Aurora Leigh
By Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Cover: Aurora Leigh (1904), oil on canvas by John White Alexander (1856-1915) · Wikimedia Commons · Public domain (artist died 1915)
Aurora Leigh, an orphan raised in Italy and England, refuses her cousin Romney's offer of marriage so that she can be a poet, and the novel in blank verse follows her to London and Paris and back to Florence. In nine books it argues about art, women's work and social reform.
Summary written with Claude Sonnet 5.5.