Mr Barrett dominated his children emotionally and financially. He was rigidly against the rule of marriage. Elizabeth was his most–loved daughter. Yet his tyrannical attitude forced four of his children to elope.
Elizabeth shared a very unique relationship with her father. She along with her other siblings were very open and expressive compared to her contemporary society. She labeled her father as "the monarch of Hope End" and told that he should not knit his brows or his glass eye may tumble off. The signal for endless games was the sight of their Papa riding up the drive after a business visit to London. He was a model figure of a strong father for whom their children waited for and yet remained rioters.
Elizabeth always had a complaint when her father was away from home. She never liked him staying away, even for work. Inspite of being surrounded by all the other members of her family, absence of her father made her feel insecure. She always felt down and low just after her father walking a few steps away from home, and remained awake till late night until he returned. A simple sickness to him filled her with a feeling of terror – what would happen without him? But Elizabeth was unduly sensitive. Her father always considered her different and superior from her siblings.
Mr Barrett’s main concern for Elizabeth was her illness. Love and affection between father and daughter was free flowing and untroubled. Once in his letter to Elizabeth he wrote, "I know and feel the congratulations are due to myself in having been blessed above all desert with such dear beloved and affectionate children". Elizabeth, too was very proud of her father and could feel deeply for him. She too wrote, "I feel how dearly he loves us". Her relationship with him was so harmonious that his anger against inefficiency and incompetence was notorious but for her it was an honor.
He was short-tempered and Elizabeth was frightened of it just because she saw it as a symptom of extreme distress on his part. She worried that he had no other outlet for his anger. She thought that he had no one, with whom he could share his worries nor anyone with whom he could truly relax.
After her mother’s death he was so affected mentally that she was bound more than ever to him and could neither contemplate nor imagine ever leaving him.
The relationship Elizabeth and her father had influenced her style of composing poems. Her father and other literary icons motivated and inspired much of her work. Her earlier works were written for her father.
For ‘neath thy gentleness of praise,
My father! rose my early lays !
And when the lyre was scarce awake,
I lov’d its strings for thy lov’d sake;
Thought only how to win they smile –
- To My Father on His Birthday
At the age of 38, Elizabeth Barrett lovingly dedicated her 1844 collection of poetry to her father.
After her father passed away in 1857, she quoted a paragraph from Corinne :
My beloved father has gone away…His tears fell almost as fast as mine did when we parted…I never told him of it, of course, but, when I was last so ill, I used to start out of fragments of dreams, broken from all parts of the universe, with the cry from my own lips, ‘Oh, Papa, Papa!’ I could not trace it back to the dream behind, yet there it always was very curiously, and touchingly too, to my own heart, seeming scarcely of me, though it came from me, at once waking me with, and welcoming me to, the old straight humanities.
ROBERT BROWNING: HER SOULMATE
The initial period of acquaintance between the duo resulted in their marriage. In fact, Sonnets from the Portuguese describe her feelings for Robert Browning. According to Kathleen Black, Robert Browning was practically, "a one man refutation of virtually all her anxieties".
From Sonnets from the Portuguese
Beloved, my Beloved, when I think
That thou wast in the world a year ago,
What time I sat alone here in the snow
And saw no footprint, heard the silence sink
No moment at thy voice, …but, link by link,
Went counting all my chains as if that so
They never could fall off at any blow
Struck by thy possible hand…why, thus I drink
Of life’s great cup of wonder! Wonderful,
Never to feel thee thrill the day or night
With personal act or speech – nor even cull
Some prescience of thee with the blossoms white
Thou sawest growing! Atheists are as dull,
Who cannot guess God’s presence out of sight.
Born on March 6, 1806, Elizabeth Barrett was the daughter of Edward and Mary Moulton Barrett. She was the eldest of the eleven siblings. Her childhood was spent in an isolated place called Hope End.
AS A CHILD
Since she belonged to a small place like Hope End exposure to the outside world was practically nil, she indulged herself in voracious reading. She was obviously a precocious prodigy who wrote odes at nine. Edward, who was nicknamed Bro, was her favorite brother. Ba, i.e. Elizabeth, herself learned Greek with Bro.
Unfortunately she and her sisters, Henrietta and Arabella, were afflicted with a disease. Elizabeth was slow in recovering from the disease for various reasons. In order to improve upon her health, she even visited a spa, (i.e. a mineral spring having remedial properties) in Gloucester. It was during these days that Elizabeth was prescribed opium to help her sleep. This got her addicted to the drugs.
