Robert Browning’s Poetry

628 Pages·1979·36.352 MB·English

by  JAMES F. LOUCKS, ROBERT BROWNING

A NORTON CRITICAL EDITION
Robert Browning’s
Poetry
EDITED BY JAMES F. LOUCKS
AUTHORITATIVE TEXTS
CRITICISM
Digitized by the Internet Archive
in 2018 with funding from
Kahle/Austin Foundation
https://archive.org/details/robertbrowningspOOOObrow
7
ROBERT BROWNING'S POETRY
AUTHORITATIVE TEXTS
CRITICISM
W. W. NORTON & COMPANY, INC.
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THE NORTON ANTHOLOGY OF AMERICAN LITERATURE
edited by Ronald Gottesman et al.
THE NORTON ANTHOLOGY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE
edited by M.H Abrams et al.
.
THE NORTON ANTHOLOGY OF MODERN POETRY
edited by Richard Ellmann and Robert O’Clair
THE NORTON ANTHOLOGY OF POETRY
edited by Arthur M. Eastman et al.
THE NORTON ANTHOLOGY OF SHORT FICTION
edited by R.V. Cassill
THE NORTON ANTHOLOGY OF WORLD MASTERPIECES
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THE NORTON INTRODUCTION TO LITERATURE
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THE NORTON READER
edited by Arthur M. Eastman et al.
A NORTON CRITICAL EDITION «<-
ROBERT BROWNING'S
POETRY
AUTHORITATIVE TEXTS
CRITICISM
Selected and Edited by
JAMES F. LOUCKS
THE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY
W • W • NORTON & COMPANY
New York London
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Harold Bloom: from The Ringers in the Tower. Copyright © 1971 by The Uni¬
versity of Chicago. All rights reserved. Reprinted by permission of the author
and The University of Chicago Press.
G. K. Chesterton: from Robert Browning. London: Macmillan, 1903. Reprinted
by permission of Macmillan, London and Basingstoke.
Gerard Manley Hopkins: from The Correspondence of Gerard Manley Hopkins and
Richard Watson Dixon edited by Claude Colleer Abbott, 1935. Reprinted by per¬
mission of Oxford University Press.
E. D. H. Johnson: “Robert Browning’s Pluralistic Universe: A Reading of The
Ring and the Book,” reprinted from University of Toronto Quarterly Vol. 31,
(1961), by permission of the author and University of Toronto Press.
Roma A. King, Jr.: from The Bow and the Lyre. Ann Arbor: University of Michi¬
gan Press, 1957. Reprinted by permission of University of Michigan Press.
Robert Langbaum: from The Poetry of Experience. Copyright © 1957 by Robert
Langbaum. Reprinted by permission of Random House, Inc., and Chatto &
Windus Ltd.
J. Hillis Miller: from The Disappearance of God: Five Nineteenth-Century Writers
by J. Hillis Miller. Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University
Press, Copyright © 1963 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. Re¬
printed by permission of the author and publishers.
F. E. L. Priestley: “Blougram’s Apologetics.” Reprinted from University of To¬
ronto Quarterly, Vol. 15 (Jan. 1946), by permission of the author and the Uni¬
versity of Toronto Press.
William O. Raymond: from The Infinite Moment and Other Essays in Robert
Browning, by William O. Raymond. Reprinted by permission of University of
Toronto Press. © University of Toronto Press 1965.
George Santayana: from Interpretations of Poetry and Religion. Reprinted by per¬
mission of Constable Publishers.
W. David Shaw: from The Dialectical Temper. Copyright © 1969 by Cornell Uni¬
versity. Used by permission of Cornell University Press.
Copyright © 1979 by W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Browning, Robert, 1812-1889.
Robert Browning’s poetry.
(A Norton critical edition)
Bibliography: p.
Includes index.
1. Browning, Robert, 1812-1889—Criticism and inter¬
pretation—Addresses, essays, lectures. I. Loucks,
James F.
PR4202.L59 1979 821'.8 79-10295
ISBN 0-393-04475-0
ISBN 0-393-09092-2 pbk.
Published simultaneously in Canada by George J. McLeod Limited,
Toronto. Printed in the United States of America.
All Rights Reserved.
FIRST EDITION
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Contents
Preface ix
Browning: A Chronology xi
List of Abbreviations xiii
The Texts of the Poems xv
A Note on the Texts xvi
The Experimental Phase (1833-45) 1
