meaning when you read on in the poem.
The Duke begins to show his possessive and materialistic ways. "Since none puts by the curtain
I have drawn for you, but I". This shows how he is determined and made sure that he was in
control of his relationship with the Duchess. The "curtain" shows how he does everything for her
and is control of her life, " Since none........but I". It shows that his whole life was devoted to
her.
The Duke then becomes critical of the Duchess and shows how he dislikes her joyful and easy
to please manner. "She had a heart-how shall I say?-too soon made glad, too easily impressed;
She liked whate'er she looked on, and her looks went everywhere.". This shows how the Duke
is critical of her and dislikes her ways, he'd rather that she was only satisfied by him then by
others too. The Duke then later on explains his restricting and critical attitude of the Duchess
due to her pleasures in life. " The dropping of the daylight in the West, the bough of cherries
some officious fool, broke in the orchard for her, the white mule she rode with around the
terrace-all and each would draw from her alike the approving speech, or blush at least. She
thanked men, good!". This shows how the Duke is a jealous man and was jealous of the
attention that the Duchess gave to other people and other priceless objects such as "the
dropping in the West". Due to the Duke's jealousy and possessive behaviour, the reader pity's
the Duchess as it must be awful for her to live with such a difficult man.
The Duke later reveals his arrogance as well as revealing the fact that he is a stubborn, jealous
and ignorant husband. "Somehow-I know not how-as if she ranked my gift of a nine year old
name, with anybody's gift.". He also shows his lack of respect for his wife when critising her
again, " Just this or that in you disgusts me". This shows the Duke potraying his "bad husband"
image.
The Duke explains to the count's servant how he tried to tell his Duchess to change her
disappointing ways, yet he felt to do so was beneath him. " Who'd stoop to blame this sort of
trifling?............. I choose never to stoop". This shows how he feels he couldn't tell her as he
didn't want to stoop down to somebody else's level. Here, his arrogance is shown again. He
goes on to explain how instead of telling the Duchess he murdered her. " I gave commands, then
all smiles stopped together". His ignorance forced him to kill the Duchess instead of asking her
to change.
The Duke then changes the subject whilst starting to talk about the count's daughter who he
intends to marry. "Though his fair daughter's self, as I avowed at starting, is my object". He
explains that although the daughter of the count is beautiful he is more interested in the dowry.
"Of mine for dowry", this shows that he is materialistic as well as being a hypocrite due to
talking about her beauty when really only the dowry was important to him. Due to the Duke
talking about the dowry it arouses the reader's suspicion as we become aware of his money
grabbing ways. We come to realise his true personality.
The last line in the poem points out another valuable possession of his, his new wife. The
readers become aware of his current situation and how his current relationship is in parallel with
his and the Duchess' relationship. The reader begins to feel pity for his new wife as she too will
have to experience his jealousy. ignorance, restricting and critical attitude and his arrogance as
well as his possessive behaviour.
We can see how similar the Duke is to Porphyria 's lover. Both characters are possessive and in
control of their female partners. The two characters are also potrayed as slightly psychotic due
to them murdering their partners. They both explain in their poems that they feel they have done
the right thing by killing their partners, they seem to both excuse themselves from the terrible act
of murder. The dramatic monologue in both poems provides us with an entertaining and unusual
structure for a poem. Both poems are almost written as short stories due to the narration in each
of them. As for the monologue being extremely dramatic both poems are seen as unusual. Due
to the weird deaths and psychotic lovers in each poem we can be entertained by both of them.
By Chloe Maslin