Revenge is the key damaging effect of love shown in the relationships that are explored within Robert Browning’s “The Laboratory” and Lord Alfred Tennyson’s “The Sisters”. Revenge is the act of taking vengeance and inflicting punishment. Revenge was a common theme for plays of the Victorian era, in which the poems were written, and was seen often in Robert Browning’s poems.
In “The Laboratory” the speaker’s actions show that her desire for revenge has a destructive effect. The speaker takes revenge because she feels that her lover is “with her”, “her” being her love rival. She feels as though her lover and her love rival think she is weak and that “they laugh” at her when they are together. This makes her more determined to get revenge. She disproves their theories that she is weak by taking revenge through the form of poisoning her love rival. Within the second stanza the speaker says “I am here”. The abruptness of the sentence creates an impression of power showing that she is trying to contradict what her enemies were saying about her. In the first stanza the speaker refers to the laboratory as a “devil’s-smithy”, this shows that she knows what she’s doing is evil and despite this, she continues to take revenge. It is clear that the speaker is taking revenge, not just murdering anyone for pleasure, as she already knows who her victim is, this is shown when she says “which is the poison to poison her”. Her intended victim is a women call Pauline, she says that Pauline has “masculine eyes”. This insult shows the reader that the speaker is jealous of her rival. There is another women who the speaker feels is her rival, called Elise, the speaker makes it clear that she is also jealous of this rival, this becomes evident when the speaker says “Elise, with her head and her breast and her arms and her hands”. The cumulative list of Elise’s features gives the impression that the speaker is jealous of her appearance. In the eleventh stanza the speaker refers to the poison as being her “whole fortune’s fee”, she is saying that she has spent all of her money on having the poison made, this shows her determination, which is shown throughout the poem. Her determination is shown again in the poem through her descriptions of the poison being made. She says that she “may gaze thro’ these faint smokes curling whitely” suggesting that she is taking great pleasure in watching the poison be prepared, she also says she is “not in haste!” suggesting that she wants to take full pleasure in watching the production of the poison and the exclamation mark shows her excitement at this thought, emphasising her lack of remorse for what she is doing. The phrase also suggests that she doesn’t want the production to be rushed in order to make sure that it is perfect. The speaker shows her delight when the poison has been finished by saying “Quick-is it finished”. The caesura in the middle of the sentence allows the reader to see how excited she is. When the poison is finished she seems disappointed ta the colour of it saying “the colour’s too grim!”, this suggests that she wants it to look pleasant so that her victim will take pleasure in drinking it, showing her craving for ultimate revenge and also suggesting that she has thought about her plan in great detail, enforcing her determination. In the sixth stanza the speaker says her rival “should drop dead!”. This alliterative “d” sounds in the phrase “drop dead” create a harsh sound, reflecting the evilness and bitterness of what she is doing. The word “should”, which is a modal verb, suggests that the speaker thinks that her rival’s death is a compulsion. We learn as the poem advances that the speaker is determined to get more than simple revenge, she wants to take full pleasure in it and she wants it to be painful for both her lover and her rival. This is shown when the speaker says she wants her lover to “remember her dying face!”. She not only wants to punish her rival but her lover too by subjecting him to watch the other woman’s death. She wants him to suffer as much as she did when she was betrayed. The exclamation mark reinforces that she is excited about the prospect of punishing her lover and also emphasises her lack of remorse. The speaker’s anger, jealousy and determination are what lead her to get revenge. Revenge is the destructive effect of love as it is love that triggers these emotions.
The other poem that features the destructive effects of revenge is “The Sisters”. In this poem the cause for the revenge is that the speakers sister has “fell”, the speaker means that she has fallen pregnant. During the era in which the poem is set, it was deeply frowned upon to get pregnant without being married. The speaker feels that her sister has “mix’d her ancient blood with shame” meaning that she has bought shame on the family. It is because of this that the speaker takes revenge on her sister’s lover, the one who got her pregnant. We also learn that the speaker had feelings for the Earl as she says “O the Earl was fair to see!” suggesting that she thought the Earl was attractive; she also says that she wants to “win his love”. In the second stanza the impression is that the speaker has planned her revenge for some time this is shown when she says “whole weeks and months, and early and late, to win his love, I lay in wait”. The speaker lures the Earl to his death by making him “a feast”, we learn that this “won his love”. To win his love is what she has waited for and what she wanted but because she “hated him with the hate of hell” for what he had done to her sister, she continues to get her revenge. The speaker makes the Earl think that she loves him by performing gestures of love, this is shown when the speaker says “I kiss’d his eyelids into rest”. Once the Earl had fallen “into rest” the speaker gets her revenge. She “stabb’d him thro’ and thro”, “three times”. The harsh “st” and “d” consonants in “stabb’d” reflect the harshness of her actions and the force with which she stabbed him. Also the repetition of the word “thro’” suggests that she stabbed him repeatedly as though stabbing him once wouldn’t be enough to satisfy her longing for revenge. In the final stanza, the speakers lack of guilt and remorse is evident. Once she is sure that the Earl is dead, the speaker begins to toy with the body, she “curl’d and comb’d his comely head”. The fact that she plays with his corpse reinforces her lack of remorse for what she has done. The speaker says that the Earl “look’d so grand when he was dead”, this illustrates that she finds him more attractive now that she has performed her revenge. Throughout the poem, the middle line of each stanza describes the actions of the wind, the pathetic fallacy builds up the tension throughout the poem as the adjectives used to describe the wind get gradually more severe until the words are very dramatic, such as “raging” and “raving”, just before the murder takes place. The hard consonants in the words used to describe the wind reflect the speaker’s anger at the Earl. In the final stanza, after the Earl has been killed, the middle line reads, “the wind is blowing in turret and tree”. “blowing” is a much softer sounding adjective than the ones used before the murder, giving the impression that the speaker has calmed now that she has had her revenge.
