Robert Browning's "Sordello," published in 1840, is a narrative poem about a 13th-century troubadour, known for its complexity and obscure setting. Initially poorly received, the poem was later championed by critics like Ezra Pound and Algernon Swinburne.
Robert Browning's "Sordello," published in 1840, is a narrative poem about a 13th-century troubadour, known for its complexity and obscure setting. Initially poorly received, the poem was later championed by critics like Ezra Pound and Algernon Swinburne.
Front | Sordello |
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Back | Sordello is a narrative poem by the English poet Robert Browning. Worked on for seven years, and largely written between 1836 and 1840, it was published in March 1840. It consists of a fictionalised version of the life of Sordello da Goito, a 13th-century Lombard troubadour depicted in Canto VI of Dante Alighieri's Purgatorio. Quick facts: Author, Country … Convoluted and obscure, its difficulties increased by its unfamiliar setting, Sordello is notorious as one of the hardest poems in English literature. It was harshly received at the time of its publication: Tennyson's opinion was recorded thus by William Sharp in his biography of Browning: Lord Tennyson manfully tackled it, but he is reported to have admitted in bitterness of spirit: "There were only two lines in it that I understood, and they were both lies; they were the opening and closing lines, 'Who will may hear Sordello's story told,' and 'Who would has heard Sordello's story told!'". The poem was, however, championed decades later by Algernon Swinburne and Ezra Pound. Plot summary The setting is northern Italy in the 1220s, dominated by the struggle between the Guelphs (partisans of the Pope) and the Ghibellines (partisans of the Holy Roman Emperor). Sordello is a Ghibelline, like his lord Ecelin II da Romano, and the soldier Taurello. |
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