The lives of the poets from The Dictionary of National Biography ...

The next pamphlet and four more of them were plays, which Browning designed for stage production. The
only one produced, by Macready against his better judgement, was A Blot in the ʹScutcheon. Presented in
February 1843, it was withdrawn after three performances, at which point Browningʹs break with Macready
was complete and so, effectively, were his hopes for the stage. The plays offer little plot and almost no
action, their interest (as in Strafford) centring on action in character rather than character in action. The root
conception of Browningʹs plays lies in the conflict between love and duty, or love and power, which is for
the most part worked out within a political situation. However interesting to Browning, this was far from
being the primary focus that theatregoers expected.
Pamphlets three and seven—Dramatic Lyrics (1842) and Dramatic Romances and Lyrics (1845)—contain
some of Browningʹs best‐known poems, such as ‘My Last Duchess’, ‘Porphyriaʹs Lover’, and ‘The Bishop
Orders his Tomb at St Praxedʹs Church’. These are dramatic monologues (called by the poet dramatic lyrics
or dramatic romances), which take the form of narratives told in the first person by a carefully characterized
narrator who, so distanced, is understood to be distinct from the poet. Browningʹs achievement in grounding
these narrators in their historical milieu was memorably praised in Modern Painters by Ruskin, who
commented that in ‘The Bishop Orders his Tomb at St Praxedʹs Church’, Browning had put ‘nearly all that I
said of the central Renaissance in thirty pages of the Stones of Venice into as many lines’ (Poems, 1.1093).
The narrator in one of Browningʹs dramatic monologues usually speaks to an auditor within the poem, and
inadvertently reveals his true nature to the reader through his words. The monologues internalize plot and
deal with an interior conflict of which the speaker is frequently not consciously aware. As Browning said in
the preface to Dramatic Lyrics, the poems in this genre are ‘for the most part Lyric in expression, always
Dramatic in principle, and so many utterances of so many imaginary persons, not mine’. In other words, the
utterance by the fictitious speaker is lyric to the degree that it is expressive of self, and dramatic to the degree
that it is suggestive of conflicting motives and tendencies. The dramatic monologue became the chief genre
that Browning employed and experimented with for the remainder of his career, and in large part because of
his skilful manipulation of its peculiar characteristics, it became one of the dominant genres employed by
poets over the following century. Recognizing his young friendʹs amazing achievement, Walter Savage
Landor published a poem in November 1845 attesting to Browningʹs majority, as having become a name to
be listed, along with those of Chaucer and Shakespeare, among the greatest English writers.
Marriage and early life in Italy
Another poet, whom Browning had recently come to know, was equally enthusiastic. Elizabeth Barrett [see
Browning, Elizabeth Barrett (1806–1861)], among the most famous poets of the day, had praised Browningʹs
poetry in a journal article in 1842 and in one of her poems published in 1844. Browning was full of gratitude,
and posted a letter to her on 10 January 1845 telling her that ‘I love your verse with all my heart … and I love
you too’ (Browningsʹ Correspondence, 10.17). She replied the next day thanking him for his letter and
proclaiming herself ‘a devout admirer & student’ of his works (ibid., 10.19). Thereafter they began to
exchange letters every few days.
Elizabeth Barrett fended off Browningʹs requests to visit her for some time, as she feared his reaction on
seeing an ageing invalid some six years his senior confined to a sofa. But he persisted, and she finally
allowed him to come to 50 Wimpole Street on 20 May 1845. He fell in love with her almost at first sight, as he
told her in his letters. For her part, she could not believe that someone could love a seemingly incurable
invalid and was also terrified that her tyrannical father, who had forbidden his children to marry, would
learn about her admirer. But after many letters and visits, she was ready to declare her love for him in
forthright terms in November 1845, although she told none of her friends or family. When, however, her
father became suspicious of Robertʹs visits, she came to recognize her father as a despotic egoist and agreed
to discuss the possibility of marriage.
One obstacle to marriage was money. Browning was completely dependent financially on his parents, but
Elizabeth had inherited a fortune that yielded about £350 annually. Browning would not hear of taking any
money from her and for a time considered several careers that he might take up. At last the money question