Explore the various and surprising ways in which Browning deals with the theme of love in the poems "My Last Duchess" and "Porphyria's Lover"

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Pre 1914 Poetry GCSE Literature Coursework

Explore the various and surprising ways in which Browning deals with the theme of live in the poems “My Last Duchess” and “Porphyria’s Lover”

The stereotypical representation of love in a love poem is a feeling of mixed emotions, cheerful feelings that generally brighten up your day. A love poem should typically have a genuine romance that concludes with a jubilant ending. However this is only the portrayed idea of love, as love can also be represented in others ways, take for example My Last Duchess and Porphyria’s Lover. In these poems, we are shown a different type of love, a possessive love where the male in each wants the woman to himself. The shocking thing about this type of love is the fact that the possessiveness reaches a point to where the lover kills his partner just to keep her to himself.

Both ‘My Last Duchess’ and ‘Porphyria’s Lover’ are written in the style of a dramatic monologue, where there is only one person (the protagonist) speaking throughout. Also both poems are written in continuous enjambment, this gives the effect of a conversation in ‘My Last Duchess’, even though it is only the Duke speaking, while the servant listens, however in Porphyria’s Lover, it gives the effect of a recalled memory from the lover of Porphyria.

The main character and protagonist of ‘My Last Duchess’, is the Duke. We can learn a lot about the Duke from the way he speaks for instance we learn that he is a very cold, detached and possessive person, which can be seen throughout ‘My Last Duchess’ for example “The bough of cherries some officious fool broke in the orchard for her.” This illustrates how an admirer of the Duchess gives gifts to her, and shows how cold and detached he is by calling the man an “officious fool.” In addition, it also shows how possessive he is, as he finds anyone providing gifts for his Duchess below himself. The Duke describes the Duchess as an object at the start of the poem; “That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall”, and portrays her to be disobedient as she does things that the Duke finds displeasing i.e. smiling at strangers in the same way that she smiles at him; “She had a heart – how shall I say? – too soon made glad, too easily impressed”, “She thanked men, - good! But thanked somehow – I know not how – as if she ranked my gift of a nine-hundred-years old name with anybody’s gift.” This indicates that his love for the Duchess is not a normal love, as we would expect from a love poem, but a possessive love, as if he loves an object, not a living being. This can also be seen through the way he boasts about his wealth and his collections of valuable items – “Notice Neptune, though, taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity, which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me!”

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When it comes to describing the Duchess to other people, in this case a servant, the Duke talks about the Duchess very carefully and gives subtle hints about her that gives the impression that she was a not fit for the title of Duchess. By using these subtle hints to describe the Duchess, it shows us that he has planned this conversation over in his mind many times before, so he can lead the listener to take the side of the Duke in believing that the Duchess was not worthy of her title. His way of speech indicates that ...

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