Robert Browning was born on 7 May 1812 at Southampton Cottage, Camberwell, then a semi-rural district south of London, and died on 12 December 1889 in Venice. Few English poets have combined such audacity of intellect, dramatic energy, moral curiosity, and technical resourcefulness. During his lifetime he moved from the position of a puzzling, frequently mocked young writer to that of a revered elder of Victorian let…
“You speak out, you,—I only make men and women speak—give you truth broken into prismatic hues, and fear the pure white light, even if it is in me.”
Neighbourhood:
Dramatic Poets, Love Poets, Pre-Raphaelite Poets, Victorian Poets
Emotional landscape: Tenderness, Longing, Wonder
Algernon Charles Swinburne was born on 5 April 1837 at 7 Chester Street, Grosvenor Place, London, into a family whose rank, traditions, and geography would all enter his imagination. He was the eldest surviving child of Captain, later Admiral, Charles Henry Swinburne and Lady Jane Henrietta Ashburnham, daughter of the third Earl of Ashburnham. His inheritance was aristocratic, military, and literary. The Swinburnes p…
“A child with any ear or eye for the attraction of verse or art can dispense with analysis and rest content to apprehend it without comprehension; it were to be wished that adults equally incapable would rest equally content.”
Neighbourhood:
Decadent Poets, Dramatic Poets, Political Poets, Pre-Raphaelite Poets, Victorian Poets
Emotional landscape: Longing, Sorrow, Despair
