Can anyone give information on Elizabeth Barrett-Browning?

Question

I am writing a commemerative speech, can anyone possibly help me with this? timely answers insure points!
Any guide lines to commerative speaches would be awsome!
Thanks!

Answer 1

Elizabeth Barrett Moulton Barrett grew up in a slave-owning family from Jamaica, knowing she was herself part Black. She hated slavery. She married Robert Browning, whose family likewise had owned slaves on St Kitts. She used her poetry to speak out against slavery as a 'crime against humanity'.


"How do I love thee, let me count the ways." These words, penned by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, are some of the most widely-known love lyrics in Victorian English poetry.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning was born at Coxhoe Hall, Durham, England on March 6, 1806. She was the first of eleven children born to Edward and Mary Barrett. Browning was privately educated and spent much of her childhood in the country. It was a very happy childhood until Browning became seriously ill at age 15. She was virtually incapacitated as the result of a spinal injury and lung ailment.

In 1832, Browning moved with her family to Sidmouth, Devon and then several years later to London. In 1833, Browning's translation of Prometheus Bound received high praise. After moving to London, Browning began publishing her own writings. Her first collection entitled The Seraphim and Other Poems was published in 1838, and her second volume Poems, by E. Barrett Barrett was published in 1844. The second volume was also published in the United States and included an introduction by Edgar Allan Poe.

After the drowning death of her brother in the early 1840s, Browning became a virtual recluse. She did not want to meet anyone who did not belong to her close circle of friends, and she conducted most of her friendships through letters. However, in 1845, Browning received a telegram from the poet Robert Browning. The telegram read "I love your verses with all my hear, dear Miss Barrett. I do, as I say, love these books with all my heart - and I love you too." The two met several months later and fell in love. They wrote to each other daily and the letters from their courtship are a wonderful record of its progress. During this period, Browning composed her famous Sonnets from the Portuguese, which were published in 1850.

Elizabeth and Robert kept their love a secret because Browning's father was vehemently opposed to the relationship. The couple eloped on September 12, 1846 and for the next week, Browning continued to live at home so the secret would not be revealed. When Browning's father died ten years later, she had never been forgiven.

Shortly after their marriage, Elizabeth and Robert departed for Pisa, Italy and ultimately settled in Florence. In Italy, Browning regained her health and in 1849, gave birth to the couple's only child, Robert Wiedemann Barrett. The Brownings lived in Florence for the next 15 years, with occasional visits to London. Browning published several works based on Italian politics entitled Casa Guidi Windows (1851) and Poems Before Congress (1860). During this period, she also produced her most ambitious work entitled Aurora Leigh (1856). The poem is a love story that defends a woman's right to intellectual freedom.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning died on June 29, 1861 in Florence. She is chiefly remembered for her love poems, although Aurora Leigh has recently received new appreciation.

Answer 2

Elizabeth Barrett Browning (March 6, 1806 – June 29, 1861) was a member of the Barrett family and one of the most respected poets of the Victorian era.


[Biography
Elizabeth spent her youth at Hope End, near Great Malvern. While still a child she showed her gift, and her father published 50 copies of a juvenile epic, on the Battle of Marathon. She was educated at home, but owed her profound knowledge of the Greek language and much mental stimulus to her early friendship with the blind scholar, Hugh Stuart Boyd, who was a neighbor. In her early teens, Elizabeth contracted a lung complaint, possibly tuberculosis, although the exact nature has been the subject of much speculation, and was treated as a permanent invalid by her parents. For a girl of that time, she was well-educated, having been allowed to attend lessons with her brother's tutor. She published her first poem, anonymously, at the age of fourteen. In 1826 she published anonymously An Essay on Mind and Other Poems.

Shortly afterwards, the abolition of slavery, of which she was a supporter (see her work The Runaway Slave at Pilgrim's Point (1849)), considerably reduced Mr. Barrett's means. He accordingly disposed of his estate and moved with his family first to Sidmouth and afterwards to London. At the former location Miss Barrett wrote Prometheus Bound (1835). After her move to London she fell into delicate health, her lungs being threatened. This did not, however, interfere with her literary labours, and she contributed to various periodicals "The Romaunt of Margaret", "The Romaunt of the Page", "The Poet's Vow", and other pieces. In 1838 appeared The Seraphim and Other Poems (including "Cowper's Grave").

Shortly thereafter, the death of her favorite brother gave a serious shock to her already fragile health; and for a time she hovered between life and death. Eventually, however, she regained strength, and meanwhile her fame was growing. The publishing about 1841 of "The Cry of the Children" gave it a great impulse, and about the same time she contributed some critical papers in prose to Richard Henry Horne's New Spirit of the Age. In 1844 she published two volumes of Poems, which comprised "The Drama of Exile", "Vision of Poets", and "Lady Geraldine's Courtship".


Literary significance


Her most famous work is Sonnets from the Portuguese, a collection of love sonnets written by Browning but disguised as a translation. By far the most famous poem from this collection, with one of the most famous opening lines in the English language, is number 43:


Elizabeth Barrett BrowningHow do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of everyday's
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for Right;
I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints!---I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life!---and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.



The government of Italy and the Commune of Florence celebrated her poetry with commemorative plaques on Casa Guidi, where the Brownings had lived during their 15 year marriage. Lord Leighton designed her tomb in the English Cemetery, its sculpting in Carrara marble being carried out, not faithfully, by Francesco Giovannozzo. In 2006 the Comune of Florence lays a laurel wreath on this tomb to commemorate the 200 years since her birth.