Editing Robert Browning (section)

==Biography==
===Early years===
Browning was born in [[Walworth]] in the parish of [[Camberwell]], Surrey, which now forms part of the [[London Borough of Southwark|Borough of Southwark]] in south London. He was baptised on 14 June 1812, at Lock's Fields Independent Chapel, York Street, Walworth,<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:JW86-2ZV |title=FamilySearch.org|website=[[FamilySearch]]}}</ref> the only son of Sarah Anna (née Wiedemann) and Robert Browning.<ref name="Karlin9">Browning, Robert. Ed. Karlin, Daniel (2004) ''Selected Poems'' Penguin, p. 9</ref><ref>{{Cite book |url=http://www.bookrags.com/biography/robert-browning-dlb2/ |title=Robert Browning Biography |via=bookrags.com}}</ref> His father was a well-paid clerk for the [[Bank of England]], earning about £150 per year.<ref name="Maynard">John Maynard, ''Browning's Youth''</ref> Browning's paternal grandfather was a slave owner in [[Saint Kitts and Nevis|Saint Kitts, West Indies]], but Browning's father was an [[Abolitionism in the United Kingdom|abolitionist]]. Browning's father had been sent to the [[West Indies]] to work on a sugar plantation but returned to England following a slave revolt. Browning's mother was the daughter of a German shipowner who had settled in [[Dundee]], Scotland and his Scottish wife. His paternal grandmother, Margaret Tittle, had inherited a plantation in St Kitts and was rumoured in the family to have a mixed-race ancestry including some Jamaican blood, but author Julia Markus suggests she was [[Saint Kitts and Nevis|Kittitian]] rather than Jamaican.<ref>''Dared and done: the marriage of Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning'' Knopf, 1995, University of Michigan, p. 112. {{ISBN|978-0-679-41602-9}}</ref> The evidence is inconclusive.<ref>''The dramatic imagination of Robert Browning: a literary life'', 2007. Richard S. Kennedy, Donald S. Hair, University of Missouri Press, p. 7. {{ISBN|0-8262-1691-9}}</ref> Robert's father, a literary collector, had a library of some 6,000 books; many of them were rare so that Robert grew up in a household with significant literary resources. His mother, to whom he was close, was a devout [[Nonconformist (Protestantism)|nonconformist]] and a talented musician.<ref name="Karlin9"/> His younger sister, Sarianna, also gifted, became her brother's companion in his later years, after the death of his wife in 1861. His father encouraged his children's interest in literature and the arts.<ref name="Karlin9"/>

By the age of 12, Browning had written a book of poetry, which he later destroyed for want of a publisher. After attending one or two private schools and showing an insuperable dislike of school life, he was educated at home by a tutor, using the resources of his father's library.<ref name="Karlin9"/> By 14 he was fluent in French, [[Ancient Greek|Greek]], Italian and Latin. He became an admirer of the [[Romantic poets]], especially [[Percy Bysshe Shelley|Shelley]], whom he followed in becoming an [[atheism|atheist]] and a vegetarian. At 16, he studied Greek at [[University College London]], but left after his first year.<ref name="Karlin9"/> His parents' [[evangelicalism|evangelical faith]] prevented his studying at either [[University of Oxford|Oxford]] or [[Cambridge University]], both then open only to members of the [[Church of England]].<ref name="Karlin9"/> He had inherited substantial musical ability through his mother, and composed arrangements of various songs. He refused a formal career and ignored his parents' remonstrations by dedicating himself to poetry. He stayed at home until the age of 34, financially dependent on his family until his marriage. His father sponsored the publication of his son's poems.<ref name="Karlin9"/>

