Young Romantics

''A most impressive achievement'' Michael Holroyd ''Enthralling'' Sunday Times ''Masterly'' Telegraph _______________________ ''The web of our Life is of mingled Yarn'' - John Keats In Young Romantics Daisy Hay shatters the myth of the Romantic poet as a solitary, introspective genius, telling the story of the communal existence of an astonishingly youthful circle. The fiery, generous spirit of Leigh Hunt, radical journalist and editor of The Examiner, took centre stage. He bound together the restless Shelley and his brilliant wife Mary, author of Frankenstein; Mary''s feisty step-sister Claire Clairmont, who became Byron''s lover and the mother of his child; and Hunt''s charismatic sister-in-law Elizabeth Kent. With authority, sparkling prose and constant insight Daisy Hay describes their travels in France, Switzerland and Italy, their artistic triumphs, their headstrong ways, their grievous