By Jill Phillips, Armstrong Browning Library and Digitization and Digital Collection Preservation Services Summer Intern

Jill Phillips at the Armstrong Browning Library

My name is Jill Phillips, and I am senior at Baylor University studying Classics and Museum Studies. Over the past several weeks of this summer I have had the pleasure to serve as the Armstrong Browning Library’s summer intern. It has been such a fun and unique experience, and I would recommend to anyone looking for an internship to apply for a Baylor Libraries summer internship. Over the course of the internship, I am expected to help out the ABL’s staff with the creation of metadata, digitization, and creation of a temporary exhibit of my own design and curation, from several of their more recent acquisitions. Overall, my experience has been a wildly positive one, from being able to expand my experience with metadata creation, to working on a unique piece of technology, to being able to curate my own exhibit while still a student.

Working at both the Armstrong Browning Library and the Riley Digitization Center has been such a unique and fun experience that has undoubtedly added to my wonderful education that I have been receiving here at Baylor. This internship has provided me with many opportunities to grow and experience working in an active field that will help me as I near graduation in December. Part of my internship parameters was to set goals within my intern experience, and work with faculty members to grow and meet these goals. Some of the goals that I personally set for myself were to grow in my skills working with metadata and online collections, as well as learn more about the process of curating an exhibit. All of which I have been given the chance to do.

Walking into the ABL is such an amazing moment—the building itself from the outside is just phenomenal to look at—the metallic doors glinting in the early Texas sun is a sight to behold—and one that is nearly impossible to explain to its fullest extent. The library and museum are gorgeous, both outside and in, and you can tell that Dr. Armstrong had taken great pride in the building and its collection. The library and museum itself is such a unique place to be able to work. It holds a standing as a library, museum, and archive due to all of the miscellaneous collections housed within. The third floor Belew Scholars’ Room is an amazing resource for both local and visiting scholars to be able to do research into whichever topic piques their fancy. The room that I have been working in, like all of the other rooms in the library, has these two gorgeous stained-glass windows that allow the sun to be refracted into all the colors of the rainbow, while also allowing for some much-needed vitamin c without having to brave the Texas sun. The staff here at the ABL is also fabulous. Jennifer Borderud has been great to work under and has made the internship like a walk in the park. I started out my summer having a meeting with her and getting to know the ABL, taking a tour of the museum, and Jennifer showing me where the stacks were and a few other secrets of the museum. After that, I got to work! There were 2 bankers boxes worth of recently acquired letters, manuscripts, and books that I was to create metadata for and put into a pre-existing spreadsheet that was shared with the Riley Digitization Center. I got to be hands-on with each document, finding the information while also keeping an eye out for any through lines that might be appearing to use to create my exhibit in the last half of the summer. While doing that, I read several of the ABL’s manuals about exhibit creation and archive storage, to get a grasp of the industry standards that the library adheres to.

Jill Phillips at the Riley Digitization Center

Once I finished with the initial metadata, I spent several weeks working in the Riley Digitization Center in Moody Library on campus, working with the team down there to digitize and upload the documents to Baylor’s digital collections in Quartex. I had the pleasure to work with a Zeutschel Scanstudio A0, which I’m pretty sure is worth four years of tuition at Baylor, plus some. It was definitely a tad daunting, to be working on such an advanced piece of machinery; however, the Scanstudio creates some of the highest quality photographs and scans, making it perfect for the project I am working on. The Riley Center is a fabulous place on Baylor campus, with some of the kindest, most intelligent people on staff working there. They took their time to train and work with me while I was there to ensure that I knew what I was doing and the ABL was receiving the highest quality scans it could get. Working with Allyson Riley and the team was crazy fun and allowed me to see a separate part of the archival field—the digitization portion. In a world where technology is nearly impossible to separate from humans, having access to a growing and evolving digital archive is something that is incredibly important for the archival field. Plus, it allowed me to nerd out over the technology I was getting to use (I definitely took too many selfies and videos to send to my dad.) The Digitization Center showed me the different ways of collecting, storing, and uploading digital archives, while also allowing me some more hands-on work with the documents as well as some Women Poet books that also needed to be digitized and uploaded to the website. Working there taught me more of the industry standards in digitizing collections—leaving borders on letters to ensure the whole thing is captured, or cropping an image of a page in a book or manuscript where the page ends so that there isn’t anything to distract from the words on the page.

