THE RAFFISH, 1821
Mary sitting in the sand;
a small sealed box on one knee
Detained,
missing my carriage,
on a day when shadows
dared to be rooks,
I was without a reason
for my English intolerance
--isn't it all sagas,
how fashion flaunts the Masses!
On the promenade among them
faces became dim and boring,
my mind sent forth a voice
loudening in words like "lowly"--
Pisa,
I shunted your showy peasants!
Curiosity brought about my stroll...
Portrait of Jane Williams -- George Clint
Early in 1820 the Shelleys moved to Pisa and began their last perid together. Mary had already published "Frankenstein" to great acclaim, though some readers mistakenly believed that Percy had done most of the writing. In Pisa she resumed writing, mainly for her father's upkeep, since he would get the royalties. Percy, a believer in free love, continued his adulterous ways. Percy's cousin, Thomas Medway, visited them in Pisa and, early in 1821, introduced them to Edward Williams (with whom he had seved in the army in India) and his common-law wife Jane, who, however, was still married to another man. The Shelleys changed their Pisa residences frequently; in May 1821 they moved back to their summer home in Bagni di San Giuliano,and the Williamses moved to Pugnano, four miles away. In October the Shelleys moved back to Pisa, at Tre Palazzi di Chiesa, and were soon joined in Pisa by Lord Byron and his new mistress. The Shelleys and the Williamses moved into a small house in a remote location near Lerici, where they were visited in early 1822 by Edward John Trelawny, a friend of Medway and the Williamses and an admirer of Percy and Byron. The fatal circle was then complete.
ReplyDeleteIn April the Shelleys and Mary's half-sister Claire took a summer residence at Casa Magni, San Terenzo, where they were joined by the Williamses in May. In June Mary miscarried Percy's last child and nearly died from the resulting hemorrhaging, leaving her depressed and irritable. As a result, Percy became infatuated with Jane, seeing her as the embodiment of ideal womanhood, though he hid his flirtation from Mary. Jane had been raised in part in exotic India, where she learned Hindi, and not only sang well but also played the flute, harp, and guitar, sometimes incorporating Indian harmonies into her music. He bought her a guitar, which she kept for the rest of her life and played often, and commemorated the gift in the poem "With a Guitar, to Jane;" since the guitar was made by Ferdinando, he cast himself as Ariel, the spirit of fire and air, and the Williams as Miranda and Ferdinand, three characters from William Shakespeare's penultimate play, "The Tempest." It read in part,
ReplyDeletePoor Ariel sends this silent token
Of more than ever can be spoken;
Your guardian spirit, Ariel, who
From life to life must still pursue
Your happiness,-- for thus alone
Can Ariel ever find his own.
Percy also purchased her a flageolet and wanted to give her a harp, but it was too expensive. Though she did not openly share his ardor, he wrote 11 poems for her, making Jane his last great muse. Expecting that Jane and Edward read these poems together, Percy tried to disguise his feelings for her, and in some cases he addressed them to both Edward and Jane. In "To Edward Williams," which he hinted that he did not want Jane to read, he was even less discreet, beginning, "The serpent is shut out from Paradise. / The wounded deer must seek the herb no more / In which its heart-cure lies: / The widowed dove must cease to haunt a bower / Like that from which its mate with feigned sighs / Fled in the April hour. / I too must seldom seek again / Near happy friends a mitigated pain." The poem ended, "I asked her, yesterday, if she believed / That I had resolution. One who HAD / Would ne’er have thus relieved / His heart with words, -- but what his judgement bade / Would do, and leave the scorner unrelieved. / These verses are too sad / To send to you, but that I know, / Happy yourself, you feel another’s woe." He also used Edward as a stand-in for himself by having him read poems to Jane that were filled with ambiguous pronouns and innuendos. Jane later gave the poems to Medwin and Trelawny, who published them. On 1 July, Percy and Edward Williams sailed to Livorno in Shelley's boat; returning home on 8 July they drowned in the Gulf of Spezia, and their bodies were found 10 days later. After Percy and Edward's cremation, Mary insisted that Leigh Hunt give her what they believed was Percy's unburnt heart which he had taken from the pyre, and Jane persuaded him to do so. Mary and Jane settled briefly in Albaro before proceeding together to Genova for a few months before they returned separately to England. Jane and Mary remained close and lived together in Kentish Town. Mary suggested that Jane should contact Percy's schoolmate and close friend, lawyer Thomas Jefferson Hogg, to gain advice about Edward's estate. By 1823 Jane and Hogg had begun a romatic attachment that lasted the rest of their lives. When Jane became pregnant in 1827, Mary learned that Jane had spoken openly of Percy 's attraction to her and his coolness towards Mary late in his life, but their friendship survived, and Mary became the godmother of Jane's daughter Prudentia Sarah Jefferson Hogg in 1836.