This account of Robert Browning's literary development is scrupulously researched and annotated and contains previously unpublished material. It is an indispensable aid to those who are engaged in research on Browning. Those who love Browning will also find it accessible enough to augment their appreciation of his work.

The genius of Mark Twain is that his work is still enjoyable, and funny, to this day. This book, originally published in 1871, is Twain's account of his journey from Missouri to Hawaii (called the Sandwich Islands in his day). He tells story after story of his adventures along the way, starting with the stagecoach ride on the Overland Stage Line to Carson City, Nevada, around 1861, and then telling of his stay in Nevada, then California, then his visit to Hawaii. The stories are informative, humorous, and all-around entertaining. He lampoons everybody he can--nobody is safe--including miners, pioneers (emigrants), politicians, Mormons, Blacks, American Indians, Chinese, newspaper reporters, "desperados", even himself on more than one occasion. Sometimes his stories are so outrageous that you wonder how much is true and how much is embellishment, or just outright fiction. Even he understands this by telling the reader on occasion that he has not made up a particular story, to demonstrate that truth is often stranger than fiction, but also to imply that he has taken liberties in other places in the book. (I wonder if the Mormon Church has ever banned this book for the things he says about them.) Even while he is being irreverent, however, he often demonstrates a sensitivity toward people, with an awareness of the situation of others that seems to me to be ahead of his time. For example, he has a chapter on the immigrant Chinese population in the West, and while he pokes fun at them in some respects, he spends the time detailing their lives and culture, as much as he could understand it, with a respect that was uncommon in his day.

I bought a copy of this book years ago because I am a native Californian, and knew that there was some material in here about California in the early days (my copy is an old hardcover published by Grosset and Dunlap). As Twain states in his Prefatory: "...There is quite a good deal of information in this book. I regret this very much, but really it could not be helped." I enjoyed reading about the "old West" from an eye-witness, although most of it deals with Nevada, not California. While some of it sounded familiar, like something from any Western-genre movie, other things were like nothing I had ever heard of before, describing the "Wild West" from an original point of view. In that respect, this book is a great resource.

This book falls short of five stars due to some minor flaws. He often digresses with text that is not only marginal to the point, but not even written by him, reprinting someone else's text. I skipped over some of that. He would also spend pages detailing coversations between other people that he could not have possibly remembered verbatim. While I understand that it was a common writing style of his day, it sounds like bad jounalism today. Those complaints aside, this is some great writing by Twain and some valuable American history.

Twain's escapades in the West make fascinating reading. His encounters with the Mormons in Utah are particularly interesting. Anyone afflicted with Mormon missionaries on his or her doorstep ought to bring out a copy of this book and read aloud the chapter in which Twain discusses the absurd Book of Mormon. Nobody can match Twain in skewering foolishness and pomposity dressed up as religion.

A long-time fan of Mark Twain, I had still managed to make it past my fortieth birthday never having read this book. But recently, when I needed something to read (you know the kind of days I am talking about), I stumbled across this book and set to laughing.

The story-telling is magnificent. Few writers can take the small things of daily life and make them breathe -- but Twain possessed that gift, and uses it well. How many others went West the same time he did, and never saw the gold dust, sunsets, and taverns the way he wrote them into our consciousness?

And yet, and yet... As much as I loved the stories he told, I see "Roughing It" as important in a different manner. Even when the truth is slightly embellished to make us, his readers (of whom he is always very much aware), laugh out loud, it still truly presents the era and place he put down in black and white. We can be so bombarded with romanticized movies about the gold rush and settlers heading West, that we lose sight of them as genuine people with the same faults and virtues we know in 2001.

But with Mark Twain's keen eye, our history -- our American history -- comes to life. And suddenly, we "get it", we comprehend that all that stuff we had to learn in high school was done by people, not daguerrotypes.

I have started to read a bit on Browning and decided to get an idea of his poetry. Given the price of this book, this was a good choice.

Browning covered a lot of ideas, and all are written very intelligently. Reading through this book though, may cause you to scratch your head. If you read it, enjoy each selection rather than try to read straight through.