Upon returning to the ABL, I began work on my exhibit, and the whole process of creating and designing my ideas. I have been working on my context cards and labels, the lay out of the letters within their case, advertising, facsimiles and so much more to ensure I do everything by the book. I have decided to focus on classical education in the Victorian era, and how children were educated, and why language was something that was at the forefront of their education then but has seemingly slipped from American education until high school and secondary education. My exhibit will be finished by the end of the summer and on display during the fall semester in the ABL’s Hankamer Treasure Room. I look forward to being able to see this project through to the end and seeing my very own exhibit on display in a museum.

Greek, Latin, Italian, Oh My! is on display in the Hankamer Treasure Room through Fall 2023

Overall, I have really enjoyed the opportunities this internship has brought me. I’ve been able to meet some fabulous people, who all are smart and brilliant people who have been in my corner as I complete my internship requirements. The fact that I am allowed to be a student and a professional at the same time has allowed me such an opportunity for growth and professional development that I have no doubt that I have gained an experience that will benefit me well past college graduation. Please come give the ABL a visit, see my exhibit in the Hankamer Treasure Room, or simply browse Baylor’s Digital Collections. You may very well see a document that I helped scan and upload! I would like to thank the Baylor Museum Studies Department, as well as both the ABL and Riley Digitization Center for allowing me to come in and work as an intern. It has proved an extremely fruitful experience and I cannot thank everyone I have worked with enough!

The Armstrong Browning Library is grateful to the donors who made the Armstrong Browning Library Endowed Internship possible.

We at Armstrong Browning thank Erin Rogers for featuring the Library & Museum in one of her Traveling Soldiers articles! In a recent publication, the ABL&M is called one of the 50 most beautiful university libraries in the world.

Pair of famous poets alive through collection

The English rosewood bracket clock, on display in the library’s Hankamer Treasure Room, was owned by three generations of Brownings – Robert’s grandfather, father and then finally by Robert Browning himself. Erin Rogers, Sentinel Leisure Editor

A view of the far wall of the Hankamer Treasure Room shows bookcases full of famous authors, treasures owned by Robert Browning and the library’s famous stained glass. Erin Rogers, Sentinel Leisure Editor

This stained-glass window on the main floor has a quote from Elizabeth Barrett Browning on the top, and a quote from Robert Browning on the bottom. It is part of a series of windows telling the story of their courtship. Erin Rogers, Sentinel Leisure Editor

A painting by Egisto Manzuoli, who painted during the time the Brownings wrote, called “Angel of Annunciation” hangs in the Hankamer Treasure Room. Erin Rogers, Sentinel Leisure Editor

A view of the Jones Research Hall on the library’s main floor. The windows in this room illustrate 10 of Brownings most famous poems. Erin Rogers, Sentinel Leisure Editor

The McLean Foyer of Meditation is at the back of the library’s main floor. This room is often used for concerts, lectures and ceremonies of Baylor’s organizations because of its beauty. Erin Rogers, Sentinel Leisure Editor

The alcove at the front of the McLean Foyer features a bronze sculpture of Robert and Elizabeth’s clasped hands. There are poems inscribed on the walls of the alcove by the Brownings written for one another. Erin Rogers, Sentinel Leisure Editor

A collection of original work by Robert Browning is on display in the Hankamer Treasure Room. Erin Rogers, Sentinel Leisure Editor

A view of the front of the Armstrong Browning Library. Erin Rogers, Sentinel Leisure Editor

One of two 19th-century palace jars sits on display in the McLean Foyer of Meditation. Erin Rogers, Sentinel Leisure Editor

The Dotson Wedgewood Collection is on display in the library’s bottom floor, along with the library’s newest stained-glass windows. There are 333 pieces of Wedgewood in the collection. Erin Rogers, Sentinel Leisure Editor

Drawn from “Victorian Era” in Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia:

Events

1832

Passage of the first Reform Act.^[10]

The 1843 launch of theGreat Britain, the revolutionary ship of Isambard Kingdom Brunel

1837

Ascension of Queen Victoria to the throne.^[10]

1840

Queen Victoria marries Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfield. He had beennaturalised and granted the British style of Royal Highness beforehand. For the next 17 years, he was known as HRH Prince Albert.

1840

Birth of the Queen’s first child The Princess Victoria. Within months she was granted the title Princess Royal.

1840

New Zealand becomes a British colony, through the Treaty of Waitangi.

