R551116A. Men and Women.
The Globe and Traveller, 16 November 1855, p. 1.
As reprinted in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 22, 292–293.
It has long ago been decided by competent authorities that Mr. Browning is a poet. It has also been agreed by them that he never will be a popular poet—at least, never in his own day and generation. These two new volumes of his will go to confirm these opinions. It will be difficult to characterise them accurately, but we must try to do so.
“Men and Women” is a collection of fifty-one poems of various lengths, and of very various subjects and modes of treatment. Some of them will be perfectly repugnant to ordinary lovers of fine poetry. Everything about them repels—the subject, the treatment, and last but not least, the metre. Only one who remembers that Robert Browning wrote “Paracelsus” and “The Blot on the Scutcheon,” and therefore that he cannot be put aside as a trifler—a mauvais plaisant—can see anything good in productions like “Holy Cross Day,”—“In a Year,”—“How it Strikes a Contemporary,” and others among these fifty poems. There is evidence of careful finish and conscientious labour, as well as of the true rich poetic substance in them. But in several cases, besides those above cited, we are sorry to say that the author has laboured for the poetry that perisheth. It is of the distorted, unnatural kind—which is not beautiful, but ugly—which, therefore, is not poetry at all, as we believe. Our creed in regard to works of art is, that before all things they must be beautiful. Throughout these poems we see, however (as was evident in Robert Browning’s earlier poems), that he is a poet of rare—we had well nigh said of a singular nature. He is sensuous, passionate, earnest, and wilful, but at the same time he is a subtle thinker and a bitter satirist. He is inclined to metaphysics, yet gives their full value to the senses and to matters of fact. He loves music;—to judge from his writings he is even somewhat of a musician; yet the greater part of his poetry—even the lyrical pieces—want the magical charm of sweet singing. His poetry is not song in the sense in which Coleridge’s was. Yet granting all Browning’s defects—want of melody—wilful mannerism—an apparent desire to startle his readers by paradox and verbal eccentricity—and a habit of making his meaning implicit not explicit—so that many verses and whole poems you read like enigmas and have to find out their meaning—in spite of these faults there are qualities in Browning’s works which are rarely to be met with in poetry. A lofty and courageous spirit—prompt and daring in the cause of the noblest and purest virtue—a keen, sharp, direct, eagle-eyed intellect, and a strange subtilty—a serpentine winding into the heart and centre of a subject. As a thinker he is more original than many far better poets. In matters of feeling, too—in love especially, he is unlike other poets. There is a deeper glow of passion—a bolder, freer expression in his erotic poetry than in most modern compositions of that kind. He is wild, fantastic, yet deeply earnest—strongly sensuous, and yet tinged with a lofty spiritualism. His tenderness of passion never found better expression than in the following passage, taken from the concluding poem of the present work, called—“One word more.” It is addressed to his wife:—
God be thanked, the meanest of his creatures
Boasts two soul-sides, one to face the world with,
One to show a woman when he loves her.
. . . . . . . .
This I say of me, but think of you, love;
It is to you—yourself, my Moon of Poets;
Ah, but that’s the world’s side—there’s the wonder.
Thus they see you, praise you, think they know you,
Here in turn I stand with them and praise you
Out of my own self I dare to phrase it;
But the best is when I glide from out them,
Cross a step or two of dubious twilight,
Come out on the other side the novel,
Silent silver lights and darks undreamed of,
Where I hush and bless myself with silence.
Oh, their Rafael of the dear Madonnas!
Oh, their Dante of the dread Inferno!
Wrote one song—and in my brain I sing it;
Drew one angel—borne, see, on my bosom.
One of the longest of the poems is a dramatic fragment, called “In a Balcony.” It is full of strong true passion, very finely expressed. The part of the Queen in it is sadly and wonderfully true to nature. It thrills the reader with its vitality. Another long poem is a singular piece of satirical, logical, philosophising about the sort of life a sceptical man ought to lead. The moral being, that each man should try to do the best he can for himself and the world with the qualities he possesses. As to religious want of faith, the Bishop says to his companion—a man who rests on his unbelief:—
And now what are we? Unbelievers both,
Calm and complete determinately fixed
To-day, to-morrow, and for ever, pray;
You’ll guarantee me that? not so I think
In no wise; all we’ve gained is, that belief,
As unbelief before, shakes us by fits,
Confounds us like its predecessor. Where’s
The gain? how can we guard our unbelief—
Make it bear fruit to us?—the problem here.
Just when we are safest; there’s a sunset-touch
A fancy from a flower-bell, some one’s death,
A chorus-ending from Euripides—
And that’s enough for fifty hopes and fears
As old and new at once as nature’s self,
To rap and knock and enter in our soul,
Take hands and dance there, a fantastic ring,
Round the ancient idol, on his base again,—
The grand perhaps; we look on helplessly,—
There the old misgivings, crooked questions are
This good God,—what he could do, if he would,
Would, if he could—then must have done long since.
If so, when, where, and how? some way must be—
Once feel about, and soon or late you hit
Some sense, in which it might be, after all
Why not? The way the truth the Life.
“The Statue and the Bust” is a beautiful poem on a tale so turned as to illustrate the weakness of “letting I dare not wait upon I would.” “Andrea del Sarto” is touching and eloquent—full of fire and poetic beauty. One of the grandest poems here is “Saul,” a portion of which we remember in the “Bells and Pomegranates.” The dark splendour of this oriental conception of the King of Israel in his hour of trouble is perfectly sublime. “Cleon” is a noble philosophic poem, and “Fra Lippo Lippi” is a fine broad piece of satire. The shorter poems are nearly all remarkable—we mark them for strong approval—or for the reverse. It is noteworthy that the spirit of our age speaks in these volumes quite as distinctly as in Tennyson’s “Maud,” though not so loudly or in the same key. On the whole, we close these volumes for to-day with a feeling that they will bear frequent and minute inspection, and that perhaps we may see reason hereafter to admire them more than we do. We are disappointed, having prepared ourselves for a grand masterly display of his poetic maturity from Robert Browning—so evident that it should be recognised immediately. Still we are very thankful for these volumes.
Reviewed:
Men and Women (RB), London: Chapman & Hall, 1855.
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