Preview

Comparing 'My Last Duchess And Porphyria's Lover'

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
911 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Comparing 'My Last Duchess And Porphyria's Lover'
Different But The Same
(Comparing and contrasting My Last Duchess and Porphyria’s Lover) Robert Browning is one of the best writers when it comes to dramatic monologues. Dramatic monologue is a poem where a person is speaking to an intended audience about something that they feel strongly about. There are two questions that you ask when reading dramatic monologues they are: Who is the speaker? And who is the speaker speaking to? Robert Browning is known for some of the most influential dramatic monologues that we study today. Two of his best dramatic monologues are My Last Duchess and Porphyria's Lover which happen to have a lot of things in common and many differences. One thing Porphyria’s Lover and My Last Duchess have in common is in both poems a man is talking about killing their loved one. In the poem My Last Duchess a duke is talking to a person who is talking to him about his next wife when, he shows him this portrait of a …show more content…
There are many ways to interpret this poem many readers think that they are simply supposed to be poems about killing your loved one but, there are messages inside of them. “The actions of “Porphyria's Lover” unfolds through the recounting of the events of on night--culminating in the murder of Porphyria--by the speaker of the poem.” (Anne Marie Hacht. Vol. 15. Detroit: Gale, 2002. N. pag. Literature Resource Center.) This is telling us that guys don’t know what they are capable of doing and how far they may go. In My Last Duchess we are told of a totally different message, in this poem we are told the duke kills his duchess because she smiles to much, it's a poem of how men want all control in a relationship. “Most Critics consider the central theme of “My Last Duchess” to be an attack on the arrogance and abuse of power on the part of the aristocracy.” (Detroit: Gale, 2009. N. pag. Literature Resource
Continue Reading
View Writing Issues

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Porphyria's Lover, My Last Duchess, And The Leper
    • 1030 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Porphyria's Lover, My Last Duchess, And The Leper

    Women in 19th Century British Poetry Response: "Porphyria's Lover," "My Last Duchess," and "The Leper"…

    • 1030 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Compare the Ways Poets Present Relationships in ‘Les Grands Seigneurs’ and in 'My Last Duchess'
    • 928 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Compare the Ways Poets Present Relationships in ‘Les Grands Seigneurs’ and in 'My Last Duchess'

    Compare the ways poets present relationships in ‘Les Grands Seigneurs’ and in one other poem from Character and Voice…

    • 928 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Comparing The Voice In Porphyria's Lover And My Last Duchess
    • 824 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Comparing The Voice In Porphyria's Lover And My Last Duchess

    Robert Browning’s dramatic monologues Porphyria’s Lover and My Last Duchess contain many thematic similarities, despite portraying different scenarios, primarily spoken through a possessive and jealous man. In Porphyria’s Lover a man waits in his cottage for Porphyria. Her arrival “shut[s] the cold out and the storm” both literally and metaphorically. Porphyria confesses her undying love for the speaker, who, “happy and proud”, that Porphyria…

    • 824 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Adam and Eve Versus Porphyria's Lover
    • 626 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Adam and Eve Versus Porphyria's Lover

    Porphyria’s Lover and Adam and Eve are both poems regarding the expectations and disappointments of man. Although both poems are about expectations of a man regarding a woman, both narrators take a different perspective. Both narrators portray animal-like behavior. The difference between the two narrators is one is carefree and the other feels guilty. Both narrators have extreme reactions and both are internalized.…

    • 626 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Powerful Essays

    Comparing Lady Macbeth 'And My Last Duchess'
    • 1968 Words
    • 8 Pages

    Comparing Lady Macbeth 'And My Last Duchess'

    This could have been one of the many possible reasons why Lady Macbeth could not live with herself, therefore, committing suicide. However, the poem, ‘my last duchess’, can arguably contain a whole range of themes. One possible theme that could be presented within my last duchess is luminosity and bliss. I think this because the Duke speaks with a very polite posture, to the lower class envoy, and to a majority of the audience, it could sound very sincere, yet deceiving.…

    • 1968 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Compare the ways that authors present the speakers in their poems
    • 768 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Compare the ways that authors present the speakers in their poems

