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And Lord Byron.

Byron fits the template to perfection. In marked contrast, Lady Byron has been
variously portrayed as reserved, awkward, humourless, judgemental, religiously self-

righteous and hypochondriac, addicted to rest-cures. A more sympathetic recent
biographer, Julia Markus, while admitting Annabella’s personal failings, accuses
Byron scholars as misrepresenting her as a “demented and dull-witted demon”. She
points out that this is true of all the women in Byron’s life, including his half-sister
Augusta, lovers such as Lady Caroline Lamb. All have been treated as more-or-less
unsatisfactory extras in the life of Lord Byron.

Markus makes Lady Byron the focus and portrays her much more positively:
intelligent and well-read, interested in maths and astronomy (Lord Byron mocked her
as the “princess of parallelograms”), a single parent who brought up Ada single-
handed and oversaw her education, through which she gained an interest in
education and became a philanthropist, founding two schools for the poor. She also
took up the causes of slum improvement, the abolition of slavery and women’s
rights. Markus acknowledges that Annabella was not perfect and could be difficult,

but concludes that she was a woman of intelligence and imagination who made
something of her life in difficult circumstances, “a worthy but complex woman who
led a big life that is still unsung.”