Integration And Innovation: The Poetics Of Aurora Leigh In European Cultural Context

Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Aurora Leigh extends beyond the traditional track that meanders along the patrilineal inheritance of the Classical and Romantic poets,heading for a nexus of fearless and impetuous representation of literature filled with “attainable perfection” and “sublime of virtue” which interfuse substantial production of “a symbolic allegory of the poet's spiritual and imaginative growth”.The creative power of Aurora Leigh manifests the glamour of blended styles that underlies the rise of individual inspiration and an organic composition of mind,which could be engaged with Aurora's georgic-motivated fashion and divinely inspired philanthropy—the common humanity.Mainly guided by New Criticism and Cultural Poetics,this thesis will concentrate on the multiple identity of Aurora Leigh and set out for an exploration into how Elizabeth Barrett Browning integrates the Feminist poetic concepts into her poetry to construct a world of her own through Aurora's excursion and artistic insights.The first chapter focuses on the European tradition of classics and epics combined with a research into Elizabeth Barrett Browning's self acquisition of classical languages and translation of ancient Greek works.To grasp the precise meaning of “female Homer”,interpretations on the genre,allusions,and the theme of Aurora Leigh are provided.The second chapter discusses the relation between Aurora Leigh and the preceding British Romanticism in the style of “a poetic revision”.In parallel with Wordsworth's autobiographical epic The Prelude,a distinctive style of poetry and its cultural meanings are revealed to develop with Elizabeth Barrett Browning's perception of the poet.Chapter three moves further to more sophisticated readings of Aurora Leigh,dealing with her varied roles that explicate the connection between female writings and social reality.As the reading traces back to the kernel of understanding poets and their writings,Aurora is proved to realize her unfulfilled dream of a utopia in the creation of arts.As it is stated in the “Preface” that at the heart of Aurora Leigh there is a book: it is a book that Aurora sits down to write about her own stories;it is also a magnum opus that demonstrates Elizabeth Barrett Browning's “newness” in poetics.Even though harboring a dual anxiety of authorship and influence,she built an innovative structure derived from the progenitors that fostered her creativity,gradually changing herself from the role of a daughter in the house of the literary fathers into a grandmother whom she had been looking for everywhere but found none.Further indications of Aurora's achievement in the unification of a mother and a poet come with more remarks on domestic duties and paid labour that offer an explanatory scheme for female writings and feminist studies.Based on these,this thesis aims to provide new ideas for the feminist poetics of Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Aurora Leigh,hoping to make some contribution,however small,to poetic and cultural studies of the Victorian period.