INVALIDITY
Elizabeth was physically not keeping well. Throughout her life she suffered from one problem or the other. When she was 11, she had severe headache and pains in sides, suffered from convulsive twitches of the muscles; a general feeling of malice, from which she did not recover fast. After this illness she developed Measles and classic symptoms of Hypochondria. She experienced constant pains around the right side of her chest, which stretched round on her back. There were on an overage three attacks a day, but none at night. Her spine had been swollen. Due to this doctor came to the conclusion that she was taking opium. All the treatments provided more than a temporary and sometimes illusory alleviation. She could walk only a few steps after long months during which she remained immobile, most of the time in the spine crib. This difficulty remained with her as a disability forever.
Ba, unluckily, had a long story of invalidity. Yet, one can arrive at the conclusion that her being an invalid proved to be a boon in disguise to the world of literature.
GENDER BIASED SOCIETY
Though Elizabeth Barrett outclassed her brothers at Latin and Greek, she had to face the limitations of being a woman, at the early age of 15. Staying back at home, while her brothers were sent away for education; loneliness, loss as well as frustration made her prone to physical illness. She was never able to regain robust health.
ON HER LITERARY VOYAGE
With in born qualities as a writer, she wrote since she was nine. Reading and writing provided the essential life force to her semi-confined state of life. Till she was 10, she read several of Shakespeare’s plays, sections of Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey and the histories of great nations as England, Greece and Rome. She read Dante’s Inferno in Italian. She also learned Hebrew and read the entire Old Testament in Hebrew. During her teens she read the major Greek and Latin classical authors and their original writings without the help of translations.
By the age of 12, she had written an epic poem consisting of four books of rhyming couplets. It was her first literary attempt as she herself put it – "Pope’s Homer done over again or rather undone."
As a child she read books on Latin, Greek, French, Italian and Portuguese. Due to her frequent sickness she could concentrate more on her hobby and love of reading and writing. Just before her illness, on her 14th birthday in March 1820, her father published her long epic poem in imitation of Pope – The Battle of Marathon. Having on hand these 50 copies with her work printed in them he marked the transition from liking to writing poetry. She wrote in her private note, "Literature was the star which in prospect illuminated my future days… it was the spur … the aim … the very soul of my being".
She published poems in journal about Greece and Byron and in 1826 published Essay on Mind, With Other Poems.
SPATE OF MISFORTUNES
1828 was perhaps the beginning of Elizabeth Barrett’s misfortunes. Her mother died, leaving her to suffer for years. Death of her brother and a recurrence of her illness, plus loss of family fortune followed her mother’s death. Moreover, family disputes, adverse trading conditions and end of colonial systems reduced the family income. They were forced to leave their stately home, to reside in a fashionable area of London.
The polluted air of London, once again forced Elizabeth Barrett Browning to her sick room; yet her reputation as a poet and a critic grew.
THE RECOGNITION
In 1837, the Barrett family finally settled at 50, Wimpole Street, London. It can be presumed that her literary career progressed rapidly at this stage. The years 1838, 1842 and 1844 saw her published works, which were highly in her favor. The works The Cry of the Children and Lady Geraldine’s Courtship were so highly regarded that in 1850, after the death of William Wordsworth, her name was even suggested as his successor as Poet Laureate of England. However, in 1850, Tennyson was finally appointed as Poet Laureate.
An Essay On Mind was a collection of poems, heavy with pedantic tone imitative of Pope and Milton. As its name suggests it is a poetic essay in two books, on qualities, elements and abilities of mind. Here she wrote, "Poetry is the enthusiasm of the understanding, encompassing everything." Here she justified her belief, and in doing so demonstrated evidence of deep and wide reading.
LOVE OF HER LIFE
The most interesting event, which marked a turning point in Barrett’s life came after the publication of a two-volume edition of Poems. The edition was published with an introduction by Edgar Allan Poe. Captivated by the charms of her poems, Robert Browning, then an unknown poet, admired Barrett. John Kenyan, a friend of Barrett, was the link between Barrett and Robert Browning. Kenyan even inspired him to write to her, and finally arranged a meeting in May 1845.
The first meeting of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett turned into an eternal meeting of their hearts and souls. Robert Browning was impressed by her writings and loved her. He took an instant decision of marriage; together they planned their wedding day. It was only their love to fill the empty church, as parents were not present and social gathering was not done. It was a private marriage without consent of her parents, but with a very few cordial friends. There was neither choir, nor singing. The silence was eerie as they repeated their vows. Robert and Elizabeth left the St Marylebone Parish church in London, England at half past eleven on the morning of Saturday September 12, 1846, when Elizabeth was 40 and Robert was 34. After a week they eloped to Florence, Italy. There, Elizabeth recovered remarkably in its warm and clear air. In a book entitled Love Letters : An Anthropology of Passion by Michelle Lovric, there is a reference about a letter Elizabeth Barrett wrote to her friend that Browning’s letter "threw me into ecstasies". This was really romantic.
