Publisher's Synopsis
Mr. Holland has here done a great service at once to Mr. Browning's fame and to the public. In view of the general reader he has adopted the most efficient form of interpretation applicable to a poet whose greater efforts are essentially dramatic in character, though often hardly dramatic in form. The works dealt with are 'Strafford," "Sordello," 'Luria, ' 'The Adventures of Balaustion," "A Blot in the Scutcheon, ' 'The Ring and the Book," ' Passes, ' 'The Return of the Druses," and "Colombe's Birthday. Mr. Holland in all cases has put himself en rapport with his author, and has picturesquely presented the outline of facts in which Mr. Browning has built up his masterpieces. And he has been most successful precisely where his task was likely to prove most difficult. The story of 'Sordello" and 'The Ring and the Book" leave nothing to be desired-as stories there are touches which for simplicity and grace bespeak something of real imagination on the part of the writer. Notably is this the case too in "Luria" and 'Balaustion." But we fear that the reading of these tales will be a disappointing introduction to the originals for all who are indisposed to welcome qualities which have, and can have, no reflection here, in which lie the differentiae of Mr. Browning's genius. Mr. Browning is not like Shakespeare, the story of whose dramas are really the outlines of the dramas: with Mr. Browning the facts are merely starting-points for psychological analysis and suggestion, in which Mr. Browning figures as a speculator not only on the events and characters, but on their inner history, which needs a constant reference to his own....--The British Quarterly Review, Volume