1841

Birth of the Queen’s heir-apparent The Prince Albert Edward, Duke of Cornwall (Duke of Rothesay). He was swiftly made Prince of Wales. Sir James Brooke founds the White Rajah dynasty of Sarawak.^[11]

The last stand of the survivors of Her Majesty’s44th Foot at Gandamak, Afghanistan

1842

Treaty of Nanking. The Massacre of Elphinstone’s Army by the Afghans inAfghanistan results in the death or incarceration of 16,500 soldiers and civilians.^[12] The Mines Act of 1842 banned women/children from working in coal,iron, lead and tin mining.^[10] The Illustrated London News was first published.^[13]

1843

Birth of The Princess Alice

1844

Birth of The Prince Alfred

1845

The Irish famine begins. Within 5 years it would become the UK’s worst human disaster, with starvation and emigration reducing the population of Ireland itself by over 50%. The famine permanently changed Ireland’s and Scotland’s demographics and became a rallying point for nationalist sentiment that pervaded British politics for much of the following century.

1846

Repeal of the Corn Laws.^[10]

The last of the mail coaches at Newcastle upon Tyne, 1848

1846

Birth of The Princess Helena

1848

Death of around 2,000 people a week in a cholera epidemic.

1848

Birth of The Princess Louise

1850

Restoration of the Roman Catholic hierarchy in Britain.

1850

Birth of The Prince Arthur

1851

The Great Exhibition (the first World’s Fair) is held at the Crystal Palace,^[10] with great success and international attention. The Victorian gold rush. In ten years the Australian population nearly tripled.^[14]

The Great Exhibition in London. The United Kingdom was the first country in the world to industrialise.

1853

Birth of The Prince Leopold

1854

Crimean War: The United Kingdom declares war on Russia.

1857

The Indian Mutiny, a widespread revolt in India against the rule of the British East India Company, is sparked by sepoys (native Indian soldiers) in the Company’s army. The rebellion, involving not just sepoys but many sectors of the Indian population as well, is largely quashed within a year. In response to the mutiny, the East India Company is abolished in August 1858 and India comes under the direct rule of the British crown, beginning the period of the British Raj. Prince Albert is given the title The Prince Consort

1857

Birth of The Princess Beatrice

1858

The Prime Minister, Lord Palmerston, responds to the Orsini plot against French emperor Napoleon III, the bombs for which were purchased in Birmingham, by attempting to make such acts a felony; the resulting uproar forces him to resign.

1859

Charles Darwin publishes On the Origin of Species, which leads to various reactions.^[10] Victoria and Albert’s first grandchild, Prince Wilhelm of Prussia, is born — he later became William II, German Emperor. John Stuart Mill publishes On Liberty, a defense of the famous harm principle.

Governor-General of IndiaLord Canning meets MaharajaRanbir Singh of Jammu and Kashmir, 1860

1861

Death of Prince Albert;^[10] Queen Victoria refuses to go out in public for many years, and when she did she wore a widow’s bonnet instead of the crown.

1863

The Prince of Wales marries Princess Alexandra of Denmark at Windsor.

1865

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is published.

1866

An angry crowd in London, protesting against John Russell‘s resignation as Prime Minister, is barred from Hyde Park by the police; they tear down iron railings and trample on flower beds. Disturbances like this convince Derby and Disraeli of the need for further parliamentary reform.

1867

The Constitution Act, 1867 passes and British North America becomes Dominion of Canada.

1875

Britain purchased Egypt‘s shares in the Suez Canal^[10] as the African nation was forced to raise money to pay off its debts.

1876

Scottish-born inventor Alexander Graham Bell patents the telephone.

1877

The Princess Alice becomes Grand Duchess of Hesse when her husband succeeds as Louis IV, Grand Duke of Hesse

1878

Treaty of Berlin (1878). Cyprus becomes a Crown colony. The Princess Alice dies. Princess Louise‘s husbandThe Marchioness of Lorne is appointed Governor-General of Canada. First incandescent light bulb by Joseph Wilson Swan.

1879

The Battle of Isandlwana is the first major encounter in the Anglo-Zulu War. Victoria and Albert’s first great-grandchild, Princess Feodora of Saxe-Meiningen, is born.

The defence of Rorke’s Driftduring the Anglo-Zulu War of 1879

1882

British troops begin the occupation of Egypt by taking the Suez Canal, in order to secure the vital trade route and passage to India, and the country becomes a protectorate.

