My Last Duchess Essay

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The speaker of the “My Last Duchess” was a Duke of Ferrara in Italy, and he is ready to get married again. In order to determine the number of dowry, the fiancée’s family sent a representative to negotiate with the Duke. Duke let the envoy that visited art collection in his palace, where he had the portrait of the “last Duchess” – his last wife, now dead. Throughout the poem, the Duke talks about the woman’s imperfections and failure, but it turns out this woman’s “faults” were the qualities like compassion, humility, modesty and treat the best to those to served her.
In “My Last Duchess, the Duke has the intention of dislike his last wife, but from the accusation the reader can produce a very different impression towards this Duchess.
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Note the Duke tried to depict himself as a “frank” person; one does not do “techniques” in his speech. At this point the poem, the reader may aware of the Duke’s techniques he used in his speech. Duke explained that even though he has the ability to tell how much the Duchess dislikes him, he would not have to explain to her how and why her behavior offend him. In his word, explain his feeling to her is the compromise to his dominance. This reveals the Dutch’s hubris, obsessed with all his power in the hierarchical society other than to share his own feelings with his own wife. Near the end of the poem, the Duke redirects the attention to the upcoming marriage. He told the envoy that he was convinced that his future father-in-law will provide him a generous dowry. However the duke want to be seen as a person who more interested in the future alignment than the money his fiancée would bring in the future. At this point the reader has the sense of the feeling to this young woman’s future well being will not as peaceful as the Duke

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1371 Words | 3 Pages
...ose who possess a disobedient temperament, and imagining women, such as his late wife, as the rarely tamed seahorse, the Duke leaves no doubt as to his severe expectations regarding obedience and submissiveness in his future duchess. Also, unlike Medusa, there are no verses in ‘My Last Duchess’. This conveys an urgent continuous pace as the poem moves relentlessly on suggesting the Duke will not be stopped.
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...d insecure about himself. In fact by the end of the poem we actually sympathize the Duchess after hearing the Duke’s words because she had to put up with his arrogance and possessiveness until he got rid of her.
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664 Words | 2 Pages
The Duke of Ferrara was a very arrogant man. He did not seem to care about the happiness of his wife, only his own. He did not like the fact that she found happiness in other places beside himself, as if he should be the only life in her life. He could not understand how she could rank his nine thousand year old name with more simpler things such as her white mule that she rode on the terrace, an act of kindness from an "officious fool" and the "drooping of the daylight in the west." His wife, no doubt, had no idea he felt that way but he could not discuss it with her, blaming it on the fact that he had no skill in speech. He let the problem persist until he no longer could stand it and finally "gave commands" that in one way or another caused her death.
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The characters of My Last Duchess and Porphyria’s Lover each speak as if the woman he loves is still alive, which neither woman is. My Last Duchess is a man speaking to another, telling him of his late wife, whose picture hangs on the wall. He talks of her traits and how she blushes, though she no longer lives. This perhaps represents that he hasn’t completely come to terms with the fact that he is alone. Throughout the poem, he seems to almost blame her, though the reader does not know what for; perhaps for leaving him alone. The speaker of Porphyria’s Lover is much more direct than the man in the previous poem. He speaks directly to the reader, and tells of his girl. He first describes her in a way that makes her seem like she doesn’t care about him. She comes in from a stormy nights an...
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In My Last Duchess, Robert Browning uses voice to create a sinister tone by the use of words he chooses for the Duke of Ferrara to use in his dramatic monologue. The Duke is an arrogant, selfish man who loves the arts. He introduces his deceased wife, as “That’s my last Duchess, painted on the wall,” he says as if he owned her. The Duke was not happy when she participated in things that that he did not provide her with, she didn’t bow down to his aristocratic ways and this displeased him to a great extent. Then nonchalantly, he tells the ambassador that “I gave commands, Then all smiles stopped together.’ This is the dukes sinister way of confessing he had her murdered.
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The usage of all these literary elements really brings the poem together. The usage of language, voice, and style can invoke feelings in the reader that are not expected. The reader feels for the Duchess because due to her childlike demeanor and innocence, which all people go through when they are younger, eventual became the “issue” that decided her
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In “The Making of a Poem, A Norton Anthology of Poetic Forms”, I found many pleasing and displeasing poems in my search for a bad poem. The poem that stood out as the most displeasing poem in my opinion was “My Last Duchess” by Ferrara. In this poem we learnt about a man who is getting married, might be his second wedding or his tenth wedding, we do not know; he is talking about ...
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1159 Words | 3 Pages
...ding this poem, it is obvious to think that the Duke was definitely a cruel and heartless man. Assuming he had his first wife killed, he didn't seem to care. He just forged ahead in an attempt to find another woman he could control. As a matter of fact, he used his influence to actually warn the servant of his plans for his marriage to the Count's daughter. Instead of mourning his first wife, he seemed to revel in the fact that he was now able to control her beauty in the portrait by only allowing viewing to those he invited to see it when he opened the curtain. Oh, what a powerful feeling that must have been for him! In the 20th century, however, I think this poem would have been written differently to reflect the freedom women have today. No woman would have put up with him! Maybe the Duke would have had second thoughts about how he treated his beautiful Duchess.
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Browning’s works were the primary model for the basic form of the standard Victorian dramatic monologue which was based around a speaker, listener, and a reader. Browning’s poem “My Last Duchess” became a model for the dramatic monologue form primarily because of the strict approach he took while developing the poem. One of the aspects characteristic of this work is the authors level of consciousness. Each element in “My Last Duchess” is thoughtfully constructed with form and structure in mind. This poem is filled with dramatic principle that satisfied the Victorian period’s demand for an action and drama that were not overtly apparent in the work. In the case of “My Last Duchess” the drama of the poem is how his character, the Duke, is introduced. In dramatic monologues the character’s self is revealed through thoug...
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1236 Words | 3 Pages
In ‘My Last Duchess,’ the speaker is conveyed as being controlling, arrogant, malicious, and capricious. The Duke shows signs of jealousy and over-protection towards his first wife. On the other hand, the narrator in ‘Porphyria’s Lover’ is portrayed as who has lost touch with reality, someone clearly insane. There a few hints that this character may be lonely and withdrawn. After Porphyria enters the room he is in, the tension immediately drops and the mood warms.
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488 Words | 1 Pages
The Duke of Ferrara was made jealous by everything the duchess did, no matter how unimportant it was. He was especially jealous of Fra Pandolf, the man who painted the duchess in the poem. A woman should be pleased only by her husband, as was not the case with the duchess and Fra Pandolf. She was “too easily impressed'; by the painter (line 23). Fra Pandolf was not the only man that made the duke jealous. Everyone who passed the duchess received “much the same smile'; as the duke (line 44). The duke expected to be the only man to receive a smile from his wife.
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1415 Words | 3 Pages
In Robert Browning's "My Last Duchess," a portrait of the egocentric and power loving Duke of Ferrara is painted for us. Although the duke's monologue appears on the surface to be about his late wife, a close reading will show that the mention of his last duchess is merely a side note in his self-important speech. Browning uses the dramatic monologue form very skillfully to show us the controlling, jealous, and arrogant traits the duke possessed without ever mentioning them explicitly.
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My Last Duchess Essay

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Robert Browning

A compare/contrast analysis of the speaker of My Last Duchess and the speaker of Porphyria’s Lover; how they are similar and how they are different

Diction In My Last Duchess