Welcome to The Browning Society
Registered Charity No: 269771
from Love letters of Barrett and Browning (First published on Tuesday 14 February 2012 in The Guardian Online)
573 billets-doux that capture Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett's romance are now available online through Wellesley College and Baylor University.
"I love your verses with all my heart, dear Miss Barrett … " so begins Robert's first letter to Elizabeth. Copyright Wellesley College
New Cross, Hatcham, Surrey.
[Postmark: 10 January 1845]
I love your verses with all my heart, dear Miss Barrett,—and this is no off-hand complimentary letter that I shall write,—whatever else, no prompt matter-of-course recognition of your genius and there a graceful and natural end of the thing: since the day last week when I first read your poems, I quite laugh to remember how I have been turning and turning again in my mind what I should be able to tell you of their effect upon me
After more than a year of almost daily letters between them, the couple wed in secret in September 1846, defying her father's prohibition against her ever marrying. They fled from London to Italy, where doctors had told Barrett her health might improve. Her father disinherited her and never spoke to her again.
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About us
The Browning Society was formed in 1969 to provide a focus for contemporary interest in Robert and Elizabeth Barrett Browning. The Society arranges an annual programme of lectures, visits, etc., in London and elsewhere. The aims of the Society are to widen the appreciation and understanding of the poetry of the Brownings, and other Victorian writers and poets, and to collect items of literary and biographical interest. For an account of The Browning Society formed during the poet's lifetime, see William S. Peterson's Interrogating the Oracle: A History of the London Browning Society (Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press, 1969).
Membership of the Society is open to all. The Society's activities centre on London and the South East, but members who live elsewhere in Britain and overseas are kept in touch through the journal and regular interchanges of news and information. In addition to activities and events in England, the Browning Society supports the efforts of the Friends of Casa Guidi to restore and maintain the Brownings' home in Florence, Italy.
Forthcoming Events in 2017
Committee Meeting
20th May 2017
St Marylebone Parish Church, London NW1 5LT
11 am
Browning Day during the St Marylebone Music Festival
25th July 2017
St Marylebone Parish Church, London NW1 5LT
1.10 pm Lunchtime Concert. Browning Songs, Soprano and Piano
3 pm A showing of the 1934 film The Barretts of Wimpole Street
6.30 pm Pre Concert Talk
7.30 pm Robert & Elizabeth: An Extravaganza with Rosumund Shelly & Julian Forsyth
Annual Commemmoration of the Marriage of the Brownings at St Marylebone on 12th September 1846
10th September 2017
St Marylebone Parish Church, London NW1 5LT
11 am Choral Eucharist and Poetry Reading
https://stmarylebone.org
An Afternoon with the Brownings
4th November 2017 to be confirmed
Eton College, Berkshire
An Afternoon with the Brownings at Eton College: Afternoon Tea, Talk and Treasures from the Brwoong Collection with Michael Meredith
Wreath Laying and Reception
December 2017 date to be confirmed
Westminster Abbey followed by a Reception in The Westmisnter Arms, Storey's Gate
Other events will be listed as they are confirmed.
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