===First published works===
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 |title=[[s:Waring|Waring]] (ll. 192–200)
 |quote=<poem>Some one shall somehow run a muck
With this old world, for want of strife
Sound asleep: contrive, contrive
To rouse us, Waring! Who's alive?
Our men scarce seem in earnest now:
Distinguished names!—but 'tis, somehow,
As if they played at being names
Still more distinguished, like the games
Of children.
</poem>
 |source=''Bells and Pomegranates No. III: Dramatic Lyrics'' (1842)
}}In March 1833, ''"[[Pauline, a Fragment of a Confession]]"'' was published anonymously by Saunders and Otley at the expense of the author, Robert Browning, who received the money from his aunt, Mrs Silverthorne.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Chesterton |first=G K |title=Robert Browning |publisher=Macmillan Interactive Publishing |location=London |orig-date=1903 |isbn=978-0-333-02118-7 |date=1951}}</ref> It is a long poem composed in homage to the poet [[Percy Bysshe Shelley|Shelley]] and somewhat in his style. Originally Browning considered ''Pauline'' as the first of a series written by different aspects of himself, but he soon abandoned this idea. The press noticed the publication. W. J. Fox writing in ''The Monthly Repository'' of April 1833 discerned merit in the work. [[Allan Cunningham (author)|Allan Cunningham]] praised it in the ''[[Athenaeum (British magazine)|Athenaeum]]''. However, it sold no copies.<ref>{{Cite book |title=The Major Works |first=Robert |last=Browning |editor=Roberts, Adam |editor2=Karlin, Daniel |isbn=978-0-19-955469-0 |year=2009 |publisher=Oxford University Press |series=Oxford World's Classics}}</ref> Some years later, probably in 1850, [[Dante Gabriel Rossetti]] came across it in the Reading Room of the [[British Museum]] and wrote to Browning, then in [[Florence]], to ask if he was the author.<ref name="TheCambridge1907">{{Cite book |title=The Cambridge History of English and American Literature in 18 volumes (published 1907–1921) |volume=XIII|chapter=III}}</ref> [[John Stuart Mill]], however, wrote that the author suffered from an "intense and morbid self-consciousness".<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://britlitwiki.wikispaces.com/Robert+Browning |title=Robert Browning |last=Stevenson |first=Sarah |access-date=26 August 2012}}</ref> Later Browning was rather embarrassed by the work, and only included it in his collected poems of 1868 after making substantial changes and adding a preface in which he asked for indulgence for a boyish work.<ref name="TheCambridge1907" />

In 1834, he accompanied the Chevalier George de Benkhausen, the Russian consul-general, on a brief visit to [[St Petersburg]] and began ''Paracelsus'', which was published in 1835.<ref name="Browning Poetical Works 1833–1864">{{Cite book |title=Browning Poetical Works 1833–1864 |editor=Ian Jack |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=1970 |chapter=Introduction and Chronology |isbn=978-0-19-254165-9 |oclc=108532 |url=https://archive.org/details/browningpoetical00brow}}</ref> The subject of the [[Paracelsus|16th-century savant and alchemist]] was probably suggested to him by the Comte Amédée de Ripart-Monclar, to whom it was dedicated. The publication had some commercial and critical success, being noticed by [[Wordsworth]], [[Dickens]], [[Walter Savage Landor|Landor]], J. S. Mill and the already famous [[Tennyson]]. It is a monodrama without action, dealing with the problems confronting an intellectual trying to find his role in society. It gained him access to the London literary world.

As a result of his new contacts he met [[William Charles Macready|Macready]], who invited him to write a play.<ref name="Browning Poetical Works 1833–1864"/> ''[[Strafford (play)|Strafford]]'' was performed five times. Browning then wrote two other plays, one of which was not performed, while the other failed, Browning having fallen out with Macready.

In 1838, he visited Italy looking for background for ''[[Sordello (poem)|Sordello]]'', a long poem in heroic couplets, presented as the imaginary biography of the Mantuan bard spoken of by [[Dante]] in the [[Divine Comedy]], canto 6 of Purgatory, set against a background of hate and conflict during the wars of the [[Guelphs and Ghibellines]]. This was published in 1840 and met with widespread derision, gaining him the reputation of wanton carelessness and obscurity. Tennyson, jokingly, commented that he only understood the first and last lines. [[Jane Welsh Carlyle]], wife of [[Thomas Carlyle]] (a friend of Browning's who deeply influenced Browning's poetry),<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Sanders |first=Charles Richard |date=1974 |title=The Carlyle-Browning correspondence and relationship. I |jstor=community.28212026 |journal=Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, Manchester |type=Periodical |volume=57 |issue=1 |pages=213–246 |doi=10.7227/BJRL.57.1.8 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Sanders |first=Charles Richard |date=1975 |title=The Carlyle-Browning correspondence and relationship. II |jstor=community.28212035 |journal=Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, Manchester |type=Periodical |volume=57 |issue=2 |pages=430–462 |doi=10.7227/BJRL.57.2.9 }}</ref> quipped that she read the poem through and "could not tell whether Sordello was a [sic] 'a book, a city, or a man'".<ref>Browning, Robert. Ed. Karlin, Daniel (2004) Selected Poems Penguin</ref>

Browning's reputation began to make a partial recovery with the publication, 1841–1846, of ''Bells and Pomegranates'', a series of eight pamphlets, originally intended just to include his plays. Fortunately for Browning's career, his publisher, Moxon, persuaded him to include some "dramatic lyrics", some of which had already appeared in periodicals.<ref name="Browning Poetical Works 1833–1864"/>

===Marriage===
{{See also|Elizabeth Barrett Browning}}
[[File:Thomas B. Read (American, 1822-1872) - Portraits of Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Robert Browning.jpg|thumb|Portraits of Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Robert Browning.]]
[[File:Clasped Hands of Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning MET DT8282.jpg|thumb|''[[Clasped Hands of Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning]]'', 1853 by [[Harriet Hosmer]].]]

