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DespairOne of the contemporary objections to the Byronic Hero was his predilection fordespair, an attitude which could be seen as a rejection of the hope of Christianity, 412and, thence, as a rejection of the established social order, a slide towards thecataclysmic radicalism of the French Revolution. The Critical Review, in its articleon Manfred, charged Byron with ‘monotonously’ delighting in murder, incest, andcharactersin which all the ordinary passions are wrought to the intensity of a convulsion,and sublimated by the operations of a fierce pride which triumphs in its owndespair. 413Byron’s fascination with despair, however, seems to have been more artistic thanpolitical, less about the despairing hero’s rejection of the normal emotional palliativessuch as religion, nation, and family, which would present implied slight against theirvalue, and more about the nature of the hero’s suffering when those palliatives arefound unavailing in the face of terrible trials. As Chew notes, Byron’s plays “areconcerned with the effect of situation on character rather than with the course ofexternal incident”. 414 The issue of significance in this play is the psychology of thevictim of despair, which is precisely why no deus ex machina is allowed to interruptthe progress of the character’s interaction with the feeling.Instead, the problem and its resolution are both placed within the individual. AsJoseph explains, this is why much of Manfred’s questing amongst the spirits is afailure:What Manfred demands of the spirits is self-forgetfulness; and this is Byron’sown problem of losing himself in nature, “to withdraw myself from myself”.412 A good example of a hostile religious attitude to such despair is found in the depiction of ‘accidie’in ‘The Parson’s Tale’ (Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales, X.678ff, in The Riverside Chaucer,ed. by Larry D. Benson, 3 rd edn (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987), p.310 ff).413 Critical Review, 5th series, V (June 1817), 622-29, RR, II, 666-70: p.623 (667).414Chew, p.30; see also McGann, Fiery Dust.263