1883

Princess Louise and Lord Lorne return from Canada

1884

The Fabian Society is founded in London by a group of middle class intellectuals, including Quaker Edward R. Pease, Havelock Ellis, and E. Nesbit, to promote socialism.^[15] Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany dies.

1886

Prime Minister William Ewart Gladstone and the Liberal Party tries passing the First Irish Home Rule Bill, but theHouse of Commons rejects it.

1888

The serial killer known as Jack the Ripper murders and mutilates five (and possibly more) prostitutes on the streets of London.^[10] Victoria’s eldest daughter, the Princess Royal, becomes German Empress when her husband succeeds as Frederick III, German Emperor. Within months, Frederick dies, and their son becomesWilliam II, German Emperor. The widowed Vicky becomes the Dowager Empress as is known as “Empress Frederick”.

1870 – 1891

Under the Elementary Education Act 1870, basic State Education becomes free for every child under the age of 10.^[16]

1891

Victoria and Albert’s last grandchild, Prince Maurice of Battenberg, is born.

1892

The Prince of Wales’ eldest son Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence dies of influenza.

Workmen leaving Platt’s Works, Oldham, 1900

1893

The Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh succeeds as Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha when his uncle dies. The Duchy skips over The Prince of Wales due to his renunciation of his succession rights to that Duchy.

1898

British and Egyptian troops led by Horatio Kitchener defeat the Mahdist forces at the battle of Omdurman, thus establishing British dominance in the Sudan. Winston Churchill takes part in the British cavalry charge at Omdurman.

1899

The Second Boer War is fought between the British Empire and the two independent Boer republics.

1900

Alfred, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha dies. His nephew Prince Charles Edward, Duke of Albany succeeds him, because his brother Prince Arthur, Duke of Connaught and nephew Prince Arthur of Connaught had renounced their rights.

1901

The death of Victoria sees the end of this era. The ascension of her eldest son, Edward, begins the Edwardian era; albeit considerably shorter, this was another time of great change.

RB saw the painting the Guardian Angel while visiting Fano on the Adriatic. He was inspired to write the poem “The Guardian Angel –A Picture at Fano.” The window was placed in the Browning Room in 1924, along with two other windows.

The Guardian-Angel by Robert Browning A PICTURE AT FANO. I. Dear and great Angel, wouldst thou only leave That child, when thou hast done with him, for me! Let me sit all the day here, that when eve Shall find performed thy special ministry, And time come for departure, thou, suspending Thy flight, mayst see another child for tending, Another still, to quiet and retrieve. II. Then I shall feel thee step one step, no more, From where thou standest now, to where I gaze, —And suddenly my head is covered o’er With those wings, white above the child who prays Now on that tomb—and I shall feel thee guarding Me, out of all the world; for me, discarding Yon heaven thy home, that waits and opes its door. III. I would not look up thither past thy head Because the door opes, like that child, I know, For I should have thy gracious face instead, Thou bird of God! And wilt thou bend me low Like him, and lay, like his, my hands together, And lift them up to pray, and gently tether Me, as thy lamb there, with thy garment’s spread? IV. If this was ever granted, I would rest My bead beneath thine, while thy healing hands Close-covered both my eyes beside thy breast, Pressing the brain, which too much thought expands, Back to its proper size again, and smoothing Distortion down till every nerve had soothing, And all lay quiet, happy and suppressed. V. How soon all worldly wrong would be repaired! I think how I should view the earth and skies And sea, when once again my brow was bared After thy healing, with such different eyes. O world, as God has made it! All is beauty: And knowing this, is love, and love is duty. What further may be sought for or declared? VI. Guercino drew this angel I saw teach (Alfred, dear friend!)—that little child to pray, Holding the little hands up, each to each Pressed gently,—with his own head turned away Over the earth where so much lay before him Of work to do, though heaven was opening o’er him, And he was left at Fano by the beach. VII. We were at Fano, and three times we went To sit and see him in his chapel there, And drink his beauty to our soul’s content —My angel with me too: and since I care For dear Guercino’s fame (to which in power And glory comes this picture for a dower, Fraught with a pathos so magnificent)— VIII. And since he did not work thus earnestly At all times, and has else endured some wrong— I took one thought his picture struck from me, And spread it out, translating it to song. My love is here. Where are you, dear old friend? How rolls the Wairoa at your world’s far end? This is Ancona, yonder is the sea. Fano, Italy: An ancient causeway leading into the Adriatic.