In 1845, Browning met the poet [[Elizabeth Barrett Browning|Elizabeth Barrett]], six years his senior, who lived as a semi-invalid in her father's house in [[Wimpole Street]], London. They began regularly corresponding and gradually a romance developed between them, leading to their marriage and journey to Italy (for Elizabeth's health) on 12 September 1846.<ref name="Karlin10">Browning, Robert. Ed. Karlin, Daniel (2004) ''Selected Poems'' Penguin p10</ref><ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/182 |title=Robert Browning|website=poets.org |access-date=7 May 2020}}</ref> The marriage was initially secret because Elizabeth's domineering father disapproved of marriage for any of his children. Mr. Barrett disinherited Elizabeth, as he did each of his children who married: "The Mrs. Browning of popular imagination was a sweet, innocent young woman who suffered endless cruelties at the hands of a tyrannical papa but who nonetheless had the good fortune to fall in love with a dashing and handsome poet named Robert Browning."<ref>Peterson, William S. ''Sonnets From The Portuguese''. Massachusetts: Barre Publishing, 1977.</ref> At her husband's insistence, the second edition of Elizabeth's ''Poems'' included her love sonnets. The book increased her popularity and high critical regard, cementing her position as an eminent Victorian poet. Upon [[William Wordsworth]]'s death in 1850, she was a serious contender to become [[Poet Laureate]], the position eventually going to [[Alfred Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson|Tennyson]].

From the time of their marriage and until Elizabeth's death, the Brownings lived in Italy, residing first in [[Pisa]], and then, within a year, finding an apartment in [[Florence]] at [[Casa Guidi]] (now a museum to their memory).<ref name="Karlin10"/> Their only child, [[Robert Barrett Browning|Robert Wiedemann Barrett Browning]], nicknamed "Penini" or "Pen", was born in 1849.<ref name="Karlin10"/> In these years Browning was fascinated by, and learned from, the art and atmosphere of Italy. He would, in later life, describe Italy as his university. As Elizabeth had inherited money of her own, the couple were reasonably comfortable in Italy, and their relationship together was happy. However, the literary assault on Browning's work did not let up and he was critically dismissed further, by patrician writers such as [[Charles Kingsley]], for deserting England.<ref name="Karlin10"/>

===Political views===
Browning identified as a [[liberalism|Liberal]], supported the emancipation of women, and opposed slavery, expressing sympathy for the North in the [[American Civil War]].<ref name="Robert Browning">{{Cite book |last1=Woolford |first1=John |last2=Karlin |first2=Daniel |title=Robert Browning |date=2014 |publisher=Routledge |page=157}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last1=Dowden |first1=Edward |title=Robert Browning |url=https://archive.org/details/cu31924013444744 |date=1904 |publisher=J.M. Dent & Company |pages=[https://archive.org/details/cu31924013444744/page/n136 109]–111}}</ref> Later in life, he even championed animal rights in several poems attacking vivisection. He was also a stalwart opponent of anti-Semitism, leading to speculation that Browning himself was Jewish.<ref name="Robert Browning"/> In 1877 he wrote a poem explaining "Why I am a Liberal" in which he declared: "Who then dares hold – emancipated thus / His fellow shall continue bound? Not I."<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Woolford |first1=John |last2=Karlin |first2=Daniel |title=Robert Browning |date=2014 |publisher=Routledge |page=158}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book |last1=Dowden |first1=Edward |title=Robert Browning |url=https://archive.org/details/cu31924013444744 |date=1904 |publisher=J.M. Dent & Company |pages=[https://archive.org/details/cu31924013444744/page/n137 110]}}</ref> Critical attention to Browning's politics has, in general, been sparse. [[Isobel Armstrong]]'s writing on dramatic monologues, as well as more recent work on the influence of ''[[Coriolanus]]'' on Browning's politics, has attempted to situate the poet's political sensibility at the centre of his practice.<ref>Isobel Armstrong, ''[https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/mono/10.4324/9781315775883/victorian-poetry-isobel-armstrong Victorian Poetry: Poetry, Poetics and Politics]'' (London and New York: Routledge, 1993); Joseph Hankinson, '[https://doi.org/10.1093/escrit/cgac014 King Multitude: Browning and ''Coriolanus'']', ''Essays in Criticism'', vol. 72, iss. 2 (2022), pp. 148–169.</ref>

