Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s deeply disturbing 1847 poem about a woman escaping slavery and killing her child was written to shock its intended white female readership to the abolitionist cause. Browning was the direct descendant of slave owners in Jamaica and a fervent anti-slavery campaigner, and her dramatic monologue presents a searing attack on the hypocrisy of ‘liberty’ as enshrined in the United States constitution. Mark and Seamus look at the origins of the poem and its story, and its place among other abolitionist narratives of the time. Mark Ford is Professor of English at University College, London, and Seamus Perry is Professor of English Literature at Balliol College, Oxford. Sign up to the Close Readings subscription to listen ad free and to all our series in full: Directly in Apple Podcasts: https://lrb.me/ppapplesignup In other podcast apps: https://lrb.me/ppsignup Read more in the LRB Matthew Bevis: Foiled by Pleasure: https://lrb.me/bevispp Alethea Hayter: Reader, I married you: https://lrb.me/hayterpp John Bayley: A Question of Breathing: https://lrb.me/bayleypp Colin Grant: Leave them weeping: https://lrb.me/grantpp Fara Dabhoiwala: My Runaway Slave, Reward Two Guineas: https://lrb.me/dabhoiwalapp Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.