Undisciplining Elizabeth Barrett Browning Dashboard
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"Destruction of the Roehampton Estate," Adolphe Duperly (1833); Portrait of Elizabeth Barrett Browning from The Poetical Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (London, 1889-90)
Throughout her life, the poetry of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (hereafter EBB) critiqued not only American slavery but also European complicity in the slave trade. From her juvenilia, represented in the unpublished “The African” (early 1820s) to her more mature pieces, such as the anonymously published "The Appeal" (1833), “The Runaway Slave of Pilgrim’s Point” (1848), “Hiram Powers’ Greek Slave” (1850), and “A Curse for a Nation” (1856), EBB’s work is particularly notable for centering the experiences and voices of enslaved people themselves and drawing attention to their objectification and oppression. This COVE edition seeks to explore the nuances of such power relations, seen in both the dynamics of EBB, a white woman descended from a plantation-owning family, writing about the plight of enslaved people, and the broader system of racial inequity that persists into the present.
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Richard Barrett (1789-1839) was a cousin of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's father Edward Barrett Moulton Barrett. Richard Barrett was a prominent political figure for much of his life, speaking in parliament on behalf of the Jamaican legislature on matters concerning emancipation. Though he was himself the owner of two sugar plantations in St. James, he had a reputation for nonviolence towards the enslaved people who worked on the family's land, a point potentially supported by the sparing of at least two of the Barrett family's plantation houses, Greenwood Great House and Cinnamon Hill, during the 1831 slave uprisings. Barrett shared this story of a runaway slave with a young EBB, who then used it as the inspiration for her narrative poem, "The African."... more
Elizabeth Barrett Browning's original manuscript of "The African" was completed in the early 1820s when EBB was in her early teens. Inspiration for the narrative poem came from her cousin, Richard Barrett, who owned sugar plantations in Jamaica. EBB kept Barrett's written account of an escaped slave, originally named Copperbottom, but altered the tone of the story significantly in her version.
Material sourced from Baylor's Armstrong Browning Library.
This map includes paratextual information about significant places that help to illuminate and contextualize Elizabeth Barrett Browning's anti-slavery poetry. Charting these locations situates EBB's work within the larger, globalized framework of her own family history, drawing direct connections to their centuries-long standing as wealthy plantation owners in the West Indies.
This timeline tracks key events in the life of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, her anti-slavery poetry, and the fight for abolition across the British Empire. In doing so, it contextualizes EBB and her work within the scope of British sociopolitics, charting historical moments of overlap and divergence between the two.
Individual Entries
One of several great houses owned by the Barrett family in Jamaica. [Expand with image, history, and contextual information]