autifully and vividly
brought before us, being of secondary importance. The "adventure," as it
has been said, is the amber in which Browning has embalmed the
_Alkestis_. The play itself is rendered in what is rather an
interpretation than a translation; an interpretation conceived in the
spirit of the motto taken from Mrs. Browning's _Wine of Cyprus_:--

"Our Euripides, the human,
With his droppings of warm tears,
And his touches of things common
Till they rose to touch the spheres."

Browning has no sympathy with those who impute to Euripides a sophistic
rather than a pathetic intention; and it is conceivable that the "task"
which Lady Cowper imposed upon him was to show, by some such method of
translation and interpretation, the warm humanity, deep pathos, right
construction and genuine truth to nature of the drama. With this end in
view, Browning has woven the thread of the play into a sort of connected
narrative, translating, with almost uniform literalness of language, the
whole of the play as it was written by Euripides, but connecting it by
comments, explanations, hints and suggestions; analyzing whatever may
seem not easily to be apprehended, or not unlikely to be misapprehended;
bringing out by a touch or a word some delicate shade of meaning, some
subtle fineness of idea or intention.[42] A more creative piece of
criticism can hardly be found, not merely in poetry, but even in prose.
Perhaps it shares in some degree the splendid fault of creative
criticism by occasionally lending, not finding, the noble qualities
which we are certainly made to see in the work itself.

The translation, though not literal in form, is literal in substance,
and it is rendered into careful and expressive blank verse. Owing to the
scheme on which it is constructed, the choruses could not be rendered
into lyrical verse; while, for the same reason, a few passages here and
there are omitted, or only indicated by a word or so in passing. The
omitted passages are very few in number; but it is not always easy to
see why they should have been omitted.[43] Browning's canon of
translation is "to be literal at every cost save that of absolute
violence to our language," and here, certainly, he has observed his
rule. Notwithstanding the greater difficulty of the metrical form, and
the far greater temptation to "brighten up" a version by the use of
paraphrastic but sonorous effects, it is improbable that any prose