The love Robert Browning had for Elizabeth Barrett Browning is clear from his love letter, which he had written to her.
Extracts –
January 10th, 1845
New Cross Hatcham Surrey,
"I love your verses with all my heart, dear Miss Barrett, ---- and this is no off-hand complimentary letter that I shall write, -- whatever else, no prompt matter of course recognition of your genius and there a graceful and natural end of the thing : since the day last week when I first read your poems, I quite laugh to remember how I have been turning again in my mind what I should be able to tell you of their effect upon me – for in the first flush of delight I thought I would this once get out of my habit of purely passive enjoyment, when I do really enjoy, and thoroughly justify my admiration – perhaps even, as a loyal fellow – craftsman should, try and find fault and do you some little good to be proud of hereafter! – But nothing comes of it all – so into me has it gone, and part of me has it become, this great living poetry of yours, not a flower of which but took root and grew…oh, how different that is from lying
to be dried and pressed flat and prized highly and put in a book with a proper account at bottom, and shut up and put away…and the book called a Flora, besides! After all, I need not give up the thought for my faith in one and another excellence, the fresh strange music, the affluent language, the exquisite pathos and true new brave thought --- but in this addressing myself to you, your own self, and for the first time, my feeling rises altogether. I do, as I say, love these Books with all my heart ---- and I love you too : do you know I was once seeing you ?"
She was equally fond of him. Her best known poems were the one that she wrote for her love Robert Browning, between 1845 and 1847, under the title Sonnets from the Portuguese. It begins with a beautiful note –
"How do I loved thee ?
Let me count the ways."
THE LATER YEARS
Elizabeth Barrett Browning enjoyed 15 years of marital bliss with Robert Browning. After marrying Robert Browning in September 1846, Casa Guide became their base for the rest of her life. Yet, they visited Rome, Sienna, Bagni di Lucca, Paris and London.
Though the marital life of Elizabeth Barrett Browning was quite happy, she had two miscarriages before her son Robert was born in 1849 when she was 43. She was depressed. Her Mother and Poet reveals her bereavement.
‘Dead! One of them shot by the sea in the east,
And one of them shot in the west by the sea.
Dead! both my boys! When you sit at the feast
And are wanting a great song for Italy free,
Let none look at me!’
‘What art can a woman be good at? Oh, vain!
What art is she good at, but hurting her breast
With the milk – teeth of babes, and a smile at the pain?
Ah boys, how you hurt! you were strong as you pressed,
And I proud, by that test.’
‘What art’s for a woman? To hold on her knees
Both darlings! to feel all their arms round her throat,
Cling, strangle a little! to sew by degrees
And ‘broider the long – clothes and neat little coat;
To dream and to doat.’
‘Forgive me. Some women bear children in strength,
And bite back the cry of their pain in self-scorn;
But the birth-pangs of nations will wring us at length
Into wail such as this – and we sit on forlorn
When the man – child is born.’
Later in her life, Elizabeth Browning developed an interest in spiritualism and the Italian independence movement. She even supported Italian unity, and opposed slavery through her works.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning died in the arms of her husband on June 29, 1861at Florence. She was buried there, in the Protestant cemetery.
English poet, political thinker and feminist, Elizabeth Barrett Browning was probably the only female poet who was held in high esteem among literary society in U S and England, in the 19th Century.
Her most inspiring poems were those, wherein she dealt with evils of child labor and slavery. Human rights was one such concept, which reigned FFF supreme in the thoughts and works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning. She opposed slavery in her books The Runaway Slave At Pilgrims Point (1849) and in the political Poems Before Congress (1860). The Cry Of The Children, published in 1842, deals with the evils of child labor. It not only became famous but also brought about the regulation of child labor.
She devoted her lifetime to literature despite her disability. She was immensely popular and was considered a worthy successor of William Wordsworth.
As Robert Bernard Martin rightly said, "Elizabeth Barrett Browning has always been one of those writers who act like a polished surface to reflect the concerns of those who write about them…"
CHRONOLOGY OF LIFE
1806 Elizabeth Barrett Moulton Barrett, was born at Coxhoe Hall, County Durham.
1809 Family shifted to Hope End, a country estate in Hertfordshire.
She began writing poems within the next five years.
