839. EBB to Mary Russell Mitford
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 5, 101–103.
[Torquay]
August 4. 1841
My beloved friend,
I have seen & read the book, [1] —and although perfectly understanding why any critic by profession wd naturally look ‘grave’ upon it, [2] and even admitting myself that all the words of it are not scrupulously & wisely said, yet my conclusion remains .. that no plague-touch need be feared from its author. It is written by an enthusiast in the cause of genius upon the spectacle of its misery, lighted up to ghastliness by the torchlight of D’Israeli [3] & other memorialists. Its thunderbolts are hurled against all false media—such as interpose between men of genius & the public, in the form of readers for publishers & Theatrical managers, &c &c—which aforesaid thunderbolts do occasionally smell a little over much of sulphur. There is in fact, with much talent & power, a sufficiency of acrimony & indiscretion. Nothing & nobody escape. Universities, Royal academies, Literary societies .. there is a sweep of scorn over all!– For my own part, after all .. notwithstanding my private reasons for weighing faithfully .. notwithstanding the sense forced upon me of the overweight of certain words—I did feel myself taken off my feet & carried along in the brave strong generous current of the spirit of the book– It is a fearless book, with fine thoughts on a stirring subject– I myself once, long ago, fancied & began to fashion a poem drawing near to the same subject—at least, recording the sorrows of poets—(“The poets’ record” was to be my name for it) [4] and D’Israeli’s mournful tales were my incitement to it. The wrongs done & the sorrows suffered by men of genius (for whom genius itself seems to cut down & curtail of fair proportion the common sympathies of man to man, .. not always but very often) turn the whole heart into sickness. I forgive the book its indiscretion, with tears in my eyes. And that you may forgive it too, I must try to get it to you soon .. I must be satisfied with your opinion. Surely nobody but poor Southey’s snow Lady, [5] need be afraid of approximation to the author of the book—I mean that no woman need, on the point of womanly delicacy, .. of moral delicacy .. be afraid. There is nothing in it touching womanly offices & conduct. Even women of genius (except Fanny Kemble, whose Francis the first & its fourteen editions are dismissed coldy & briefly .. (“a weak subject” he says “& weakly treated”) [6] even women of genius pass silently,
<…> [7]
as I cannot write here. Dearest, “warmest of friends” (“that warmest of friends Miss Mitford” said Mr Townsend to me!) may God bless you. If I cd do anything for you in any way, so as to soften one of your cares, I shd feel it to be well worth the cost of many cares of mine. I wish I cd have such cares!– Mine are selfish things. Yet I love you through them all.
Mr Kenyon is not yet heard of—but if he comes while I am here, I will see him—but (an honest ‘but’) I hope he will not come while I am here. It is not prudery. It is faint-heartedness. I seem to shrink from people’s faces & voices—& most of all here. Still it wd not be altogether kind, to refuse seeing Mr Kenyon—particularly when I can get to the sofa—& most particularly when you wish it. So I shall see him if he comes. And I shall hope to get away in time to be too late.
But our uncertainties continue: and to clench their character, I heard suddenly yesterday of Papa’s having gone into Herefordshire for a few days!! What will become of me? My patience has dreadful chilblains from standing so long on a monument! [8] To go away, without coming to a definite resolution, or sending a carriage for me!– Well—I am a little bit vexed—which proves how human I am, & not how human he is .. except in his love for me. I have not climbed so high in ingratitude, as to complain of the delay, the least bit! And everybody says that a few more days will see the solution of the problem. Indeed they must—Dr Scully beginning to talk of the unfitness of my setting out on a journey, after the tenth of September—, this being August!
In regard to places, I am blind too—as blind as Fortune [9] —or Misfortune. And I have been so afraid of annoying that dearest Papa of mine, that I have not asked him for very long to take off the bandage. Still, voices come to me from London—younger voices, which try to say what I may like to hear best—flattering apocryphal voices, which are not to be trusted. And they say “You are sure either to go to Reading or to London”. But I say .. “I dare not believe them”—and I dare not.
I can walk very closely by your side (always a dear position) in the matter of these poets—but scarcely all the way. We think just alike of Moore, for instance—who wd be a truer poet, if poetry were a bundle of fancies—as Hume thought the soul a bundle of ideas. [10] As it <***>
Publication: EBB-MRM, I, 254–256.
Manuscript: Wellesley College.
1. Exposition of the False Medium and Barriers Excluding Men of Genius from the Public (1833). See letter 829.
2. A review of Horne’s book by Christopher North (John Wilson) in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine (October 1833, pp. 440–468) castigated Horne: “He must, without delay, be drenched with drastics—purged within an inch of his life … but all this will be of no avail, unless he be denied access to pen and ink.”
3. Isaac D’Israeli (1766–1848), the father of Benjamin Disraeli, published Curiosities of Literature (1791–1834), An Essay on the Literary Character (1795), Calamities of Authors (1812–13) and Quarrels of Authors (1814).
4. EBB mentioned this project in 1831 (see Diary, p. 93). Three manuscripts exist at Wellesley (see Reconstruction, D733–735); one was published in Anthony Munday and Other Essays, ed. Eustace Conway (1927), pp. 105–111.
5. Laila, the daughter of Okba the sorcerer, had been sequestered in a snowy region as a protection, her only companions figures made of ice; see Southey’s Thalaba the Destroyer (1801), bk. X.
6. Horne wrote (p. 48): “As to style, it is not poor or negative … but inexcusably bad throughout. ‘Francis the First’ is an abortive attempt, because its chief character commences with the greatest pretensions of inherent power, and ends with the weakest compromise … It was a weak subject, weakly treated, and passed through fourteen editions in a short time.”
7. Pages of the manuscript missing.
8. Cf. Twelfth Night, II, 4, 114.
9. Cf. Henry V, III, 6, 32.
10. See “On the Immortality of the Soul” (1779).
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