He studied the Middle Age carefully, not for its picturesque externals,
its feudalisms, chivalries, and the like; but because he found it a rich
quarry of spiritual monstrosities, strange outcroppings of fanaticism,
superstition, and moral and mental distortion of all shapes. It
furnished him especially with a great variety of ecclesiastical types,
such as are painted in _Fra Lippo Lippi, The Heretic's Tragedy,_ and
_The Bishop Orders his Tomb in St. Praxed's Church._
Browning's dramatic instinct always attracted him to the stage. His
tragedy, _Strafford_ (1837), was written for Macready, and put on at
Covent Garden Theater, but without pronounced success. He wrote many
fine dramatic poems, like _Pippa Passes, Colombe's Birthday_, and _In a
Balcony_; and at least two good acting plays, _Luria_ and _A Blot in the
Scutcheon._ The last named has recently been given to the American
public, with Lawrence Barrett's careful and intelligent presentation of
the leading role. The motive of the tragedy is somewhat strained and
fantastic, but it is, notwithstanding, very effective on the stage. It
gives one an unwonted thrill to listen to a play, by a contemporary
English writer, which is really literature. One gets a faint idea of
what it must have been to assist at the first night of _Hamlet_.
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