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From the previous Eduqas anthology
This page was written for the Eduqas anthology that was examined for the last time in summer 2026. The anthology Eduqas examines from summer 2027 does not include Sonnet 43. Pearson Edexcel GCSE sets it, in Relationships.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning · Previous Eduqas anthology, to 2026
Eduqas, to 202610 questions available at this level
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
EBB was one of the most famous Victorian poets. She suffered from chronic illness from her teenage years and was largely confined to her father's house in London. She published her first collection at 14 and was considered for Poet Laureate after Wordsworth's death.
In 1845, EBB began an exchange of letters with the younger poet Robert Browning. They fell in love through correspondence. Her father forbade her to marry, so they eloped to Italy in 1846. They had a happy 15-year marriage until EBB's death in 1861.
"Sonnet 43" (also called "How do I love thee?") is the penultimate poem in EBB's sonnet sequence Sonnets from the Portuguese. The title was a private joke - Robert called her his "little Portuguese". The 44 sonnets trace the development of her love for Robert.
EBB writes in the tradition of Petrarch, the 14th-century Italian poet whose sonnets to "Laura" defined love poetry for centuries. By using this form, she places her love within a long tradition of literary romance - but as a woman writing to a beloved man, she reverses the conventional gender roles.
EBB lived through a period of crisis in Victorian religious belief. The line "my lost saints" suggests she had experienced doubt or loss of faith. Her love for Robert restores spiritual experience - love becomes religion.
For centuries, sonnets had been written BY men ABOUT women. EBB writes as a woman declaring love TO a man. This was unusual and powerful. She claims for herself the same right to passionate, articulate love that male poets had always taken.
“How do I love thee? Let me count the ways”
One of the most famous opening lines in English poetry. The rhetorical question is direct and intimate. "Count the ways" suggests love can be itemised - but the rest of the poem shows it cannot. The speaker tries to measure something immeasurable.
“I love thee to the depth and breadth and height / My soul can reach”
The speaker uses spatial dimensions - "depth and breadth and height" - to measure love. The tricolon creates a sense of total coverage. But these are also the dimensions her SOUL can reach, suggesting love is spiritual as well as physical. The scale is cosmic.
“For the ends of Being and ideal Grace”
"Ends of Being" - the limits of existence itself. "Ideal Grace" - perfect divine grace, the highest spiritual concept. The speaker compares her love to a soul reaching toward God. Love has theological scale.
“I love thee to the level of every day's / Most quiet need”
After the cosmic scale, the poem moves to the domestic. Love is also "everyday" and "quiet" - not just grand passion but daily companionship. The shift from universal to intimate is deeply moving. Love must operate at all scales.
“I love thee freely, as men strive for Right; / I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise”
Two parallel similes. Love is "free" (not coerced) like political struggle for justice. Love is "pure" (not selfish) like those who reject vanity. EBB compares love to noble moral pursuits. Love is not separate from ethics but a form of ethical commitment.
“I love thee with the passion put to use / In my old griefs”
The speaker reveals personal history. The intense emotions of past sufferings are now redirected into love. Pain has become passion. This makes the love feel earned, not naive - it carries the weight of past experience.
“I love thee with a love I seemed to lose / With my lost saints”
A confession of past spiritual loss. The speaker had lost her saints - her religious faith or sacred figures. She thought she had lost the capacity for that kind of devotion. But Robert's love has restored it. Love replaces religion - or completes it.
“I shall but love thee better after death”
The closing line is an extraordinary promise. Love does not end at death - it intensifies. The speaker rejects mortality as a limit on love. This is the most romantic possible declaration: love is eternal, beyond physical existence.
“I love thee ... I love thee ... I love thee”
The phrase "I love thee" repeats throughout the poem, creating an incantatory rhythm. The repetition builds emotional intensity and gives the poem the quality of a prayer or vow. Each repetition adds a new dimension of love.
“depth and breadth and height”
Three spatial dimensions create a sense of total coverage. The tricolon makes love feel measurable, even as it claims to exceed measurement. The list captures the speaker's attempt to articulate the inexpressible.
“soul ... ideal Grace ... my lost saints ... if God choose”
The poem is saturated with religious language. Love becomes a spiritual experience, equivalent to faith. The speaker's past religious doubt is transformed into a new kind of devotion - to her beloved.
[Traditional Petrarchan sonnet]
The 14-line Petrarchan form gives the poem dignity and places it in centuries of love poetry tradition. The strict form contains and shapes the overflowing emotion. The contrast between formal control and passionate content creates power.
“I love thee with the passion put to use / In my old griefs”
The traditional turn at line 9 shifts the poem from public, abstract dimensions of love to personal, confessional ones. The speaker reveals her past suffering and lost faith. The volta makes the poem feel deeply personal.
“as men strive for Right ... as they turn from Praise”
The similes compare love to noble moral pursuits - political struggle and humility. Love is not separate from ethics but a form of ethical commitment. The comparisons elevate love to the status of moral virtue.
“I LOVE thee FREEly, AS men STRIVE for RIGHT”
The regular metre creates a steady, prayer-like rhythm. The iambic pulse mirrors a heartbeat, making the poem feel both controlled and deeply alive. The rhythm carries the reader smoothly through emotional intensity.
Other pages written for the same anthology, to compare it with.
John Keats
Both poems use rich, sensual language to celebrate something precious. Keats celebrates a season; EBB celebrates love. Both use the lyric tradition to express deeply felt emotion in formal poetic structures.
Rupert Brooke
Both are sonnets about devotion. EBB declares total love for a person; Brooke declares total love for a country. Both use the sonnet form to express absolute commitment.
Percy Bysshe Shelley
Both are sonnets that use the form for very different purposes. Shelley's sonnet shows the limits of human power; EBB's sonnet claims that love transcends all limits. A perfect contrast in what the form can do.