===Religious beliefs===
Browning was raised in an evangelical non-conformist household. However, after his reading of Shelley he is said to have briefly become an atheist.<ref name=everett>Everett, Glenn. [http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/rb/rbrelge.html Browning's Religious Views] at [[Victorian Web]]. Retrieved 19 February 2018</ref> Browning is also said to have made an uncharacteristic admission of faith to Alfred Domett, when he is said to have admired Byron's poetry "as a Christian".<ref name=Dommet>Domett, Alfred. [http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/rb/religionov.html Robert Browning's Religious Context and Belief], cited at [[Victorian Web]]. Retrieved 19 February 2018</ref> Poems such as "Christmas-Eve and Easter-Day" seem to confirm this Christian faith, strengthened by his wife. However, many have dismissed the usefulness of these [[Thematic focus of Robert Browning poetic work|works]] at discovering Browning's own religious views due to the consistent use of dramatic monologue which regularly expresses hypothetical views which cannot be ascribed to the author himself.<ref name=everett/>

===Spiritualism incident===
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 |title=[[s:Mr. Sludge, "The Medium"|Mr. Sludge, "The Medium"]] (opening lines)
 |quote=<poem>Now, don't, sir! Don't expose me! Just this once!
This was the first and only time, I'll swear,—
Look at me,—see, I kneel,—the only time,
I swear, I ever cheated,—yes, by the soul
Of Her who hears—(your sainted mother, sir!)
All, except this last accident, was truth—
This little kind of slip!—and even this,
It was your own wine, sir, the good champagne,
(I took it for [[Catawba (grape)|Catawba]]—you're so kind)
Which put the folly in my head!
</poem>
 |source=''Dramatis Personae'' (1864)
}}
Browning believed [[Spiritualism (movement)|spiritualism]] to be fraud, and proved one of [[Daniel Dunglas Home]]'s most adamant critics. When Browning and his wife [[Elizabeth Barrett Browning|Elizabeth]] attended one of his séances on 23 July 1855,<ref name="Thomas1989">[[Donald Serrell Thomas]]. (1989). ''Robert Browning: A Life Within Life''. Weidenfeld and Nicolson. pp. 157–158. {{ISBN|978-0-297-79639-8}}</ref> a spirit face materialized, which Home claimed was Browning's son who had died in infancy: Browning seized the "materialization" and discovered it to be Home's bare foot. To make the deception worse, Browning had never lost a son in infancy.<ref>[[John Casey (academic)|John Casey]]. (2009). ''After Lives: A Guide to Heaven, Hell and Purgatory''. Oxford. p. 373. {{ISBN|978-0-19-997503-7}} "The poet attended one of Home's seances where a face was materialized, which, Home's spirit guide announced, was that of Browning's dead son Browning seized the supposed materialized head, and it turned out to be the bare foot of Home. The deception was not helped by the fact that Browning never had lost a son in infancy."</ref>

After the séance, Browning wrote an angry letter to ''[[The Times]]'', in which he said: "the whole display of hands, spirit utterances etc., was a cheat and imposture."<ref>[[Frank Podmore]]. (1911). ''The Newer Spiritualism''. Henry Holt and Company. p. 45</ref> In 1902 Browning's son [[Robert Barrett Browning|Pen]] wrote: "Home was detected in a vulgar fraud."<ref>[[Harry Houdini]]. (2011 reprint edition). Originally published in 1924. ''A Magician Among the Spirits''. Cambridge University Press. p. 42. {{ISBN|978-1-108-02748-9}}</ref> Elizabeth, however, was convinced that the phenomena she witnessed were genuine, and her discussions about Home with her husband were a constant source of disagreement.<ref>[[Peter Lamont (historian)|Peter Lamont]]. (2005). ''The First Psychic: The Extraordinary Mystery of a Notorious Victorian Wizard''. Little, Brown & Company. p. 50. {{ISBN|978-0-316-72834-8}}</ref>

