Table Of ContentElizabeth Barrett Browning and Robert Browning
Also by Martin Garrett
* A BROWNING CHRONOLOGY: Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Robert
Browning
GREECE: A Literary Companion
LORD BYRON
MASSINGER: The Critical Heritage
SIDNEY: The Critical Heritage
TRAVELLER'S LITERARY COMPANION TO ITALY
* From the same publishers
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
and Robert Browning
Interviews and Recollections
Edited by
Martin Garrett
First published in Great Britain 2000 by
MACMILLAN PRESS LTD
Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS and London
Companies and representatives throughout the world
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
First published in the United States of America 2000 by
ST. MARTIN'S PRESS, INC.,
Scholarly and Reference Division,
175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010
ISBN 978-1-349-62896-4 ISBN 978-1-349-62894-0 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-62894-0
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Robert Browning : interviews and recollections /
edited by Martin Garrett.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1. Browning, Elizabeth Barrett, 1806-1861. 2. Browning, Robert, 1812-1889. 3.
Browning, Elizabeth Barrett, 1806-1861-Friends and associates. 4. Browning,
Robert, 1812-1889-Friends and associates. 5. Poets, English -19th century
-Biography. 6. Married people-Great Britain-Biography. I. Garrett, Martin.
PR4193 .E45 2000
821'.809-dc21
[B]
99-087395
Introduction, compilation and editorial matter © Martin Garrett 2000
Text © Macmillan Press Ltd 2000
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1stedition 2000 978-0-312-23226-9
All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made
without written permission.
No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written
permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act
1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright
Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London W1P 0LP.
Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to
criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
The authors have asserted their rights to be identified as the authors of this work in accordance
with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained
forest sources.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
09 08 07 06 0504 03020100
To Helen, Philip and Edmund
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Contents
Acknowledgements xiii
Abbreviations
XV
Introduction xix
Part 1: Elizabeth Barrett 1806-46
'Glimpses Into My Own Literary Character'
Elizabeth Barrett 3
Religious Imagination
Elizabeth Barrett 4
More 'Glimpses'
Elizabeth Barrett 5
'Happy influences'
Anne Thackeray Ritchie 7
'Dearest Papa would be sorry to think how much he
grieved me'
Elizabeth Barrett 8
'My first acquaintance with Elizabeth Barrett'
Mary Russell Mitford 10
'The fatal event which saddened her bloom of youth'
Mary Russell Mit(ord 11
Miss Barrett at Thirty-Five
Mary Russell Mit(ord 12
'The duties belonging to my femineity'
Elizabeth Barrett 14
On Poetry I: 'the object of the intellectual part of me'
Elizabeth Barrett 1 5
On Poetry II: 'I want to write a new poem of a new class'
Elizabeth Barrett 1 5
On Poetry III: 'relations ... higher than the naked eye of the
cold reasoning intellect can discern at all'
Elizabeth Barrett 16
'I look everywhere for grandmothers and see none'
Elizabeth Barrett 17
viii Contents
Mr Browning's Poetry: 'A palpable power'
Elizabeth Barrett 18
'I was as a man dying who had not read Shakespeare'
Elizabeth Barrett 19
'I was repulsed too often'
Elizabeth Barrett 21
Part II: Robert Browning 1812-46
Childhood Memories
Alexandra Orr 27
The Poet's History
Robert Browning 30
Music
Robert Sidney 32
An Unpoetical Nose
Sarah Flower 33
'Robert talks immensely'
Katie Bromley 33
'Lemon-coloured kid-gloves and such things'
Eliza Bridell-Fox 34
'Long ringlets and no neck-cloth'
Mary Russell Mitford 35
Browning's 'lion-like ruff'
William Harrison Ainsworth 35
Browning and Thomas Carlyle
William Allingham 36
'Little Paracelsus Browning'
Thomas Carlyle 3 7
Browning and Jane Carlyle
Alexandra Orr 38
Browning, Macready and Forster I: Strafford
William Charles Macready 38
Pippa Passes
Alexandra Orr 44
Browning, Macready and Forster II: The Return of the Druses
William Charles Macready 44
Browning, Macready and Forster III: A Blot on the 'Scutcheon
William Charles Macready 45
'Conversation ... as remarkably good as his books'
Joseph Arnauld 47
Contents ix
Part III: The Brownings 1846-61
Marriage
Elizabeth Barrett Browning 51
The Journey to Italy
Anna Brownell Jameson 53
The Brownings, 1847
George Stillman Hillard 57
Story's First Impression of the Brownings
William Wetmore Story 59
Casa Guidi
Kate Field 60
Florence
Elizabeth Barrett Browning 61
Browning and the Anglo-Florentines
Thomas Adolphus Trollope 61
'Better than any poem'
Henriette Corkran 62
Recollections of Mrs Browning
Eliza Ogilvy 63
The Brownings: a Child's View
Henriette Corkran 67
Browning and his Beard
Elizabeth Barrett Browning 69
'A countenance of April shine and shower'
William Michael Rossetti 69
'A face corresponding with delicate exactness to the tone of
her poems'
William Michael Rossetti 70
Browning Portraits
William Michael Rossetti 71
'I'll fling you down the stairs': Browning and Mr Sludge
William Allingham 72
Tennyson and Browning perform
William Michael Rossetti 73
'This generous humility of nature'
Anne Thackeray Ritchie 74
Browning at Bellosguardo
Frances Power Cobbe 76
Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Conversation
Kate Field 78
