November 10, 1845

Miss Barrett responds to Browning's fear that her helping him with his poetry will in some way hurt her work:

"Monday.

If it were possible that you could do me harm in the way of work, (but it is’nt) it would be possible, not through writing letters & reading manuscripts, but because of a reason to be drawn from your own great line

'What man is strong until he stands alone?'

What man .. what woman? For have I not felt twenty times the desolate advantage of being insulated here & of not minding anybody when I made my poems?—of living a little like a disembodied spirit, & caring less for suppositious criticism than for the black fly buzzing in the pane?– That made me what dear Mr Kenyon calls ‘insolent’,—untimid, & unconventional in my degree,—& not so much by strength, you see, as by separation– You touch your greater ends by mere strength,—breaking with your own hands the hampering threads which, in your position, wd have hampered me."

 

She has grasped a line from Browning's Colombe's Birthday --which has been used in the book she is reading, Pomfret (see below and her letter to Chorley on November 8th)--and is comparing it to her own life experience. She believes that her poetry was made bolder, not because of strength, but because of what she sees as her 'separation'. Perhaps her lack of timidity in her poetry came from a type of disregard for her own (social) safety. What did she have to lose? But isn't this a type of strength? She is perhaps misinterpreting herself because she sees Browning as giving her a strength she felt she lacked. This could really be seen as feeling of security rather than a sense of strength. She sees Browning's strength as pure power, a male power that she would like to possess in her poetry.

"Still .. when all is changed for me now, & different, it is not possible, .. for all the changing, .. nor for all your line & my speculation, .. that I should not be better & stronger for being within your influences & sympathies, in this way of writing as in other ways– We shall see—you will see. Yet I have been idle lately I confess,—leaning half out of some turret-window of the castle of Indolence & watching the new sunrise—as why not?– Do I mean to be idle always? no!—and am I not an industrious worker on the average of days? Indeed yes! Also I have been less idle than you think perhaps, even this last year, though the results seem so like trifling: and I shall set about the prose papers for the New York people, & the something rather better besides we may hope .. may I not hope, if you wish it? Only there is no ‘crown’ for me, be sure, except what grows from this letter & such letters .. this sense of being anything to One! there is no room for another crown. Have I a great head like Goethe’s that there should be room?—& mine is bent down already by the unused weight—& as to bearing it, .. 'will it do,—tell me, .. to treat that as a light effort, an easy matter?' "

 

Yes, she is stronger and more secure with Browning's support and certainly she has been less idle--for certainly she has begun the Sonnet Sequence. And of course she demures from Browning wanting her to place a crown on her own head as she crown's him. It is too much for the humble Miss Barrett. She seems melancholy at his praise.

"Now let me remember to tell you that the line of yours I have just quoted, & which has been present with me since you wrote it, Mr Chorley has quoted too in his new novel of 'Pomfret.' You were right in your identifying of servant & waistcoat—& Wilson waited only till you had gone on saturday, to give me a parcel & note, .. the novel itself in fact, which Mr Chorley had the kindness to send me ‘some days or weeks,’ said the note, ‘previous to the publication.’ Very goodnatured of him certainly! and the book seems to me his best work in point of sustainment & vigour, & I am in process of being interested in it. Not that he is a maker, even for this prose. A feeler .. an observer .. a thinker even, in a certain sphere—but a maker .. no, as it seems to me .. and if I were he, I would rather herd with the essayists than the novelists where he is too good to take inferior rank & not strong enough to ‘go up higher’. Only it would be more right in me to be grateful than to talk so—now wd’nt it?"

 

Such an opinionated woman! My, my.

 

"And here is Mr Kenyon’s letter back again—a kind good letter .. a letter I have liked to read, (so it was kind & good in you to let me!)—and he was with me today & praising the ride to Ghent, & praising the Duchess, & praising you altogether as I liked to hear him. The Ghent-ride was ‘very fine’—& the

‘Into the midnight they galloped abreast’

drew us out into the night as witnesses. And then, the ‘Duchess’ .. the conception of it was noble, & the vehicle, rhythm & all, most characteristic & individual .. though some of the rhymes .. oh, some of the rhymes did not find grace in his ears .. but the incantation-scene, ‘just trenching on the supernatural,’ that was taken to be ‘wonderful’, .. 'showing extraordinary power, .. as indeed other things did, .. works of a highly original writer & of such various faculty!'– Am I not tired of writing your praises as he said them? So I shall tell you, instead of any more, that I went down to the drawing room yesterday (because it was warm enough) by an act of supererogatory virtue for which you may praise me in turn. What weather it is! & how the year seems to have forgotten itself into April.

