The annotation presents new contextual matter, including unpublished letters relating to 'Lyric Love', Browning's famous invocation to his dead wife. The appendices give the original Italian text of Browning's second source, 'Morte dell'Uxoricida Guido Franceschini Decapitato'; two previously unpublished autograph chronologies in which the poet worked out historical details of his story; and a new account of the biographical significance of the 'Ring' image. The editors have made six substantive emendations to the text, ranging from inaccuracies in the original typesetting to changes made by Browning after publication. The evolution of the text from manuscript to copy text is also discussed, and an appendix is devoted to a set of corrected proofs preserved at Yale, a textual evolutionary dead end of great interest and significance.
This is an edition of the first third of Browning's 21,000-line masterpiece The Ring and the Book, a poem which Henry James called a "monstrous magnificence." The editors throw new light on how the poet wrote this Italian murder story and give all the background annotation needed to understand it.
This is an edition of the first third of Browning's 21,000-line masterpiece The Ring and the Book, a poem which Henry James called a "monstrous magnificence." The editors throw new light on how the poet wrote this Italian murder story and give all the background annotation needed to understand it.