Elizabeth Barrett Browning (6 March 1806 – 29 June 1861) was one of the most prominent poets of the Victorian era.
Elizabeth Barrett Moulton Barrett was born on 6 March 1806, in Coxhoe Hall, between the villages of Coxhoe and Kelloe in County Durham, England. Her parents were Edward Barrett Moulton Barrett and Mary Graham Clarke; Elizabeth was the eldest of their 12 children (eight boys and four girls). All the children lived to adulthood except for one girl, who died at the age of four when Elizabeth was eight. The children in her family all had nicknames: Elizabeth's was "Ba". The Barrett family, some of whom were part Creole, had lived for centuries in Jamaica, where they owned sugar plantations and relied on slave labour. Elizabeth's father chose to raise his family in England while his fortune grew in Jamaica. The Graham Clarke family wealth, also derived in part from slave labour, was also considerable.
Elizabeth was baptized in 1809 at Kelloe Parish Church, though she had already been baptized by a family friend in the first week after she was born. Later that year, after the fifth child, Henrietta, was born, their father bought Hope End, a 500-acre (2.0 km2) estate near the Malvern Hills in Ledbury, Herefordshire. Elizabeth had "a large room to herself, with stained glass in the window, and she loved the garden where she tended white roses in a special arbour by the south wall"[2] Her time at Hope End would inspire her in later life to write Aurora Leigh. She was educated at home and attended lessons with her brother's tutor. This gave her a good education for a girl of that time; she read passages from Paradise Lost and Shakespearean plays, among other works, before the age of ten. During the Hope End period, she was an intensely studious, precocious child.[3] Her intellectual fascination with the classics and metaphysics was balanced by a religious intensity which she later described as "not the deep persuasion of the mild Christian but the wild visions of an enthusiast." [4][5] The Barretts attended services at the nearest Dissenting chapel, and Edward was active in Bible and Missionary societies. Elizabeth was very close to her siblings and had great respect for her father: she claimed that life was no fun without him, and her mother agreed, probably because they did not fully understand what the business really was that kept him when his trips got longer and longer.
As I understood from this information, I can see that Elizabeth's father earned money from slave labour. At the end of the text we can see how Elizabeth loved his father and thought that life was no fun without him, and that she didn't fully understand what the business really was, refering to this horrible business of slaves. This also shown how Victorian Society was, people tried to hide their "true faces".
ReplyDeleteSilvina, do you think the horrible buisness was slavery? can you make another educated guess since you have mentioned the hiding of one´s ¨true face¨?
ReplyDeleteMaybe his business was that he killed people?
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ReplyDeleteElizabeth lived a good life because of the working her family did, they had lands and a slavery business. Everything went good, she had a good education, good living conditions, and she was a religious child which at that moment was something right to be. In connection to the book, religion was something important and present in victorian society also they tried to do charities things maybe to give a good impression about the family or have a good reputation
ReplyDeleteTHIS PIECE OF INFORMATION CLEARLY SHOWS THE WAY VICTORIAN SOCIETY BEHAVED WAS VERY CONTRADICTORY. VICTORIAN SOCIETY WAS DUAL AS ON ONE HAND THEY WANTED TO PRESERVE VALUES SUCH AS DIGNITY, HONESTY, JUSTICE AND THE SENSE OF DUTY AND RESPONSABILITY TOWARDS THE LESS WELL OFF WHILE ON THE OTHER THE UPPER CLASSES EXPLOITED SLAVES AS IN THIS CASE AND IN OTHERS EVEN EMPLOYED CHILD LABOUR. SO WHERE ARE THE ETHICS AND VALUES THEY ARE SUPPOUSEDLY AIMING TO DEFEND? AND THE INFO ALSO DEPICTS RELIGION AS SOMETHING CRUCIAL. IN VICTORIAN TIMES BRITAIN WAS OVERWHEMINGLY CHRISTIAN AND THE CHURCH DOMINATED RELIGION AND THE MORALITY OF THAT TIME. THESE ARE TWO THEMES ALWAYS PRESENT IN THE BOOK SO THAT WERE THE PARALLELISMS I FOUND.
ReplyDeleteI think that in this text we can see that religion was very important at those times since she got a good education and also education in religion. Furthermore, we can also realize this because of the fact that she was baptized 2 times.
ReplyDeleteMoreover, we can also see a characteristic of victorian society that was to hide things and keep a good image. They were living in England by owning a sugar plantation in Jamaica who used slaves.
We can also see some hiding in the end when it is mentioned that her father's trips got longer and longer and she and her mother didn't really know what he was doing.