3 Review(s)

This book was written at the request of members of the Browning Society, and was intended to be a primer of the works of Browning. Mrs. Orr describes the nature of Browning's genius—If we were called upon to describe Mr. Browning's poetic genius in one phrase, we should say it consisted of an almost unlimited power of imagination exerted upon real things; but we should have to explain that with Mr. Browning the real includes everything which a human being can think or feel, and that he is realistic only in the sense of being never visionary; he never deals with those vague and incoherent fancies, so attractive to some minds, which we speak of as coming only from the poet's brain. He imagines vividly because he observes keenly and also feels strongly; and this vividness of his nature puts him in equal sympathy with the real and the ideal—with the seen and the unseen. The one is as living to him as the other.