READING MODULE 3

19 / JAN /06

By: Gaspar Julio Navarro Amador

SUBJECT: ANALYSIS AND CONTEXTUALIZATION OF THE AUTHOR FROM THE POEM

By Elizabeth Barrett Browning

From Poems Before Congress

A Curse For A Nation

I

1 I heard an angel speak last night,
2 And he said 'Write!
3 Write a Nation's curse for me,
4 And send it over the Western Sea.'
II
5 I faltered, taking up the word:
6 'Not so, my lord!
7 If curses must be, choose another
8 To send thy curse against my brother.
III
9 'For I am bound by gratitude,
10 By love and blood,
11 To brothers of mine across the sea,
12 Who stretch out kindly hands to me.'
IV
13 'Therefore,' the voice said, 'shalt thou write
14 My curse to-night.
15 From the summits of love a curse is driven,
16 As lightning is from the tops of heaven.'
V
17 'Not so,' I answered. 'Evermore
18 My heart is sore
19 For my own land's sins: for little feet
20 Of children bleeding along the street:
VI
21 'For parked-up honors that gainsay
22 The right of way:
23 For almsgiving through a door that is
24 Not open enough for two friends to kiss:
VII
25 'For love of freedom which abates
26 Beyond the Straits:
27 For patriot virtue starved to vice on
28 Self-praise, self-interest, and suspicion:
VIII
29 'For an oligarchic parliament,
30 And bribes well-meant.
31 What curse to another land assign,
32 When heavy-souled for the sins of mine?'
IX

33 'Therefore,' the voice said, 'shalt thou write
34 My curse to-night.
35 Because thou hast strength to see and hate
36 A foul thing done within thy gate.'
X
37 'Not so,' I answered once again.
38 'To curse, choose men.
39 For I, a woman, have only known
40 How the heart melts and the tears run down.'
XI
41 'Therefore,' the voice said, 'shalt thou write
42 My curse to-night.
43 Some women weep and curse, I say
44 (And no one marvels), night and day.
XII
45 'And thou shalt take their part to-night,
46 Weep and write.
47 A curse from the depths of womanhood
48 Is very salt, and bitter, and good.'
XIII
49 So thus I wrote, and mourned indeed,
50 What all may read.
51 And thus, as was enjoined on me,
52 I send it over the Western Sea.

53 The Curse
XIV
54 Because ye have broken your own chain
55 With the strain
56 Of brave men climbing a Nation's height,
57 Yet thence bear down with brand and thong
58 On souls of others, -- for this wrong
59 This is the curse. Write.
XV
60 Because yourselves are standing straight
61 In the state
62 Of Freedom's foremost acolyte,
63 Yet keep calm footing all the time
64 On writhing bond-slaves, -- for this crime
65 This is the curse. Write.
XVI

66 Because ye prosper in God's name,
67 With a claim
68 To honor in the old world's sight,
69 Yet do the fiend's work perfectly
70 In strangling martyrs, -- for this lie
71 This is the curse. Write.
XVII
72 Ye shall watch while kings conspire
73 Round the people's smouldering fire,
74 And, warm for your part,
75 Shall never dare -- O shame!
76 To utter the thought into flame
77 Which burns at your heart.
78 This is the curse. Write.
XVIII
79 Ye shall watch while nations strive
80 With the bloodhounds, die or survive,
81 Drop faint from their jaws,
82 Or throttle them backward to death;
83 And only under your breath
84 Shall favor the cause.
85 This is the curse. Write.
XIX
86 Ye shall watch while strong men draw
87 The nets of feudal law
88 To strangle the weak;
89 And, counting the sin for a sin,
90 Your soul shall be sadder within
91 Than the word ye shall speak.
92 This is the curse. Write.
XX
93 When good men are praying erect
94 That Christ may avenge His elect
95 And deliver the earth,
96 The prayer in your ears, said low,
97 Shall sound like the tramp of a foe
98 That's driving you forth.
99 This is the curse. Write.
XXI

100 When wise men give you their praise,
101 They shall praise in the heat of the phrase,
102 As if carried too far.
103 When ye boast your own charters kept true,
104 Ye shall blush; for the thing which ye do
105 Derides what ye are.
106 This is the curse. Write.
XXII
107 When fools cast taunts at your gate,
108 Your scorn ye shall somewhat abate
109 As ye look o'er the wall;
110 For your conscience, tradition, and name
111 Explode with a deadlier blame
112 Than the worst of them all.
113 This is the curse. Write.

