R551118A. Men and Women.
The Observer, 18 November 1855, p. 7.
As reprinted in The Brownings’ Correspondence, 22, 298.
Robert Browning, a name honourably known in poetic art, has published in these two volumes a series of lyrical poems, intended to illustrate the various conditions of the soul, intellectual and sensuous. There is more, however, of the latter than of the former, and therefore it is that the series is in its character rather erotic than pathetic—in other words, the material predominates the moral. Nevertheless the high tone of the poet’s mind, the keen perception he manifests for the beautiful, the mastery he displays over his matter, and the general truth that pervades his productions, place these lyrics in a very high position as works of poetic art. Among the foremost of them—certainly the foremost for pathos and for perfection of form—is “Evelyn Hope.”
Beautiful Evelyn Hope is dead,
Sit and watch by her side an hour.
That is her book-shelf, this is her bed;
She plucked that piece of geranium flower
Beginning to die, too, in the glass.
Next to this in point of interest is “Fra Lippo Lippi,” in which the biography of the illustrious painter of that name is told in blank verse in a singularly pleasing manner. The artist is the narrator, the frame work supplied by the poet being the fact stated by Vasari, that the monk, while painting for Cosmo de Medici in Florence, went out at nights among the wantons who then frequented the Lung d’Arno, as they do even now, and was often caught tripping by the city watch.
Various subjects besides these are, however, put into the poetical crucible, and come out “refined gold;” such, for example, as an Italian squire’s desire to live in the city, rather than “up in the country,” because of the life he could see from the windows in the square; such as mesmérism; such as Master Hugues of Saxe-Gotha; or such as Bishop Blougram’s apology, in which a picture is presented, whether true or false in its lineaments may not be pronounced, of Cardinal Wiseman, with scarcely the colourable pretext of change of name to conceal the intended impersonation. “Andrea del Sarto, the painter;” “Saul, the first Jewish King,” when kings were avowedly given as a curse to the Jewish people; and a number of other poems on several topics—namely, “Old Pictures in Florence;” “The Balcony,” a dramatic scene, in three parts. “Women and Roses;” “Holy Cross Day;” “The Guardian Angel;” “The Heretic’s Tragedy,” a middle interlude, referring to the persecution of the Templars and the destruction of that once powerful order; “A Grammarian’s Funeral,” full of quod libets; “One Way to Love;” “One Word More;” &c. &c., form the sequel of the collection.
These little volumes will in nowise detract from the well-won fame of the author of Bells and Pomegranates, and Pippa Passes; and they will be certain to obtain that which their undoubted merit fully entitles them to—a large share of favour at the hands of the enlightened and cultivated portion of the public.
Reviewed:
Men and Women (RB), London: Chapman & Hall, 1855.
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