Bringing Byron's poetry and prose into dialogue with other poets, novelists and thinkers, Jane Stabler argues that Byron puts himself and his readers on the front line of a debate about feeling, thought and how we read the world around us. Byron's phenomenal rise to fame in 1812 and his equally rapid cancellation in 1816 has fascinated and alarmed critics from his own day to our own. His poetry is still powerfully relevant and challenging today in the way it addresses free speech, hate speech, human rights, environmental destruction and the nature and boundaries of consciousness. Here, Stabler explores the affective and cognitive experience of reading Byron. Fresh attention to his manuscripts illuminates his textual addictions, his process of composition, his love of music, his comic timing and his determination to keep readers in the company of flesh and blood.