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In: Poetry·Plays/Films/Dramas·British Literature
Public-domain ebook sourced from Project Gutenberg #50954.
The Cambridge Edition presents the complete poetic and dramatic output of Robert Browning in a single, carefully condensed volume. Its front matter explains that the work derives from the 1887 Riverside Edition, later aligned with the author’s own revisions, and that the editors have retained the chronological order of the original ten‑volume set while adding a biographical sketch, brief head‑notes drawn from George Willis Cooke’s guide, and a modest appendix of explanatory material, indexes, and a chronological list of Browning’s writings. The opening pages list the contents in exhaustive detail, from early fragments such as “Pauline” and the sonnet “Eyes, Calm Beside Thee” through the full range of his dramas, lyrical poems, and prose pieces, showing the breadth of his 19th‑century English poetry and drama.
Browning’s voice is unmistakably Victorian, marked by dense, allusive diction and a dramatic intensity that often folds interior monologue into verse. His poetry and plays reflect the intellectual vigor of the mid‑to‑late 1800s, blending classical references with contemporary concerns. Readers who relish intricate language, historical literary context, and the psychological depth of a poet who was both a meticulous scholar and a vivid storyteller will find this collection rewarding.
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The Riverside Edition of the Poetic and Dramatic Works of Robert Browning was published first in 1887. It included all the writings which the American publishers had from time to time brought out by arrangement with Mr. Browning or his representatives. A year later the English publishers issued a new and revised edition, whereupon the Riverside Edition was carefully compared with the author's latest revision and made to agree with it. There had grown up, moreover, about the writings a considerable body of comment and interpretation, and to facilitate the study and enjoyment of the poems, the American publishers engaged Mr. George Willis Cooke to prepare a Guide-Book which served as a very desirable accompaniment to the Riverside Edition of the works. They added also to the series, by arrangement with the English publishers, the authorized Life of the poet by Mrs. Sutherland Orr.
The ten volumes thus brought together furnish a complete Browning collection, but it has long been apparent that students and lovers of Browning would find it very convenient to have the complete works of their author in a single portable volume, and the plan of the Cambridge Edition so successfully applied to the poems of Longfellow and Whittier was adopted for this purpose. By a careful study of condensation with every regard for legibility it has been found possible to bring the entire body of Browning's work into a single volume, and to equip the edition with the requisite apparatus. The order of arrangement is chronological, with one or two obvious divergences. As in the other volumes of the Cambridge Edition, a biographical sketch introduces the work, brief head-notes chiefly pertaining to the origin of the respective poems have been supplied, drawn largely from Mr. Cooke's admirable volume, and a small body of pertinent notes of an explanatory character added, though the reader will readily see that the exigencies of the volume have compelled the editor to be very frugal in this respect. The appendix also contains the one notable piece of Browning's prose, a chronological list of his writings, and indexes of titles and first lines.
BOSTON, 4 PARK STREET, August 1, 1895.
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