| Synopsis: |
Robert Browning's poems are among the most influential in the English language; his impact can be felt on poets as different as Thomas Hardy, T.S. Eliot, W.B. Yeats and Robert Lowell. Unlike his boyhood hero Shelley, Browning believed in the importance of "a need, a trust, a yearning after God". At the same time, he was profoundly engaged with the business of living: some of his poems shocked Victorian readers with their frankness and sensuality. In this short, incisive and informative book, Jonathan Keates shows how Browning mirrors the preoccupations of his own age, but is not so narrowly Victorian that he cannot transcend its prejudices and taboos. His vision of life is comprehensive and deeply compassionate. |