Elizabeth Barrett Browning

Empathetic due to her own lifelong physical sufferings but evocative of profound
intellectual thought, Browning’s poems are considered among the greatest contributions
to English poetry for the nineteenth century. Through her pen, she was passionately
outspoken on issues of social injustice like slavery, child labor, and oppression of
women, and later in life expressed her political opinions of the struggle in Italy with
Austria. She had a lasting influence on future American poet Emily Dickinson (1830-
1886) and English author Virginia Woolf (1882-1941) who praised her works, which are
still widely read in the twenty-first century.

Elizabeth Barrett Moulton Barrett was born on 6 March 1806 at Coxhoe Hall, County
Durham, England, the daughter of Mary Graham Clarke (d.1828) and Edward Moulton
Barrett (d.1857), who amassed great wealth from his Jamaican sugar plantations. Three
years after Elizabeth was born, he bought the 500 acre estate `Hope End’ in
Hertfordshire.

Young Elizabeth benefited from a privileged life in the country with her eleven younger
siblings. Although frail at times, she still enjoyed physical pursuits like riding her pony
and attending social gatherings with family and friends. Similar to her future husband
Robert Browning, she was a voracious reader and early on became a keen student under
her tutors, studying languages including Greek, the Bible in Hebrew, and classical
literature, philosophy, and history. While her father was overly protective and actually
forbade her to marry, he did encourage her to write, and in 1820 had fifty copies of her
narrative poem “The Battle of Marathon” printed. Her autocratic father’s concern
increased when Elizabeth was stricken with illness around the age of fifteen. A course of
opium was prescribed and for the rest of her life she would need it for various ailments .

An English poet widely read by her contemporaries, Elizabeth Barrett Browning was born
the eldest of eleven children in Coxhoe Hall near Durham. The family moved to Hope End
in Herefordshire in 1809 where Elizabeth spent her childhood. An avid reader, she was
educated at home where her father gave her access to his classical library. Her first
volume of poems was privately published when she was 14. 

She suffered from ill health for most of her life. Her mother died in 1828 and her father
was forced to sell Hope End in 1832 during the Abolition movement with the result that
the family moved to London. Ten years later Elizabeth was more or less an invalid, but
used her confinement to write Poems (1844) which was celebrated by all and which led
to her introduction by letter to the poet Robert Browning. She also became a good friend
of Miss Mitford at this time. On 12 September 1846 she clandestinely married Browning,
and moved immediately to Italy. They settled in Florence, in Casa Guidi where in 1849
she gave birth to a son, Robert Wiedeman Barrett Browning. 

Her health improved greatly during her years in Italy, allowing her to travel throughout
Europe. By the time of the publication of Aurora Leigh, a poem dealing with the
restrictions imposed on women by Victorian society, she was firmly established as a poet
of distinction. In fact, most of her work expresses her concern for the liberal causes of
her day, including the cause of Italian nationalism. The Sonnets from the Portuguese
(1850) altered the conventions of the love sonnet by the use of a tone of playful
humour. In the last years of her life she was influenced by the popular interest in
spiritualism. The Poems Before Congress (1860), although written in her final years
when her health was deteriorating, are said to contain some of her most forceful and
beautiful lyrics.
 Elizabeth Barrett Browning

1806-1861

Elizabeth Barrett was born at Coxhoe Hall, Durham, England. Elizabeth was
educated at home, learning Greek, Latin, and several modern languages at an early
age. In 1819, her father arranged for the printing of one of her poems (she was 13
at the time.)

In 1821, Elizabeth injured her spine as a result of a fall. When her brother died in
1838, she seemingly became a permanent invalid. She spent the majority of her
time in her room writing poetry. In 1844, Robert Browning wrote to Elizabeth
admiring her Poems. He continued to write to her and they were engaged in 1845.

Elizabeth's father disapproved of the courtship and engagement. In 1846, Elizabeth

and Robert were secretly wed. Soon the couple ran off to Italy where Elizabeth's
health improved. She continued to live in the villa of Casa Guidi for the remainder
of her life.

In 1850, Elizabeth's best known book of poems was published Sonnets from the
Portugese. They are not translations, but a sequence of 44 sonnets recording the
growth of her love for Robert. He often called her "my little Portuguese" because
of her dark complextion.

Elizabeth's poems have a diction and rhythm evoking an attractive, spontaneouse

quallity though some may seem sentimental. Many of her poems protest what she
considered unjust social conditions. She also wrote poems appealing for political
freedom for Italy and other countries controlled by foreign nations.

In 1861, Elizabeth Barrett Browning died at the age of 55. Her son, born 1849, and
husband returned to England after her death.