William Page was an American painter and portrait artist born in Albany, New York in 1811. In 1849 he went to Italy where he lived in Florence and Rome for eleven years, returning to New York in 1860. While he was in Italy, he painted the portraits of Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning and other well-known Englishmen and Americans.

The ABL&M owns Page’s portrait of Robert Browning. This was Elizabeth’s favorite portrait of her husband. Unfortunately, it is now so dark that it is difficult to see Robert’s face in the painting. Due to his painting methods, much of Page’s work darkened excessively. This darkening happened, apparently, because he mixed bitumen ( a cousin of asphalt) in his paints and glazes. At first, this gave his works a warm glow, but we are told that the portrait of RB began darkening four or five years after it was painted. Sadly, Elizabeth’s favorite portrait of Robert is now so dark that, just to make out his visage, one must stand at just the right angle with light coming from behind. (Visitors can see RB’s visage much clearer in the above photo than in person.)

Recently, we are pleased to announce, the Armstrong Browning Library & Museum was named among the 50 most beautiful libraries in the world. Among the most beautiful items within the ABL&M are the sixty-two stained-glass windows. Below are photos of the three oldest windows in the building. Based on poems by RB, they were originally placed in the old main library’s Browning Room in 1924. 1) The Guardian Angel; 2) How they brought the good news from Ghent to Aix; 3) The Pied Piper.

One of three windows placed in the Browning Room (Old Main Library) in 1924

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came painted by Thomas Moran in 1859.

“Childe Roland” has served as inspiration to a number of popular works of fiction, including: American author Stephen King for his The Dark Tower series of stories and novels (1978–2012).

• African-American author Countee Cullen for “From the Dark Tower” poem (1927)
• Welsh science fiction author Alastair Reynolds for the “Diamond Dogs” novella (2001).
• Canadian science-fiction author Gordon R. Dickson for his “Childe Cycle” series of novels (1959–2001).
• American science-fiction author Andre Norton for the fourth novel in her “Witch World” series (1967).
• Elidor (1965) by English writer Alan Garner.
• The ‘Doctor Who‘ Twentieth Anniversary special ‘The Five Doctors‘ takes much imagery and several key phrases from the poem which has been cited as a source by screenwriter Terrance Dicks.
• British novelist A. S. Byatt for the character Roland Michell (and perhaps his formidable love interest Maud Bailey (“bailey”=”tower”)) in her novelPossession: A Romance (1990).
• ‘The Dark Tower’, a radio play written by Louis MacNeice with incidental music by Benjamin Britten which was first broadcast in 1946 on theBBC’s Home Service (now Radio 4). This play follows the basic theme of the original with references to the quest, the dark tower, and the trumpet.^[3]
• Willa Cather‘s The Burglar’s Christmas.
• John Connolly‘s novel The Book of Lost Things (2006).
• Roger Zelazny‘s novel Sign of the Unicorn (1975) refers to the song and the poem (part of The Chronicles of Amber series).
• Lawrence Ferlinghetti‘s poem I Am Waiting refers to Childe Rowland coming ‘to the final darkest tower’.
• P.G. Wodehouse‘s novel The Mating Season: Jeeves uses the phrase ‘Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came’ to describe Bertie Wooster’s arrival at Deverill Hall. Bertie does not understand the reference.^[4]
• P.G. Wodehouse’s novel The Code of the Woosters: Jeeves also uses the phrase ‘Childe Roland to the dark tower came’ to describe Bertie Wooster’s arrival, in this case, at Totleigh Towers. Bertie does not understand the reference in this case either.^[5]
• Neil Gaiman‘s Sandman character, Charles Rowland, one of the Dead Boy Detectives, is a reference to Childe Roland, particularly in his The Children’s Crusade miniseries (1993), which prominently features a dark tower, a motif later picked up by the Books of Magic series.
• Characters of Philip Jose Farmer‘s series Riverworld quote passages of the poem and make allusions to the dark tower in their quest.

