Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Shakespeare: 'This Is Living Art'

Description

For most of the twentieth century the exuberantfluency of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's art was not regarded as worthy ofserious attention. Even the evidence for the swiftness of her wit, thought andcomposition remains more impressionistic and anecdotal than firmly proven.Through close attention to original manuscript material, Josie Billingtonargues that Barrett Browning's fast, fine and excitedly vigorous and agileimaginative intelligence is Shakespearean, both in its power, and in thecreative drive and dynamic to which it gives rise.Billington contends that for Barrett Browning, asfor Shakespeare, writing was demonstrably a creative event not a second-orderrecord of experience, and that Barrett Browning's characteristic habits ofcomposition, and her creative procedure, resemble in significant ways those ofthe poet she valued most highly. A fascinating study of both writers' analogouscreative dispositions, minds and modes." IrregularCaps1unique0 IrregularCaps2unique0 IrregularCaps17unique0 IrregularCaps22unique0 IrregularCaps22unique1 IrregularCaps4unique0 IrregularCaps7unique0 IrregularCaps14unique0 IrregularCaps5unique0 IrregularCaps3unique0 IrregularCaps21unique0 IrregularCaps19unique1 IrregularCaps9unique0 IrregularCaps7unique1 IrregularCaps6unique0 IrregularCaps8unique0 IrregularCaps16unique0 IrregularCaps9unique1 IrregularCaps10unique0 IrregularCaps11unique0 IrregularCaps11unique1 IrregularCaps12unique0 IrregularCaps11unique2 IrregularCaps11unique3 IrregularCaps11unique4 IrregularCaps22unique2 IrregularCaps16unique6 IrregularCaps16unique1 IrregularCaps16unique2 IrregularCaps8unique1 IrregularCaps8unique2 IrregularCaps8unique3 IrregularCaps8unique4 IrregularCaps8unique5 IrregularCaps8unique10 IrregularCaps13unique0 IrregularCaps15unique0 IrregularCaps15unique1 IrregularCaps16unique3 IrregularCaps17unique1 IrregularCaps18unique0 IrregularCaps17unique2 IrregularCaps8unique6 IrregularCaps8unique7 IrregularCaps17unique3 IrregularCaps19unique0 IrregularCaps1unique1 IrregularCaps16unique4 IrregularCaps6unique1 IrregularCaps8unique11 IrregularCaps16unique5 IrregularCaps8unique8 IrregularCaps8unique9 IrregularCaps19unique2 IrregularCaps8unique12 IrregularCaps8unique13 IrregularCaps15unique2 IrregularCaps20unique0 Hyphenation1unique1 Hyphenation2unique1 Table of Contents Abbreviations Acknowledgements Introduction Chapter 1 The Poet at Work Transitions, Blanks and In-Betweens Discipline and Improvisation The Sonnet Chapter 2 Sonnets from the Portuguese (1850) A Drama of Becoming A New Tradition? A Place to Stand and Love In Chapter 3 Aurora Leigh The Blank Verse Adventure Great Freedom within Great Order ‘This is Living Art’ ‘Pauses Frequent to Brokenness’ Aurora and Hamlet16 Aurora Leigh as a ‘Problem Play’ Conclusion Bibliography Index