1828
Death of her mother.
1832 Moved to a modest home in Sidmouth, Devonshire.
1837 Family settled at 50, Wimpole Street in London.
1840 “Bro” drowns in Babbacombe Bay off Torquay, affecting Elizabeth greatly.
1841 Returned to the family home in London, still an invalid.
1845 Robert Browning visited her at Wimpole Street.
1846 Robert Browning and Elizabeth secretly married in London.
1847 Brownings move from Pisa to Florence.
1848 She involved herself for the cause of Italian political unity.
1849 Gave birth to a son : Robert Barrett Browning aka Pen.
1851 Brownings set out for London 1854 Returned to Florence.
1857
Death of her father Edward Moulton-Barrett.
1860
Death of her dear sister Henrietta.
1861 Died in Florence : buried there, in Protestant cemetery.
CHRONOLOGY OF WORKS
Below given is a list of the milestones of her literary journey:
1817 Her narrative poem The Battle of Marathon was published.
1825 The Rose and Zephyr, her first published work, printed in Literary Gazette.
1826 An Essay on Mind, first volume of poems published anonymously.
1833 Prometheus Bound, a translation from Greek poet Aeschylus published anonymously.
1838 The Seraphim and other Poems, published under her own name, favorable response received.
1842 The Cry of the Children published.
1844 A two-volume edition of Poems published. American edition published; introduction by Edgar Allan Poe.
1850 A new, two-volume edition of Poems, including the Sonnets from the Portuguese published.
1851 Casa Guidi Windows, a work about Italy, published.
1860 Poems Before Congress published.
1862 Posthumous publication of Last Poems, including De Profundis.
Elizabeth loved her name to be published as it brought her fame. It was something she starved to achieve in 1838. She worked hard to come out of shadows and published her collection of poetry without remaining anonymous. Till 32, she was not much recognized as a literary figure, which disturbed her mind. She was the happiest person when The Seraphim and Other Poems were published on June 6, 1838. In its preface she mentioned that all her poems were religious in their general character and she felt intensely that it was the solemn responsibilities of the poet.
Though her readers did not always smile with her, her shorter poems were preferred by them. She was loved especially for her ballads. Critics said that all her poems contained the same vocabulary and the theme of death, corpses, shrouds and general paraphernalia of dying kept on recurring in her poems. They displayed greater use of onomatopoeia at the same time being harmonic.
Readers’ liking towards her poems varied – some thought her style irritating while others found the same refreshing. The Athenaeum, The Examiner, The Atlas, Blackwood’s. The Quarterly Review and The Metropolitan Magazine paid her considerable recognition. She had the most professional stance about her fame and she was always observant about the type of reviews she received.
There is perhaps no poetess in the history of English literature who could match the stature of Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
Her works had a variety of themes. In some, she opposes child labor, whereas she criticizes slavery in the other. Apart from these themes, one can find the theme of love as well.
Her works include –
Battle of Marathon is a narrative poem written in 1818. It was printed by her father in 1820. The Rose and Zephyr - her first published work was published in 1825, in Literary Gazette.
Elizabeth Barrett had written two poems anonymously. They were – An Essay on Mind, which was published in 1826. It did not draw any critical attention. This was followed by another work Prometheus Bound. This work is a translation from the Greek playwright Aeschylus, published in 1833. Like her earlier work, this work also received no critical attention.
Her first poem was a long ode to the greatness of Napoleon III. It was an applaud and cherish. The seven other poems were different in tone.
However, her other works had been quite popular. The Seraphim and Other Poems was published in 1838, under her own name. This work was favorably received, and made a good sale. This work was the starting point of her literary career.The Seraphim consisted of long dialogues between two angels, mid-air above Judea, looking down on the crucifixion. They swoop down, calling on God to avenge his son’s death but the vision of the cross fades and Christ rises.
Poems Before Congress was pro-Italian and anti-English. It was a war work. The preface was thick with personal emotion and she spoke of her admiration of the Italian people, their heroic constancy and union. She stated that if patriotism meant the flattery of one’s own nation then this made the patriot little better than a courtier, which she had no intention of being.
The year 1842 saw her popular work The Cry of the Children. In this work, she directly attacked the use of child labor in coal mines.The work was so popular that it helped in bringing about regulation of child labor.
Some lines from the poem:
Do ye hear the children weeping, O my brothers,
Ere the sorrow comes with years ?
They are leaning their young heads against their mothers, -
And that cannot stop their tears.