But after all, how have I answered your letter? & how are such letters to be answered? Do we answer the sun when he shines? May God bless you .. it is my answer—with one word besides .. that I am wholly & ever your

EBB

On thursday as far as I know yet—& you shall hear if there shd be an obstacle. Will you walk? If you will not, you know, you must be forgetting me a little– Will you remember me too in the act of the play?—but above all things in taking the right exercise, & in not over-working the head.!– And this for no serpent’s reason."

 

She began the letter in a rather reflective mood and then tried to snap herself out of it. I think she realized that her response to his beautiful letter was a bit moody and excuses herself a bit with--"how can I answer such a letter?...it is too much for me." She is almost Browning-like in her inability to put her thoughts into words. Tomorrow will be better.

November 9, 1845

Browning went to Wimpole Street on Saturday, November 8, 1845 to visit with Miss Barrett. He wrote the date and time of their meeting on the envelope of the last letter he received from Miss Barrett: "+ Saty Nov 8. / 3–4.5m. p.m." A fairly short meeting. He wrote the next day:

"Sunday Evening.

When I come back from seeing you, and think over it all, there never is a least word of yours I could not occupy myself with, and wish to return to you with some .. not to say, all .. the thoughts & fancies it is sure to call out of me:—there is nothing in you that does not draw out all of me:—you possess me, dearest .. and there is no help for the expressing it all, no voice nor hand, but these of mine which shrink and turn away from the attempt: So you must go on, patiently, knowing me, more and more, and your entire power on me, and I will console myself, to the full extent, with your knowledge,—penetration,—intuition .. somehow I must believe you can get to what is here, in me—without the pretence of my telling or writing it. But, because I give up the great achievements, there is no reason I should not secure any occasion of making clear one of the less important points that arise in our intercourse .. if I fancy I can do it with the least success: for instance, it is on my mind to explain what I meant yesterday by trusting that the entire happiness I feel in the letters, and the help in the criticising might not be hurt by the surmise, even, that those labours to which you were born, might be suspended, in any degree, thro’ such generosity to me: dearest, I believed in your glorious genius and knew it for a true star from the moment I saw it,—long before I had the blessing of knowing it was my star, with my fortune and futurity in it—and, when I draw back from myself, and look better and more clearly, then I do feel, with you, that the writing a few letters more or less, reading many or few rhymes of any other person, would not interfere in any material degree with that power of yours—that you might easily make one so happy and yet go on writing 'Geraldines' and 'Berthas'—but—how can I, dearest, leave my heart’s treasures long, even to look at your genius? .. and when I come back and find all safe, find the comfort of you, the traces of you .. will it do,—tell me—to treat all that as a light effort, an easy matter?

Yet, if you can lift me with one hand, while the other suffices to crown you—there is queenliness in that, too!"

 

Browning can really turn it on when he wants to. This has to be one of his greatest efforts. His default position is that he cannot put what he feels into words and often he cannot. But then he makes your heart melt with his words.

Well, I have spoken. As I told you, your turn comes now: how have you determined respecting the American Edition?—you tell me nothing of yourself! It is all me you help, me you do good to .. and I take it all! Now see if this goes on! I have not had every love-luxury, I now find out .. where is the proper, rationally-to-be-expected, 'lovers’ quarrel?' Here, as you will find! 'Iræ amantium' .. I am no more 'at a loss with my Naso,' than Peter Ronsard. Ah .. but then they are to be 'reintegratio amoris' ['lovers’ quarrels are love’s renewals']—and to get back into a thing, one must needs get for a moment first out of it .. trust me, no! And now, the natural inference from all this? The consistent inference .. the 'self-denying ordinance'? Why,—do you doubt?—even this,—you must just put aside the Romance, and tell the Americans to wait, and make my heart start up when the letter is laid to it,—the letter full of your news, telling me you are well and walking, and working for my sake towards the time I—informing me, moreover, if Thursday or Friday is to be my day–

May God bless you, my own love–

I will certainly bring you an Act of the Play .. for this serpent’s reason, in addition to the others .. that– No, I will tell you that. I can tell you now more than even lately!

Ever your own RB"

 

A beautifully rendered letter. He admonishes her to not stop her work for his sake and then mocking himself he selfishly tells her to put aside her Romance poem and the essay's for the American publisher and write a letter to him. I think the meeting on the 8th must have been very successful.

 

The quote is from his just published poem "The Glove."

November 8, 1845

Miss Barrett has been send a presentation copy of Chorley's latest book, Pomfret; or, Public opinion and private judgment, and writes to thank him. As usual she writes a very charming letter:

"50, Wimpole Street,

November 8th.

