In pursuance of his plan Browning completed, in 1832, his first important poem, Pauline, which was published through the generosity of an aunt the following year. The poem is a confession of a youth a poet and a student whose life, in spite of dreams of usefulness, has been misspent. Pauline is the name of the lady who edits it. "So I will sing on — - fast as fancies come, Rudely the verse being as the mood it paints. And then I shall show how these elements Produced my present state, and what it is." The poem was crude, obscure, and scarcely understood; but both its matter and its manner were significant of the poet's programme, and this programme he followed to the last. Paracelsus In 1833 Browning traveled in Europe, visiting Russia and Italy. During 1834-35 he composed the long dramatic poem Paracelsus. dello. It was a wonderful production for a youth of twenty-two. and Sor "I go to prove my soul!" the hero cries; "I see my way as birds their trackless way. The general theme of the poem may, perhaps, be suggested by the headings of its sections: Paracelsus aspires; Paracelsus attains; Paracelsus; Paracelsus aspires; Paracelsus attains. There are many imperfections in the poem and many beauties. It won the poet some notable friends. THE SECOND PERIOD 435 Browning was already at work upon another poem, but set that work aside at the request of the celebrated actor, Macready, for a play. In May, 1837, the drama of Strafford was completed and presented at the Covent Garden Theatre. It proved only a partial success. The great philosophical poem Sordello, thus interrupted, was not finished until 1840. It was another "soul" poem, the author's most ambitious effort. It was much longer than Paracelsus, more profound, and, alas, much more obscure. Several amusing anecdotes are told of those who attempted in vain to understand it. Carlyle declared that his wife had read the poem through without being able to decide whether Sordello was a man, a city, or a book. Tennyson affirmed that only two lines did he understand — and they were both lies: these were the opening, 66 'Who will may hear Sordello's story told, — "Who would has heard Sordello's story told." Between the years 1840 and 1870 Browning produced his best work. He had then emerged The Second from the heaviness and abstruseness of the Period. first period and wrote with a freshness and vigor of style that gave intense dramatic interest to the expression of profoundest thought. In 1841 was published Pippa Passes, a genuine masterpiece of creative power. The story of the poem is an episode in the life of Felippa, or Pippa, a little silk-winder from the factory in Asolo, an Italian town in the Trevisan. Upon her birthday, which is New Year's Day, Pippa spends her unwonted leisure wishing she might do some small service in the world. She allows her childish imagination to participate in the happiness of certain prominent personages who are in the town - the happiest of all in Asolo: Ottima, illicitly beloved by Sebald; Luigi, the idol of his mother; Phené, that day to become the bride of the young artist Jules; and Monsignor, who is to arrive from Rome, whose happiness must be the greatest of all, because his is a spiritual affection, the sacred passion of the Holy Church. Thus Pippa passes through the city, singing her blithe song: until, unconsciously, she becomes a saving element in the soul struggle of each of these great people and the instrument of consequences momentous to herself. Pippa Passes was published as the first of a series of volumes, eight in all, which appeared at intervals from 1841 to 1846, under the general title Bells and Pomegranates. The series included the Dramatic Lyrics (1842), the Dramatic Romances and Lyrics (1845), and five of Browning's poetical dramas, of which A Blot in the 'Scutcheon (1843) and Colombe's Birthday (1844), are the best known. Elizabeth In 1846 the poet was married to Elizabeth Barrett. This gifted woman had already published two Barrett. or three volumes of song which had won ready recognition by their worth. She was an invalid for many years, and at the time when her acquaintance with Robert Browning began had, apparently, not long to live. Her father, a man of obstinate and violent temper, opposed the friendship strenuously; but four months after their first meeting, the two poets were quietly married and slipped away to Italy, where they continued to reside until Mrs. Browning's death in 1861. The married life of the Brownings was ideally happy. Each was an inspiration to the other; and in the new environment of love and happiness, health and life came back to the invalid. THE RING AND THE BOOK "I yield the grave for thy sake, and exchange My near sweet view of heaven for earth with thee," 431 she wrote in one of her Sonnets from the Portuguese, -love poems written in their home at Pisa and, under the disguise of a purely fanciful title, dedicated to her husband. They afterward removed to Florence, where Mrs. Browning wrote Casa Guidi Windows and Aurora Leigh. In 1849 their son, Robert, was born; and in the same year Browning's Poetical Works were published in two volumes. In 1853-54 the Brownings passed the winter in Rome. Here were written the poems published in the following year under the title Men and Women, including Fra Lippo Lippi, The Epistle of Karshish, and the completed version of Saul. The volume was dedicated in a beautiful introductory lyric, One Word More, to the poet's wife. In the spring of the next year Mrs. Browning presented her husband with the first six books of Aurora Leigh. The Ring Book. During the five years following Mrs. Browning's death in 1861, Robert Browning wrote comparatively little; yet to this period belong some of the most notable among his shorter poems: James Lee's Wife, Abt Vogler, A Death in the Desert, Rabbi Ben Ezra, and Prospice. In 1868-69 appeared the poet's real masterpiece, The Ring and the Book. This extraordinary work, consisting of some 20,000 and the lines, longer than the Iliad and twice as long as Paradise Lost, contains the dramatic recital of a brutal crime, -Count Guido Franceschini's murder of his wife. Out of this unpromising material Browning has constructed a fascinating and impressive study in character; it is a drama of the consequences of an act, and its effect on the soul. The story of the crime is told by nine different persons, including the murderer, his victim (who makes an ante-mortem statement), a young priest (who has been the friend of the wife), the public prosecutor, the advocate, and the pope (to whom appeal is made). The significance of the title is explained by its symbolism. A goldsmith in making a ring mixes alloy with the pure metal, so that the gold can be modeled by art; when the ring is made, the alloy is removed by acid. The book referred to is the yellow-colored text of evidence submitted in the trial of Count Guido at Rome in 1698. It contains the truth of circumstantial fact. Now the poet will take his material thus discovered, mix fancy with the fact, and beat out in his own way the finer truth which his artist's eye discerns "Because it is the glory and the good of Art, That Art remains the one way possible Of speaking truth." Full with the vivacity and cheeriness of a vigorous physique, Browning passed the later years of Later Life. his life partly in Venice, partly in London; he never returned to Florence after Mrs. Browning's death. He was fond of company; he continued active in brain and body to the end. Of the fourteen volumes of verse published between 1870 and 1890, it is not necessary to speak in detail. His best poetry belongs to the middle period of his life. Always philosophical, his philosophy became more abstruse, his expression more eccentric in the later works. But the magnificent virility of his style, and the triumphant optimism of his healthy soul, characterized his poetry to the end. He died in Venice December 12, 1889, and his body was finally laid in Westminster Abbey. Of all the poets, Browning most demands a guide. It has Suggestions so long been the custom to magnify the "obfor Study. scurity" of Browning's poetry that much injustice has been done both the poet and the possible reader of his |