Conrad is described very similarly to the way most would describe Byron: a man of few regrets and pleasures . He is seen by those closest to him as, “[t]hat man of loneliness and mystery, / Scarce seen to smile and seldom heard to sigh” (I.173-4). While Conrad is physically a normal man – “in [his] form seems little to admire,” – his persona demonstrates that something “more than marks the crowd of vulgar men,” and “[t]hough smooth his voice, and calm his general mien, / Still seems there something that [others] would not have seen” (I.195; I.200; I.206-7). Conrad is also described as being able to perceive into a person’s soul:

“He had the skill [...] to probe [ones] heart and watch [ones] changing cheek,
At once the observer’s purpose to espy,
and on himself roll back his scrutiny,
Lest he to Conrad rather should betray
Some secret thought…” (I.217-21).

Byron is seemingly describing both Conrad and himself simultaneously. Conrad is more than just an outlaw fighting his personal chivalrous war against oppression, he is a part of Byron, and Byron attributes some of his most public personae to Conrad.

Conrad is the most “Byronic” of the characters in the story, but the behaviors of other characters also illustrate the way Byron inserts himself into his art. The story of “The Corsair” easily could be seen as a traditional damsel-in-distress story but Byron twists this: Conrad is the poetical hero, but he does not conquer the evil he fights and his quest fails. Gulnare must kill Pasha Seyd and rescue the “hero.” Conrad would rather allow himself to die than to lose his chivalrous beliefs, so Gulnare must step in and perform the fatal act of murder.

Byron presents Gulnare as a feminine mirror to Conrad. At first, she is passively and typically feminine, but in rescuing Conrad, she immediately shakes off the burdens of defined gender roles and becomes something more than just a damsel. In making up for Conrad’s inability to overcome his chivalrous absolutes, the more restrained he becomes the less she restrains herself. Byron could have reduced her role to that of a plot devise to allow Conrad to escape Pasha Seyd’s dungeon, but by allowing her to abandon her given place in life, she becomes the driving force of half the poem taking on an aspect that rivals Conrad’s own in importance. Conrad, for a moment, is almost the prop upon which Gulnare is allowed to grow.

Her transformation from clichéd former damsel-in-distress enamored by her rescuer: “[I] long to view that chief again, / If I but to thank for, what my fear forgot, The life – my loving lord remember’d not!” to vengeful murderer “That hated tyrant [...] he must bleed” illustrates her total change from feminine victim to something more (III. 270-3; III.319). This change does not illustrate any feminist sympathies on the part of Byron because in becoming something more, Gulnare emasculates Conrad and destroys her innocence: the “spot of blood, that light but guilty streak, Had banish’d all the beauty from her cheek” (III.426-7). However, even by raising a woman to the status of Byronic hero, Byron blurs the line of gender roles. His attitude toward women in general is seen plainly when he requires that Gulnare sacrifice her feminine soul as she attains a masculine superiority and in the fact that he allows her voice to reach a fevered pitch before silencing her; thus, placing her voice subservient to Conrad again. This is also demonstrated when Conrad rejects Gulnare after the murder seeing only, “Gulnare, the homicide!” ((An interesting note is that the rhyme of “homicide” with the word “bride” of the previous line forms the following couplet: “He thought on her afar, his lonely bride; He turn’d and saw Gulnare, the homicide!” Thus, it foreshadows his lonely bride’s death, and, in a way, placing the blame for her death on Gulnare and her relationship with Conrad. Symbolically, the death of Medora may represent the betrayal of Conrad’s spirit when he kisses Gulnare because Gulnare is his true match. Medora and he are in love but they are not really “made” for each other, and Gulnare is Conrad’s equal both mentally and physically.)) (III.463). Gulnare has emasculated him, so he rejects her seeing only the negative aspects of her even after he realizes that “she for him had given / Her all on earth, and more than all in heaven!” (III.529-30).