    Both of the writers have made their speakers very proud of things in their life, the duke in My Last Duchess is very proud of his 900 year old name he has given her and all his power and riches. But he is also very viscous in the poem and seems to not care about women as he treats them like objects in the time of patriarchal society “My Last Duchess” and “is my object”.…

    • 768 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Better Essays

    Significance of Narrators: Robert Browning, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Ian McEwan
    • 1383 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Significance of Narrators: Robert Browning, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Ian McEwan

    In contrast a seemingly passive narrator is presented in ‘Porphyria’s Lover’, with his twisted reflection on the situation being prevalently more dominate, adding to the air of ambiguity about his character. Alternatively, his narration follows his internal thoughts as he “debated” and “listened”.…

    • 1383 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Comparison of 'My Last Duchass' and 'Porphryia's Lover'
    • 1071 Words
    • 3 Pages

    Comparison of 'My Last Duchass' and 'Porphryia's Lover'

    The ways in which the poems begin are quite different. In ‘Porphyria’s Lover’ Robert Browning starts by setting the scene, the mood at the beginning of the poem is very cold and gloomy as he describes the weather outside, using a personification of the wind, ‘the sullen wind was soon awake,’ but then as Porphyria enters the room the mood changes at once bringing warmth to poem, ‘When glided in Porphyria; straight She shut the cold out and the storm, And kneeled and made the cheerless grate Blaze up, and all the cottage warm,’ I think this contrast in settings is very powerful and gives the reader a vivid but simple picture in their head. Whereas in ‘My last duchess’ I think that mood is quite bleak and stays like that throughout the poem as the Duke begins by showing off a painting of his wife to a guest and says that she looks as if she were alive, this immediately tells us that she is dead.…

    • 1071 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Better Essays

    Comparing Porphyria's Lover 'And My Last Duchess'
    • 1223 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Comparing Porphyria's Lover 'And My Last Duchess'

    Very little information is leaked on the personalities or views of the two women, but we see that they are different in the status they carry with their lovers. Porphyria cannot necessarily even be proven to be a girlfriend, but only a lover. ‘From pride, and vainer ties dissever,” Line 24 of Porphyria's Lover we find that the man strongly believes she is unfaithful to just being his. We cannot base any facts off of what the men say, but we find no literal obligation that Porphyria would have to be faithful to her lover. The status of a girlfriend (if even) is not comparable to the status of a wife. Which leads us to the next woman, the wife of the duke. Where obligation is found and the status between duke and duchess is more prominent. This is proven simply in the title of the story, My Last Duchess. This undeniable difference is no exception to the uncanny comparison between both monologues. The fact that both men kill their lovers subsides with whether or not their status is necessary. “That's my Last Duchess painted on the wall, Looking as if she were alive” lines 1-2 in My Last Duchess state that she is no longer alive, reading further it becomes evident to assume that the duke had killed her. “A thing to do, and all her hair In one long yellow string I wound Three times her little throat around, And strangled her.” Lines 38-41 distinctively admit to the murder of his…

    • 1223 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Porphyria's Lover Vs Laboratory
    • 869 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Porphyria's Lover Vs Laboratory

    Although the era was a likely influence Undeniably In both pieces, the speakers appear to be greatly deluded. The fact that there is no addressee in “Porphyria’s Lover”, highlights “the insanity and loneliness of the criminal” (Paccaud-Huguet 94). The lover further Psychotic. Why did porphyria have to come in and start a fire? Why wasn’t it already started? Why was he sitting in the dark? Further more the cold. Says something about the lover. Either in deep thought or just plain mad. The wife had paranoia, browning depicts this in his rhyme and repetition “laugh laugh at me”…

    • 869 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Better Essays

    Masculinity And Femininity In Macbeth 'And The Last Duchess'
    • 1711 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Masculinity And Femininity In Macbeth 'And The Last Duchess'

