Editorial

This issue of The Byron Journal is centred on the theme of ‘Byron and the Bible’ and gives you a taste of the wonderful conference held at Newstead Abbey on this theme in May of 2015, attended by speakers from around the world. Many hoped to hear Peter Cochran speak at Newstead this year, but he was too ill. He died on 20 May, aged 71. This issue is a tribute to Peter. It publishes his last contribution to The Byron Journal. It also includes a moving obituary by Sir Drummond Bone. His essay appears here largely in the form he left it in. You will hear his voice. It is an example of the kind of work Peter loved getting to grips with, and is on his favourite Byron text, The Vision of Judgement, unforgettable acted readings of which he staged at so many conferences.

Balancing the loss to Byron Studies, the issue contains essays by two up-and-coming scholars of Byron based at Oxford—one on the biblical precursors of the Byronic heroine, and the other on the failure of community in ‘Darkness’. There are two more essays by eminent Byronists, one on Byron and the theoretical concept of the post-secular, and one on Byron’s use and adaptations of Scripture. The blossoming state of Byron Studies is also evident from the three conference reports included in this issue, the first from the annual one-day Byron conference at Newstead Abbey, the second from the 10th International Student Byron conference in Messolonghi, the third from the IABS conference in Gdańsk this summer.

This year has seen Byronists travel from Newstead to Messolonghi to Gdańsk. And it is not over yet, as December will see another international Byron conference, this time in Bath, on ‘Byron and the Regency’.

As we tend towards yet another great bicentenary year in Byron studies, 2016, there is a lot to look forward to: in April, another international gathering of Byronists at Newstead Abbey, followed in June by the ‘The Summer of 1816’ conference at Sheffield, and, last but not least, the much-anticipated IABS conference in Paris in July. Peter Cochran would have been at each and every event.

In the meantime, this issue is dedicated to Dr Peter Cochran, who, being inimitably sui generis, made the Byron world an extraordinary place. It is now our turn.