Elizabeth Barrett Browning (redirected from Elizabeth Barrett)

Browning, Elizabeth Barrett 

(Moulton Barrett). Born Mar. 6, 1806, in Durham; died June 30, 1861, in Florence. English poet. Daughter of a West Indian planter and wife of the poet R. Browning.

Browning’s first work was the narrative poem The Battle of Marathon (1820). A collection of poems (vols. 1-2) was published in 1844; it included the poem, “The Cry of the Children,” which was translated into Russian several times and served as the basis for the work by N. A. Nekrasov of the same name. The theme of the poem is the backbreaking labor of children in capitalist factories. A subtle artist in the use of intimate lyrics, Browning also wrote poems with social themes, such as the poems Casa Guidi Windows (1851) and “Songs to the Congress” (1860), in which impressions of the Italian revolution of 1848 are reflected. Her novel in verse, Aurora Leigh (1857), was devoted to the theme of women’s equality.

WORKS

Complete Poetical Works, vols. 1-2. New York, 1919.
The Letters, vols. 1-2. Edited by F. G. Kenyon. [London], 1897.

REFERENCES

Iakovlev, N. “Nekrasov i Barret Brauning (’Plach detei’).” Kniga i revoliutsiia, 1921, no. 2.
Taplin, G. B. The Life of Elizabeth Barrett Browning. New Haven, 1957.