I

In her biography of Dr. Armstrong Lois Smith Douglas commented on some of the many awards Dr. A. received beginning in 1912:

“The year 1921 was the six-hundredth anniversary of the death of the great Dante. Dr. Armstrong  was named one of a national committee of fifty to arrange for proper commemoration of the date…

“With the recognition of Dr. Armstrong’s work on Robert Browning came invitations to membersip in various Browning Societies over the country, e.g., Los Angeles, New York, Boston, Pasadena, Kansas City and many others…

“The first listing of Dr. Armstrong in Who’s Who in America appeared in 1922 and the column space was expanded several times after that first date…

“Dr. Armstrong “collected” many honorary degrees. The most recent, Doctor of Humane Letteres, from Shurtleff College in Alton, Illinois…

“(In addition to all his other activities) Dr. A taught the Baraca Class (Men) at First Baptist Church for approximately thirty years… (Only) acceptance of the task of raising money for the construction of the “Browning library” forced him to relinquish his much beloved class…

“On October 23, 1935 the (women’s) Literature Survey Class presented a head and shoulders bust of Dr. A to Baylor University (He taught the group of nearly 100 women for almost 25 years). (The bust, by Bonnie MacLeary, now resides in the ABL&M’s Hankamer Treasure Room.)

“Carl Sandburg, poet and friend of the Armstrongs, wrote:

Dr. Armstrong is one of the sturdy and indefatigable figures in American cultural life, so it seems to some of us who know him and his work. His labors in the Browning field have a monumental dimension and will long endure. As a friend of American poets he is among the outstanding and significant, worthy of the bronze in which you memorialize him.”

The length of Browning’s The Ring and the Book — 21,000 lines, ten sections or “Books,” militates against an extensive, prose description of the work in a blog post. This, then, is an outline of salient features of the extended dramatic narrative poem.

As stated in Part 1, Browning was inspired by the lurid details of a 1698 Roman murder trial recorded in what became known as the Old Yellow Book, a collection of written testimony purchased by Robert for one lira in June 1860. Browning read the contents of the Old Yellow Book immediately and repeatedly right after the purchase, but circumstances forced him to put it aside.

He returned to the depositions in 1862 and spent much of the next six years turning their contents into a poetic tour de force. Nine of the Books are dramatic monologues.

Major Characters

Count Guido Franceschini, impoverished, middle-aged nobleman

Pompilia Comparini, his much-younger wife

Pietro and Violante Comparini, putative parents of Pompilia

Giuseppe Caponsacchi, a priest

Pope Innocent XII, to whom Franceschini appeals his conviction

The Books

1. The Ring and the Book — features a narrator (possibly Browning); explains how he came across the Yellow Book and provides a broad outline of the plot.

2. Half-Rome &  3.The Other Half-Rome – Views and gossip of the Roman public, divided over which side to support (Guido or Pompilia) in the famous case; differing accounts of the circumstances surrounding the case and the events which took place.

4. Tertium Quid — Spoken by a lawyer who has no connection with the case; he gives, according to himself, a balanced, unbiased view of the case.

5. Franceschini — The accused murderer gives his side of the story; claims that it was a matter of honor; accuses Pompilia and Caponsacchi of adultery.

6. Caponsacchi — The young priest swears that no adultery took place; he simply tried to help Pompilia escape her abusive husband.

7. Pompilia — Gravely-wounded and dying Pompilia presents her account of the story.

8. & 9. Dry, pedantic depositions by the opposing trial lawyers; filled with legal bickering and discussion of tiny, irrelevant points.

10. Pope Innocent — Considers Franceschini’s appeal against a wider view of moral issues; reflects on the nature of good and evil; rejects the appeal.

11. Franceschini in his cell the night before his execution — Veers from near-psychotic fury to begging for this life.

12. The narrator (Browning?) returns; wraps up the aftermath of the trial and ends the poem.

The Ring and the Book was the best-selling of Browning’s works during his lifetime. The work’s deep philosophical, psychological and spiritual insights outstripped anything the poet had produced earlier or would produce later. It restored Browning’s reputation as among the first rank of English poets, which he had lost nearly thirty years before when  the difficult, obscure Sordello was published.

Sources: Poetry Criticism, Gale Cengage, 2005 and “The Ring and the Book,” Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia.