This is what I mean by the arrangement; I poem on the killing of a loved one (Porphyria's Lover) precedes the Pied Piper of Hamelin. The jump in ideas can slow you down a bit. The arrangement is logical in that the editors printed the poems in groups according to the collection they were originally published in. These collections, in turn, are arranged in chronological order. This is good because you can watch Browning's work as time progresses.

There are 42 poems in this selection. It does include the great ones (I will abbreviate titles) like Andrea del Sarto, Caliban upon Setebos, Karshish, Childe Roland, My Last Duchess, Fra Lippo Lippi, The Bishop Orders His Tomb, Johannes Agricola, and others.

I would recommend this book for reflecting on the occasional work of a great poet.

Robert Browning is a treat, especially to read out loud. This book includes "My Last Duchess," of course, and some great poems like "The Bishop Ordering His Tomb" and "Fra Lippo Lippi." I like to think of Robert Browning as the first poet of the twentieth century since he really can't be put in a box with Tennyson or other popular poets of his own time. Also, he had a big influence on Ezra Pound who, in turn, had a big influence on many popular poets today.

Dover Thrift Editions are surprisingly well-constructed - they'll outlast, say, your Oxford World Classics paperbacks - and the poetry is usually very well selected. Oh...and they're cheap!

Robert Browning's poetyr is more difficult than his contmeporaries, arnold and tennyson (the lower-cases are intentional) and much better. Reading "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came" makes one wonder why Kafka was so uplifting, yet the same poet also writes such charming verse for shildren as "The Pied Piper of Hamlin". A marvelous book!

The romantic story of 2 poets who fell in love at mid-life, married, escaped to Italy, and lived happily for 15 years until Elizabeth's death. The author discusses the lives of the poets amongst their friends, acquaintances, other writers, & artists in Italy where living was less expensive and the climate more favorable. There are many cute stories about their son Pen and how the couple disagreed over various aspects of his unbringing. Also touched upon are the previous generations of both the Barretts and the Brownings and their history in Jamaica. Besides learning about the the Brownings, this book gives you a good feel of what life was like in the middle 19th century. Lots of B&W illustrations throughout the book.

A wonderful biography of a marriage between two genius poets, Dared and Done drew me in with such force and speed that I was almost glad of being ill myself so as to have an excuse to stay in bed and finish it. Markus has managed to convey her own excitement at relating such an intriguing story and did what a good author should do - made me want to delve into these poets' lives and their poetry even more.

Some of the speculation I did not agree with such as EBB's father not wanting his children to marry because of possible African blood. The birth of Pen Browning should have eradicated that concern. We may never understand the strange, cruel elder Barrett and fortunately, Dared and Done doesn't hinge on the theory. I did want to know more about the conniving Sophia Eckley - her cause of death for example, since she played such a huge role in the Browning marriage. I was also curious about EBB's illness - oddly, we never do get a diagnosis - only her maintenance cure of morphine and ether.

Remarkably, EBB had the greater reputation as a poet during the Barrett-Browning marriage with Robert Browning for many years being considered the lesser poet. That can make for trouble in the most loving of marriages and re-witnessing the devotion these two gifted poets demonstrated repeatedly is both exceptional and inspiring.

The Brownings hold a special place in my world, especially EBB. "Sonnets From The Portuguese" speaks with the eloquence, dignity and passion of the human ideal behind the flaws and veils of life and lovers (both RB and EBB's poetry are available on disc). Especially the last ten sonnets. EBB wrote not only about love and lovers, but about the human condition. She lived an insulated life yet was by nature a worldly and sophisticated soul. RB struggled with his inability to support his family, living off of EBB's inheritance annuity. Through this biography I was better able to appreciate his humaness and struggle, though I am still inclined toward EBB and her poetry. They were the sum of many contradictions, the big one being that they were so English (formal and proper) yet Bohemian in their liberal thinking. Both lovers and artists in the same household, in the same relationship, in the same struggle to survive and create (they do remind me of John Lennon and Yoko Ono's struggle and life together). While the book probably told the whole story, at least as much as a biographer can research and reveal, I still felt something lacking. I wanted the story to go on a little longer, a little deeper. I knew quite a bit about EBB before I began the book, I learned much more about her heritage and conflicts by reading this biography. My appreciation is much greater. It's a shame that we Moderns let so much of our heritage lay dormat (literaturewise) in the vaults of the "old days". To sip and savour the lives and poetry of the past is something we should cherish and celebrate. This book points in that direction. I strongly recommend this to all lovers of RB & EBB and poetry.

