Current work on speech pragmatics and visual thinking calls for
a radical reassessment of the problem of obscurity or difficulty
in Robert Browning’s work. In this innovative study, Bailey
reinterprets Browning''s life and work in the context of
contemporary theories of language and attention, drawn from the
cognitive sciences. Specifically, new readings of under-examined
historical sources show the extent to which Browning’s cognitive
and perceptual worlds differed from the norm, aligning him with
Victorians like Sir Francis Galton or fellow-artist William
Wetmore Story. Exploring how perceptual biases are transformed
in the language of the poems, Bailey demonstrates how the
cognitive sciences can ground a new biographical practice,
drawing attention to such matters as the creative process and
the ethics of understanding individuals who think differently.
In doing so, she re-energizes debates about this unusual
Victorian poet, his later works, and the nature of literary
style.