Opium, Sexual Affairs, and Occult: Percy Shelley’s Many Escapades

Percy Shelley's Portrait; Image by User: Dcoetzee from the National Portrait Gallery, London 

If 19^th century romantic writer, Percy Bysshe (read bish) Shelley’s life was to be directed into a movie, it’d be horror. The kind that many lovebirds would watch cuddling over a smoke and Saturday dinner takeout, assuming it to be complete fantasy; except, it is not.

The obscure death of his first wife ‘Harriet’ after a busy euro trip with mistress ‘Mary’, his many love affairs with women of all ages, occult, opium indulgence for recreation, superiority complex towards Byron, marriage followed by an unfortunate miscarriage, and his own death in a storm that capsized his boat which ended with his untouched heart literally being handed back to Mary; Percy Shelleys’ journey casts dark shadows from the very start.

Born into a wealthy household in 1792, Shelley's first publication was the gothic novel Zastrozzi completed at age seventeen. Shortly after that, he put forth The Necessity of Atheism which led to his expulsion from Oxford. He could’ve avoided it with his father’s support, but only if he would embrace Christianity which would mean abandoning his true nature, as he'd been vocal about radical thinking and alternative literature.

With no financial support from home, he escaped to Scotland at 19 with Harriet Westbrook, 16 years old daughter of a coffee house owner in London. After their marriage, they moved to the Lake District of England where he desired to resume studying and writing. His stay there in 1812 blossomed his friendship with William Godwin, a British philosopher. One thing led to another and our man found himself infatuated to the guru’s daughter, Mary Godwin. A year later observed Shelley’s publication of Queen Mab: A Philosophical Poem.

In 1814, Harriet Shelley birthed their first baby, a daughter. Harriet stayed with her elder sister and new born while Percy Shelley wandered away, desiring to meet his guru William Godwin, which made Mary Godwin accessible. It is believed that their first love-making act was at Mary’s mother’s burial ground, where they’d often dwell. Only a month after, both eloped to France in company of Mary’s step sister Jane, later named ‘Claire’; leaving Mary’s family in disagreement and his wife, Harriet, desperate for his return.

Short-lived, the tour was called off within six weeks as recorded due to exhaustion of resources. His return, naturally, didn’t heal his relationship with Harriet any further. If anything, seeing him grow close to the mistress made it worse for Harriet’s torn soul. The passionate act at the cemetery in 1814, deflowering Mary, had already initiated their bond. In February of 1815, Mary birthed her first child with him. Born premature, the baby died soon.

The trio’s second trip was marked once again during 1816; remembered as the 'Year without summer', climatic unrest across Europe was vivid. The radicals along with a few friends had booked properties at Geneva, Switzerland during this dampness; Shelley resided at a space near Lord Byron’s rented mansion. Byron, his personal physician John Polidori along with the couple and an evidently smitten Claire set to work their imaginations on a cold night, competing through ghost-stories. Unknown to Mary, this attempt was about to create one of the earliest true sci-fi works. Not having had finished the short writing, its remaining idea occurred to her in a ‘waking dream’ (Manikowski, 2021). Besides Mary’s Frankenstein, the night long contest also led to Polidori’s unfinished vampire themed work which became influential for modern vampire representations.

Eventually, summer ended and so did the group’s escapades. Returning to mundane reality, they were ignorant of the grief that had been piling back at home. A month after their arrival, Mary’s half-sister Fanny Imlay committed suicide by overdosing on a solution of opium and alcohol; allegedly due to romantic longing for Shelley.

And while still healing from Fanny’s loss, the Shelleys received a letter about his separated wife, Harriet. She had been managing herself from lodges to unknown places during the last few months before her pregnant body was discovered lifeless in Hyde Park’s lake ‘Serpentine River’; believed to have drowned herself or perhaps, attacked by William Godwin as per some sources.

It only got darker from there. Shelley, disturbed, instantly married Mary after his wife’s death. Claire and Byron too got involved with one another. In 1817, Claire birthed his daughter, who had suspiciously received a will from Shelley. Claire followed Byron to Italy after the childbirth, but he only agreed to take their daughter in if she’d live apart. Unwilling, she had no choice, but to leave her daughter with him. Soon after which, the five years old was sent away at a convent residency where she perished from fever. 

As for the Shelleys, life had always been unpredictable. They had five pregnancies during their marriage together, with four turning into unforeseen losses; one due to premature death, two from malaria, and another from a miscarriage in June, 1822. The miscarriage had been a near to death experience for Mary. Percy had her sit in a tub full of ice to not die from severe hemorrhaging from the unstoppable blood loss. Those uneventful hours induced prolonged hallucinations; one of which was premonition of the death of his retired army officer friend Edward Williams and his wife, Jane. The past marriage, loss of multiple children, and moreover the death of Byron and Claire’s daughter had gradually weighed him down.

Just a month after the miscarriage, during an evidently bad sky, Shelley insisted on taking his boat out. That was the last time he and Edward Williams were ever seen sailing on ‘Don Juan’. Shelley’s body was found ten days later as decomposed matter; identifiable only from the remains of clothing and John Keats’ poem. His body had been dug into the sea sand for a month-long quarantine before burned in pyre.

Painting by Louis Edouard Fournier: The Funeral of Shelley (Picryl) 

And as dramatic as death could get, only his heart was recovered unburnt from the ashes! Reportedly due to calcification. It was handed over to Mary Shelley; always resting in her desk within the pages of his poem Adonais, dedicated to his late friend Keats.

As for others in the circle, death had worn a rough cloak too. Byron’s physician Polidori, consumed by his unsatisfactory progress of literary achievements and rising debts, had suicided in 1821, a year before Shelley’s boat misadventure. And in 1824, Byron was found dead from a fever. As for the women, they died later. Mary in 1851 from brain tumour, Claire, still unmarried, died at 1879, and Jane Williams in 1884.

Reference:

Manikowski, Amy. “The Night Frankenstein was Born.” Biblio, 2021,            www.biblio.com/blog/2021/10/the-night-frankenstein-was born/?srsltid=AfmBOoqVZy7gAjKNRaVwtgmviSFy7eaCnZKfdh-LFGxfdJOtwqpaJuJ.