1753. EBB to Thomas Westwood
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 9, 215–217.
50 Wimpole Street
November 4. 1844
My dear Mr Westwood, .. Before I write a word on books & reviews, I must ask an explanation of what you call “egotism,” & which has cost me more thoughts than any other phrase in your kind letter. What do you mean by this [‘]‘strange & unnatural” fear of the winter,—which you ought not to have if you are well? I fear I know what you must mean by it—that your health has failed of late. Is it so indeed? A fear of the winter,—the fear which never visited myself until my own health became a ruin, .. appears fraught to me now with a painful significance, when I hear of it in relation to my friends– So you must write to me dear Mr Westwood, & explain how you are, lest I shd exaggerate my apprehension beyond the measure of the fact–
Lately I have been sympathizing with the recovery instead of the illness of my correspondents,—Miss Martineau having, to the joy & wonder of the whole world, recovered from a complaint considered mortal, by means of Magnetism. For four years & a half she was unable to leave the house,—and now she can walk “five miles a day with ease.” She is not better,—but well. She tells me so herself. Moreover, one of her servants is illustrating the estate of clairvoyance by revealing, she says, awful spiritual mysteries concerning the body & the soul, & the destination of the spiritual part of man. I, who am very credulous, feel my blood running the wrong way as I read. Can it be lawful if it is true? or expedient, if lawful?
I thank you warmly for your interest in the welfare of my book,—and I may tell you that it is meeting with ample kindness from the judges in authority. I send you the Examiner since you really care to see it,—or rather I send you the criticism out of the Examiner. And Ainsworth’s Magazine & the New Monthly both had kind notices, besides those you mention—and the Critic Journal is rather kind—and the John Bull abused me so as to hurt himself rather than my book, .. which was a comfort—and the reviews in Blackwood & Tait are a still greater. [1] Upon the whole, I shd be grateful to the critical race—even the “Sun” having compensated in the evening (Evening Sun) for its stormy bearing at dawn. [2] I was afraid of the critics, at first,—from having no friends among them in a personal sense, (Mr Horne being still abroad & likely to remain) & knowing what the ordinary fate of poetry too certainly is. I had never heard of the Dublin extract [3] —nor of the Westminster Review, .. except in the promise of the last number to “take an early opportunity &c” [4] – For the specific information, I thank you much. Perhaps it wd be magnanimous to profess to be absolutely indifferent to these sublunary critics—but it is right to be honest,—& I must frankly confess (I may .. to a brother-poet!) [5] that I never could attain to that sublime state of indifference, for which Mrs Greville offered orisons. [6] How I sow blots as I write! Can you read between them? And may I tell you that I have ‘lost & won’ [7] poor Flush again,—& that I had to compound with the thieves & pay six guineas, in order to recover him, much as I did last year—besides the tears .. the tears! Moreover my Ali Baba had the insolence to inform my agent, that he wd have the dog again at the earliest opportunity, & wd ask ten guineas on the next occasion. I am thinking of “agitating, agitating, agitating” with Daniell OConnell, to induce the government to reform whatever nodus [8] in the law or the police, permits such a state of things & thieves. I hear that the Kings of the dog-thieves are in the process of making some three thousand a year by their commerce. Did you ever lose your dog? Do you know what it is to lose a dog you love? For two days & nights I lost Flush, & could’nt sleep or eat, as a matter of course. And when he came home, he began to cry. His heart was full, like my own.
Yes—‘Duchess May’ is a favorite—& the Drama is not,—and I reproach nobody for it. Miss Martineau told me that the character of Lucifer was the worst thing in the two volumes. So it may be. I assure you I have no vain puffings up about the Drama of Exile—& I can easily believe that, as a whole, it may be a failure.
We are to consider, dear Mr Westwood, that a reason why these books have been much noticed, for good & evil, by the critics, is, that they are books .. two volumes, .. & thus, more conspicuous in form, than a single book of poems. I thank you very much for the interest you express in them,—& I may assure you that I am touched in my heart by it.
And now,—write to me, & tell me how you are,—& whether you have been doing anything in the way of composition lately.
You will send me back the Examiner, when you have quite done with it, but not earlier—and I remain
Most faithfully yours
Elizabeth B Barrett.
Publication: None traced.
Manuscript: British Library.
1. For the text of these reviews, see Appendix III.
2. In its 1 November notice of the current issue of Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, The Sun dealt almost exclusively with Blackwood’s review of EBB’s Poems (1844), giving a more positive impression of her work than it had in its pages on 9 September. For the text of these reviews, see Appendix III.
3. In the August 1844 issue of The Dublin University Magazine (no. 140, pp. 188–190), “The Cry of the Children” was reprinted as a footnote to an article entitled “Kane’s Industrial Resources of Ireland.”
4. For the text of this review, see pp. 374–378.
5. EBB has obliterated “fellow-poet” before “brother-poet.”
6. A reference to “A Prayer for Indifference” by Mrs. Fanny Greville (née McCartney) which was published in Poems: Selected and Printed by a Small Party of English (1792).
7. Cf. Macbeth, I, 1, 4.
8. “Knot.”
___________________
