THE GREAT Robert POETS Browning POETRY Read by David Timson and Patience Tomlinson Robert Browning (1812–1889) Robert Browning was a romantic poet in great effect when disclosing a macabre or 1 How They Brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix 3:49 every sense of the word. He was an ardent evil narrative, as in The Laboratory, or The 2 Life in a Love 1:11 lover who wooed the poet Elizabeth Confessional or Porphyria’s Lover. 3 A Light Woman 3:42 Barrett despite fierce opposition from Sometimes Browning uses this matter- 4 The Statue and the Bust 15:16 her tyrannical father, while as a poet – of-fact approach to reduce a momentous 5 My Last Duchess 3:53 inheriting the mantle of Wordsworth, occasion to the colloquial – in The 6 The Confessional 4:59 Keats and Shelley – he sought to show, Grammarian’s Funeral, for instance, in 7 A Grammarian’s Funeral 8:09 in the Romantic tradition, man’s struggle which a scholar has spent his life pursuing 8 The Pied Piper of Hamelin 7:24 with his own nature and the will of God. knowledge at the expense of actually 9 ‘You should have heard the Hamelin people…’ 8:22 But Browning was no mere imitator of enjoying life itself. As his body is taken to 10 The Lost Leader 2:24 a style of poetry that had been flourishing its last resting place high on a mountain 11 Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister 3:55 for the first 50 years of the 19th century. side, one of the pall-bearers, a former 12 The Laboratory 3:40 He was seeking to push back the student of the scholar, reflects on his 13 Porphyria’s Lover 3:47 boundaries of poetic expression, and in master’s achievements: 14 Evelyn Hope 3:49 some of his poems he seems to anticipate 15 Home Thoughts from Abroad 1:19 the poetic styles of the 20th century. He ‘That low man seeks a little thing to do, 16 Pippa’s Song 0:32 strives, for instance, for a conversational Sees it and does it; tone that at times seems quite modern, This high man, with a great thing to Total time: 76:20 using words that are appropriate to the pursue, = David Timson meaning of the poem, irrespective of the Dies ere he knows it.’ = Patience Tomlinson accepted poetic style of his day. To him, the idea mattered more than the form. He The scholar’s failure to succeed in life uses this technique of plain-speaking to is set against his effort to achieve his 2 3 vision. Striving to do one’s best, throwing undisguised bitterness in The Lost Leader. to the characters and did not represent his Browning creates a truthful character and caution aside and aiming high whatever Unlike the early Romantic poets, own views. For example, Song from Pippa leaves the reader to make a judgement on the consequences might be, meets with Browning sought not to be identified Passes is a lyric from a play that has often him, without any prompting from the poet. Browning’s approval here – though not in his poems as the narrator or moral been taken out of context and given as He presents the characters objectively – without a sense of irony – and is a constant voice. Wordsworth was autobiographical an example of Browning’s unbounded simply as Men and Women (as he called theme of his poems. In The Statue and in his poems, showing the effects of optimism. It shows the danger of viewing his 1855 collection of poems). the Bust, for instance, Browning pulls no the world, both natural and human, his work as a reflection of his life and views. In A Soliloquy in a Spanish Cloister punches in criticising the Duke and his on his development as a poet, whereas In the play the words are used ironically to a bitter monk reveals his own arid reluctant lover for neglecting the effort Browning wanted to be objective rather show the naïve trust of the innocent Pippa and godless soul while musing on the necessary to gain ‘the prize’ – love – which than subjective, biographical rather than in the corrupt world of Ancient Rome. popularity and success of a fellow monk, ultimately passes the couple by: auto-biographical, and chose as a medium The monologues are amongst Browning’s Brother Lawrence. In trying to insinuate for his thoughts, characters who speak for most important work and are powerful that his rival is a bore, lecherous, irreligious ‘The sin I impute to each frustrate ghost themselves in a dramatic context. They dramatic expressions, which begs the and sycophantic, he in fact makes it clear Was the unlit lamp and the ungirt loin’ express their own thoughts unreservedly question as to why Browning’s plays, (A that Lawrence is blameless while he is and we can learn from them about their Blot on the Scutcheon etc) are so weak himself drawn to the supposed traits – Browning practised what he preached: past, their weaknesses and strengths, and consigned to oblivion. The answer he is a hypocrite hiding his vice behind a after winning the love of Elizabeth Barrett without the necessity of comment from is that though his sense of character and façade of piety. he defied her father and secretly eloped the poet. dramatic utterance was powerful, his Browning creates a character at once with her to Italy in 1846. An example of this is Dramatic sense of