503. RB to William Johnson Fox
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 3, 134–135.
Camb[erwell].
16. Apr. 35.
Dear Sir,
Your communication gladdened the cockles of my heart: I lost no time in presenting myself to Moxon, but no sooner was Mr Clarke’s [1] letter perused than the Moxonian visage loured exceedingly thereat—the Moxonian accent grew dolorous thereupon:—“Artevelde” [2] has not paid expenses by about 30 & odd pounds: Tennyson’s poetry is “popular at Cambridge” & yet of 800 copies which were printed of his last, some 300 only have gone off: Mr M. hardly knows whether he shall ever venture again, &c &c & in short begs to decline even inspecting &c &c
I called on Saunders & Otley [3] at once, & marvel of marvels, do really think there is some chance of our coming to decent terms .. I shall know at the beginning of next week, but am not over sanguine.
You will “sarve me out”?—two words to that; being the man you are, you must need very little telling from me, of the real feeling I have of your criticism’s worth,—if I have had no more of it, surely I am hardly to blame, who have in more than one instance bored you sufficiently: but not a particle of your article has been rejected or neglected by your observant humble servant, [4] & very proud shall I be if my new work bear in it the marks of the influence under which it was undertaken, & if I prove not a fit compeer of the potter in Horace who anticipated an amphora & produced a porridge-pot. [5] I purposely keep back the subject until you see my conception of its capabilities .. otherwise you would be planning a vase fit to give the go by to Evanders [6] best crockery, which my cantharus [7] would cut but a sorry figure beside .. hardly up to the ansa. [8] But such as it is, it is very earnest & suggestive—& likely I hope to do good: & though I am rather scared at the thought of a fresh eye going over its 4000 lines .. discovering blemishes of all sorts which my one wit cannot avail to detect, fools treated as sages, obscure passages, slipshod verses, & much that worse is,—yet on the whole I am not much afraid of the issue, & I would give something to be allowed to read it some morning to you [9] .. for every rap o’ the knuckles I should get a clap o’ the back, I know–
I have another affair on hand, rather of a more popular nature, [10] I conceive, but not so decisive & explicit on a point or two—so I decide on trying the question with this:—I really shall need your notice, on this account; I shall affix my name & stick my arms akimbo; there are precious bold bits here & there, & the drift & scope are awfully radical,—I am “off” for ever with the other side, but must by all means be “on” with yours—a position once gained, worthier works shall follow:—therefore a certain writer who meditated a notice (it matters not laudatory or otherwise) on “Pauline” in the “Examiner,” [11] must be benignant or supercilious as he shall choose, but in no case an idle spectator of my first appearance on any stage (having previously only dabbled in private theatricals:)—& bawl “hats off,” “down in front” &c as soon as I get to the Proscenium; & he may depend that tho’ my “Now is the winter of our discontent” [12] be rather awkward, yet there shall be occasional outbreaks of good stuff .. that I shall warm as I get on, & finally wish “Richmond at the bottom of the seas,” [13] &c in the best style imaginable.
Excuse all this swagger, I know you will, &
<Your obedient Servant
Robert Browning> [14]
Publication: Orr, pp. 65–67.
Manuscript: Huntington Library.
1. Charles Cowden Clarke (1787–1877), author, lecturer, prominent in literary circles.
2. Philip van Artevelde; a dramatic romance, by Henry Taylor (1800–86), had been published by Moxon in 1834.
3. Saunders & Otley, of 50 Conduit Street, publishers of Pauline.
4. RB presumably refers here to the comments made by Fox in his review of Pauline in The Monthly Repository (vol. VII, April 1833, pp. 252–262).
5. De Arte Poetica, 21–22.
6. In the Æneid, Evander, father of Pallas, offers a libation from a sacred cup (VIII, 185–275).
7. A large drinking-vessel with handles.
8. “Handle.”
9. RB refers to Paracelsus.
10. Although Sordello was not published until 1840, RB was working on it at this time.
11. The “certain writer” was probably John Stuart Mill (1806–73). DeVane speculates (p. 46n.) that Mill’s review was only sent to Tait’s Edinburgh Magazine after being declined by The Examiner. However, as Tait’s had by this time dismissed Pauline as “pure bewilderment” (see p. 346), the magazine did not print Mill’s critique.
12. King Richard III, I, 1, 1.
13. Cf. King Richard III, IV, 4, 462–463.
14. RB’s original closing has been removed, and replaced in an unidentified hand with the wording we have bracketed.
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