Murder
mystery
intrigue
All describe Robert Browning's poem, "My Last Duchess." From the speakers indirect allusions to the death of his wife the reader might easily think that the speaker is a bit crazy and committed a vengeful crime out of jealousy. His flowery speech confuses and disguises any possible motives; however, the mystery is left unsolved. Based on the poem's style and structure, it becomes evident that even if the speaker did not directly kill his wife, he certainly had something to hide.
This poem is about a powerful Duke, and his beautiful, flirtatious wife who has two different personalities, one that was reality and the other was the lady in the painting. The duke comes off as being very possessive. "Never to stoop. Oh sir, she smiled, no doubt,/ Whene'er I passed her; but who passed without/ much the same smile?" (43-45). I believe this being said, the duke is over examining things, the smile can simply come off as simply being a nice person, but to duke sees it in a different light. He views it as being flirtatious.
The poem begins and ends with him mourning the loss of his deceased Duchess, but from the way that the mighty Duke speaks, he knows more about
her death than he leads us to believe. The Duke chooses his word very carefully, when he talks to his friend about the painting of his wife. He only drops small hints, to his friend about the death of his Duchess. "I gave commands/ then all smiles stopped together" (45-46). These lines mean that the Duke, playing a very dominant part, tells his wife to stop smiling and flirting. Being told this, she still continues on, which I believe she does not notice or see herself as being flirtatious. As a result I believe that the Duke killed his wife, or had someone to put her to her death.
As the Duke speaks of his Duchess, in the beginning, he sounds extremely
compassionate and caring towards her. The Duke had an absolute love for his
Duchess as most husbands and wives do. He sounded so proud of her and the
beauty that she posed: almost like she was a trophy. Despite all of the pride and excitement that he showed towards her, there was an element of distrust that lingered inside of his mind.
The death of the female beloved is the only way deemed possible by the insecure, possessive male to seize her undivided attention. This beloved woman represents the "reflector and guarantor of male identity. Hence, the male anxiety about the woman's independence for her liberty puts his masculine self-estimation at risk" (Maxwell 29). The jealous and controlling males in Robert Browning's "Porphyria's Lover" and "My Last Duchess" possess a fervent desire to fix and monopolize their unconstrained female beloveds. Due to a fear of death, both speakers attempt to achieve control and deny object loss; by turning their lovers (once subjects) into objects, they ultimately attain the role of masterful subject.
When people finally see the flaws, they wake up and the dream ends.” Robert Browning’s “My Last Duchess” is a haunting poem that tells the story of a seemingly perfect wife who dies, and is immortalized in a picture by her kind and loving husband. This seems to be the perfect family for a tragic accident. Upon further investigation and dissection of the poem, we discover the imperfections and this perfect “dream family” is shown for what it really is, a relationship without trust. The deceased wife appeared to be completely perfect and caring.
led her to neglect her son at the end of ‘I’m the king of the castle’,
over his wife as he refers to her as a belonging; it also shows that
may not be all that he claims to be- the use of the word ‘My’ is very
of her. He is proud of her looks but is concerned that it will attract
It goes on to speak about sympathy in general and how Browning “delighted in making a case for the apparently immoral position”, how he found dramatic monologues the best form to do so, and how he went about it. It keeps going for a couple more pages on things which I will not go into because they have little relevance to any interpretation of “My Last Duchess”.
and ease the pain of his loss. The poem can also suggest to us that at
Comparing Robert Browning's Dramatic Monologues My Last Duchess and The Laboratory Robert Browning was a Victorian poet who lived from 1812-1889. He mainly wrote dramatic monologues, this means you must have a speaker and a listener. Both "My Last Duchess" and "The Laboratory" were published in 1845. "My Last Duchess" was set in the Italian Renaissance and during that time to own large life size painting was a show of wealth. "My Last Duchess" was written in a time when women were to hold their husbands and everything that he did with the maximum respect and show little or no emotion towards anyone else. "
Another aspect of the duke’s character addressed in the poem is his condescending attitude. Two times in the poem the duke needlessly told the names of the artists who created the masterpieces that he owned (lines 3 & 56). He felt superiority over the emissary he was speaking to by dropping these names. The duke addressed the emissary as a “never read stranger'; (line 6). Not only was it patronizing for the duke to call him a stranger, but he called him unintelligent too.
The Speaker in ‘My Last Duchess’ is conversing with the servant of a count whose daughter he is proposing to marry. He treats t...
The character of this poem, right from the beginning feels a sadness that comes from the inner struggle between what society depicts as "should" and what a person really feels, "I feel a nameless sadness o'er me roll,/ yes, yes, we know that we can jest,/ we know we, we know that we can smile!/ But there's a something in this breast/ to which thy light words bring no rest." (3-7) There is the beginning sense here that he is starting to see conflict within himself, first characterized by his emotions.
In "My Last Duchess", by Robert Browning, the character of Duke is portrayed as having controlling, jealous, and arrogant traits. These traits are not all mentioned verbally, but mainly through his actions. In the beginning of the poem the painting of the Dukes wife is introduced to us: "That's my last Duchess painted on the wall,/ looking as of she were still alive" (1-2). These lines leave us with the suspicion that the Duchess is no longer alive, but at this point were are not totally sure. In this essay I will discuss the Dukes controlling, jealous and arrogant traits he possesses through out the poem.
Throughout "My Last Duchess," Browning uses diction to further increase the haunting effect of his dramatic monologue. His precise and scattered word choice is meant to make the reader recognize the underlying haughtiness in his speech to the Count's emissary. The Duke refers to his former wife's portraits "depth" and "passion" in order to place a cloudiness over the realism of the painting. This, along with the "faint" and "half-flush" appearance that "dies along her throat," brings about an overcast appearance to the poem. The Duke's "trifling" lack of "countenance" is evident in his jealousy of
has a listener within the poem, but the reader of the poem is also one