As with other titles in this fine series, the poems are presented in roughly chronological order, and are interspersed with a running narrative of the poet's life. Vivid readings are delivered by actors and actresses.

Browning is an excellent lyric poet (e.g. Meeting at Night/Parting at Daylight) but he was best known for his dramatic monologues. The recording emphasizes the monologues, which is good because I doubt I would have ever read them otherwise. The downside is that some of the monologues, especially those Browning wrote later in his career, seem to drag on, with the general idea of a "befuddled narrator attempting to sweet-talk a highly skeptical lover/policeman/critic" (hence 4 stars instead of 5). I expect I'll be listening mostly to the first of the two tapes. Incidentally "The Pied Piper of Hamelin" children's verse is included and is well done.

Most of the earlier poems appear in the Dover thrift edition of Browning's work (for a buck!). I find it easier to concentrate when I can read the poems while listening.

One of the best ways of internalizing a poem is to *hear* it, and this is especially true of classics. This audio presentation of selected poems by Browning is a great way for those familiar with his work to rediscover the poems' daring and mischievousness. The audio format is particularly apt for Browning in that it brings to life his use of dramatic monlogue. In that way, it can also serve as a good study aid for students who are new to Browning.

This book is part of the Routledge Author Guides and was published in the early 1970s.

The book is divided into decades of his life. Each chapter covers a new decade and the work he published in that time. There is also a chapter to provide context on his life, and another chapter on Browning's influence with modern poets.

Every poem or play is not covered. Gridley covers the major works and collections, although mentions many others. His primary aim is to show the reader/scholar how Brownings work was changing during his life. The author gives you commentary for nineteenth century critics and other writers of the time.

Although not a biography, there is some basic information on Brownings life. This is primarily to give some context to the poetry he was writing.

This is not a difficult read for the scholar. There will be lots of names mentioned (like Chesterton, Lyell, Tennyson) and occurences (like the repeal of the corporation acts) which would require some background to fully understand. It is not indepth, so if the reader has an encyclopedia handy, this will be no problem at all.

Gridley does go into some of the major works. I found his coverage of "The Ring and the Book" to be helpful.

I would recommend this book to others wanting to better understand one of the most influential poets from the nineteenth century.

A complete and thorough 453 page history of the events along the coast and inland water ways of North Carolina and Virginia during the American Civil War. Browning provides an in-depth discussion of the logistics, tactics and strategy of the North Atlantic Blockading Squadron, which played a very important and often overlooked role during the Civil War. Its successes benefitted the efforts of the Union's Army of the Potomac and adversely affected the operations of Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. There is also a succinct explanation of the campaign to capture Wilmington, North Carolina and the broader effects that campaign had on Lee's army. Eight maps, fourteen illustrations and over a hundred pages of notes and bibliography augment the text.

Justinian and Theodora is a good book with lots of information. I personally think it should have more about Justinian's early life. It's also just a tad bit confusing at times. Other than that, though, it's a great source for information on not only Justinian and Theodora, but also other well-known and not-so-well-known characters of ancient Rome such as Anastasius, Belisarius, and many others. You would do well to read this narrative if you need information on Justinian and/or Theodora, or are just interested in ancient Rome.

Browning is one of the great poets. this selection contains poems such as 'the last dutchess', 'porphyria's lover' and 'childe roland to the dark tower came' which shows browning at his best. this selected poems only whetted my appetite for a complete version.