Browning, Robert, 1812-1889; Poets, English -- 19th century -- Biography
It was in the autumn following his wife's death that he wrote
the noble poem to which allusion has already been made: "Prospice".
Who does not thrill to its close, when all of gloom or terror
"Shall change, shall become first a peace out of pain,
Then a light, then thy breast,
O thou soul of my soul! I shall clasp thee again,
And with God be the rest."
There are few direct allusions to his wife in Browning's poems.
Of those prior to her death the most beautiful is "One Word More",
which has been already quoted in part: of the two or three
subsequent to that event none surpasses the magic close
of the first part of "The Ring and the Book".
Thereafter the details of his life are public property.
He all along lived in the light, partly from his possession of that serenity
which made Goethe glad to be alive and to be able to make others
share in that gladness. No poet has been more revered and more loved.
His personality will long be a stirring tradition. In the presence
of his simple manliness and wealth of all generous qualities
one is inclined to pass by as valueless, as the mere flying spray
of the welcome shower, the many honours and gratifications that befell him.
Even if these things mattered, concerning one by whose genius
we are fascinated, while undazzled by the mere accidents pertinent thereto,
their recital would be wearisome -- of how he was asked
to be Lord Rector of this University, or made a doctor of laws at that:
of how letters and tributes of all kinds came to him from every district
in our Empire, from every country in the world: and so forth.
All these things are implied in the circumstance that his life was throughout
"a noble music with a golden ending."
In 1866 his father died in Paris, strenuous in life until the very end.
After this event Miss Sarianna Browning went to reside with her brother,
and from that time onward was his inseparable companion,
and ever one of the dearest and most helpful of friends.
In latter years brother and sister were constantly seen together,
and so regular attendants were they at such functions as the "Private Views"
at the Royal Academy and Grosvenor Gallery, that these never seemed complete
without them. A Private View, a first appearance of Joachim or Sarasate,
a first concert of Richter or Henschel or Halle, at each of these,
almost to a certainty, the poet was sure to appear.
The chief personal happiness of his later life was in his son.
Mr. R. Barrett Browning is so well known as a painter and sculptor
that it would be superfluous for me to add anything further here,
except to state that his successes were his father's keenest pleasures.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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