Jane Clairmont to Lord Byron

Jane Clairmont, known throughout her life as Claire, 1798-1879. Real name: Clairmont, Clara Mary Jane. Stepdaughter of the philosopher Willam Godwin and therefore stepsister of Mary Godwin. After a short romance with Lord Byron - whom she saw first as early as 1812 - she gave birth to his daughter Allegra after travelling through Europe in 1816 with Mary and her husband to be Percy Bysshe Shelley. She was also present during the night that Byron and Shelley told ghost stories, inspiring Mary Shelley to write her Frankenstein.

Claire wrote this letter to Lord Byron in 1815.

You bid me write short to you and I have much to say. You also bade me believe that it was a fancy which made me cherish an attachment for you. It cannot be a fancy since you have been for the last year the object upon which every solitary moment led me to muse.

I do not expect you to love me, I am not worthy of your love. I feel you are superior, yet much to my surprise, more to my happiness, you betrayed passions I had believed no longer alive in your bosom. Shall I also have to ruefully experience the want of happiness? Shall I reject it when it is offered? I may appear to you imprudent, vicious; my opinions detestable, my theory depraved; but one thing, at least, time shall show you: that I love gently and with affection, that I am incapable of anything approaching to the feeling of revenge or malice; I do assure you, your future will shall be mine, and everything you shall do or say, I shall not question.

Jane Clairmont to Lord Byron -- 1815