ABSTRACT
One of the effects of the development of feminist scholarship within Victorian studies in the last quarter of the twentieth century was to restore critical interest in Elizabeth Barrett Browning's unique long poem Aurora Leigh. Barrett Browning, who shared tutors with her brother Edward, began to study Greek at the age of 11 and was well acquainted with classical epic traditions. She started working on Aurora Leigh in 1853, and the poem appeared in November 1856. Nevertheless, Barrett Browning's representations of masculinity in the poem are complex and distinctive, particularly in her portrayal of the character Romney Leigh. It is useful to place Romney's extraordinary masculinity in the larger context of gender issues implicit in the poem. The complex masculinity of Romney is especially apparent in his role as male 'hero'. Masculinity is in fact idealized, as suggested earlier, in a kind of gender reversal.
