Following the critical and commercial failure of Men and Women, Robert Browning seems to have taken a lengthy break from the business of writing poetry, occupying himself by dabbling in drawing and clay-modelling. There is, however, evidence of a return to poetic activity during the winter of 1859–60, a winter the Brownings spent at Rome to help Elizabeth convalesce after she had been ‘dangerously ill’ the previous summer. 1 In a letter of 18 May 1860, Elizabeth noted that Robert was working on a ‘long poem’ that she had not seen, and on a number of ‘shorter lyrics’, which she declared ‘worthy of him’. 2 These poems were, no doubt, intended...