An Introduction to the Study of Browning Part 23

54. Spring Song.--_The New Amphion_; being the book of the Edinburgh University Union Fancy Fair. Edinburgh: T. and A. Constable, University Press. 1886. The poem is on p. 1. Reprinted in _Parleyings_, p. 189.

55. Prefatory Note to _Poems_ by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. London: Smith, Elder and Co. 1887. Three pages, unnumbered.

56. Memorial Lines, for Memorial of the Queen's Jubilee, in St.

Margaret's Church, Westminster. 1887. Reprinted in the Browning Society's Papers, Part X., p. 234.*

57. PARLEYINGS WITH CERTAIN PEOPLE OF IMPORTANCE IN THEIR DAY: to wit, Bernard de Mandeville, Daniel Bartoli, Christopher Smart, George Bubb Dodington, Francis Furini, Gerard de Lairesse, and Charles Avison.

Introduced by a Dialogue between Apollo and the Fates, concluded by another between John Fust and his Friends. By Robert Browning. London: Smith, Elder and Co., 15 Waterloo Place. 1887, pp. viii., 268.

(_Poetical Works_, 1889, Vol. XVI., pp. 93-275.)

Contents:--Apollo and the Fates--a Prologue. Parleyings: 1.

With Bernard de Mandeville. 2. With Daniel Bartoli. 3. With Christopher Avison. 4. With George Bubb Dodington. 5. With Francis Furini. 6. With Gerard de Lairesse. 7. With Charles Avison. Fust and his Friends--an Epilogue.

58. An Essay on Percy Bysshe Sh.e.l.ley. By Robert Browning. Being a Reprint of the Introductory Essay prefixed to the volume of [25 spurious] Letters of Sh.e.l.ley, published by Edward Moxon in 1852. Edited by W. Tyas Harden. London: Published for the Sh.e.l.ley Society by Reeves and Turner, 196 Strand, 1888, pp. 27. See No. 17 above.

59. To Edward Fitzgerald. (Dated July 8, 1889).--_The Athenaeum_, No.

3,220, July 13, 1889, p. 64. Reprinted in the Browning Society's Papers, Part XI., p. 347.*

60. Lines addressed to Levi Lincoln Thaxter. (Written in 1885).--_Poet Lore_, Vol. I., August 1889, p. 398.

61. THE POETICAL WORKS OF ROBERT BROWNING. London: Smith, Elder & Co., 15 Waterloo Place. 17 volumes. Vol. I.-XVI., 1889; Vol. XVII., 1894.

Vol. I. pp. viii., 289. Pauline--Sordello. Vol. II., pp. vi., 307. Paracelsus--Strafford. Vol. III., pp. vi., 255. Pippa Pa.s.ses, King Victor and King Charles, The Return of the Druses, A Soul's Tragedy. Vol. IV., pp. vi., 305. A Blot in the 'Scutcheon, Colombe's Birthday, Men and Women. Vol. V., pp. vi., 307. Dramatic Romances, Christmas-Eve and Easter-Day. Vol. VI., pp. vii., 289. Dramatic Lyrics, Luria.

Vol. VII., pp. vi., 255. In a Balcony, Dramatis Personae. Vol.

VIII., pp. 253. The Ring and the Book, Vol. I. Vol. IX., pp.

313. The Ring and the Book, Vol. II. Vol. X., pp. 279. The Ring and the Book, Vol. III. Vol. XI., pp. 343. Balaustion's Adventure, Prince Hohenstiel-Schw.a.n.gau, Fifine at the Fair.

Vol. XII., pp. 311. Red Cotton Night-Cap Country, The Inn Alb.u.m, Vol. XIII., pp. 357. Aristophanes' Apology, The Agamemnon of aeschylus. Vol. XIV., pp. vi., 279. Pacchiarotto and how he worked in Distemper, with other Poems. [La Saisiaz, the Two Poets of Croisic.] Vol. XV., pp. vi., 260.

Dramatic Idyls, Jocoseria. Vol. XVI., pp. vi., 275.

Ferishtah's Fancies. Parleyings with Certain People. General Index, pp. 277-85; Index to First Lines of Shorter Poems, pp.

287-92. Vol. XVII., pp. viii., 288. Asolando, Biographical and Historical Notes to the Poems. General Index, pp. 289-99; Index to First Lines of Shorter Poems, pp. 301-307. This edition contains Browning's final text of his poems.

