Two-Way Mirror: The Life of Elizabeth Barrett Browning

What an interesting retake on the life of Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Am enjoying it now. Fast shipping from this seller. Will definitely buy from them again.

I'm gritting my way through this biography. I enjoyed the Prologue but once the story began it read like a childrens book. If I had known it was written in present tense I never would have purchased it. History is the past, people do not live, ride, write - they lived, rode, wrote. If this sort of thing bugs you, too, than avoid this book. All the most recent information about her and the insight into her slaving male forbears seemed infantile and precious by framing it that way.

I appreciate EBB's contributions to the literary world, but sorry, I found this particular book so boring I returned it after a few chapters.

This should have been an engaging biography of a literary trailblazer, but I agree with the some other commenters that this book is simply dull and dry. I could barely get through a few chapters, though normally I do love literary biographies. If you're in the mood for this genre, try Romantic Outlaws, a dual biography of Mary Wollstonecraft, the trailblazing 18th-century feminist, and her daughter Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, the author of Frankenstein. Literary history at its best!

The book might have been wonderful, but as other reviewers have mentioned, the present tense viewpoint was severely off-putting. How sad.

I didn't really know much about EBB - other than how she's depicted in the film "The Barretts of Wimpole Street". This book was fascinating - certainly shows her as a brilliant and strong-willed woman. Well worth reading.

This book shows the dead-end that post-modernism has led the arts into. It is highly self regarding, ticking off a 'woke' list of post-modern tropes: whiteness, orientalism, post-colonialism, anti-imperialism, bisexuality, slavery, among them. It also references many saints and demons of post modernism: Said, Fanon, Princess Diana, Francis Bacon (and his gay lover in particular), Greer, Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty among them. All the above references really stick out. This was a Victorian poet, and has to be approached as such.Chapters are book-ended ('framed') with excrutiating pages that say more about the author than the subject.It is very lacking in its treatment of nonconformism, and the tensions between it and the established church - in an author who was so influenced by religion. 19th C non-conformist anti-slavery movements are not the same thing as modern attempts to 'decolonise' everything and interpret everything through identity.Some of the writing could have done with a bit of polishing, but EBB was hardly a beacon of clarity. The best bits are factual biographical accounts - though I'd have liked a bit more of the poetry.The attempt to take EBB out of her Victorian context and establish her as a proto feminist, complete with gender bending sexuality doesn't work - and there is scant reference to EBB's (hetero) sexuality - she was obviously highly sexed and had an explosion of sex late in life (evidenced by the frequent pregenancies in her 40s), but she clearly wasn't a feminist nor sexually liberated in any way. Nor was she a torch bearer of post-colomialism and anti-racism - her social reform ideas need placing in the context of nonconformist christianity. Forster's biography, embraces a pre-post-modernist feminism in a more nuanced way. Feminism is an entirely valid approach to EBB, even if it weighs her in the balance and finds her wanting. As Forster says: most of EBB's problems were of her own making.

I was really looking forward to reading this book about my favourite poet, however the book concentrated on every single ‘WOKE’ issue. Waste of money I requested a refund.Awful boring book.

This provides an engaging and insightful perspective on one of our greatest poets. However the kindle edition is deeply damaged as the publisher has not included any of the images (referred to repeatedly in the text) at all, even though the list of illustrations is included.Also some indication of the pagenotes at the end in the actual text would have been helpful. Some of these might provide additional insight but having read the text I am not going read the pagenotes, as they are divorced from their context without constantly referring back.The text however is wonderful and bring Elizabeth to glorious life in all its complexity.

This book is a masterclass in biography writing. It changes all you thought you knew about Elizabeth Barrett-Browning who, until now, has been portrayed as flouncing around English Literature hanging onto her husband Robert Browning's coat-tails, succumbing to the vapours and over-indulging her pet spaniel. Fiona Sampson's thoroughly researched biography puts an end to that travesty. Who knew that EBB was very nearly the first female Poet Laureate and, for most of her married life, was one of the best known and celebrated poets in Britain, with Robert lagging behind? it's an extraordinary story of a poet who made herself through hard work and self-will. And far from being a delicate flower, she tackled issues like slavery (in which her own family was involved), rape and the second class status of women. No sign of the Wimpole Street simperer here. It's also a subtle psychological study of a woman and the complex family background from which she came. A terrific read and one which sends you to Barrett-Browning's poems to read them with new eyes.