ABSTRACT
Miss Barrett evidently read and admired Donne before she met Robert Browning in 1845. She owned a copy of the 1639 edition of Donne' s poems and herself inscribed it on the fly leaf 'Elizabeth B. Barrett, from her very dear Stormie'; it was sold for £7 at Sotheby's in 1913 as part of 'The Browning Collections' (see Sales Catalogues of Libraries of Eminent Persons, vi, ed. J. Woolford, 1972, p. 121). Her references to Donne, reproduced below, suggest that at this time she took a romantic view of his writings.