XXIII
114 Go, wherever ill deeds shall be done,
115 Go, plant your flag in the sun
116 Beside the ill-doers!
117 And recoil from clenching the curse
118 Of God's witnessing Universe
119 With a curse of yours.
120 This is the curse. Write.

(Ref 1)

In this paper, I am going to focus on the context information that I can extract from the text. The important point is what I can take out from the poem in terms of historical context of the author, that is, political and social situation and love and feelings of Elizabeth Barrett Browning. The term “love”, here has not a sexual sense or love to another individual, but passion, devotion or agreement to an ideal or convinction, to one or several nations, and to the author herself. (Ref 2)

I have chosen this author because of the fact of being a woman. In this sense, I personally feel amazed by Elizabeth Barrett, firstly, because of the difficulties this woman must have suffered in order to overcome a male managed society, and secondly for the quality of her work.

Thus, these are, in fact, one of the most relevant issues of the poem. The fact that the author is a woman, and more than that, that this woman does not need to sign her work with a pseudonym such as a male name. I see a recognized woman name, probably due to her family’s wealthy economy. In this long and slowly evolution through women literature, only those that are within this wealthy environment can be recognized. This new women’s order and women’s social movements might have been also caused or helped by the female monarchy in Great Britain during these years. This could have helped in the sense that it logically follows to a woman’s leadership, more freedom, for the fact that women have been during history very restricted from society, and a woman leading the most powerful country on the planet, at the time, may have wanted more accessibility, more respect and more comprehension in the world. (Ref 3)

Queen Victoria was the Head of the political hierarchy in England, and Her Majesty’s Reign has been the longest reign in the history of this country, from 1837 to 1901. (Ref 3). This is a very long period of time, through which have happened some of the most important changes in world society ever (industrialization, economic liberalism, imperialism, ideological, women’s and work class movements). (Ref 3)

From the poem, I can identify a clear resentment towards her own country, her own nation. This is a very critical text produced by the action or lack of action of some entity such as a whole nation. It is deduced from the connotations from the author’s text that she is referring to Great Britain, where she was born. In this moment, Great Britain is recognized to be the world’s most powerful nation. (Ref 4).

The title “A Curse for a Nation” is a critical resentment to curse her nation, that, a part from being the only nation that has the power enough to solve any critical situation at those international levels, it is her own nation, the one that is supposed to represent her feelings, so that this image also represents the author’s frustration.

In the very first line she refers to an “angel” who asks her to write the text. This angel that Barrett is referring to may be either her own moral conscience, or her moral love and devotion to her motherland. Whatever it is, it is demanding her in an exhortative way to write. The exclamation mark in the second line is from where it can be consider this anxiety, this desperation, transformed in the necessity of writing and making public what her subconscious dictates her. In a way she is avoiding being the direct author of this writing, what it denotes is that she has been asked to do so, as I see in line three “Write a Nation's curse for me”. The critic is not only pointing at Great Britain, but also the rest of potential countries in west Europe, as I see reflected in line four “And send it over the Western Sea”. (Ref 4). From here it can also be deduced that she is abroad living in a country which needs this help from Western Europe, and in which she is established and set as well as if it were her own homeland. This nation she wants to defend from oppression is Italy. The author left England for Italy and established in Florence with her husband Robert Browning. (Ref 6)

In the second stanza there is a hesitation in her intention and decision to write. In the dialogue between this subconscious entity, which she calls Lord, as if it was God himself the one who asked her to write this poem demanding help for the fair cause. She seems not to be very sure to write against what she calls her “brother”, that is in fact Great Britain. (Ref 3)

In the third stanza she reflects her love and goodwill for those who received her and her family when they had to sell their sugar plantations in Jamaica and moved to England to establish there. (Ref 3).She may remember her years in London and later in Torquay. Reasonably the author feels sorrow for this land, where her family is still living.