dramatic construction was not. entertaining and petty, corrupted by his In his choice of simple, everyday words Lyrics, Browning’s first collection of short His plays lack drive and tension. environment, while criticising the crippling Browning goes beyond Wordsworth’s poems (1842), which he describes in But such poems as My Last Duchess, effect a dull and monotonous monastic desire to write poetry using the language the preface as being: ‘For the most part Porphyria’s Lover, The Laboratory and existence can have, in time, on a man’s of the people and is not afraid sometimes lyric in expression, always dramatic in The Confessional are poetic and dramatic faith. to be vulgar. Wordsworth, though, would principle, and so many utterances of so masterpieces. They succeed because of The power of religion on people’s lives have scorned his choice of words as un- many imaginary persons, not mine.’ Note the tension created in the reader between is the theme also of The Confessional in poetic. But Browning had long since lost his final statement there: ‘not mine’. He the attractiveness of the speaker and the which a young girl’s emotional innocence faith with Wordsworth for his betrayal of maintained all his life that the thoughts simultaneous desire to make a moral is corrupted by an unscrupulous priest and the poetic vision, which he expresses with expressed in his dramatic poems belonged judgement. Like a good playwright, degraded from passionate love for her 4 5 man to passionate hate for the Church. already impressive collection of paintings infectious galloping rhythm, and The Pied ‘We do not believe that Browning’s The Laboratory also portrays a woman’s and bronzes. Chillingly, he tells the story Piper of Hamelin – written for children and works will survive except as a curiosity and love corrupted by the decadence and of ‘his last Duchess’ to the envoy from his based on a classic legend. These poems a puzzle’, wrote the Edinburgh Review in cynicism of the Ancien Regime. Potential next bride, so that she may be prepared to are uncomplicated in structure and theme, 1864, and to some, this well describes pleasure, attendance at a ball, is twisted behave in the manner he expects from his using simple language and abundant Browning’s place in English Literature. into bitter hate for her rival in love. The Duchess. energy. Browning can be challenging at times; style of the poem is melodramatic and Browning is often accused of being a That Browning was a passionate man he does not talk down to his readers, but grotesque. Browning was fascinated with difficult poet to understand, and despite cannot be doubted. Love was a great expects them to meet him half way. If one the grotesque, and Porphyria’s Lover, in his frequent use of colloquial words he force to him, ‘a prize’ to be striven for does, the rewards are more than worth which a young man muses on murdering does often express complicated thoughts and pursued in life at all costs. This is the the effort. his mistress after achieving a moment in an obscure way. He was much criticised theme of Life in a Love. The effort in itself of happiness with her, is quite Gothic in in his own day for this tendency, and testifies to a life well-lived. In Evelyn Hope Notes by David Timson tone. The poem’s original title, Madhouse was accused of using ‘verbal freaks’, he envisages a love that might have been, Cells, abandoned by Browning, would ‘archaisms’, and compound words of his despite a difference of years between the have reinforced this connection. own invention. speaker and the young girl, had not death In My Last Duchess the patrician Duke It’s true that Browning makes demands intervened. And that Browning didn’t just of Ferrara is a cold-hearted pragmatist who on his readers, sometimes generating mean spiritual love, but physical also, is places money, honour and a 900-year-old the need to reach for a dictionary. But embodied in the temptations expressed in name above everything, even the love of Browning assumes the reader is as learned A Light Woman in which a hopeless love an open-hearted young girl he once made as he; that he or she has a knowledge of affair between a friend and an unsuitable his Duchess. We see her only through the Italian history for instance, which is the woman is complicated with the narrator’s Duke’s eyes, but her ingenuous charm is background to so many of his poems. own involvement. A knot for ‘Robert apparent throughout the poem, while his But conversely he also wrote a number of Browning’ to untie, the speaker concludes bigotry, isolation and asceticism have made very accessible poems that still appear in ironically. He also expressed love of country him blind to her virtues. It is inferred that anthologies, testifying to their enduring most memorably in Home Thoughts from he had her secretly murdered; whilst her popularity. They include How They Brought Abroad which contains perhaps his most painted image, as the years pass, becomes the Good News from Ghent to Aix – a quoted line: ‘Oh to be in England, now just another work of art to add to his popular, patriotic tale from history with an that April’s there’.