From Pauline (1833) 4
From Paracelsus (1835) 12
From Sordello (1840) 18
Pippa Passes (1841) 58
From Dramatic Lyrics (1842) 58
My Last Duchess 5^
Count Gismond 59
Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister 62
In a Gondola 64
Cristina 70
Johannes Agricola in Meditation 72
Porphyria’s Lover 74
The Pied Piper of Hamelin 75
From Dramatic Romances and Lyrics (1845) 82
“How They Brought the Good News
from Ghent to Aix” 82
Pictor Ignotus 84
Home-Thoughts, from Abroad 86
[“Here’s to Nelson’s Memory!”] 86
Home-Thoughts, from the Sea 87
The Bishop Orders His Tomb at St. Praxed’s Church 87
The Laboratory 91
Meeting at Night; Parting at Morning 92
Nationality in Drinks 93
The Major Phase (1855-69) 94
From Men and Women (1855) 94
Love among the Ruins 94
A Lovers’ Quarrel 96
Evelyn Hope 100
Up at a Villa—Down in the City 101
A Woman’s Last Word 104
Fra Lippo Lippi 105
A Toccata of Galuppi’s 114
By the Fire-Side 116
v
vi Contents
*
Any Wife to Any Husband 123
An Epistle ... of Karshish, the Arab Physician 127
My Star
*34
“Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came”
134
Respectability 140
A Light Woman 140
The Statue and the Bust 142
How It Strikes a Contemporary 149
The Last Ride Together
151
Master Hugues of Saxe-Gotha
154
Bishop Blougram’s Apology
158
Memorabilia
183
Andrea del Sarto 184
Saul [final version] 191
Women and Roses 200
Holy-Cross Day 201
The Guardian-Angel 205
Cleon 207
Popularity
215
Two in the Campagna 217
A Grammarian’s Funeral 219
“Transcendentalism: A Poem in Twelve Books”
222
One Word More 224
From Dramatis Personae (1864) 229
James Lee’s Wife 229
Dis aliter Visum 239
Abt Vogler 243
Rabbi Ben Ezra
246
Caliban upon Setebos
252
Confessions 259
Prospice
260
Apparent Failure 261
Epilogue 263
From The Ring and the Book (1868-69) 266
Book V. Count Guido Franceschini 270
Book VI. Giuseppe Caponsacchi 316
Book X. The Pope 361
The Later Achievement (after 1870) 409
From Fifine at the Fair (1872) 409
Prologue (Amphibian) 409
Epilogue (The Householder) 411
From Aristophanes’ Apology (1875) 412
[Thamuris Marching] 412
From Pacchiarotto and How He Worked in Distemper:
With Other Poems (1876) 415
House 415
Fears and Scruples 416
Numpholeptos 418
Contents vii
•
From Jocoseria (1883) 421
Adam, Lilith, and Eve 421
Never the Time and the Place 422
From Parleying with Certain People of Importance
in Their Day (1887) 423
With Christopher Smart 423
From Asolando: Fancies and Facts (1889) 430
Prologue 430
Bad Dreams, I-IV 431
“Imperante Augusto Natus Est—” 436
Development 440
Epilogue 443
Prose 445
From “Introductory Essay” to the Letters
of Percy Bysshe Shelley (1852) 445
Criticism 453
Victorian Views 455
John Forster • Evidences of a New Genius for
Dramatic Poetry 455
Thomas Carlyle • [Letter to Browning] 457
George Eliot • [Review of Men and Women] 458
William Morris • [Browning’s Alleged Carelessness] 462
John Ruskin ♦ [Browning and the Italian
Renaissance] 463
Walter Bagehot • [Browning’s Grotesque Art] 465
Robert W. Buchanan • [The Ring and the Book] 469
Alfred Austin • The Poetry of the Period:
Mr. Browning 471
Algernon Charles Swinburne • [Browning’s Obscurity] 475
Gerard Manley Hopkins • [Strictures on Browning] 479
Oscar Wilde • [Browning as “Writer of Fiction”] 480
Henry James • Browning in Westminster Abbey 482
Modern Essays in Criticism 486
Revaluations 486
George Santayana • The Poetry of Barbarism 486
G. K. Chesterton • [Reply to Santayana]
493
William O. Raymond • The Infinite Moment 496
J. Hillis Miller • [Browning’s Language] 509
The Dramatic Monologue
514
Robert Langbaum • The Dramatic Monologue:
Sympathy versus Judgment
Interpretations of Poems
W. David Shaw • Browning’s Duke as Theatrical
Producer [“My Last Duchess”]
Harold Bloom • Browning’s “Childe Roland”:
All Things Deformed and Broken
544
viii Contents
*
F. E. L. Priestley • Blougram’s Apologetics 554
Roma A. King, Jr. • Eve and the Virgin:
'‘Andrea del Sarto" 563
E. D. H. Johnson • Robert Browning’s Pluralistic
Universe: A Reading of The Ring and the Book 576
Selected Bibliography 596
Index of Titles 603