62. ASOLANDO: FANCIES AND FACTS. By Robert Browning. London: Smith, Elder & Co., 15 Waterloo Place. 1890, pp. viii., 157. (_Poetical Works_, 1894, Vol. XVII., pp. 1-131.)

Contents:--Prologue. 1. Rosny. 2. Dubiety. 3. Now. 4.

Humility. 5. Poetics. 6. Summum Bonum. 7. A Pearl, a Girl. 8.

Speculative. 9. White Witchcraft. 10. Bad Dreams (i.-iv.).

11. Inapprehensiveness. 12. Which? 13. The Cardinal and the Dog. 14. The Pope and the Net. 15. The Bean-Feast. 16.

Muckle-mouth Meg. 17. Arcades Ambo. 18. The Lady and the Painter. 19. Ponte dell' Angelo, Venice. 20. Beatrice Signorini. 21. Flute-Music, with an Accompaniment. 22.

"Imperante Augusto natus est--." 23. Development. 24. Rephan.

25. Reverie. Prologue.

63. THE POETICAL WORKS OF ROBERT BROWNING. With Portraits. In two volumes. London: Smith, Elder & Co., 15 Waterloo Place, 1896. Vol. I., pp. viii., 784; Vol. II., pp. vii., 786.

The Editor's note, after p. viii., signed "Augustine Birrell," says: "All that has been done is to prefix (within square brackets) to some of the plays and poems a few lines explanatory of the characters and events depicted and described, and to explain in the margin of the volumes the meaning of such words as might, if left unexplained, momentarily arrest the understanding of the reader ... Mr. F.G. Kenyon has been kind enough to make the notes for 'The Ring and the Book,' but for the rest the editor alone is responsible." The text is that of the edition of 1889, 1894, but the arrangement is more strictly chronological. The notes are throughout unnecessary and to be regretted.

II.

REPRINT OF DISCARDED PREFACES TO THE FIRST EDITIONS OF SOME OF BROWNING'S WORKS

1. Preface to _Paracelsus_ (1835).

"I am anxious that the reader should not, at the very outset,--mistaking my performance for one of a cla.s.s with which it has nothing in common,--judge it by principles on which it has never been moulded, and subject it to a standard to which it was never meant to conform. I therefore antic.i.p.ate his discovery, that it is an attempt, probably more novel than happy, to reverse the method usually adopted by writers, whose aim it is to set forth any phenomenon of the mind or the pa.s.sions, by the operation of persons or events; and that, instead of having recourse to an external machinery of incidents to create and evolve the crisis I desire to produce, I have ventured to display somewhat minutely the mood itself in its rise and progress, and have suffered the agency by which it is influenced and determined, to be generally discernible in its effects alone, and subordinate throughout, if not altogether excluded; and this for a reason. I have endeavoured to write a poem, not a drama: the canons of the drama are well known, and I cannot but think that, inasmuch as they have immediate regard to stage representation, the peculiar advantages they hold out are really such, only so long as the purpose for which they were at first inst.i.tuted is kept in view. I do not very well understand what is called a Dramatic Poem, wherein all those restrictions only submitted to on account of compensating good in the original scheme are scrupulously retained, as though for some special fitness in themselves,--and all new facilities placed at an author's disposal by the vehicle he selects, as pertinaciously rejected. It is certain, however, that a work like mine depends more immediately on the intelligence and sympathy of the reader for its success;--indeed, were my scenes stars, it must be his co-operating fancy which, supplying all chasms, shall connect the scattered lights into one constellation--a Lyre or a Crown. I trust for his indulgence towards a poem which had not been imagined six months ago, and that even should he think slightingly of the present (an experiment I am in no case likely to repeat) he will not be prejudiced against other productions which may follow in a more popular, and perhaps less difficult form.

15th March 1835."

2. Preface to _Strafford_ (1837).

"I had for some time been engaged in a poem of a very different nature [_Sordello_] when induced to make the present attempt; and am not without apprehension that my eagerness to freshen a jaded mind by diverting it to the healthy natures of a grand epoch, may have operated unfavourably on the represented play, which is one of Action in Character, rather than Character in Action. To remedy this, in some degree, considerable curtailment will be necessary, and, in a few instances, the supplying details not required, I suppose, by the mere reader. While a trifling success would much gratify, failure will not wholly discourage me from another effort: experience is to come, and earnest endeavour may yet remove many disadvantages.