The Ring and the Book is generally conceded to be Robert Browning’s masterwork. It was inspired by what became known as The Old Yellow Book. Its depositions, written testimony for a murder trial in 1698 Rome, were covered in soiled, yellowing vellum. Browning came upon the collection of written testimony while browsing in the “flea market” of the Piazza di San Lorenzo on a June day in 1860. In the Piazza, “pushed by the hand ever above my shoulder,” his eye caught the volume, crowded among its insignificant neighbors. “One glance at the lettered back,” declares the poet, “and… a lira made it mine.” All the way home and all day long, he pored over these pages, until by nightfall he had mastered the facts of the case and the whole tragedy lay plain before his mind’s eye. No one knows how the once official Roman documents came to be in a stall in this Piazza in Florence two hundred sixty-two years after the trial ended.

Due to Elizabeth’s death and Browning’s return to England with Pen, he did not return to the Old Yellow Book until 1862. From that year to the publication of his artistic, poetic reinterpretation of the story and trial, (1868-69, in four installments), he worked almost continuously on what became the 21,000-line The Ring and the Book.

Daniel Karlin, an eminent Browning scholar, says this of the murders and the trial in a 2001 review of a  new edition of The Ring and the Book:

Part 1: “In September 1693, Guido Franceschini, an improverished middle-aged count, originally from Arezzo in Tuscany but living in Rome in the retinue of a cardinal, married 14-year-old Pompilia, putative daughter of Pietro and Violante Comparini, a moderately wealthy middle-class couple. Shortly after the marriage, Guido, his wife and his parents-in-law moved from Rome to Arezzo. Subsequently the Comparini returned to Rome, claiming ill-treatment by Guido; Violante then publicly  confessed that Pompilia was not really her child, but a prostitute’s whom she had passed off as hers to secure an inheritance in which Pietro held only a life-interest. The  Comparini sued Guido for the return of the dowry; he counter-sued, claiming that the story of Pompilia’s illegitimacy was a fabrication. Meanwhile Pompilia, unhappy in Arezzo, eventually fled in the company of a priest who had befriended her, Giuseppe Caponsacchi. Guido pursued the couple, caught up with them just before they reached Rome, and had them arrested. The subsequent hearing satisfied nobody. The charge of adultery was not sustained , but Caponsacchi was ‘relegated’ to Civita Vecchia for three years and Pompilia was placed in the care of a convent that also acted as a reformatory for fallen women. Guido was told to go home…

(Later), it was found that Pompilia was pregnant. She was released from the convent into the custody of her supposed parents, and a few weeks later bore Guido–or Caponsacchi–a son. This was in December 1697. On the night of January 2, 1698, Guido and four accomplices–farm workers from his Aretine estate–arrived at the Comparini house…claiming that they brought a letter from Caponsacchi… Once they entered the house…Guido killed Pietro and Violante and thought he had killed Pompilia, too, — she lay still after being repeatedly stabbed. As neighbors rushed to the scene, Guido and his accomplices fled…on foot because Guido had not…secured the necessary permit to hire horses in the city. The murderers…planning to escape Roman jurisdiction by going to Arezzo…covered twenty miles…before collapsing, exhausted…at an inn where the posse caught up with them. When the bewildered Guido asked how they knew who to look for and where to find him, and was told that his wife was still living, he fainted…Pompilia lived four more days — long enough for a death-bed confession and deposition.

At the subsequent trial Guido’s lawyers claimed that the murder of his wife was a matter of honor, and that Guido had acted under extreme provocation. Already maddened by his wife’s adultery and by the Comparini’s cynical chicanery, the birth of (according to Guido) Caponsacchi’s bastard had tipped the noble cuckold over the edge. The prosecution argued that Guido’s real and ignoble motive was money…(with the Comparini and Pompilia dead)…all the lawsuits would end and Guido as the legal father of the one remaining heir would walk away with the jackpot.

Guido was found guilty and condemned to death. But he had one card left to play — an appeal to the Pope, Innocent XII — on the grounds that he was in minor orders and subject to the jurisdiction of the Church.  (It was thought that he would be let off)…but the Pope to everyone’s surprise confirmed the sentence and Guido, together with his four accomplices, was executed in February 1698.

Sources:

Hodell, Charles W. Introduction to The Old Yellow Book: Source of Robert Browning’s The Ring and the Book. New York: E. P. Dutton & Co., 1911. Reprint, 1917.

Karlin, Danny (Daniel), Resurrection Man, Review of Robert Browning’s The Ring and the Book, eds. Richard Altick and Thomas Collins.  London Review of Books 24, no. 10 (23 May 2002) 13-16.

Part II will consider Browning’s use of the depositions in The Old Yellow Book: His poetic design, sections, etc.