    We know the Duke had complete control over because he was able to talk as if she was an inanimate object but near the end of the poem he says ‘I gave commands then all smiles stopped together’. The specific use of ‘command’ shows that her husband had the power to order her to do what he wanted and had the control in this relationship. The fact that all smiles stopped together shows that he had so much dominance and power that she stopped all together. He Victorian audience would be able sympathize with this situation because during those times the males had an ownership over females. This shows that the husband had more power and was superior in this relationship. Like ‘Porphyria’s Lover’ the husband seemed to be more powerful than the…

    • 1711 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    HOW FAR DO YOU AGREE THAT THE CHARACTERS IN BROWINING’S POEMS DISPLAY A DISTURBING LACK OF MORALITY?
    • 719 Words
    • 3 Pages

    HOW FAR DO YOU AGREE THAT THE CHARACTERS IN BROWINING’S POEMS DISPLAY A DISTURBING LACK OF MORALITY?

    In My Last Duchess, the Duke is portrayed as a jealous and insecure man who hides behind his power. While jealousy is an emotion which can sometimes be seen as a good thing in the context of a relationship, the Duke is an example of how too much of a good thing can become a bad thing. The Duke feels troubled on how his wife was, apparently, “too soon made glad” and while it is evident that the Duchess was simply a kind natured woman; the Duke’s alleges her actions as wrong or even promiscuous because the Duke feels only he can discriminate what is good or not. His lack of morality is shown when he begins to criticize the Duchess’ lack of discrimination and even deems the “dropping of the daylight in the West” – a gift from God- as less important than his gift. The intensity of his jealousy is also disturbing because of the disastrous results it leads to and how casual the Duke is and his attempted kindness towards the messenger. It is after the Duchess’ death that he then appreciates her but only once she is the subject of a piece of art and his celebratory approach to her death is, to the reader, alarming. When he talks about a piece of art he owns, “Notice Neptune, though, taming a sea-horse”, he implies that taming a woman is like taming a sea-horse, while implying that a woman is one that has to be controlled which shows his immoral misogynistic nature. However, at the time period that this poem was set, art was much appreciated, women were relatively powerless, and violence and murder was not uncommon and the Duke’s act of murdering his wife in order to gain a new one may be seen as expected though not in present times. His rule of “money first, woman later” when he speaks of the Count’s “known munificence” reveals more of the Duke’s indecency and his lack of change at the end of the poem.…

    • 719 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    Tone Of My Last Duchess
    • 869 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Tone Of My Last Duchess

    Robert Browning sets the tone of "My Last Duchess," by using three significant poetic techniques, one of which is imagery. Browning uses the Duke's monologue to sketch out images in the reader's mind of the Duchess herself, and the sinister personality of the Duke. Browning also uses another key device, which is diction to illustrate the darkness in this poem. Browning's careful word choice adds to the description of the Duchess and perhaps her disgraceful behavior, as well as the Duke's terrifying jealousy, and expectations. Finally, Browning also uses symbolism, which is instrumental in showing the Duke's jealousy, which possibly could have led to the Duchess' demise. Robert Browning is able to achieve a haunting, mysterious, and eerie tone…

    • 869 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    How does Browning tell the story in Porphyria's Lover?
    • 440 Words
    • 2 Pages

    How does Browning tell the story in Porphyria's Lover?

    Browning uses a number of different narrative techniques to tell the story in Porphyria’s Lover.…

    • 440 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More
  • Good Essays

    The Insanity of the Poetic Speaker in “Porphyria’s Lover”
    • 1200 Words
    • 5 Pages

    The Insanity of the Poetic Speaker in “Porphyria’s Lover”

    Browning’s poem “Porthyria’s Lover” tells a story of a murder seen through the eyes of Porphyria’s lover- the murderer. It takes place on a rainy night, in the speaker’s home, where he sits alone in the dark until Porphyria’s arrival. She lights the fire place, takes off her garments and sits by her lover whispering how much he loves him. He then decides to strangle her with her hair, after which he lays her head once again on his shoulder and they sit as they are for the rest of the night. The poem might be influenced by Browning’s own inner thoughts and feelings, since during his lifetime he has been less appreciated as an author compared to his wife.…

    • 1200 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
    Read More

Related Topics