The portraits are, I think, faithful; and I am exceedingly fortunate in being able, in proof of this, to refer to the subtle and eloquent exposition of the characters of Eliot and Strafford, in the Lives of Eminent British Statesmen now in the course of publication in Lardner's Cyclopaedia, by a writer [John Forster] whom I am proud to call my friend; and whose biographies of Hampden, Pym, and Vane, will, I am sure, fitly ill.u.s.trate the present year--the Second Centenary of the Trial concerning Ship-money. My Carlisle, however, is purely imaginary: I at first sketched her singular likeness roughly in, as suggested by Matthew and the memoir-writers--but it was too artificial, and the subst.i.tuted outline is exclusively from Voiture and Waller.

The Italian boat-song in the last scene is from Redi's _Bacco_, long since naturalised in the joyous and delicate version of Leigh Hunt."

3. Preface to _Sordello_ (not in first edition, but added in 1863). I reprint it, though still retained by the author, on account of its great importance as a piece of self-criticism or self-interpretation.

"To J. MILSAND, OF DIJON.

Dear Friend,--Let the next poem be introduced by your name, and so repay all trouble it ever cost me. I wrote it twenty-five years ago for only a few, counting even in these on somewhat more care about its subject than they really had. My own faults of expression were many; but with care for a man or book, such would be surmounted, and without it what avails the faultlessness of either? I blame n.o.body, least of all myself, who did my best then and since; for I lately gave time and pains to turn my work into what the many might,--instead of what the few must,--like: but after all, I imagined another thing at first, and therefore leave as I find it. The historical decoration was purposely of no more importance than a background requires; and my stress lay on the incidents in the development of a soul: little else is worth study. I, at least, always thought so--you, with many known and unknown to me, think so--others may one day think so: and whether my attempt remain for them or not, I trust, though away and past it, to continue ever yours, R. B.

London, June 9, 1863."

4. Preface to _Bells and Pomegranates_.--I. _Pippa Pa.s.ses_ (1841).

"ADVERTIs.e.m.e.nT.

Two or three years ago I wrote a Play, about which the chief matter I much care to recollect at present is, that a Pit-full of good-natured people applauded it: ever since, I have been desirous of doing something in the same way that should better reward their attention. What follows, I mean for the first of a series of Dramatical Pieces, to come out at intervals; and I amuse myself by fancying that the cheap mode in which they appear, will for once help me to a sort of Pit-audience again. Of course such a work must go on no longer than it is liked; and to provide against a certain and but too possible contingency, let me hasten to say now--what, if I were sure of success, I would try to say circ.u.mstantially enough at the close--that I dedicate my best intentions most admiringly to the author of 'Ion'--most affectionately to Serjeant Talfourd.

ROBERT BROWNING."

5. Preface to _Bells and Pomegranates_.--VIII. _Luria_ and _A Soul's Tragedy_.

"Here ends my first series of 'Bells and Pomegranates:' and I take the opportunity of explaining, in reply to inquiries, that I only meant by that t.i.tle to indicate an endeavour towards something like an alteration, or mixture, of music with discoursing, sound with sense, poetry with thought; which looks too ambitious, thus expressed, so the symbol was preferred. It is little to the purpose, that such is actually one of the most familiar of the many Rabbinical (and Patristic) acceptations of the phrase; because I confess that, letting authority alone, I supposed the bare words, in such juxtaposition, would sufficiently convey the desired meaning. 'Faith and good works' is another fancy, for instance, and perhaps no easier to arrive at: yet Giotto placed a pomegranate-fruit in the hand of Dante, and Raffaelle crowned his Theology (in the _Camera della Segnatura_) with blossoms of the same; as if the Bellari and Vasari would be sure to come after, and explain that it was merely '_simbolo delle buone opere--il qual Pomogranato fu per usato nelle vesti del Pontefice appresso gli Ebrei_.' R. B."

It may be worth while to append the interesting concluding paragraph of the preface to the first series of _Selections_, issued by Messrs.

Smith, Elder and Co. in 1872:

"A few years ago, had such an opportunity presented itself, I might have been tempted to say a word in reply to the objections my poetry was used to encounter. Time has kindly co-operated with my disinclination to write the poetry and the criticism besides. The readers I am at last privileged to expect, meet me fully half-way; and if, from their fitting standpoint, they must still 'censure me in their wisdom,' they have previously 'awakened their senses that they may the better judge.' Nor do I apprehend any more charges of being wilfully obscure, unconscientiously careless, or perversely harsh. Having hitherto done my utmost in the art to which my life is a devotion, I cannot engage to increase the effort; but I conceive that there may be helpful light, as well as rea.s.suring warmth, in the attention and sympathy I gratefully acknowledge R. B.

London, May 14, 1872."