Brownings Heroines | Page 3

265
VIII. Beside the Drawing-board 268
IX. On Deck 271
PART V
TROUBLE OF LOVE: THE MAN'S
I. THE WOMAN UNWON 277
II. THE WOMAN WON 304
PART I
[Illustration: GIRLHOOD]
BROWNING'S HEROINES
INTRODUCTORY
Browning's power of embodying in rhythm the full beauty of girlhood is unequalled by any other English poet. Heine alone is his peer in this; but even Heine's imagination dwelt more fondly on the abstract pathos and purity of a maiden than on her individual gaiety and courage. In older women, also, these latter qualities were the spells for Browning; and, with him, a girl sets forth early on her brave career. That is the just adjective. His girls are as brave as the young knights of other poets; and in this appreciation of a dauntless gesture in women we see one of the reasons why he may be called the first "feminist" poet since Shakespeare. To me, indeed, even Shakespeare's maidens have less of the peculiar iridescence of their state than Browning's have, and I think this is because, already in the modern poet's day, girlhood was beginning to be seen as it had never been seen before--that is, as a "thing-by-itself." People had perceived--dimly enough, but with eyes which have since grown clearer-sighted--that there is a stage in woman's development which ought to be her very own to enjoy, as a man enjoys _his_ adolescence. This dawning sense is explicit in the earlier verses of one of Browning's most original utterances, _Evelyn Hope_, which is the call of a man, many years older, to the mysterious soul of a dead young girl--
"Sixteen years old when she died!?Perhaps she had hardly heard my name;?It was not her time to love; beside,?Her life had many a hope and aim,?Duties enough and little cares,?And now was quiet, now astir . . ."
Here recognition of the girl's individuality is complete. Not a word in the stanza hints at Evelyn's possible love for another man. "It was not her time"; there were quite different joys in life for her. . . . Such a view is even still something of a novelty, and Browning was the first to express it thus whole-heartedly. There had been, of course, from all time the hymning of maiden purity and innocence, but beneath such celebrations had lurked that predatory instinct which a still more modern poet has epitomised in a haunting and ambiguous phrase--
"For each man kills the thing he loves."
Thus, even in Shakespeare, the Girl is not so much that transient, exquisite thing as she is the Woman-in-love; thus, even for Rosalind, there waits the Emersonian _précis_--
"Whither went the lovely hoyden??Disappeared in blessèd wife;?Servant to a wooden cradle,?Living in a baby's life."
I confess that this tabloid "story of a woman" has, ever since my first discovery of it, been a source of anger to me; and I do not think that such resentment should be reckoned as a manifestation of modern decadence. The hustling out of sight of that "lovely hoyden" is unworthy of a poet; poet's eyes should rest longer upon beauty so?irrecoverable--for though the wife and mother be the happiest that ever was, she can never be a girl again.
In the same way, to me the earliest verses of _Evelyn Hope_ are the loveliest. As I read on, doubts and questions gather fast--
"But the time will come--at last it will,?When, Evelyn Hope, what meant (I shall say)?In the lower earth, in the years long still,?That body and soul so pure and gay??Why your hair was amber, I shall divine,?And your mouth of your own geranium's red--?And what you would do with me, in fine,?In the new life come in the old one's stead.
I have lived (I shall say) so much since then,?Given up myself so many times,?Gained me the gains of various men,?Ransacked the ages, spoiled the climes;?Yet one thing, one, in my soul's full scope,?Either I missed, or itself missed me:?And I want and find you, Evelyn Hope!?What is the issue? let us see!
I loved you, Evelyn, all the while.?My heart seemed full as it could hold??There was place and to spare for the frank young smile, And the red young mouth, and the hair's young gold.?So, hush--I will give you this leaf to keep:?See, I shut it inside the sweet cold hand!?There, that is our secret: go to sleep!?You will wake, and remember, and understand."

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