Unlike Conrad, Gulnare is not specifically Byron; she is a powerful voice for a time, but not entirely that of the author himself. However, she could have been: as her personality shifts from feminine to masculine, her personality shifts towards that of Conrad, and thus, comes closer to Byron. The Byronic hero torch almost passes from Conrad to Gulnare with “Conrad following, at her beck, obeyd” (III. 448). The balance between the characters of Conrad and Gulnare come to its own conclusion as, “He clasp’d that hand – it trembled – and his own / Had lost its firmness, and his voice its tone.” (III.539-49). The shifting personalities had already blurred the two, and with that moment they physically merged as she “sunk into his embrace” (III. 544). The two personalities become one as Gulnare leaves the poem never to return. The shifting between the masculine and feminine reflects Byron’s own inability to fit his own identity within the narrow confines of European culture which required that his own impulses be subservient to a specifically masculine personae.

The characters themselves are only one way that the Byronic personae infiltrates his poetry, he also uses the trappings of poetry to twist the meanings and intonations of the final product: his childe is not much of a pilgrim, his ode is more satiric than honorific. The final words of poetry demonstrate the finality of Conrad’s position: “His death yet dubious, deeds too widely known. [...] Link’d with on virtue, and a thousand crimes” (694-6, III). However, the final words of “The Corsair” are not intoned by the narrator or Conrad, but by Byron himself in a footnote of nearly 2,000 words whose importance to the piece is negligible at best. By inserting generic and unimportant footnotes into emotionally charged scenes such as Medora’s plea for Conrad to remain with her, he can control the way the reader reacts. Through devices such as the introduction, epitaphs and footnotes, Byron inserts even more of himself, but he also asserts his control over the reader by leading them where he wishes them to go.

The epitaphs are seemingly innocuous Latin quotes, but when one considers them in the context of the poem the epitaphs of “The greatest of all woes / Is to remind us of our happy days / In misery [...]”, “So as his dim desires to recognize?”, “as thou seest, yet, yet it doth remain” for Cantos I, II, and III respectively take on new meanings that illuminate the events within. ((Epitaphs were translated by Byron in the poem “Francesca of Rimini” in lines (25-7), (24), and (9) respectively for Canto I, II, and III.)) The first epigraph clearly foretells that Canto I is to be considered the “happy days,” and highlights the coming doom. The third illustrates finality: there is no going back, but the second is a little less clear. If one takes dim to reference the clarity of Conrad’s desires, the second offers a muddle. What one desires should be clear, but for Conrad and Gulnare, it is not so. These three epitaphs set the emotional charge of the succeeding Canto, but they only do so after a second reading when their connotations are less “dim;” thus, simultaneously spoiling the story for the reader and asserting the creator’s superiority.
Byron further manipulates the reader using conventions, especially in the form of verse he uses, but he wholly admits this in his introduction:

I have attempted not the most difficult, but, perhaps, the best adapted measure to our language, the good old and now neglected heroic couplet. The stanza of Spenser is perhaps too slow and dignified for narrative…The heroic couplet is not the most popular measure certainly; but as I did not deviate into the other from a wish to flatter what is called public opinion, I shall quit it without further apology…

As stated earlier, heroic couplets are almost entirely based on rhymes whose final syllables are stressed, and used solely for “heroes,” but Byron uses unstressed rhymes and uses heroic couplets not only for his vagabond corsair but also for his feminine heroine. While it could be true that these minor things do not illustrate anything more than Byron’s own artistic choices, combined with his disregard for most other conventions, one may see this as just another way for Byron to insert a little more of himself into his art. Byron’s art is entirely Byron, even when he mimics other poets, the poetry is infused with enough of Byron’s own personality that it is clearly his own work.

The multitude of voices that are present within Byron’s poetry can be daunting, but as one reads they find that the voices all come from a single source: Byron. Either intentionally or unintentionally, Byron inserts his many personae into his poetry – sometimes they flow together undetectably and others they create confusion jarring the reader with the abrupt shifts. The characters and the events are so completely “Byron” that it is hard to resist drawing parallels to Byron’s own life because at times, the poem seems to illustrate Byron’s past and future . While we cannot assume that Byron intended this to be so, the mirroring of Byron’s personality and life with the lives and personalities of his characters evidences a far deeper connection between the two than that of creator and creation. The tragedy that affects the lives of all of the characters in “The Corsair” mirrors the constant tragedy that seemed to follow Byron throughout his life. Byron’s constant searching for happiness was simultaneously defeated by his own shortcomings and the confines of society just as the Corsair’s happiness was impossible because of his own shortcomings and those around him. Through these and other examples, one can see that the entirety of “The Corsair” and other poems are not just stories, but Byron speaking through his many personae which are all pieces of him, but none entirely so.

