The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-10-10
THE YELLED PHILOSOPHER,
Robert browning.

the same age and for over fifty years con-
temporaries. For forty OF these years
Browning was almost wholly neglected and
Tennyson had it all his own way. Even to-
day Tennyson is quoted twenty times to
Browning's once. Tennyson's marvelously
clear and perfect art gave him an immense
popularity. But within the last fifteen years
this popularity has been distinctly on the
wane. His pessimism and quavering faith
and the elegant trifes to which heNgave so
much attention have had much to do with
this growing dsfavor Within the last ten
years Browning has so grown in popularity
that he now completely eclipses his great
rival, and this is so Notwithstanding the
formers uncouth style, bizarre words and
lack Of clearness. We have another instruc-
tive parallel Of an unpopular poet growing
in favor. At the beginning of this century
Wordsworth for nearly thirty years was
totally neglected, and Byron, his contem-
porary had it all his own way. Now Byron
is almost universally forgotten and Words
worth almost universally read. Several rea-
sons can be given for this phenomena of
Tennysons decline and Brownings growth
in popular esteem. One is, Browning was
much better man every way than Tennyson.
The laureate was an aristocrat and a lord,
with no sympathy whatever for common
people. Browning, on the other hand lived
and died plain Robert Browning, one of the
great middle class, without aristocratic as
sociations, university training or wealth.
Another reason is that Browning, from
start to finish, was persistent optimist,
whose faith was never shaken, seldom
never clouded. On the other hand, Tenny-
sons pessimism and wavering, one day one
thing and the next another, has brought
with the lapse of years, its just punishment
In addition to this Browning was a very
great thinker, which Tennyson never was.
Except in I'm Memoriam," Tennyson sell
dom did any original thinking, and then not
very satisfactory at best There are no
dainty trifes in Browning. Every part of
his work bristles with splendid originality
expressed. for the most part, in obscure
rugged, repellent sentences. No one can
read his lesser poems, for example, that
upon "Old Dog Tray" without being
flushed with inspiring and novel ideas.
Then, again, the clubs have added enor-
mously to the appreciation and love of
Browning. No one ever heard of a Tenny-
son Club, while there is not city in our
land which does not boast of its Browning
Club. These clubs, after a score of years of
enthusiastic work, have let daylight into
the most of Browning's obscurities and de-
veloped a growing appetite among thinking
people for his writings. And not the least
of the reasons why Browning in few
years will, as l predict, completely SUPER
sede Tennyson, is that he married one of
the grandest women of the century, Miss
Elizabeth Barrett. She was supreme and
superb pOetess, as well as a lovely char
acter, and her influence over her husband
can be traced in a hundred ways. The world
never had seen, before this marriage, two
poets and two thinkers of the very first or
der made one flesh This union was an ideal
one, each in honor and love preferring the
other, and each to each yielding untold
mutual good.
browning has some very grave defects as
well as some transcendent merits l do him
no injustice when 1 call him the Yelled
Philosopher. His chief defect is his willfuI
perversity in clothing his great thoughts, his
uncouth words and untranslatable SEN
fences. L use the word willful advisedIy. He
is purposely obscure, as, 1 think, to gain
readers. In this respect he was much like
Thomas Carlyle. AT the beginning no one
noticed the great Scotchman until he
clothed his thoughts in a jargon which
gradually grew worse and worse, then peo-
pie read him to spite him, and the worse he
wrote the greater merit was attributed him.
The idea of Browning clubs was very sweet
to our poet and the more clubs the worse
he wrote. The usual excuse made for this
obscurity is that his sentences are too
heavily loaded with thought Why, then, in
the name of common sense, didn't he use
more words and clearer sentences? There
- no such thing as reading Browning at
sight. 1t is a noticeable fact that at first
reading even to bright mind, Brownings
higher poems are 2 ostly Choctaw. Gradually
the fog rises. And here is the proper func-
tion of the Browning club A score of bright
minds reading the same lines will discover
the meaning where ore reader could not pos
siby do it alone. Then, again. Browning is
unnecessarily verbose and diffuse The
Ring and the Book spreads out over 5000
what could easily have been expressed in
5000 lines. The most patient reader becomes
weary of this prolixity. Let me give a very
homely illustration. A cider press, at first
squeeze will yield flood of rich, toothsome
juice, but squeeze the same press the
dozenth time and the drops will come slow,
very slow, and very sour and thin. So with
Browning's tiresome and tedious longer
poems His great merit lies in and his
great reputation rests, and always will rest,
upon his short poems.
Browning's merits are very great indeed
Chiefest of them all is his vigorous and al
ways powerful thought and faith. He had a
superb intellect and had pondered all the
great problems Of the nineteenth century,