“Natural Evolution” in “Dramatic Essences” from Robert Browning to T. S. Eliot

A consciously modern critic, in a review of 14 May 1920 in the Athenaeum, recommended that for the twentieth century poet “the natural evolution would be to proceed in the direction indicated by Browning; to distil the dramatic essences, if we can, and infuse them into some other liquor.” Since, in this critic's eyes, Browning “invented the dramatic monologue,” a form responsive to the demands of the English dramatic tradition, Browning's poetry was taken as indicating a direction which modern poets should follow. And, later in the review, the critic implied that Browning's work on “a kind of dramatic form” prepared the reading public to respond to the works of the dramatic poets who follow – himself included. The critic was T. S. Eliot.