E440831A. Poems (1844).
The Atlas, 31 August 1844, pp. 593–594.
As reprinted in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 9, 326–330.
If the finest poetry be that which leaves upon the mind of the reader the deepest impression, then it follows that the school to which the highly-gifted authoress, whose volumes are now before us belongs, is not of the loftiest order of genius. In the perusal of the productions of these writers, it is true, we feel the most lively pleasure. The almost endless variety of subject—the tuneful harmony—the happy thought most happily evolved—the supreme sense of beauty—the intense love of nature—the light and shade—the cloud and sunshine that seem to glance and tremble over their pages, are fascinating and delightful. For the time being we are lapped in Elysium, and close their volumes with the feeling of beauty clinging, as it were, to us like a fragrant odour.
Ye need not ask from what far port she went,
The gale declares it—laden with the scent.
The genius of this school of poets, upon a careful analysis, would appear to be a blending of the antique and the romantic with the modern—the shadows of the past substantialized by the realities of the present—the mind of the old world giving utterance to its thoughts through the influences and impressions of the new. Hence the predilection of these writers for the ballad and the romance—their fond reverting to haunted springs and fabulous wells—their plaintive warblings over the departed Gods of Hellas—their love of chivalry—their allegories—their fictions—their lingering looks to the flame-guarded gates of Paradise—their wanderings amid the lap of a lovelier nature, softened by golden dawns and long purple sun-sets, by the sound of softer waters among greener hills and fairer vallies than earth now presents. Hence, too, their thoughts of brave endurance—their trustfulness in supreme goodness—their confidence in individual and social improvement—their large-hearted humanity “that looks before and after”—their belief in virtue—their assurance in the regenerating forces now acting upon society—their assertion of the law of progress—their alliance of truth and beauty as the grand source of happiness—and, above all, their entire devotion to their art, as a serious, a sacred, a most holy thing. Harken to the priestess of the order:—“Poetry has been to me as serious a thing as life itself, and life has been a very serious thing; there has been no playing at skittles for me in either. I never mistook pleasure for the final cause of poetry, nor leisure for the hour of the poet. I have done my work so far as work—not as mere hand and head work apart from the personal being; but as the completest expression of that being to which I could attain.” Yet, with all these excellencies we cannot but feel that there is something wanting—that the impression made upon our hearts is not lasting—that there is an effort necessary on our part to catch and retain the evanescent beauties of their poems—that the quaint and formal expression—the almost total disregard, if not to rhythm, at least to rhyme—the grotesque metres—the novel, not to say far-fetched imagery— the minute individualization, even to “a mote in the sunbeam,” or “a fly on the wall,” show a labour and an art widely different for that spontaniety which should characterize, or seem to characterize, the effusions of all genuine poets. We can likewise perceive an ardent desire in the writers of this school to take their readers by surprise—to appear laboriously transcendental—to banish the concrete—to be perpetually analytical. This may show cleverness, but assuredly it militates against real fame. That poetry will alone be enduring which all can delight in, and which all can understand. Milton is popular, but not so popular as Shakspeare. The great dramatist followed nature—he was unaffected, simple, childlike. He spoke a language that all could comprehend. In the very storm and tempest of passion he was true to instinct. The secret was, he banished self—he sacrificed vanity to truth, and hence we see—
There, Shakspeare, on whose forehead climb
The crowns of the world! Oh eyes sublime
With tears and laughters for all time!