The young lambs are bleating in the meadows;
The young birds are chirping in the nest;
The young fawns are playing with the shadows;
The young flowers are blowing toward the west –
But the young, young children, O my brothers,
They are weeping bitterly! –
They are weeping in the playtime of the others,
In the country of the free.
The two-volume edition of Poems was published in August 1844. In these works she pays a tribute to authors like Wordsworth, Tennyson, Robert Browning, whom she considered great.
How do I love thee ? Let me count the ways, are the famous lines of Sonnets from the Portuguese. Elizabeth Barrett used the word Portuguese in the title, as that was the pet name given to her by Robert Browning. The work was published in 1850, under a new, two volume edition of Poems. Sonnets from the Portuguese is a series of love poems that she wrote during their courtship. Some extracts from the Sonnets are given below –
The first time that the sun rose on thine oath
To love me, I looked forward to the moon
To slacken all those bonds which seemed too soon
And quickly tied to make a lasting troth.
Quick- loving hearts, I thought, may quickly loathe;
And, looking on myself, I seemed not one
For such man’s love ! – more like on out - of - tune
Worn viol, a good singer would be wroth
To spoil his song with, and which, snatched in haste,
Is laid down at the first ill - sounding note.
I did not wrong myself so, but I placed
A wrong on thee. For perfect strains may float
‘Neath master – hands, from instruments defaced –
And great souls, at one stroke, may do and dote.
Casa Guidi Windows was published in 1851. This work deals with the political reflections of Italy. The poem basically advocates the Italian independence movement. (Casa Guide became the base for the rest of Elizabeth’s life, after her marriage.)
Aurora Leigh, published in 1857, was a novel in blank verse. It talks about a woman writer, her childhood and her pursuit of a literary career. Moreover, other themes as the poet’s mission, social responsibilities, and the position of women are also dealt with.
Aurora Leigh is based on a real life incident. Aurora, the protagonist, lost her parents at an early age and she was sent to England to be educated by a maiden aunt. She educates herself out of the crates of her father’s books which she finds in the attic. Her cousin Romney proposes her on her 20th birthday. She rejects the proposal and prefers writing.
Seven years later, during Potoato Famine in Ireland she heard about Romney Leigh about to marry the pauper Marian Erle, whom Aurora meets at a London slum. Marian had educated herself out of mutilated books from Peddlars’ packs. Marian is abducted before the wedding at St James, taken to France, raped and left pregnant. She gives birth to a child. Aurora finds Marian and her Child in Paris. Elizabeth Barrett filled the manuscript pages with agitated images of drowning here. She takes them both with her to Florence.
Romney comes to them and proposes to Marian, who rejects him. Meanwhile, Romney becomes blind from an accident during the burning of Leigh Hall by the members of his socialist Phalanstery whom he had lodged under his ancestral roof. The loss of sight and Marian’s rejection further aggrieved Romney. But fate smiles on him and Aurora reconciles at the end.
Her other work, The Runaway Slave at Pilgrim’s Point, published in 1849, again deals with slavery. Through her works, she opposed the system.
A Tale of Villafranca which had appeared in The Athenaecem in September 1859, was sarcastic and written in such a direct way that the obscurities of Elizabeth’s earlier poetry seemed a distant memory.
Just like Casa Guidi Windows, Poems before Congress, published in 1860 reflects her growing interest in the Italian struggle for independence. This poem also responds to the immediate political events and severely criticizes the British government.
Last Poems, edited by Robert Browning, were posthumously published in 1862. It contains some of her best–known lyrics.
• Earth’s crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire
with God;
But only he who sees, takes off
his shoes ---
The rest sit round it and pluck
black berries…
• Measure not the work
Until the day’s out and the labor done,
Then bring your gauges.
• What is genius -- but the power of expressing a new individuality
• Books succeed, and lives fail.
• Experience, like a pale musician, holds
A dulcimer of patience in his hand.
• God answers sharp and sudden on same prayers,
And thrusts the things we have prayed for in our face,
A gauntlet with a gift in’t.
• The beautiful seems right by force of beauty and the fable wrong
because of weakness.
• Who so loves
Believes the impossible.
• Gods gifts put man’s best dreams to
shame.
• Since when was genius found respectable?
• Children use the fist
Until they are of the age to use the brain.
• Men get opinions as boys learn to spell,
By reiteration chiefly.
• Light tomorrow with today.
• Like some small nimble mouse between the ribs
Of a mastodon, I nibbled here and here
At this or that box, pulling through the gap,
In heats of terror, haste, victorious joy,
The first book first.
• At painful times, when composition is impossible and reading is not
enough, grammars and dictionaries are excellent for distraction.