===Major works===
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 |title=[[s:How It Strikes a Contemporary|How It Strikes a Contemporary]] (ll. 21–33)
 |quote=<poem>He stood and watched the cobbler at his trade,
The man who slices lemons into drink,
The coffee-roaster's [[brazier]], and the boys
That volunteer to help him turn its winch.
He glanced o'er books on stalls with half an eye,
And fly-leaf ballads on the vendor's string,
And broad-edge bold-print posters by the wall.
He took such cognizance of men and things,
If any beat a horse, you felt he saw;
If any cursed a woman, he took note;
Yet stared at nobody—you stared at him,
And found, less to your pleasure than surprise,
He seemed to know you and expect as much.
</poem>
 |source=''Men and Women'' (1855)
}}
In Florence, probably from early in 1853, Browning worked on the poems that eventually composed his two-volume ''[[Men and Women (poetry collection)|Men and Women]]'', for which he is now well known,<ref name="Karlin10"/> although in 1855, when they were published, they made relatively little impact.

In 1861, Elizabeth died in Florence. Among those whom he found consoling in that period{{vague|reason = the one ending in '61, or the one beginning then, or a *completely*undelimited one that surrounded her death?|date=August 2019}} was the novelist and poet [[Isa Blagden]], with whom he and his wife had had a voluminous correspondence.<ref>"Isa Blagden", in: ''The Brownings' Correspondence''. [http://www.browningscorrespondence.com/biographical-sketches/?id=123. Retrieved 13 May 2015.]</ref> The following year Browning returned to London, taking Pen with him, who by then was 12 years old. They made their home in 17 [[Warwick Crescent]], [[Maida Vale]]. It was only when he became part of the London literary scene—albeit while paying frequent visits to Italy (though never again to Florence)—that his reputation started to take off.<ref name="Karlin10"/>

In 1868, after five years' work, he completed and published the long [[Blank verse|blank-verse]] poem ''[[The Ring and the Book]]''. Based on a convoluted murder-case from 1690s Rome, the poem is composed of 12 books: essentially 10 lengthy dramatic monologues narrated by various characters in the story, showing their individual perspectives on events, bookended by an introduction and conclusion by Browning himself. Long even by Browning's standards (over twenty-thousand lines), ''The Ring and the Book'' was his most ambitious project and is arguably his greatest work; it has been called a ''tour de force'' of dramatic poetry.<ref name="Karlin11"/> Published in four parts from November 1868 to February 1869, the poem was a success both commercially and critically, and finally brought Browning the renown he had sought for nearly 40 years.<ref name="Karlin11">Browning, Robert. Ed. Karlin, Daniel (2004) ''Selected Poems'' Penguin p. 11</ref> The Robert Browning Society was formed in 1881 and his work was recognised as belonging within the British literary canon.<ref name="Karlin11"/>

===Last years and death===
[[File:Robert Browning after death.jpg|thumb|left|Browning after death.]]
[[File:Robert browning cartoon-1-.png|thumb|upright|1882 caricature from ''[[Punch (magazine)|Punch]]'' reading: "''The Ring and Bookmaker from Red Cotton Nightcap country"'']]

In the remaining years of his life Browning travelled extensively. After a series of long poems published in the early 1870s, of which ''Balaustion's Adventure'' and ''[[Red Cotton Night-Cap Country]]'' were the best-received,<ref name="Karlin11"/> the volume ''[[Pacchiarotto, and How He Worked in Distemper]]'' included an attack against Browning's critics, especially [[Alfred Austin]], who was later to become [[Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom|Poet Laureate]]. According to some reports Browning became romantically involved with [[Louisa Caroline Stewart-Mackenzie]], Lady Ashburton, but he refused her proposal of marriage, and did not remarry. In 1878, he revisited Italy for the first time in the seventeen years since Elizabeth's death, and returned there on several further occasions. In 1887, Browning produced the major work of his later years, ''Parleyings with Certain People of Importance in Their Day''. It finally presented the poet speaking in his own voice, engaging in a series of dialogues with long-forgotten figures of literary, artistic, and philosophic history. The Victorian public was baffled by this, and Browning returned to the brief, concise lyric for his last volume, ''[[Asolando]]'' (1889), published on the day of his death.<ref name="Karlin11"/>

Browning died at his son's home [[Ca' Rezzonico]] in Venice on 12 December 1889.<ref name="Karlin11"/> He was buried in [[Poets' Corner]] in [[Westminster Abbey]]; his grave now lies immediately adjacent to that of [[Alfred, Lord Tennyson|Alfred Tennyson]].<ref name="Karlin11"/>

During his life Browning was awarded many distinctions. He was made [[LL.D.]] of Edinburgh, a life Governor of London University, and had the offer of the [[Rector of the University of Glasgow|Lord Rectorship of Glasgow]]. But he turned down anything that involved public speaking.