Selections From The Poems And Plays Of Robert Browning Part 48

35. _Then a humor_, etc. The tyrant goes through various changes of mood in his att.i.tude toward his enemy. In lines 35-43 he feels a moment of contemptuous compunction at the man's suffering, and recognizes the absurdity of a contest between a great king and a person as insignificant as a tricksy elf, a toad, or a rat. But in line 44 his mood turns. He perceives that the burden (_gravamen_) of the whole matter lies in the incredibly petty nature of this unconquerable, baffling opposition to his will. He sees how the situation would awaken the wonder of the great lords who abjectly obey his lightest word, but he concludes that, after all, the small becomes great if it vexes you.

53. _I soberly_, etc. Even the tyrant sees a kind of grotesque humor as he narrates first the elaborate plans to entrap and crush so seemingly powerless a foe, and then the striking reversal of position when the man proves to have G.o.d on his side, and the tyrant becomes the one to cower in fear.

THE ITALIAN IN ENGLAND

At the Congress of Vienna, in 1815, Lombardy and Venetia were a.s.signed to Austria. Most of the inhabitants submitted to the foreign rule, but there were always small bands of patriots who stirred up revolutions against Austria. The chief revolution was that led by Mazzini in 1848, and when he was in exile he read this poem with much appreciation. In _Pippa Pa.s.ses_ (1840), in the story of Luigi and the Austrian police, Browning had already given a picture based on Italy's struggle for freedom. In 1844 he visited Italy and then wrote "The Italian in England," which appeared in 1845. This poem does not represent a definite historic incident, but such a one as might have occurred in the life of some Italian patriot. For a similar feeling towards Italian independence see Mrs. Browning's _Casa Guidi Windows_ (written 1848-1851). For earlier poems see Byron's "Ode" beginning "O Venice, Venice, when thy marble walls," Sh.e.l.ley's "Lines Written Among the Euganean Hills," and the following sonnet by Wordsworth:

"Once did She hold the gorgeous east in fee; And was the safeguard of the west: the worth Of Venice did not fall below her birth, Venice, the eldest Child of Liberty.

She was a maiden City, bright and free; No guile seduced, no force could violate; And, when she took unto herself a Mate, She must espouse the everlasting Sea.

And what if she had seen those glories fade, Those t.i.tles vanish, and that strength decay; Yet shall some tribute of regret be paid When her long life hath reached its final day: Men are we, and must grieve when even the Shade Of that which once was great, is pa.s.sed away."

8. _Charles._ Carlo Alberto, King of Sardinia. He had used severe measures against "Young Italy," the party founded by Mazzini.

19. _Metternich._ A noted Austrian diplomat and one of the most powerful enemies of Italian freedom.

75. _Duomo._ The most famous church in Padua.

78. _Tenebrae._ _Darkness._ A religious service commemorative of the crucifixion. Fifteen lighted candles are put out one at a time, symbolizing the growing darkness of the world up to the time of the crucifixion.

"ROUND US THE WILD CREATURES"

The first interlude in _Ferishtah's Fancies_. These interludes are love lyrics which follow the separate Fables and Fancies of the Persian Dervish Ferishtah, and state in terms of the affections the truth embodied in didactic or philosophical fas.h.i.+on in the fables. In the first fable, "The Eagle," the Dervish observes an eagle feeding some deserted ravens. His first inference is that men will be cared for as the ravens, without effort of their own; later he sees that men should be as eagles and provide for the weak. The Dervish at once seeks the largest sphere of human usefulness with the words

"And since men congregate In towns, not woods--to Ispahan forthwith!"

The lyric protests against the temptation to self-centered seclusion on the part of those who are entirely satisfied in each other's love.

PROLOGUE TO ASOLANDO

The volume of poems ent.i.tled _Asolando_ was, by a strange chance, published on the day of Browning's death. Most of these poems were written in 1888-1889. The book was dedicated to Mrs. Arthur Bronson. The "Prologue" should be compared with Wordsworth's "Ode on Intimations of Immortality."

