Elizabeth Barrett Browning 1806-1861

Elizabeth Barrett Browning was born in County Durham the eldest of 12 children, and moved with her family to Worcestershire at an early age. Educated privately at home, she studied Latin and Greek and began to write poetry in her teens.

The family moved to London in 1838 but she fell ill and had to spend three years convalescing in Devon. Returning to London after this, she published Poems in 1844 which was received with great acclaim. This led to her receiving admiring correspondence from her future husband, Robert Browning, whom she married and with whom she secretly eloped to Italy in 1846. After their marriage she resided mostly in Florence where she gave birth to a son.

Her Sonnets from the Portuguese was privately printed in 1847 and published in 1850. This was followed by Casa Guidi Windows (1851), Aurora Leigh (1856), Poems Before Congress (1860), and Last Poems (1861). It is said that she enjoyed greater celebrity than her husband during her lifetime and in 1850 she was proposed as a successor to Wordsworth for the post of Poet Laureate.

Works include

Sonnets from the Portuguese (i)

Sonnets from the Portuguese (ii)

Sonnets from the Portuguese (iii)

Sonnets from the Portuguese (iv)

Sonnets from the Portuguese (v)

Books you might enjoy

Selected Poems (Everyman)
Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Colin Graham (Editor)