A Memorial to Lord Byron in Tirana

TIRANA, October 26 – Famous British poet Lord Byron, who visited and wrote about Albania in his early 19th century visit when the country was under Ottoman rule, will be honoured with a bronze memorial in the newly rehabilitated street named after him in the Lapraka neighbourhood, suburban Tirana. The winning design project expected to be announced on November 27, one day before Albania celebrates its 98th anniversary of independence, will be selected from a competition the Municipality of Tirana and the Albanian Lord Byron Association have declared open starting from October 20.
The memorial to Lord Byron should have the size of Thomas Phillips’s portrait showing Byron in an Albanian traditional folk costume, and some lines from his poems on the background, says the municipality.
Launching the competition last week, Tirana Mayor Edi Rama said the respect for Byron and his works, with a symbol in this city was a desire of the project’s admirers and the municipality to pay tribute to those who have died and had shown special interest and passion for the Albanian culture, including customs and costumes, as was the case of Lord Byron.
The municipality will hand over three prizes for the competition, including the best work and best idea, whose winners will be awarded symbolic 1,000 and 500 dollar cash prizes respectively.
Young contemporary visual artists and architects have been invited to participate in the competition.
British poet, Lord George Gordon Byron (1788-1824), set out on a grand tour of the Mediterranean in 1809, in the course of which he visited Spain, Malta, Albania, Greece and Asia Minor. His visit to Albania in the autumn of that year made a lasting impression on him and is reflected in the second canto of the poem “Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage,” that catapulted him to fame as a writer in 1812, according to Albanian studies specialist Robert Elsie.
The first letter, written to his mother from Albania, betrays much of the excitement he felt on his first journey to the “Orient” and, in particular, at his meeting with the formidable tyrant Ali Pasha of Tepelena (1744-1822), the so-called Lion of Janina, today’s Ioannina, the biggest city of Epirus ruled by Ali Pasha until his death in 1822.