The characters of Mrs. Elton and Emma are extremely similar: they both are overly concerned with outward appearances, place too much value on social status, tend to treat others as their play things, and are quick to judge. They think very highly of themselves and hold themselves as pinnacles of their societies. The two women are so similar one could argue that if their positions were reversed, they would hold the same positions in the story. However, for all their negative similarities, it is the small differences that makes one superior to the other””not only as a person, but as a friend.

Although Mrs. Elton tends to believe herself to a member of gentile society, her manners and mannerisms are a cheap limitation: she has a tendency to place herself on an equal footing with others who are social superior to herself. Although a biased source, quickly Emma judges her to be a vain and self-satisfied who attempted to be superior, but “with manners which had been formed in a bad school [and] drawn from one set of people” (213). Further evidencing the low origin of Mrs. Elton’s manners is how impressed she is by Mrs. Weston’s and Mr. Knightley’s manners: Emma takes their manners for granted and to her, it seems obvious that their manners would be impeccable because of the society of which they are members (218). Mrs. Elton also oversteps herself by referring to people by their given or Christian names without honorifics—even when they are of a superior social class like Mr. Knightley—while Emma would never even consider this even though the families are long-term friends and nearly equal (218).

Emma, unlike Mrs Elton, is aware that her family’s status in society is that of “the younger branch of a very ancient family” whose landed property is relatively small (108). Although she has a tendency to be snobbish and exclusive, she is able to put these feelings aside when pressured by her friends to do what is right. When the middle-class Coles were in a position to invite Emma to a dinner party, she almost gleefully prepared to rebuke them for being so presumptuous, but when the invitation actually came, she allowed the Westons to convince her to attend without argument (163). Even though she believes in the exclusivity of her class, she realizes that it is not practical to insulate herself from the other classes when she should be accepting of them. However, her egalitarian views do not extend beyond casual relations: she was very quick to refuse Mr. Elton’s advances on social status alone, and even though she was correct to do so, she did not see that the relationship she tried to create between Mr. Elton and Miss Smith was similar to Mr. Elton marrying herself. According to Emma, Mr. Elton only proposed to “aggrandize and enrich himself,” and although he “understood the graduations of rank below him [he was] blind to what rose above” (107). This evidences Emma’s flaw in oversimplifying the lives of others through her habit of lumping the middle-class into one rather than seeing it as stratified.

Mrs. Elton is very insecure about her background and tends to speak frequently of her brother-in-law’s estate comparing every aspect of it to Hartfield and claiming as its equal; however, as Emma points out, those with wealth are not impressed with people who are equally wealthy, so Mrs. Elton’s comparison serves more to show how little societal standing she has. She also judges others of similar backgrounds harshly: mentioning a family that lives near Maple Grove who are an annoyance “from the airs they give themselves” without realizing it is the same way others view her (244).

Emma is very blind to the thoughts and the feelings of the people around her to the point that she projects all of her own feelings onto people and then expresses shock when she is wrong. Events like her blindness regarding Mr Elton’s advances, her insistence that Miss Fairfax is in love with the happily married Mr. Dixon, or her belief that Miss Smith was superior to the Martins show just how little she understands the core personalities of the people around her. However, although she can be strong-headed, she does accept correction””mostly by Mr. Knightley””when she is wrong, so her weakness is less glaring than it could be.

Emma and Mrs. Elton play off each other well: they both have similar personalities and levels of intelligence, but where Emma is born rich and gentile, Mrs. Elton’s only claim to high society is a sizable dowry and a wealthy brother-in-law. Emma and Mrs. Elton are both flawed individuals, but Mrs. Elton has all of Emma’s flaws but few of her good qualities, and Mrs Elton’s one-dimensional nature is such that she seems incapable of growing as a person; however, Emma does learn from the lessons she receives, albeit slowly, and respects the opinions of others; therefore, although both individuals have their flaws, Emma would make a far better friend.

