Robert Browning is described as 'a love poet who was acutely aware of how women and men can be separated by jealousy or the passing of time'. In studying his poetry, what did you notice about the relationships he explores?

Authors Avatar

Olly Burton        11v1        Miss Hansford

                                 GCSE English Literature – Pre 1914 Poetry            24/01/2006

Robert Browning is described as ‘a love poet who was acutely aware of how women and men can be separated by jealousy or the passing of time’. In studying his poetry, what did you notice about the relationships he explores? What is revealed about the time in which Browning was writing?

The ‘Love Poet’ Robert Browning was born in London in 1812. In 1846 Browning married the poet Elizabeth Barrett and eloped with her to Italy. After Elizabeth’s death he returned to England and continued to publish a great number of poems and plays. His best poetry was written, however, in the years that he spent in Italy with his wife. He died in 1889.

        

Browning’s time period was a lot different than today’s culture and social behaviour; this is obvious in his poems. The relationships between a male and a female were much more formal. The male brought money into the house, he would work and socialise. For the wealthy men, it was often they had a pretty girl beside them. She would act as a pleasant book cover, covering the intelligent dominant man. In Browning’s poems, however, the characters are often men and women caught at moments of anxiety and obsession. Since they tend to reveal more than they actually intend, the interest of the poems lies in discovering what lies beneath the words that are actually spoken. This relates to Robert Browning’s description as ‘a love poet who was acutely aware of how women and men can be separated by jealously or the passing of time’.

        

I will be studying five of Browning’s poems including: My Last Duchess, a dramatic monologue in which the Duke speaks to an imaginary listener about a painting of his last duchess. Porphyria’s Love, another dramatic monologue where Porphyria’s lover speaks to himself about his Love surrounded by anxiety for Porphyria and how he overcomes it. Meeting at Night, which dramatizes the excitement and intensity of passion, the feeling of tense anticipation as the poet travels to meet his lover. However, Parting at Morning (the follow-on to Meeting at Night, except the woman/his lover speaks) recognizes the complexities which morning inevitably brings. The last poem I shall study is Two in the Campagna in which Browning shows the sad complications of many relationships, it shows the unawareness of ones love for another.  

Many of Browning’s poems are ‘dramatic monologues’. My Last Duchess was written in which a single character is speaking to an imaginary listener:

‘Strangers like you that pictured countenance’: Robert Browning never lets on whom his characters talk to. Indeed, the poem provides a classic example of a dramatic monologue: the speaker is clearly distinct from the poet; an audience is suggested but never appears in the poem; and the revelation of the Duke's character is the poem's primary aim. Moreover, there are other poems written in which the character talks to him/herself, which is still accounted for as a ‘dramatic monologue’. An example of this is Porphyria’s Lover, as he explains the preservation of Porphyria…

Join now!

‘I wound three times her little throat around, and strangled her.’ Although he talks in past tense, it is still as if he explains the story as it comes. The effect of which My Last Duchess and Porphyria’s Lover has… Browning’s interpretation of jealousy and severe obsession and pain:

‘Only I discern- infinite passion, and the pain of finite hearts that yearn.’ Considering the poem ends on this line; it leaves you with a feeling of how terrible the end of love can be when Robert Browning layers it as brutally as that. Meeting at night on the other hand, is a ...

This is a preview of the whole essay