jedi. Alive through the late 16th to the mid-17th centuries Musashi was a real dude who has become inseparable from his own mythos. Immortalised in Yoshikawa’s historical epic, Musashi is duly famous for being an all-round Kill Bill-style, sword wielding badass, philosophical and strategic innovator, and beatdowner of over 200 super-skilled men in one-on-one combat. And anyone who has done that two sword, head-chopping thing, from Obi Wan to Blade, owes Musashi big time. He invented that shit proper. The book clocks in at well over 1,000 densely packed pages, but they’re packed with duels to the death, and the gritty street life of feudal japan replete with drunks, gamblers, and whores.

Frederick Henry – Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemmingway

Frederick Henry is a very different kind of badass. Hemmingway’s usual projection of himself onto his character exhibits his ideal of grace in crisis. Henry is an American volunteer in the ambulance corps of the Italian army during World War I. The book is based upon Hemmingway’s own experience doing just that. During the bloodiest war in human history Hemmingway/Henry drove around in the midst of shelling, picking up the broken bits of soldiers. Amid this turmoil, and despite having his knee blown up by shell fragments, he manages to fall in love, develop cirrhosis of the liver, avoid being assassinated by his own army, create a baby, desert to Switzerland, and take tragedy like a real man. With stoicism, respect for his own grief, and a drink.

Hunter S Thompson – A Real Person, and Character

Thompson was a real person once, and a hell of a political journalist, but as the years rolled on his persona subsumed any kind of original personality he may have had. Fast motorbikes, high powered fire-arms, incredibly hard drugs and incredibly garish shirts all had their place in Thompson’s life. Fittingly one of these things killed him, but only when he wanted it to. Spitting invective and libel, both left and right, Thompson consistently satirised the political climate of his America with wit, brevity, and excess in equal measure. The man also forged an entirely new genre, part of a greater journalistic movement challenging the rigidity and  conceit of the fourth estate ideal. The public persona of Thompson was an inimitable maelstrom that filled his books with life and violence.

The classic Wuthering Heights follows on from Manfred quite nicely, the famous Heathcliff being Emily Bronte’s version of the Byronic hero. It is sumptuously Gothic, and I don’t mean the gothic that those annoying, cheap-velvet clad, eyelinered teens who hang around Flinders Street Station trying amazingly hard to not care about anything represent. I mean Gothic in the deliciously depressing, ghostly, all-consuming yet unrequited, doomed love kind of way. Though desolate, this is a wonderful, passionate novel that, while it might also leave you exhausted, will leave you with a feast for solitary ruminations on life and death.

For those who haven’t read it, the novel follows the life of one Mr Heathcliff, a badass orphan who grows to desperately love his adopted sister, Catherine. I know, cousins marry as well, but just try to ignore the rampant incest if it creeps you out, that was kind of how it was done in those days. Heathcliff and Catherine grow up on the isolated, desolate moors of Yorkshire, constantly running around in the freezing rain, until they stumble upon the only other house within miles of theirs (their house is called Wuthering Heights, hence the title). Inside this house (which is called Thrushcross Grange, for those playing at home) there is the perfect family, the Lintons, who take Catherine in after their dog almost kills her, and turn Heathcliff away like the gypsy he is.

After a marriage proposal from Edgar Linton, Catherine makes a famous speech to the housekeeper/narrator Nelly. If you don’t read anything else, I would recommend this section (it’s page 95 – 96 in the cheap Penguin Classics edition). Catherine passionately explains the difference between a love that is proper and one that is a part of her very being, the difference between what she should do and what her soul aches for. The space between the head and the heart has been a source of endless inspiration for writers since the invention of the pen (or quill, if you will). The great bard himself asked, “Where lies the better bread? In the heart or in the head?”  This is a question that ultimately leads our headstrong heroine to madness.

After this speech the novel gets a bit more confusing. Heathcliff disappears and returns inexplicably loaded, rich enough even to cheat his way into owning Wuthering Heights. He marries Isabella Linton purely out of spite and is an utter tyrant to everyone who is unfortunate enough to come near him… Catherine is forced to choose between Heathcliff and Edgar, a choice between the wild and the tame. She drives herself to insanity, constantly seeking solace in the icy wind which blows from the moors.

There is a second generation who have the names of the first. There’s more incest, cousins marry and rich men crumble to a sorry demise of drink and gambling. Catherine dies with Heathcliff’s name on her lips, and Heathcliff remains only to destroy the happiness of those around him. Without her he is miserable, he even digs up her grave and forces the marriage of her daughter to his son. Finally he is able to be with his love in death, and the two wander the moors as ghostly apparitions.