Jealousy is the destructive element in both “ The Sisters” and “My Last Duchess”. To be jealous is to resent a rival for them having successor having an advantage. Jealousy can also be described as a mental uneasiness from fear of rivalry or unfaithfulness. In “My Last Duchess” the Duke is jealous of the affection his wife displays towards other people. We get this impression, as the poem is a dramatic monologue so the image we get of the Duchess is based on the Duke’s opinions and is biased. The Duke Says that it “was not her husband’s presence only, called that spot of joy into the Duchess’ cheek”. From this we can see that the Duchess did seem joyous around her husband only but around other men too. The duke feels that it should have only been him that was able to bring that expression to her face. We can tell that the Duke is angry about this when he says that people would ask him about “that spot of joy”, “if they durst”. The word “durst” means dared, this suggests that the Duke has a temper and gets angry when talking about his wife’s expression in the painting, as he is resentful that it wasn’t just him that gave her that expression. This is reinforced when the Duke says that the Duchess’ “looks went everywhere” suggesting that she may have looked upon other men with the same affection she did the Duke. It is made clear that the duke does not approve of this behaviour as he describes the Duchess as “too easily impressed”. The adverb “too” suggests that her flirtatious behaviour was to an excessive extent and beyond what the Duke approved of. We can also see that the Duke is jealous as he describes his wife’s behaviour as “trifling” showing that he thought her behaviour was frivolous and he says that this “disgusts” him. The Duke says that “all and each would draw from her alike” suggesting that her unfaithfulness was not occasional or a singular event but that it occurred with anyone. As well as her unfaithfulness, the Duke is also jealous of the Duchess’ appreciation of the gifts she receives from other men. He says “she ranked my gift of a nine-hundred-years-old-name with anybody’s gift.” Suggesting that he feels she should have given greater thanks to the Duke’s family name and less thanks for the gifts from other people, this shows that he is jealous. Although the “men” the Duke refers to are never given an identity, one is referred to specifically as an “officious fool”. The adjective officious means to be meddling, interfering and to offer something without being requested to. This suggests that the Duke thought that “the bough of cherries” this man bought for the Duchess was unnecessary and trouble-causing. The fact that the duke is insulting his rival shows his jealousy but this is also reflected in the hissing sound created by the “ff” in “officious”, which creates an impression of bitterness and resentment. Overall, the duke is jealous of the fact that his wife treats him as she would any other man.
“The Sisters” is another poem that features the theme of jealousy. IN the first stanza, the reader learns that the speaker is jealous of the relationship her sister had with the Earl. The speaker describes her sister as being “the fairest in the face” suggesting that she was jealous of her sister being more attractive than she was. As this features in the first stanza it is prominent that the speaker is jealous of her sister and suggests that it is this that leads to the events that follow on, as this is the reason why the Earl chose the speakers sister and not her. In the same stanza we learn that she is jealous because “they were together” showing that she was jealous of the relationship that the Earl and her sister had. Throughout the poem, the final line of each stanza reads “O the Earl was fair to see!” from this it is clear that the speaker is attracted to the Earl, this is reinforced by the exclamation mark, this attraction towards the Earl is what makes her jealous of her sister. In the fourth stanza, the speaker says she “hated him with the hate of hell”. This shows, despite the fact that she was attracted to the Earl, that she was consumed by jealousy. The word “hell” is often associated with evil and death, emphasising the severity of he jealousy. The hard “h” sounds, which occur throughout the phrase, also reflect her bitterness and jealousy. Despite this hatred for the Earl, which has stemmed from jealousy, the speaker says she “loved his beauty passing well” reinforcing the fact that she was attracted to the Earl despite the fact that she hated him for choosing her sister and not her. Also, there is an impression that the speaker is jealous of the Earl causing her relationship with her sister to weaken. In the first stanza the speaker says, “we were two daughters of one race” creating the impression of unity with the word “race”. This suggests that they had a close relationship, which would have been weakened by the speaker’s jealousy. Also, the speaker may have been jealous that her sister was in a relationship and she wasn’t this is shown by the tone of bitterness when the speaker says, “they were together”.
To conclude, it is clear that the damaging and destructive effects of love are shown through a various themes within each poem. In each dramatic monologue, the murders that occur are fuelled by emotions which stem from the effects of love. In “My Last Duchess” and “Porphyria’s lover” it is clear that possessiveness of a lover leads to destruction in the form of murder. In “The Laboratory” it is a sense of betrayal that leads the speaker to take revenge again leading to murder. In “The Sisters” it is jealousy and hatred that pushes the speaker into murder. In all of the poems, no remorse or feelings of guilt are shown which emphasises the strength of the emotions, which drove the speakers to murder, and suggests insanity, which is another theme which runs through all four poems. In all four poems, the damaging and destructive effects of love are emphasised by the fact that they are all dramatic monologues which means that the reader only gets to see one side of each story making it biased. The societal strictures and expected etiquette of the Victorian era, in which all the poems were written, also emphasises the horror of the events in each poem as they shock the reader because they are so unmoral and so different from the behaviour that was expected at the time.