Dear Mr. Chorley,–

I cannot wait till I have read these three volumes, to thank you for the kindness and distinction of the gift. The pleasure and sympathy which are sure to come with the reading, I think, will be another motive of grateful acknowledgement—but in the meantime I will let the earlier motive act. So I thank you much now.

There was a letter too from Italy which was a pure kindness on your part, and which reached me just as I was midway in a dream of being there myself this winter .. breaking off as dreams of mine are apt to do whenever they try to exceed that certain limit of poetical vagueness of .. 'whether in the body or out of the body I cannot tell.' So instead of the south I take to my winter-prison again, .. I, who have been at comparative liberty this summer and moving about nearly like other people: but though the bolts are shot again now, I remain very well just so far into the winter, and should be quite well always, I believe, if I were but charmed from the wind and the frost by some good strong useful curse after the fashion of Kehama’s. Then I agree with you that the weather is delightful, and that my phrase 'just so far into the winter' which I meant for the eighth of November (is’nt it the eighth?) is little suitable to this luxurious warm soft atmosphere which might belong to the eighth of April.

So, instead of writing any more, I shall go to Pomfret and enjoy it all the more of course (in an exquisite human selfishness) because the rest of the world cannot at the same moment. And after all, how much better this sort of early fruit is than any other—how much better for instance, than peaches a guinea each! So I go to Pomfret as I said; thanking you, dear Mr. Chorley, again and again for all your goodness to me. Miss Mitford spent some hours with me a few days ago and was looking well and talking like herself.

Very truly yours,

Elizabeth Barrett Barrett."

 

 

November 6, 1845

Browning's book has been published and he sends a note with the volume to Miss Barrett:

"Just arrived! .. (mind, the silent writing overflows the page, and laughs at the black words for Mr Kenyon to read!) —But your note arrived earlier—more of that, when I write after this dreadful dispatching-business that falls on me—friend A, & B. & C—must get their copy, and word of regard, all by next post!–

Could you think that that untoward letter lived one moment after it returned to me? I burned it and cried 'serve it right'! Poor letter!—yet I should have been vexed & offended then to be told I could love you better than I did already! 'Live and learn!' Live and love you––dearest, as loves you RB."

 

No, he did not keep the letter. It would be interesting to see what he wrote that got her so upset. But, alas....

 

"You will write to reassure me about Saturday, if not for other reasons. See your corrections .. and understand that in the one or two instances in which they would seem not to be adopted, they are so, by some modification of the previous, or following line .. as in one of the Sorrento lines .. about a 'turret'—see! (Can you give me Horne’s address—I would send there)"

 

And so, he writes notes to his friends and mentors to accompany copies of his poems. Here is one to Mr. William Johnsin Fox, a very early mentor. Browning was also friends with Fox's daughters--perhaps his first mature lady friends.

 

"My dear Sir,

Last year, I had a note from you, in which with other kind expressions, you gave me your address and an invitation to call there. I went abroad soon after, and after my return, have only been waiting such an opportunity as the sending another of my pamphlets to assure you (very unnecessarily I hope) that I shall have all my old pride and pleasure in availing myself of a privilege should you still be disposed to concede it.

Ever yours very faithfully and affectionately,

R. Browning."

 

But of course Miss Barrett writes:

 

"Thursday evening

I see & know,—read & mark,—& only hope there is no harm done by my meddling .. & lose the sense of it all in the sense of beauty & power everywhere, which nobody could kill, if they took to meddling more even– And now, what will people say to this & this & this—or 'o seclum insipiens et impietum [Oh, this age! how tasteless and ill-bred it is!]'!—or rather, o ungrateful right hand which does not thank you first! I do thank you. I have been reading everything with new delight,—& at intervals remembering in inglorious complacency (for which you must try to forgive me) that Mr Forster is no longer anything like an enemy. And yet (just see what contradiction!) the British Quarterly has been abusing me so at large, that I can only take it to be the achievement of a very particular friend indeed,—of someone who positively never reviewed before & tries his new sword on me out of pure friendship. Only I suppose it is not the general rule, & that there are friends 'with a difference.' Not that you are to fancy me pained—oh no!—merely surprised. I was prepared for anything almost from the quarter in question, but scarcely for being hung ‘to the crows’ so publicly .. though within the bounds of legitimate criticisms, mind. But oh—the creatures of your sex are not always magnanimous—that is true. And to put you between me & all .. the thought of you .. in a great ecclipse of the world .. that is happy .. only, .. too happy for such as I am;—as my own heart warns me hour by hour."

