Elizabeth Barrett Browning Research Paper

Born in 1806 at Coxhoe Hall, Durham, England, Elizabeth Barrett Browning was an English poet. For centuries, the Barrett family, who were part Creole, had lived in Jamaica, where they owned sugar plantations and relied on slave labor. Browning’s father, Edward Barrett Moulton Barrett, chose to raise his family in England, while his making his fortune in Jamaica. Educated at home, Browning apparently had read passages from Paradise Lost and a number of Shakespeare plays, among other works. By her twelfth year, she had written her first “epic” poem, which consisted of four books . In 1826, Browning published, though anonymously, her collection An Essay on Mind and Other Poems. The end of slavery in England and mismanagement of the plantations …show more content…
He began sending Browning’s brothers and sisters to Jamaica to help with the family’s properties. She bitterly opposed slavery and did not want her siblings sent away. During this time, she wrote The Seraphim and Other Poems (1838), expressing Christian beliefs in the form of classical Greek tragedy. Due to her weakening disposition, she was forced to spend a year at the sea of Torquay accompanied by her brother Edward. He drowned later that year while sailing at Torquay, and Browning returned home emotionally broken, becoming an invalid and a recluse. She spent the next five years in her bedroom at her father’s home. She continued writing, however, and in 1844 produced a collection entitled simply …show more content…
Marylebone Parish Church, which was not far from the Barretts' house. Almost immediately the couple left for Italy, where they hoped the warmer climate might help Elizabeth to regain some of her strength. After one winter they moved to Florence, which was to remain their home until Elizabeth's death. Despite the responsibilities of marriage and motherhood—their only child, Robert Wiedemann Barrett Browning, was born in 1849.
For three years following her marriage Mrs. Browning kept the forty-four sonnets in a notebook; she did not show them to her husband until the summer of 1849. He was so impressed with their beauty that he insisted on their appearing in her forthcoming new edition of Poems (1850). In order to make it appear that the poems had no biographical significance, the Brownings selected the ambiguous title "Sonnets from the Portuguese," as if they were translations.
Elizabeth Barret-Browning is personally among my favorite poets. As with many other admirers of her work, I hold in high esteem “How Do I Love Thee, (Sonnet 43).” How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and

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