The boy Wordsworth (hereafter “the boy) is “lead by her,” the personified, feminine and parental Nature, to a small cove where he steals a small boat in “an act of stealth / And troubled pleasure…” (357, 361-2). Ignoring the psychological and physiological explanation for the boy’s “troubled pleasure”, the “troubled pleasure” he felt was caused by completing the theft and giving in to “The passions that build up our human soul” (407). Although the direct effect of the boy’s action was the theft of a boat, the intent behind the action was to follow the direction of Nature–not break the law. While the boy does not make the connection, the adult Wordsworth (hereafter: Wordsworth) is able to see that nature encouraged the behavior solely to punish it, and believed that nature took “The passions that build up our human soul” and intertwining them “Not with the mean and vulgar works of man, / But with high objects, with enduring things,” taught him how to “…recognize / A grandeur in the beatings of the heart” (407, 408-9, 413-14).

To ensure that the boy learned how to do recognize this grandeur, Nature punished the boy for his misdeed by sending a “creature” after him. While this “creature” is literally a cliff that slowly comes into view and the boy recognizes it as such, it seems to him “As if with voluntary power instinct / [it] Upreared its head.” and “with purpose of its own / And measured motion like a living thing / strode after me.” (378, 379-80, 383-5). Literally, as he pulled away from the “craggy steep”, the cliff was no longer shielded from his view, and as he moved further away from it, it seemed to get larger; however, this does not explain his reaction, so one must focus on the context and the abrupt change of emotion in the scene: at first the ridge seems peaceful and elegant and he perceived it as, literally, the edge of the world behind which there is “nothing but the stars and the grey sky”; however, as he moves away from it, the crag reveals that it was not peaceful, but only the facade behind which the cliff hid until it “Upreared its head… / and growing still in stature the grim shape / towered up…” and became part of his nightmares of “huge and mighty forms…” (372, 379-82, 398). The boy realized that the laws of nature cannot be trespassed upon without consequences, and the experience left him so “for many days, [his] brain / Worked with a dim and undetermined sense / …[and] o’er [his] thoughts / There hung a darkness…” which altered his world view replacing pleasant images of the trees, sky, fields and sea with “huge and mighty forms, that do not live / Like living men…” that haunted his days and nights (390-4, 398-9). However, looking back, Wordsworth realizes it was for the best and praises Nature for subjecting him to it because in doing so, nature used “enduring things” and “high objects” to teach the boy its lessons (409).

Aside from showing us the role of nature in the growth of the individual, Wordsworth relates this experience to demonstrate the change of perception based on emotion. The boy’s entire word view changed immediately after he was chastised by nature: “…No familiar shapes / Remained, no pleasant images of trees, / Of sea or sky, no colours of green fields” (395-7). While this is a major change and is understandable after what the boy believed he witnessed, Wordsworth also shows us more subtle changes. In the very beginning, the boat was “tied to a willow tree / Within a rocky cave…”, but afterwards the boy returned the boat “Back to the covert of the willow tree” (358-9). The boat was returned to the same place it started from, but originally, the boy perceived the boat as just being there; however, when he returned it, he realizes that it wasn’t laying out in the open, but that someone had purposefully hidden it which accentuated the theft. This change is also evident in how the boy is rowing: at first when he rows he does it “nor without the voice / Of mountain-echoes…” but then when returning the boat he “stole” his way “through the silent water” (362-3, 395). These shifts in the language Wordsworth uses mirrors the shifts in the boy’s thinking and emphasizes the differences in the way the young and the adult Wordsworth perceive the same events.

The duality of experience that separates the now from the past, the action from the intent, the cause from the effect, and perception from reality is the central theme in “The Prelude”. In examining his childish behaviors from the point-of-view of the adult, Wordsworth is able to use his experience to demonstrate how nature is both beautiful and sublime and how these contrast with the changing human perceptions of the same.