Robert Browning: a life within life

The Story

This sturdy, readable biography is a largely straightforward, largely admiring retelling of the familiar life story: the happy, sheltered, father-educated childhood, which led to ""the extraordinary consistency of Browning's beliefs throughout life""; the ambitious beginnings, early failures; the infatuation with the theater; his bouts of (perhaps psychosomatic) trigeminal neuralgia; the success of "Pippa Passes"; the courtship of invalid Elizabeth Barrett, followed by the marriage and move to Italy; friendships, from the literary to the social/eccentric; and, with Elizabeth's fatally failing health, the beginnings of Browning's aggressive socializing--flirtations, hobbies, country houses. All the important poetry is also discussed, in reasonable, clear, unremarkable terms. The book is a competent, one-volume treatment, free of much old-fashioned Browning-bio baggage.

A hardcover edition from 1983 of Robert Browning by Donald Thomas. It runs to 334 pages, in very good condition. We hold one copy, so once it is gone it is gone. Shelved under Biography & Memoir. Wrapped with care for collectors and shipped from Kuwait.