We have likewise the impression that these poets could do better if they would, and this idea frets us. We meet with a fine thought—a striking image—a happy expression—a delicate touch of feeling—a dash of rare beauty. Standing apart we perceive the excelling grace of each and all of these. But we ask, how came this here, and for what purpose has the poet introduced it? The natural chain of association has been warped or broken, and nature has been banished to make way for the besetting sin of this school—mannerism. For the sake of having it thought that they have done well, they pursue the uncommon in manner—the uncommon in matter—the uncommon in language. On this last score they are superlatively guilty. Tennyson led the way with his compound epithets, and his imitators have deluged our pure Saxon—the tongue that Shakspeare, and Spenser, and Milton could find copious enough to express their numerous thoughts in—with intolerable barbarisms. But enough respecting faults; there is room for praise, as we have already made evident. We have no hesitation in saying that among the female poets of the day, Miss Barrett stands at the head. Her present volumes show extraordinary power, and, abating the failings of which all the followers of Tennyson are guilty, extraordinary genius. Her verses, like the Assyrian’s tent, are hung with purple and gold, yet they are as far removed from the sensuous as the radiant cloud is elevated above the creeping vapour. They are the emanations of a chastened spirit, and a serene and penetrating intellect. They are purified like refined silver. The dross and scum of earth have passed from them. A tender melancholy mostly pervades them, but it is never morbid, it never degenerates into egotism. The philosophy of endurance is the basis on which her healthful genius has erected its edifice—a calm resignation broods over it. Her subjects, though numerous, preserve their individuality. Each stands out in its own massiveness, full, rounded, complete. Her efforts appear to advantage after a second reading—they require reflection rightly to comprehend them. Apart from the mistiness of transcendentalism to which she is prone, this is no trifling proof of excellence.
The longest poem in Miss Barrett’s volumes is entitled the Drama of Exile. It was with hesitation and doubt that she decided on its publication. Respecting it, she remarks, that the subject of the drama rather fastened on her than was chosen; and the form approaching the Greek tragedy shaped itself under her hands rather by force of pleasure than design. When the excitement had subsided, she felt afraid of her position. Her subject was the new and strange experience of fallen humanity as it issued forth from Paradise to the Wilderness. The allotted grief of Eve appeared to her imperfectly apprehended, hitherto, and she deemed it more expressible by a woman than a man. She imagined there was room for lyrical emotion in those first steps into the Wilderness—in that first sense of desolation after wrath—in that first audible gathering of the recriminating groan of the whole creation—in that first darkening of the hills from the recoiling feet of angels—in that first silence of the voice of God. She had promised her own prudence to shut close the gates of Eden between Milton and herself, so that none might dare to say that she walked in his footsteps. He should be with his Adam and Eve unfallen or falling, and she without with her Exiles. It would not do, the subject, and his glory covering it, swept through the gates, and she stood full in it against her will and contrary to her vow, with hesitation and fear. She further states that she has only attempted in respect of Milton, what the Greek dramatists achieved lawfully in respect to Homer. They constructed their dramas on Trojan ground—they raised on the buskin, and clasped with the sock the feet of Homeric heroes—yet they neither imitated Homer nor emasculated him. The Agamemnon of Æschylus, who died in the bath, did no harm to, nor suffered harm from the Agamemnon of Homer, who bearded Achilles.
Homer’s subject was his own by creation, Milton’s by illustration only. The exception was favourable to her, and to this analogy she appeals. The comparison which Miss Barrett draws betwixt her own drama and that of the Greek tragedy is essentially correct. Like hers it consisted of one great simple and touching event, wrought out by the agency of a small number, and narrated in grave, measured, and stately language. The business was carried forward by the songs of the chorus, and the action was never allowed to pause. The plot was free from intricacy, and was developed by the simplest means. The interest was maintained by pathetic exclamations, pointed reflections, and an artless and unostentatious display of feeling.