6 7 The Great Poets on Naxos AudioBooks David Timson has made over 1,000 broadcasts for BBC Radio Drama. For Naxos AudioBooks he wrote The History of Theatre, which won an award for most original production from the Spoken Word Publishers Association in 2001. He has also directed four Shakespeare plays for Naxos AudioBooks, including King Richard III (with Kenneth Branagh), which won Best Drama Award from the SWPA in 2001. In 2002 he won the Audio of the Year Award for his reading of A Study in Scarlet. He reads the entire Sherlock Holmes canon.
Patience Tomlinson has appeared extensively in theatre and radio in the UK. She has worked for the Royal National Theatre and the Young Great Poets: Wendell Holmes The Great Poets: Burns Vic, and was twice a member of the BBC Radio Drama Company. (Wendell Holmes) ISBN: 9789626349540 (Burns) ISBN: 9789626349687 She has made over 1,500 broadcasts, including stories, books, radio read by Peter Marinker read by Forbes Masson plays and poetry. For Naxos AudioBooks, she has read Wives and Daughters and played the part of Emilia in Othello.
Credits Produced by Roy McMillan Recorded at The Square Studio, Codicote, Hertfordshire Edited by Sarah Butcher
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. UNAUTHORISED PUBLIC PERFORMANCE, BROADCASTING AND COPYING OF THESE COMPACT DISCS PROHIBITED. The Great Poets: Barrett Browning The Great Poets: McGonagall and Rossetti (Barrett Browning, Rossetti) (McGonagall) ISBN: 9789626348932 Cover picture: Robert Browning (1812–89) 1853 by Thomas Buchanan Read (1822– ISBN: 9789626349205 read by Gregor Fisher 72); courtesy of Bridgeman Art Library read by Rachel Bavidge and Georgina Sutton 8 9 Other works on Naxos AudioBooks Other works on Naxos AudioBooks
The Great Poets: Milton The Great Poets: Dickinson (Milton) ISBN: 9789626348550 (Dickinson) ISBN: 9789626348567 The Great Poets: Blake The Great Poets: Wordsworth read by Samantha Bond read by Teresa Gallagher (Blake) ISBN: 9789626344729 (Wordsworth) ISBN: 9789626348604 and Derek Jacobi read by Robert Glenister, Michael Maloney read by Oliver Ford Davies and Stephen Critchlow and Jasper Britton
The Great Poets: Kipling The Great Poets: Yeats (Kipling) ISBN: 9789626344743 (Yeats) ISBN: 9789626344903 Great Poets: Shelley The Great Poets: Keats read by Robert Hardy, Robert Glenister read by Jim Norton, Denys Hawthorne, (Shelley) ISBN: 9789626348611 (Keats) ISBN: 9789626344897 and Michael Maloney Nicholas Boulton and Marcella Riordan read by Bertie Carvel read by Samuel West 10 11 For a complete catalogue and details of how to order other Naxos AudioBooks titles please contact:
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