Works by modern and Victorian critics are presented together with poems from each stage of Browning's literary career.

This carefully crafted ebook: "My Last Duchess (Unabridged)" is formatted for your eReader with a functional and detailed table of contents. "My Last Duchess" is a poem, frequently anthologised as an example of the dramatic monologue. It first appeared in 1842 in Browning's Dramatic Lyrics. The poem is written in 28 rhymed couplets of iambic pentameter. The poem is set during the late Italian Renaissance. The speaker (presumably the Duke of Ferrara) is giving the emissary of the family of his prospective new wife (presumably a third or fourth since Browning could have easily written 'second' but did not do so) a tour of the artworks in his home. He draws a curtain to reveal a painting of a woman, explaining that it is a portrait of his late wife; he invites his guest to sit and look at the painting. Robert Browning (1812 - 1889) was an English poet and playwright whose mastery of dramatic verse, and in particular the dramatic monologue, made him one of the foremost Victorian poets. His poems are known for their irony, characterization, dark humor, social commentary, historical settings, and challenging vocabulary and syntax. The speakers in his poems are often musicians or painters whose work functions as a metaphor for poetry.

This carefully edited collection has been designed and formatted to the highest digital standards and adjusted for readability on all devices. Robert Browning (1812–1889) was an English poet and playwright whose mastery of the dramatic monologue made him one of the foremost Victorian poets. His poems are known for their irony, characterization, dark humour, social commentary, historical settings, and challenging vocabulary and syntax. Contents: Life and Letters of Robert Browning: Life and Letters of Robert Browning by Mrs. Sutherland Orr The Brownings: Their Life and Art Letters Life of Robert Browning by William Sharp Robert Browning by G.K. Chesterton Poetry: Bells and Pomegranates No. III: Dramatic Lyrics Bells and Pomegranates No. VII: Dramatic Romances and Lyrics Pauline: A Fragment of a Confession Sordello Asolando Men and Women Dramatis Personae The Ring and the Book Balaustion's Adventure Prince Hohenstiel-Schwangau, Saviour of Society Fifine at the Fair Red Cotton Nightcap Country Aristophanes' Apology The Inn Album Pacchiarotto, and How He Worked in Distemper La Saisiaz and the Two Poets of Croisic Dramatic Idylls Dramatic Idylls: Second Series Christmas-Eve and Easter-Day Jocoseria Ferishtah's Fancies Parleyings with Certain People of Importance in Their Day Plays: Strafford Paracelsus Bells and Pomegranates No. I: Pippa Passes Bells and Pomegranates No. II: King Victor and King Charles Bells and Pomegranates No. IV: The Return of the Druses Bells and Pomegranates No. V: A Blot in the 'scutcheon Bells and Pomegranates No. VI: Colombe's Birthday Bells and Pomegranates No. VIII: Luria and a Soul's Tragedy Herakles The Agamemnon of Aeschylus

Many of Robert Browning’s poems are concerned with different aspects of human identity. In the great dramatic monologues, such as Fra Lippo Lippi, Andrea del Sarto and My Last Duchess, the question of exactly who is speaking obviously concerns us, but to what extent do the speaker’s language and attitudes mirror those of the poet himself ? In the various poems on the theme of love and sexual relationships which Browning included in his published collections, we inevitably want to know which of these spring directly from his personal experience. Browning, however, never felt a duty to reveal himself to the reader within his poetry. Though he admired several of the Romantic writers among the poetic generation immediately preceding his own, especially Shelley and Wordsworth, he was unwilling to follow their example by relating his discourse to the concept of a dominant ego, an “I” whose personal drama of feeling and experience formed the substance of a sustained narrative. Several of his works deliberately criticise the tendency, made fashionable by the Romantics, to see a poem as offering clues to its writer’s identity and, by association, his private life. In 1874 Browning a poem, House, arguing that the reader has no right to share an author’s privacy: “For a ticket, apply to the Publisher.” No: thanking the public, I must decline. A peep through my window, if folk prefer; But, please you, no foot over threshold of mine!” In this guide, Jonathan Keates looks at the roots of Browning’s poetry, at at why he is so influential and at how, despite his determination to keep his private and poetic identities separate, some of his work is so shocking.

In this series, a contemporary poet selects and introduces a poet of the past. By their choice of poems and by the personal and critical reactions they express in their prefaces, the editors offer insights into their own work as well as providing an accessible and passionate introduction to some of the greatest poets in our literature. Robert Browning (1812-89) was largely educated in his father's vast library and spent only one term at university. In 1846 he married Elizabeth Barrett Browning, eloping to Italy until her death in 1861, when he returned to England to complete his celebrated work The Ring and the Book (1868-9). He died in Venice in 1889.