The opening scene of Miss Barrett’s drama is placed on the outer side of the gates of Paradise, which are shut fast with clouds from whose depth revolves the sword of fire self-moved. A watch of innumerable angels slopes up around them to the zenith, and the glare cast from them and the sword extends far into the Wilderness. Adam and Eve are seen flying along the glare. The angel Gabriel and Lucifer are beside the gates, before which they hold “high parle.” After the dialogue of the “hierarchies” has ended, in which the Gabriel and Lucifer of Miss Barrett pale and grow dark before the sublime creations, we dare not call them “illustrations,” of Milton— a chorus of Eden spirits are heard chanting from Paradise, while Adam and Eve are still speeding toward the Wilderness. After these have ended their song, which breathes consolation to the fallen, then the spirits of the trees—the river spirits—the bird spirit, and the spirits of the flowers, take up the strain. These choral odes possess all the beauties, and many of the faults, of Miss Barrett’s school. They are more replete with fancy than with feeling. In the following consecutive stanzas the justice of our remarks will be apparent. The first is really beautiful, the last is disfigured with a vice that reminds us of Cowley:—
The yearning to a beautiful denied you
Shall strain your powers,
Ideal sweetness shall over-glide you
Resumed from ours!
In all your music our pathetic minor
Your ears shall cross,
And all far sights shall mind you of diviner
With sense of loss!
The song of the spirits of the trees will bear comparison with any of Shelley’s noblest Promethean odes.
Spirits of the trees
Hark! the Eden trees are stirring,
Slow and solemn to your hearing!
Plane and cedar, palm and fir,
Tamirisk and juniper,
Each is throbbing in vibration
Since that crowning of creation
When the God-breath spake abroad,
Pealing down the depths of Godhead,
Let us make men like to God.
And the pine stood quivering
In the Eden-gorges wooded,
As the awful word bent by;
Like a vibrant chorded string
Stretched from mountain-peak to sky
And the cypress did expand,
Slow and gradual, branch and head;
And the cedar’s strong black shade
Fluttered brokenly and grand!—
Grove and forest bowed aslant
In emotion jubilant.
Voice of the same, but softer.
Which divine impulsion cleaves
In dim movements to the leaves
Dropt and lifted, dropt and lifted
In the sunlight greenly sifted,—
In the sunlight and the moonlight
Greenly sifted through the trees
Ever wave the Eden trees
In the nightlight, and the moonlight,
With the ruffling of green branches
Shaded off to resonances;
Never stirred by rain or breeze!
Fare ye well, farewell!
The sylvan sounds, no longer audible,
Expire at Eden’s door!
Each footstep of your treading [p. 594→]
Treads out some murmur which he heard before:
Farewell! the trees of Eden
Ye shall hear nevermore.
Adam and Eve fly onward. A colossal shadow, as of the dark angel passing quickly, is cast upon the sword glare. At the extremity of the glare the fugitives pause, and the dialogue commences. Adam is represented as calm, serene, and self-resigned. The feeling most conspicuous in his character is love and tenderest affection to his “drooped” and helpless mate—the dove with soiled wings, which within the bowers of Paradise were lately resplendent with azure and gold. The converse is admirably suited to the speakers and the occasion. Adam thus gives utterance to his boundless love:—
I am deepest in the guilt
If last in the transgression.
Eve. Thou!
Adam. If God,
Who gave the right and joyaunce of the world
Both unto thee and me—gave thee to me,
The best gift last; the last sin was the worst,
Which sinned against more complement of gifts
And grace of giving. God! I render back
Strong benediction and perpetual praise
From mortal feeble lips (as incense-smoke,
Out of a little censer, may fill heaven),
That Thou, in striking my benumbed hands,
And forcing them to drop all other boons
Of beauty, and dominion, and delight—
Hast left this well-beloved Eve—this life
Within life—this best gift between their palms,
In gracious compensation!
Eve. Is it thy voice?
Or some saluting angel’s—calling home
My feet into the garden?
Adam. O my God!
I, standing here between the glory and dark—
The glory of thy wrath projected forth
From Eden’s wall; the dark of our distress,
Which settles a step off in that drear world—
Lift up to Thee the hands from whence hath fallen
Only creation’s sceptre—thanking Thee
That rather Thou hast cast me out with her,
Than left me lorn of her in paradise;—
With angel looks and angel songs around,
To show the absence of her eyes and voice,
And make society full desertness,
Without the uses of her comforting.
