Robert Browning

Adam Roberts (Royal Holloway, University of London)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.07: English Writing and Culture of the Victorian Period, 1837-1901.
Vol. editors: Gillian Fenwick (University of Toronto), Grace Moore (University of Otago)

Dates

Born 7 May 1812
Died 12 Dec 1889
Activity 1833-1889

Places

Born in England
Active in England; France; Italy

Activities

Primary

Playwright / Dramatist
Poet

Resources

Browning was born in Camberwell, south London, in 1812; the son of a banker father and a devoutly religious mother; he had one younger sister, Sarianna. The family were financially comfortable, and he was never troubled with having to earn his own living; but Browning looked about for something to do with his life. He enrolled in the newly formed London University in 1828 (as only the sixteenth entrant), but dropped out after a year; in 1834 he travelled to Saint Petersburg as the secretary of the Chevalier de Benkhausen, possibly contemplating a diplomatic career. But by this stage his heart was already given to poetry. Reading in his father's extensive library throughout his youth, he had first fallen in love with Byron, producing …

Please log in to consult the article in its entirety. If you are a member (student of staff) of a subscribing institution (see List), you should be able to access the LE on campus directly (without the need to log in), and off-campus either via the institutional log in we offer, or via your institution's remote access facilities, or by creating a personal user account with your institutional email address. If you are not a member of a subscribing institution, you will need to purchase a personal subscription. For more information on how to subscribe as an individual user, please see under Individual Subcriptions.

1767 words

Citation: Roberts, Adam. "Robert Browning". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 30 March 2001 [https://staging.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=5162, accessed 26 November 2024.]

Save this article

If you need to create a new bookshelf to save this article in, please make sure that you are logged in, then go to your 'Account' here