 

I puzzled over this paragraph when I first read it. It was rather unlike her to talk about herself when she would normally be praising his poetry. On second reading I think I see what she is doing. She knows that his poems will not be well received so she let's him know that she has been picked over by the critics as well. She doesn't want him to feel that he alone in being mauled by the critics. And in the end, what does it matter because they are happy in each other.

 

" 'Serve me right!' I do not dare to complain. I wished for the safety of that letter so much that I finished by persuading myself of the probability of it: but ‘serve me right’ quite clearly. And yet—but no more 'and yets' about it. 'And yets' fray the silk."

 

Yes, the offending letter is gone. She won't order him to burn any more of his letters.

 

"I see how the 'turret' stands in the new reading, triumphing over the ‘tower’, & unexceptionable in every respect. Also I do hold that nobody with an ordinary understanding has the slightest pretence for attaching a charge of obscurity to this new number—there are lights enough for the critics to scan one another’s dull blank of visage by. One verse indeed in that expressive lyric of the ‘Lost Mistress,’ does still seem questionable to me, though you have changed a word since I saw it,—& still I fancy that I rather leap at the meaning than reach it—but it is my own fault probably .. I am not sure. With that one exception I am quite sure that people who shall complain of darkness are blind .. I mean, that the construction is clear & unembarrassed everywhere. Subtleties of thought which are not directly apprehensible by minds of a common range, are here as elsewhere in your writings—but if to utter things ‘hard to understand’ from that cause, be an offence, why we may begin with 'our beloved brother Paul,' you know, & go down through all the geniuses of the world, & bid them put away their inspirations. You must descend to the level of critic A or B, that he may look into your face .. Ah well!—'Let them rave'. You will live when all those are under the willows. In the meantime there is something better, as you said, even than your poetry .. as the giver is better than the gift, & the maker than the creature, & you than yours. Yes—you than yours .. (I did not mean it so when I wrote it first .. but I accept the ‘bona verba [good words-words of good omen]’,& use the phrase for the end of my letter) .. as you are better than yours, .. even when so much yours as your own EBB–"

 

I admire the fact that she will tell him when she sees a problem in his work. She always calls them as she sees them. Perhaps through the tint of love and hero worship.

 

"May I see the first act first? Let me!—— And you walk?–"

 

She is still wanting to see the first act of "Luria". She lusts after his poetry. The "Let me!" cry of a child wanting to look at a kaleidoscope.

 

"Mr Horne’s address is Hill Side, Fitzroy Park, Highgate. There is no reason against saturday so far. Mr Kenyon comes tomorrow, friday, & therefore ..!!—and if saturday shd become impracticable, I will write again."

 

And so the visits continue, dodging Mr. Kenyon all the way.

November 5, 1845

Miss Barrett writes to Browning after a silence of five days:

"Wednesday.

I had your note last night, & am waiting for the book today,—a true living breathing book let the writer say of it what he will. Also when it comes it wont certainly come ‘sine te [without you]’. Which is my comfort.

And now—not to make any more fuss about a matter of simple restitution—may I have my letter back? .. I mean the letter which if you did not destroy .. did not punish for its sins long & long ago .. belongs to me—which, if destroyed, I must lose for my sins, .. but, if undestroyed, which I may have back,—may I not? is it not my own? must I not?—that letter I was made to return & now turn to ask for again in further expiation. Now do I ask humbly enough? And send it at once, if undestroyed—do not wait till saturday–"

 

Ah, so finally she asks for her "boon". She wants the "missing" letter back. The letter Browning wrote after their first meeting and in which he declared his love. The letter that began the long summer of courting that Browning had to undertake to win her trust. She had made him promise to burn the letter. Perhaps she is assuming that he disobeyed her request. Perhaps it is a pretty lovers compliment.

 

"I have considered about Mr Kenyon & it seems best, in the event of a question or of a remark equivalent to a question, to confess to the visits ‘generally once a week’ .. because he may hear, one, two, three different ways, .. not to say the other reasons & Chaucer’s charge against 'doubleness.'I fear .. I fear that he (not Chaucer) will wonder a little—& he has looked at me with scanning spectacles already & talked of its being a mystery to him how you made your way here; & I, who though I can bespeak selfcommand, have no sort of presence of mind (not so much as one would use to play at Jack straws) did not help the case at all. Well—it cannot be helped. Did I ever tell you what he said of you once—'that you deserved to be a poet—being one in your heart & life': he said that of you to me, & I thought it a noble encomium & deserving its application.

For the rest .. yes! you know I do—God knows I do—whatever I can feel is for you .. & perhaps it is not less, for not being simmered away in too much sunshine as with women accounted happier– I am happy besides now—happy enough to die now. May God bless you, dear—dearest.