Lucifer again appears, and with sharp words and bitter malice reminds the fallen pair of their lost estate. The ruined angel has little of his former grandeur. He does not rise higher than a keen and wordy satirist. In Miss Barrett’s hands he falls infinitely short of his great prototype in Milton. The chained Titan on his rock of adamant, surrounded by dark and solemn shadows or radiant shapes, “thronging like golden mists uprolled on the morning wind,” is a sublime spectacle. But his indomitable will, his lofty bearing, in his quick torture and burning agony, are grander still. Shelley had the fear of Æschylus before his eyes, but is his Prometheus less in greatness by the long lapse of two thousand years? There he is in the poet’s gorgeous page, the son of Japetus still and for ever!
To add pungency to Lucifer’s rebukes, next appear the spirits of organic and inorganic nature. Adam thus describes them:—
Adam. Colossal Shapes—twin sovran images—
With a disconsolate, blank majesty
Set in their wondrous faces!—with no look,
And yet an aspect—a significance
Of individual life and passionate ends,
Which overcomes us gazing.
O bleak sound!
O shadow of sound, O phantasm of thin sound!
How it comes, wheeling as the pale moth wheels,
Wheeling and wheeling in continuous wall,
Around the cyclic zodiac; and gains force,
And gathers, settling coldly like a moth,
On the wan faces of these images
We see before us; whereby modified
It draws a straight line of articulate song
From out that spiral faintness of lament—
And, by one voice, expresses many griefs.
A vision of Christ is next introduced, who rebukes the spirits of earth, and commands them henceforth to minister to man’s happiness, as on him shall depend their spirit—life, and being. The whole conception is a bold one. We feel assured, however, that its propriety will be questioned. The following passage is full of lofty poetry:—
eternity.
Christ. Eternity stands alway fronting God;
A stern colossal image, with blind eyes,
And grand dim lips, that murmur evermore
God, God, God! while the rush of life and death,
The roar of act and thought, of evil and good—
The avalanches of the ruining worlds
Tolling down space—the new worlds’ genesis
Budding in fire—the gradual humming growth
Of the ancient atoms, and first forms of earth,
The slow procession of the swathing seas
And firmamental waters—and the noise
Of the bread, fluent strata of pure airs—
All these flow onward in the intervals
Of that reiterant, solemn sound of—God!
Which word, innumerous angels straightway lift
High on celestial altitudes of song
And choral adoration, and then drop
The burden softly; shutting the last notes
Hushed up in silver wings! I’ the noon of time,
Nathless, that mystic-lipped Eternity
Shall wax as silent-dumb as Death himself,
While a new voice beneath the spheres shall cry,
“God! why hast thou forsaken me, my God?”
And not a voice in Heaven shall answer it.
Songs of peace and consolation from a chorus of invisible angels close the scene, while Adam and Eve pursue their way far into the wilderness.
The longest among the lesser poems is entitled “A Vision of Poets,” in which the writer has endeavoured to indicate the necessary relations of genius to suffering and self-sacrifice. “She expresses her view of the mission of the poet—of the self-abnegation implied in it—of the great work involved in it—and of the obvious truth, that if knowledge is power, suffering should be acceptable as a part of knowledge.” It is, perhaps, the most remarkable poem in these volumes. The native bent of the poetess is more clearly seen in it than any other of her present efforts. From the “Vision of the Poets” we would form our estimate of the school. It has all the beauties—all the blemishes—all the originality—all the transcendentalism, and much of the Sapphic and Adonian r[h]ythm to which these writers are so greatly addicted. We cannot resist quoting a few stanzas.
a vision of poets.
The poet knew them. Faint and dim
His spirit seemed to sink in him,
Then, like a dolphin, change and swim
The current—These were poets true
Who died for Beauty, as martyrs do
For Truth—the ends being scarcely two.
God’s prophets of the Beautiful
These poets were—of iron rule,
The rugged cilix, serge of wool.
