Robert Browning | |
|---|---|
 Portrait by Herbert Rose Barraud, c. 1888 | |
| Born | 7 May 1812 Camberwell, Surrey, England |
| Died | 12 December 1889 (aged 77) Venice, Italy |
| Resting place | Westminster Abbey |
| Occupation | Poet |
| Alma mater | University College London |
| Literary movement | Victorian |
| Notable works | |
| Spouse | |
| Children | Robert Barrett ("Pen")[1] |
| Signature | |
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Robert Browning (7 May 1812 – 12 December 1889) was an English poet and playwright whose dramatic monologues put him high among the Victorian poets. He was noted for irony, characterization, dark humour, social commentary, historical settings and challenging vocabulary and syntax.
His early long poems Pauline (1833) and Paracelsus (1835) were acclaimed, but his reputation dwindled for a time – his 1840 poem Sordello was seen as wilfully obscure – and took over a decade to recover, by which time he had moved from Shelleyan forms to a more personal style. In 1846, he married fellow poet Elizabeth Barrett and moved to Italy. By her death in 1861, he had published the collection Men and Women (1855). His Dramatis Personae (1864) and book-length epic poem The Ring and the Book (1868–1869) made him a leading poet. By his death in 1889, he was seen as a sage and philosopher-poet who had fed into Victorian social and political discourse. Societies for studying his work survived in Britain and the US into the 20th century.
- ^ "Robert Wiedeman Barrett (Pen) Browning (1849–1912)". Armstrong Browning Library and Museum, Baylor University. Retrieved 29 May 2018.