In the following stanzas the question-answer dialogue is carried on between Browning and her subconscious. Whereas Barrett is doubtful, her subconscious entity makes from the point that Elizabeth is a person who has her brothers in the nation that can help her new homeland, the most important reason to accept this challenge, simply because there is none better than her to do so due to her bounding knowledge, and in a sense the obligation and patriotism that connects the author to Great Britain.

Elizabeth, is still rejecting the seemingly order by justifying that Great Britain is unable to help abroad, just because the situation in there is unbearable, perfectly reflected in the image of lines 19 and 20 “For my own land's sins: for little feet, Of children bleeding along the street”. This is the actual situation in Victorian England. (Ref 3)

Because of the movements of Industrialization there is a non-stop growing industrial cities all over the country, the social situation is so precarious, that the well-known Mill Towns grew up with the poor population from the country side, trying to get a proper job and a proper way of life following the new working class, in which every one has an opportunity for better living. The paradox is that due to the low rights and security of the emergent working class and to the imperialism, the expansion towards outside of England, the maintenance of the military and expansion abroad was costing poverty inside the country. (Ref 5). Thus, the picture is that women, and even children would have to work in an absolute exploitation, which will be reflected in other very famous poem by Barrett Browning “"The Cry of the Children" published in1842, and denouncing this situation as well. (Ref 3)

The dialogue between the author and her subconscious continues the following stanzas. Her subconscious carries on trying to convince and encourage the author with a sum of reasonably facts, and Elizabeth, is still rejecting that task and giving her reasons not to do it.

In stanza 10^th, lines between 37 and 40, is where another of the most characteristic images of the Victorian Era appears. It is the situation of the women in a world of men. (Ref 3). She prefers a man for the task, arguing that nobody is going to recognize a woman’s will:

38 'To curse, choose men.
39 For I, a woman, have only known
40 How the heart melts and the tears run down.'

This way of self-degradation and victimism, was a very common method used at the time by those who were, in a way, forced to be pariah or outside society, such as slaves or women, because they did not have the right to express themselves in this very restricted society. Women were not suppose to think, but to be kept in a domestic atmosphere, and moved by instincts and feelings, leaving beside the scientific, or reasonable part of any issue. (‘Trifles’, Susan Glaspell)*.

In the 11^th and 12^th stanzas there is an opposition of terms, and the change of interest between line 43 “women weep and curse” and 44”night and day”, and the following contraposition in line 46 “women weep and write” in name of “womanhood”(47). This represents all those oppressed voices. The contradiction in line 48 is what she feels by doing this; on the one hand she has the moral obligation to do it, which is good and rational; on the other hand she feels sore and bitter because it affects her heart, her personal convictions.

In stanza 13^th she appears decided to curse that nation that has not done anything to avoid what she thinks is an injustice, that all must read, and must know, about Western Countries and specially Victorian Great Britain.

In the second part of the poem, named “the curse”, there is a change in style. From the four lines stanzas, which have a regular rhyme “aabb” in the first part of the poem, to double triplets that make a chain of sextets.

In all the stanzas, there is an explained reason why Western Europe should help Italy against the oppression and occupation of the Austrian Empire with Victor Manuel II, and in all of them the author criticises the big lie and hypocrisy in which Britain lives. (Ref 5). The curse that Elizabeth Barrett Browning makes for Britain is the fact of writing. By writing she reaffirms herself and her ideals. The truth is in her writings. She denounces the lack of England’s interest in the old continent. Browning makes such affirmations that absolutely discredit English Government by saying that:

63 ”Yet keep calm footing all the time

64 On writhing bond-slaves...”

For her this is a crime, as abolitionist, she attacks slavery. (Ref 3)

In lines 66 to 71:

66 “Because ye prosper in God's name,
67 With a claim
68 To honour in the old world's sight,
69 Yet do the fiend's work perfectly
70 In strangling martyrs, -- for this lie
71 This is the curse. Write.”

