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Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Great English Poetess
by Anna Shirey
 Elizabeth Barrett Browning is perhaps best known for the love story between herself and poet Robert Browning which she conveys in Sonnets from the Portuguese. Her Sonnets from the Portuguese have become so widely known and quoted that today many overlook the fact that she was revolutionary. Until her work was reviewed by feminist critics in the late 20th century, Portuguese was the pillar of Brownings fame. However, Browning accomplished much more than the happily-ended Portuguese would indicate. From the forms of poetry she explored to the content of her writing, Barrett Browning was not hindered by the social dictates of her society for women. She redefined the boundaries of a female Victorian poet.
She challenged the long tradition in which it was accepted that poetry was better left to men. Barrett Browning wrote sonnet sequence, poetic essay, verse essay and the epic. Though in her early poems she imitated English Neo-classic poets, her style became innovative; she experimented with variations of the accepted metre and rhyme.
She not only tackled a wide variety of writing styles, but she also took on both social and political causes. Barrett Brownings feminist ideals are unmistakable in poems such as Aurora Leigh, A Drama of Exile and the brazen Lord Walters Wife. She was not afraid to take on the abolitionist cause in The Runaway Slave at Pilgrims Point and A Curse For a Nation. Her sympathetic political views concerning the Italian struggle for freedom are expressed in the poems Casa Guidi Windows and Poems Before Congress.
Did Elizabeth Barrett Browning try to find a place in the poetic field for women or did she create one? Either way she profoundly changed the rules of poetry and womens place in the poetic realm. If your interest in Barrett Brownings poetry has been limited to Sonnets from the Portuguese I challenge you to seek out her other works.
Anna Shirey is the Dusty Shelf publisher.
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