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Andrea del Sarto

Robert Browning

Summary

This poem represents yet another of Browning’s dramatic monologues. It is spoken in the voice of a historical Renaissance painter. It is spoken by Andrea to his wife, Lucrezia. Andrea del Sarto, like Fra Lippo Lippi, lived and worked in Florence. He was later appointed court painter by Francis, the King of France. Under the nagging influence of his wife Lucrezia, he left the French court for Italy but promised to return. Hee took with him some money that Francis had given him to purchase Italian artworks for the court. He also took the money advanced to him for his own commissioned paintings. However, he spent all the money on a house for himself and his wife in Italy and never returned to France. This poem finds Andrea in the house he has bought with the stolen money. He thinks back on his career and laments that his worldly concerns have kept him from fulfilling his promise as an artist. As he and Lucrezia sit at their window, he talks to her of his relative successes and failures. But Michelangelo (here, Michel Agnolo) and Raphael (Rafael) enjoyed higher inspiration and better patronage. They did not have a nagging wife like Lucrezia. He is the better craftsman. He points out to her the problems with the Great Masters’ work. But while Andrea succeeds technically, they do not. That is why the title ‘the Faultless Painter’. Their work ultimately triumphs for its emotional and spiritual power. Andrea now finds himself in the twilight of his career and his marriage: Lucrezia’s “Cousin”—probably her lover—keeps whistling for her to come; she apparently either owes the man gambling debts or has promised to cover his own. The fond, weary Andrea gives her some money. He promises to sell paintings to pay off her debts. He sends her away to her “Cousin,” while he remains to sit quietly and dream of painting in Heaven.

Form

“Andrea del Sarto” is in pentameter blank verse, mostly iambic. It is a quiet poem, the musings of a defeated man. Both in language and in form it is modest and calm. Yet it 2

also manages to mimic natural speech quite effectively, with little interjections and asides.

Commentary

This poem has a most compelling premise—an artist’s comparison of his own work to that of the Great Masters. Andrea blames his disappointing career on his inability to match his unparalleled technical skills with appropriate subject matter: all the Virgins he paints look like his wife, and he has never had the time at court to allow his work to blossom. While Raphael and Michelangelo often err in their representations, the intentions and the spirit behind their work shine through so strongly that their work nonetheless surpasses his. As Andrea notes, Raphael, Michelangelo, and Leonardo did not have wives: they lived for their work. For Andrea, painting is reduced to a means to make money; he has the avaricious Lucrezia to support. Between trying to pay her debts, buying her the things she wants, and keeping her attention, Andrea cannot afford to focus solely on his art.

Andrea presents us with a different kind of character than we are used to seeing in Browning’s work. Unlike the Duke of “My Last Duchess,”Fra Lippo Lippi, or Porphyria’s Lover, Andrea expresses a resigned, melancholy outlook; his wife keeps him completely under her thumb. He lacks the hubris of these other characters. Andrea has long since left Francis’s court, and the money he stole has long since disappeared into the house and Lucrezia’s wardrobe. While this monologue comes across as dramatic in nature, it does not dramatize anyone’s actions. Rather, it seeks to capture a mood and an attitude.