793. EBB to Richard Hengist Horne
As published in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 5, 12–13.
[Torquay]
[late January 1841] [1]
I am so glad, dear Mr Horne, that you really do like the subject—so glad—& something surprised—because I fancied the ink frowned through your envelope before I opened it—I never wrote down a subject before, for anybody to see,—& all your indulgence could’nt keep me from being afraid of you.
Asleep again? No—but the Sunday’s no-post intervened—& even today I must write very briefly on account of my head which aches as if out of malice, & has done, from the morning “sans intermission”.
Oh yes—your suggestions are excellent—& bring with them, suggestively too, new courage. I like the genii very much indeed.
Shd the Islanders, (the Islander chorus I mean) represent the five senses, or the conventionalities which encrust the senses, & are body beyond body .. opaker than the natural body? Will you consider? Perhaps both in a measure.
It seems to me that we shd avoid allegory in any cold strict sense,—& hold fast the individualities of the human beings– It was only for this, (to suggest the individuality of the principal personage), that I wrote down “Cymon”––not from any especial preference for the name. [2]
What will you have dear Mr Horne?—Philaster—Archas—Crates—Leon—Theanor—Herman? I am not sure I like either much.
For the bride .. Evadne, Luce, Berthe (no) Bianca—Violante—Viola—Elinda—Earine—a beautiful name which brings beauty of all sorts to remembrance, besides Jonson’s Sad Shepherd– You remember Earine!
“Who had her very being & her name
From the first knotts & buddings of the spring–” [3]
Mariana—or shall it be German to go with Herman– [4]
The Princess Royal might be suited out of this catalogue. Decide yourself.
And as to the title generally .. why what shall be said? That is a graver point. ‘Psyche Unveiled’ wd surely do—altho’ it did suggest to my own associations, Mr Foster’s ‘Mahometan[i]sm unveiled’ [5] & titles of the kind.
The Unveiled.
A Psychological Mystery.
Wd that be better?—anything better? out of Mr Foster’s way, & the “nature displayed” people’s. You speak of a Greek-English title. Such as “The apocalypse of Psyche.”? or “Psyche apocalyptic”—<…> [6] Oh it wont do—will it? Shall it be more Greek than English? But then nobody, not most bodies at least, will know what we mean.
Psyche the Pursuer?—or the Persecutor? Psyche the Terrible?
Well– I know what name you will choose for me after all this—perhaps a Greek one .. & then it will begin with μ. [7] But it is hard upon me, to expect an answer to such a question by an early post—when everybody admits that the title of a book now a days, takes more study than all the rest of it– You must think yourself—& your first thought is better than the best of mine in the rear.
I was pleased in every way by your expression of satisfaction with the rough outline I dared to send you—I felt it to be absolute daring—pleased in every way—& not the least, with the sympathy of feeling. Only my head aches so, that I can scarcely see to write down whatever part of the pleasure wd be otherwise expressive .. Oh—I have an agreeable sense of writing nonsense—coincident with the close of every sentence. Can you make out anything?–
In regard to the question about the attack on Chaucer, I fancied it was an oratorical question, & not meant to be answered! You did’nt before say who ‘the black gentleman’ was, or whence protruding his blackness. Now I shall send for the magazines, for the present month & February. [8]
I cant write any more—but will do so in another day, or two—to tell you what Miss Mitford says of you in Chaucer.—— Did you see the English Journal, the first Jany number [9] —a three halfpenny publication .. but sovereignly courteous.
Ever truly yours EBB
Publication: EBB-RHH, II, 70–74 (in part).
Manuscript: Pierpont Morgan Library.
1. This is EBB’s reply to Horne’s response to the outline sent him with letter 791.
2. Later changed to Medon.
3. Act III, 2, 44–45, slightly misquoted. Earine, a shepherdess, was the beloved of Æglamour, the Sad Shepherd.
4. An oblique reference to Porson’s epigram on Professor Hermann (see letter 508, note 8).
5. Charles Forster’s edition of Mahometanism Unveiled was published in 1829.
6. About half a line obliterated, apparently by EBB.
7. Horne has placed an asterisk next to the Greek character and written, at the foot of the page, the word μαινὰς. The Mænades, priestesses of Bacchus, became so abandoned in celebrating their festivals that they appeared mad.
8. There was a negative review of Chaucer, Modernized in The Athenæum; see letter 796.
9. The English Journal, 2 January 1841, included, in addition to Miss Mitford’s “Little David,” a review of Chaucer, Modernized. (For the text of the review, see pp. 385–387.)
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