ИСТИНА

The aim of the paper is to contribute to the discussion of poetic digression by a reading of Robert Browning’s “The Ring and the Book” (1868). It is an explicitly subjective elaboration of a 17th century murder trial record in a form of a blank verse poem with a lyrical framing and a dramatic main part made up of a series of monologues. The question of truth lies at the core of the poem, taken in its epistemological, ethical and quasi-religious aspect: what evidence can prove a criminal fact? can this evidence be communicated discursively? can justice be restored through legal procedures or are there other ways of atoning for the wrong? My contention is, first, that Browning’s approach to “truth” is closely linked to the idea of “digression” in the sense of Romantic irony and is identified with “obliquity”, “mediation” and non-verbal communication (XII, 855-863). Second, irony is considered a positive artistic value with a potential for reconciling conflicting forces. Third, reaching the truth indirectly is the constitutive principle of the poem that accounts for complex relations between the dramatis personae, the lyrical self and its audience