This novel can definitely be a slog, as the descriptive, flowery language is at times tiring and the plot gets decidedly difficult to follow, especially with the complicated family tree. Start at chapter three, then the real story (told by Nelly Dean, the housekeeper) begins at page 41 (again of the orange Penguin edition). If you were really lazy you could even start at Chapter six, but you’d miss out on some interesting back story. Try to stick with it until the end, it is interesting how the second generation have to deal with the problems of their parents and grandparents. It is a must for anyone with a wild heart, but be careful if you believe in ghosts.

Next time you’re wandering around any Uni Campus take note of this iconic creature: The Byron-fan. They can be found in dingy cafes smoking cigarettes or wondering aimlessly through leafy parks (usually in Autumn for dramatic affect). Their luxurious, literary outfits (which for some reason remind you of the last French Court’s obscene aristocracy) nonchalantly float with the breeze. If female then they’re sighing wistfully, dreamily, over the beautiful poetry their boyfriend might write for them (or they themselves might, if they’re brave enough), and if male then they’re frowning over many inconsequential philosophic dilemmas, for example whether to wear red or white socks with their old-fashioned, brown leather shoes. The women clutch their poetry books and dream of some guy with the poetic genius and sexual allure of the late, great Lord Byron (lets face it, the guy was a babe); and the gentlemen of this group delude themselves that, after last-might’s drunken scribblings, they actually are Byron. The men tend to use this persona for many purposes, the most popular use seems to be the idea of Byron-as-sex-god to justify cheating on their girlfriend. That’s right ladies, the bad-boy image that Byron cultivated in his lifetime has lived on, and now exists in rock stars, Jack Sparrow, motor-bike owners, in short the man that women believe they can change. After all, the Romantic poet was the model for Dracula, the sexist bad-ass that’s after your blood.

The idea of who Byron was (not necessarily who he really was, but who his fans like to imagine he was) pervades so much of our culture that we don’t even notice. Spike or Angel from Buffy are typical examples, super cool but ultimately bad news (bad, soul destroying news in Angel’s case). Ever the libertine, Byron left a string of mistresses, marriages and illegitimate children in his wake, to the extent that he had to leave England permanently in 1816 (alledgedly for having sex with his sister… eww). His attention seeking behavior didn’t help the reckless reputation, and throughout his youth it was understood in decent English society that Byron was ‘mad, bad and dangerous to know’. He travelled throughout Europe and exotic places like Greece and Egypt, wooing princesses and swimmming across oceans, all the while his adoring fans were creating the Byronic hero. His poetry (shocking at the time) has been adored by enamored (if not slightly delusional) women since. Besides reciting Don Juan, these women spend hours arguing in cafes that Byron was untamable and wild and free, which all sounds lovely, except when your Byron-boyfriend leaves you for a jaunt in the Alps and several lusty affairs. If you were one of the many women from Byron’s time you would not only be left high and dry, but you’d have a baby to look after and no real job-prospects… doesn’t sound like fun. And for those guys who believe a Byronic-lifestyle sounds great, I suggest (along with condoms) a read of Manfred.

The play begins at midnight in a gothic castle. Our tormented hero summons wordy, but ultimately ineffectual spirits to send him not to death, but to oblivion. The whole play is really one big suicide note, best read at night by candlelight in any castle you come across (preferably one in the Alps, if you can get it). Manfred languishes on mountain tops feeling sorry for himself about a terrible crime he committed. We are never told what the great crime actually is, but as the play goes on it becomes clear: he had sex with his sister, who was then driven to suicide. That’s right, all this melancholy and metaphysical depression and juicy, gothic angst has been caused by sex. For Manfred sex is totally inappropriate, illegal and in the end, soul destroying. He even summons his sisters ghost to beg for forgiveness, but, like the spirits from act one, she cannot help him. After this sex there is no consolation or even the prospect of peace for Manfred. Why would Byron, the enigmatic, exciting, oh-so-bad, worshipper on the alter of sex, write a play where sex causes the main protagonist to try and jump off a cliff? All of a sudden this bad-boy image has a very lonely consequence. Manfred calls up beings from heaven and hell, but none can help him be free of the curse that this incestuous sex has had on him. Incest also brings to mind the idea of loving oneself, and loving oneself too much, a fatal flaw in the Byronic ideal. Self-involvement to the point of blatant selfishness ultimately leads to depression and self-destruction. In the end, Manfred refuses to be taken to hell by the devil and dies on his own terms, turning his back of God, Satan and humanity in an attempt to find oblivion. Manfred is a rebel, and a prototype for the Byronic hero, but ultimately he has sex with his sister he is plagued by suicidal depression because of that sex.

So to all you bejacketed beloved beautiful boys who model their personality on that sexy dead poet, maybe stop and think about the depressing consequences of loving too many, too much. And for those literary ladies, who swoon before all Byron inspired heroes, think about what happens after Edward Cullen stops sucking your blood. Surely for the modern, empowered woman, a possible lover should be someone who doesn’t, like Manfred, derive all his power from taking away yours.

You can read Manfred by Lord Byron on Google Books, isn’t the internet wonderful!