The author attacks what England justifies with God’s will. There is a parallelism between lines 66 to 70 and the author’s contemporary history. English first puritan settlers in XVII^th century in North America conquered by justifying that that new land was their promised land, their Canaan, and for that reason they had the right to kill, destroy, castrate and take possession of everything they wanted to. For them it was all excused because everything they did was God’s will. This idea is still present in Victorian Great Britain. They reinvented history for their own purpose. For instance John Smith, William Bradford or Mary Rowlandson, became heroes through their false writings in those first attempts of imperialism by massacre. The worst thing for the author is that they still feel like the well behaved when they are actually ”the fiend” (69). (John Smith...)*

Some of the most beautiful and bitter lines are those from 72 to 78:

72 Ye shall watch while kings conspire
73 Round the people's smouldering fire,
74 And, warm for your part,
75 Shall never dare -- O shame!
76 To utter the thought into flame
77 Which burns at your heart.
78 This is the curse. Write.

The comparison is that the head of England, which is the Queen, does not care about the slow suffering of the oppression in Northern Italy by Austria. The Queen in her country remains warm and safe, avoiding confrontation, which is a shame, and that in fact what everybody thinks and feels, that is the injustice they are suffering, it is shut and hidden instead of being showed and erase it with fire.

In the lines from 93 to 99:

93 “When good men are praying erect
94 That Christ may avenge His elect
95 And deliver the earth,
96 The prayer in your ears, said low,
97 Shall sound like the tramp of a foe
98 That's driving you forth
99 This is the curse. Write.”

Barrett makes a reference to the double shaped knife that is to follow their policy and thoughts justified by God, and occupying with no real control, which is “the tramp of a foe that is driving you forth” (97-98).

From here (line 100) the critiques continues in all verses and lines linked. For the author, British men, now called “fools” that “scorn” (107-8), they only deserve to “explode with a deadlier blame” (111). In her opinion, they can keep conquering new lands, or even the “sun” (115), but the real God is witnessing and they’ll have their curse, because they are the “ill-doers” as in line 116.

From my point of view what Elizabeth Barret Browning is trying to do is to condemn what she thinks is necessary and fair. She is, at the moment of writing, in Italy. There are some reasons why she establishes there her new homeland. On one hand the natural, historical and social beauty of the country, in which she has found a place to spend with her husband, seduces her. On the other hand she is escaping from England, where the international policy of the country, the economical liberalism, industrialization and the corruption of the upper classes, are making of the nation a place in which it is very difficult to live.

Thus, from Italy, she sees how that country that has given her a place to live peacefully is about to be destroyed by a third influence which is Austria. In this hostile environment, she decided to denounce the situation and to blame the most powerful country at the time, for the events.

She expresses through her poem her report to society. She denounces three things at the same time: first, the impotence of the country in which she is living to avoid a confrontation against Austria; second, the lack of interest that her mother land, England, has towards the situation; and third, the natural right, that as a woman, has to write and express her opinions freely and showing, over all, a high quality in her writings.

REFERENCES

* Susan Glaspell, ‘Trifles’, Heinle, Stamford, 2003.

*

• John Smith, ‘The Generall Historie of Virginia’, Applewood books, Bedford, 2002
• Mary White Rowlandson, ‘Narrative Of The Captivity And Restoration Of Mrs Mary Rowlandson’, Kessinger Publishing, Whitefish, 2003.
• William Bvradford, ‘Of Plymouth Plantation’, Random House USA Inc, New York, 1998.

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http://www.poemhunter.com 19/01/06

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3 - George P. Landow. The Victorian Web: An Overview. University Scholars Program, University of Singapore. 19/04/2006. http://www.victorianweb.org 19/01/2006

4 – Wikimedia Foundation, Inc. Portada - Wikipedia, la Enciclopedia Libre. 16/04/2006

http://es.wikipedia.org, http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/A%C3%B1os_1860 19/01/06

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http://www.questia.com/library/literature/literature-of-specific-countries19/01/2006

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http://www.cswnet.com/~erin / http://www.cswnet.com/~erin/browning.htm 19/01/2006

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