Here, Homer, with the broad suspense
Of thunderous brows, and lips intense
Of garrulous god-innocence.
There, Shakspere! on whose forehead climb
The crowns o’ the world! Oh, eyes sublime—
With tears and laughters for all time!
Here, Æschylus—the women swooned
To see so awful when he frowned
As the gods did—he standeth crowned.
Euripides, with close and mild
Scholastic lips—that could be wild,
And laugh or sob out like a child
Right in the classes. Sophocles,
With that king’s look which down the trees,
Followed the dark effigies
Of the lost Theban! Hesiod old,
Who somewhat blind, and deaf, and cold,
Cared most for gods and bulls! and bold
Electric Pindar, quick as fear,
With race-dust on his cheeks, and clear,
Slant startled eyes that seem to hear
The chariot rounding the last goal,
To hurtle past it in his soul!
And Sappho crowned with aureole
Of ebon curls on calmed brows—
O poet-woman! none forgoes
The leap, attaining the repose!
Theocritus, with glittering locks,
Dropt sideway, as betwixt the rocks
He watched the visionary flocks!
And Aristophanes! who took
The world with mirth, and laughter-struck
The hollow caves of Thought and woke
The infinite echoes hid in each.
And Virgil! shade of Mantuan beech
Did help the shade of bay to reach
And knit around his forehead high!—
For his gods wore less majesty
Than his brown bees hummed deathlessly.
Among the minor poems we have many favourites—some are exceedingly beautiful. We may especially mention “Lady Geraldine’s Courtship,” “The Rhyme of the Duchess of May,” and “Bertha in the Lane.” Tennyson has produced nothing superior to this most exquisite gem. “The Dead Pan” is a poem of a loftier cast, and is worthy of the high name (Schiller) that inspired it.
the fate of ancient oracles.
Calm, of old, the bark went onward,
When a cry more loud than wind,
Rose up, deepened, and swept sunward,
From the pilèd Dark behind:
And the sun shrank and grew pale,
Breathed against by the great will—
Pan, Pan is dead.
And the rowers from the benches
Fell—each shuddering on his face—
While departing Influences
Struck a cold back through the place:
And the shadow of the ship
Reeled along the passive deep—
Pan, Pan is dead.
And that dismal cry rose slowly,
And sank slowly through the air;
Full of spirit’s melancholy
And eternity’s despair!
And they heard the words it said—
Pan is dead—Great Pan is dead—
Pan, Pan is dead.
’Twas the hour when One in Sion
Hung for love’s sake on a cross—
When His brow was chill with dying,
And His soul was faint with loss;
When His priestly blood dropped downward,
And his kingly eyes looked throneward—
Then, Pan was dead.
By the love He stood alone in,
His sole Godhead stood complete:
And the false gods fell down moaning,
Each from off his golden seat—
All the false gods with a cry
Rendered up their deity—
Pan, Pan was dead.
Wailing wide across the islands,
They rent, vest-like, their Divine!
And a darkness and a silence
Quenched the light of every shrine:
And Dodona’s oak swang lonely
Henceforth, to the tempest only,
Pan, Pan was dead.
Pythia staggered—feeling o’er her,
Her lost god’s forsaking look!
Straight her eyeballs filmed with horror,
And her crispy fillets shook—
And her lips gasped through their foam,
For a word that did not come.
Pan, Pan was dead.
O ye vain false gods of Hellas,
Ye are silent evermore!
And I dash down this old chalice,
Whence libations ran of yore.
See! the wine crawls in the dust
Wormlike—as your glories must!
Since Pan is dead.
A writer who can produce poetry like this redeems the age in which she lives from the reproach of materialism. Her strains cannot but be hailed with pleasure by all who are able to appreciate excellence, while the candid and the discerning critic will cheerfully award her a place among the most distinguished poetesses of her day.
Reviewed:
Poems (EBB), London: Edward Moxon, 1844.
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