With an Introduction and Notes by Dr Sally Minogue, Canterbury Christ Church University College.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning was such an acclaimed poet in her own lifetime that she was suggested as a candidate for the Poet Laureateship when Wordsworth died in 1850.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning was such an acclaimed poet in her own lifetime that she was suggested as a candidate for the Poet Laureateship when Wordsworth died in 1850. Yet today we have only a limited knowledge of her considerable life’s work as a poet, in part because of a lack of representative but accessible editions of her work. Readers will find here not only her well-known sonnet sequence of love poems, Sonnets From the Portuguese but also lesser-known sonnets, some in praise of the cross-dressing bohemian writer George Sand, others to contemporary poets and artists. Her religious and spiritual poetry echoes that of the Metaphysical poets. A different voice emerges in her social and political protest poems, such as ‘The Cry of the Children’ and ‘The Runaway Slave at Pilgrim’s Point’. Her experimental ballads allowed her to develop a distinctive way of writing about women within an apparently conventional form. In the outstanding work of her maturity, Aurora Leigh, the woman’s voice takes centre stage. This ‘novel-poem’ is full of verve and interest, with a female poet-hero who casts a caustic eye on life and on her fellow men – and women.
We all think we know the story of Elizabeth Barrett Browning – the mysterious illness which enclosed her in her room, her over-loving but imperious father, and her romantic, secret marriage to the poet Robert Browning and their life together in Italy. But this comprehensive selection of her poetry tells the real story of her sustained creative life as a poet, which began with her childhood poetic ambitions and ended only with her death. All the major aspects of her poetry are represented in this accessible edition which is well-annotated and contextualised, with a wide-ranging introduction which covers Barrett Browning’s poetic and intellectual life as well as her personal one. Recent critical re-readings, including major feminist reassessments, of her poetry, are covered in the introduction, with helpful suggestions for further reading.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Elizabeth Barrett Browning, born 6 March 1806, was one of the most prominent English poets of the Victorian era. Her poetry was widely popular in both Britain and the United States during her lifetime.
Born in County Durham, the eldest of 12 children, Browning was educated at home. At 15 Browning became ill, suffering from intense head and spinal pain for the rest of her life, rendering her frail. She took laudanum for the pain, which may have led to a lifelong addiction and contributed to her weak health.
In the 1830s Barrett’s cousin, John Kenyon introduced her to prominent literary figures of the day such as William Wordsworth, Mary Russell Mitford, Samuel Taylor Coleridge; Alfred, Lord Tennyson, and Thomas Carlyle, which influenced her greatly.
A few years later, she contracted a disease, possibly tuberculosis, which continued to weaken her further. However, she still continued with her writing as well as other aspects of her life that she felt passionately about, such as her role in the campaign to abolish slavery. Her commitment to the cause eventually helped to bring about reform to child labour legislation in the UK.
Interestingly, her prolific output made her a rival to Tennyson as a candidate for poet laureate upon the death of Wordsworth.
Browning’s volume Poems (1844) brought her great success. During this time she met and corresponded with the writer Robert Browning, who admired her work. The courtship and marriage between the two were carried out in secret, for fear of her father’s disapproval. Following the wedding, she was disinherited by her father and rejected by her brothers. The couple moved to Italy in 1846, where she would live for the rest of her life. They had one son, Robert Barrett Browning, whom they called Pen. Towards the end of her life, her lung function worsened, and she died in Florence in 1861. A collection of her last poems was published by her husband shortly after her death.
