Monday, April 1, 2013

Morality versus Nature

Don Juan seems to have a problem throughout Canto I with being unable to rein in his passions and act on logic something that gets him and Julia into a lot of trouble when they begin an affair and get caught. This problem with not being able to control there passions and act completely on instinct seems to be a way for Byron to explore whether man is ruled by his base instincts first and learns morality later or has personal morals that are instilled at birth. This question was something that was being studied at the time and looking at this question through the eyes of a character so obviously portraying his own morality rather than what is expected is a good idea.

The fact that Don Juan is 16 at the time was a odd choice though in that by him being so young it casts a reckless light to this character making his actions more primal in that as teenagers were more in tune with our baser emotions and allow them to rule us, not that Don Juan being a teenager excuses his actions but it does cast them in a more realistic light. The fact that this question of whether people are ruled by logic or instinct is a fundamental question for the nature of this story but there's no true way to tell whether people are born with morality or learn it.

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