Ever I am yours–

 

The book does not come—so I shall not wait.

Mr Kenyon came instead, & comes again on friday he says, & Saturday seems to be clear still."

 

"For the rest .. yes! you know I do—God knows I do," is in response to Browning's asking her, in his last note, if she loved him. This is notable turn of phrase. Notice that she does not say "yes! I love you." I did a 'find' for the word 'love' on the Project Gutenberg epage for this volume of the letters and 'love' is used more than 100 times, in all kinds of contexts. However Miss Barrett does not actually tell Browning that she loves him (using those words) until January 9, 1846: "If you were to leave me even,—to decide that it is best for you to do it, and do it,—I should accede at once of course, but never should I nor could I 'repent' ... regret anything ... be sorry for having known you and loved you ... no!" and again later in the same letter: "I love you from the deepest of my nature—the whole world is nothing to me beside you—and what is so precious, is not far from being terrible." Why is she so reticent to write the words? Is it shyness? Browning repeatedly uses the word in describing his feelings for her, from his very first letter as a matter of fact. Earlier, in some of my blog cogitations I mused that she was really quite brave in being so open with him because he could have used her letters for nefarious purposes if he were an evil man. I believe I was discussing trust. She seemed to trust him in some ways but not in others. She certainly did not trust him to know his own mind or heart when it  came to his feelings for her. Could her timidity to say that she loved him come from a lack of trust? And yet she is totally open in so many other ways. I will also note that Browning is very affectionate in his letters, often referring to wanting to kiss her and hold her hand, etc. but she seldom discusses this in the letters. She certainly does in her poetry. I conclude that this reticence is the reserve of a Victorian lady. But does this reserve in discussing their physical affection apply to her stating that she loves Browning. I do not think so because she eventually does clearly state her love for him, eventually. Shyness? Lack of trust? Fear of rejection?

 

Also note how she writes, "whatever I can feel is for you". This is a woman crawling out of a well of despair, shaking off a self-imposed numbness. This might explain it as well. Perhaps she does not trust her own feelings, just as she does not trust Browning to know his own heart.

 

Discuss amongst yourselves. When you have reached a consensus let me know your conclusions.

 

November 4, 1845

The letters are a bit thin this week because Browning is busy with his book being published, but he sends Miss Barrett a short note today:

"Tuesday–

Only a word to tell you Moxon promises the books for to-morrow, Wednesday—so towards evening yours will reach you—'parve liber, sine me ibis [Little book, will you go without me?]' .. would I were by you, then and ever! You see, and know, and understand why I can neither talk to you, nor write to you now, as we are now;—from the beginning, the personal interest absorbed every other, greater or smaller—but as one cannot well,—or should not,—sit quite silently, the words go on, about Horne, or what chances—while you are in my thought.

But when I have you .. so it seems .. in my very heart,—when you are entirely with me—oh, the day!—then it will all go better, talk and writing too–

Love me, my own love,—not as I love you—not for—but I cannot write that: nor do I ask anything, with all your gifts here, except for the luxury of asking. Withdraw nothing, then, dearest from your RB"

 

Browning asks Miss Barrett to love him. I wonder why he thought he had to ask her to love him. Hmmm.....

November 3, 1845

Browning is on the verge of publishing his latest volume: Dramatic Romances and Lyrics and his publisher, Moxon sent the proof sheets to Eliot Warburton in hopes that he would publish a review in The English Review. Browning responds to a congratulating letter from Warburton:

"Hatcham, Surrey.

Nov. 3. Night.

You meant to give me great pleasure, my dear Warburton, by this note brimming over with kindness .. and you have given me the very greatest pleasure, and made me proud & grateful, you must needs feel. It was a happy inspiration of Moxon to send you the proof-sheets, and I quite forgive him forestalling me in, perhaps, the main gratification of an author—for that is a white minute when one’s book only exists for oneself and a friend. Thank you heartily .. all I can say, and too little: I hope to do more & better—but at no period of any possible career do I wish for truer reward than the sympathy and assistance such a warm-hearted letter makes my own. I will send a clean copy in a day or two, when I can get one. We meet often, I hope, in London next Spring or earlier .. meantime I have your Book which I never take up without renewed delight.

Ever yours most faithfully,

Robt Browning."

 

Warburton's book was The Crescent and the Cross, also published in 1845 which was an account of his travels in the east. It was huge successful, going into 17 editions. The same could not be said for Dramatic Romances and Lyrics. But this is the difference between poetry and prose, the fog and the cloudless sky.