13. _Chrysopras._ The ruby and the emerald of this pa.s.sage stand for rich red and green. The chrysopras is also green (an apple green variety of Chalcedony), but the first part of the word is from the Greek [Greek: chrysos], "gold," and that may be the color intended here.

SUMMUM BONUM

The t.i.tle means, The Chief Good. The poem came out in _Asolando_ in 1889.

EPILOGUE TO ASOLANDO

In the _Pall Mall Gazette_, Feb. 1, 1890 the following incident is given concerning the third stanza of this poem:

"One evening just before his death illness, the poet was reading this from a proof to his daughter-in-law and sister. He said: 'It almost looks like bragging to say this, and as if I ought to cancel it; but it's the simple truth; and as it's true, it shall stand.'"

Compare this poem and Tennyson's "Crossing the Bar."

PIPPA Pa.s.sES

Mrs. Sutherland Orr writes that while Browning was one day strolling through Dulwich Wood "the image flashed upon him of someone walking ...

alone through life; one apparently too obscure to leave a trace of his or her pa.s.sage, yet exercising a lasting though unconscious influence at every step of it; and the image shaped itself into the little silk-winder of Asolo, Felippa, or Pippa."

INTRODUCTION

_Asolo in the Trevisan._ Asolo, a fortified medieval town at the foot of a hill surmounted by the ruins of a castle, and situated in the center of the silk-growing and silk-spinning industries, is in the province of Treviso about thirty-three miles northwest of Venice.

62. _Monsignor._ A t.i.tle conferred upon prelates in the Roman Catholic church. This Monsignor is the chief personage in Part III, or _Night_.

88. _Martagon._ A kind of lily with light purplish flowers. The common name is Turk's Cap. Perhaps that suggested to Browning his comparison to the round bunch of flesh on the head of a Turk bird, or turkey.

131. _Possagno church._ Designed by Canova, who was born at Possagno, an obscure village near Asolo.

181. _The Dome._ The Duomo, or Cathedral, in the center of the town. The palace of the Bishop's brother is close by.

MORNING

28. _St. Mark's._ There is an extensive view from Asolo. Venice, with its cupolas and steeples, is seen to the east. Ottima detects the belfry of the Church of St. Mark. The towns of Vicenza and Padua are also discernible.

59. _The Capuchin._ A branch of the Franciscan order of monks. Their habit is brown.

170. _Campanula chalice._ The flower of any one of a large genus of flowers with bell-shaped corollas.

INTERLUDE I

27. _El canibus nostris._ Virgil, _Eclogues_ iii, 67. "_Notior ut jam sit canibus non Delia nostris_"--"So that now not Delia's self is more familiar to our dogs." The boy Giovacchino of whose poetry they are making fun evidently had ideals not in harmony with the ways of these Venetian art students. These "dissolute, brutalized, heartless bunglers," as Jules calls them, attack with quick, clever, merciless tongues whatever savors of idealism, aspiration, purity. Their revenge for the scornful superiority manifested towards them by Jules is to secure, by a well-managed trick, a marriage between him and a paid model.

86. _Canova's gallery._ Possagno was the birthplace of the sculptor Canova, and the circular church there was designed by him. In the gallery at Possagno is his Psyche (_Psiche-fanciulla_, or Psyche the young girl); his Pieta (the mother with the dead Christ in her arms) is in the church.

111. _Malamocco._ A little town on an island near Venice.

111. _Alciphron._ A Greek writer (about 200 A. D.) of fict.i.tious letters famous for the purity of their style and for the knowledge they give of Greek social customs.

115. _Lire._ Plural of lira, an Italian coin equal to 18.6 cents in our money.

117. _A scented letter._ Forged letters have represented this fourteen year old, ignorant model as delicate, shy, reserved, intellectually alert, with lofty poetic and artistic ideals.

117. _Tydeus._ One of the Seven Allies in the enterprise against Thebes.

Jules is supposed to have modeled a statue of him for the Venetian Academy of Fine Arts. From Scene II, 14, we see that it is still in clay.

120. _Paolina._ Some actress at the Phenix, the leading theater of Venice.

140. _Hannibal Scratchy._ In jest they burlesque the name of Annibale Caracci, a famous Italian artist, and apply it to one of their number.

NOON