'With reference to three or more pre 1900 love poems consider the relationship of power to love'.

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Lucinda Batchelor D11

English Coursework

‘With reference to three or more pre 1900 love poems consider the relationship of power to love’

The relationship between Love and Possession or power is a thin line and these poems it explores both sides of these poems and how they compare to each other and which is the stronger influence on the overall relationship of the two.

A male influence often carries out power in romantic relationships during the Victorian era. And this is often the cause of possessiveness and violence that is seen in many Victorian poems to show how a man’s ‘love’ for a woman can be destructive and can lead to an imbalance of power in a romantic relationship.

However woman also carry the power of being the power of being doting and grateful to their husbands and making sure that their love is felt the most in the house.

‘Porphyria’s lover’ is a poem about the relationship between a woman who is married and is having an affair with another. During one of her visits to her lover she is subsequently murdered. The poem is written as if the male is thinking out loud and explores his possessiveness and exposes some of the reasons why he had murdered her and whether he feels any remorse or feelings.

Another poem that has similar feelings on the masculine view of the woman is ‘My last duchess’. This explores the relationship between a duke and his late wife and is talking to a servant about her because he is looking at her picture that is held in prominence in hi s home. This poem is written as if the duke is talking about someone who he has complete confidence with as he uses words, which can only concluded to a very narrow range of ideas. This also explores the ideas of jealousy and again possessiveness and the need to have complete control or power over their spouses.

         However the poem ‘ Remember’ has a certain amount of power but is used in a different way. The poem is about a woman who is dying. She is asking her lover to remember her after she has passed. This is an intimate poem that uses the strength and power of their love together to be strengthening force that keeps them together after she or both of them have died. She the goes like this until half way through the poem she changes her plea of her lover to remember her but if they should forget it didn’t matter. She explains this with the final line ‘ better by far you should forget and smile than that you should remember and be sad’

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        The language used in ‘Porphyria’s lover’ in the beginning is dark and cold for instance ‘sullen wind was soon awake’. This suggests that the room that the man is inside is cold dark and miserable much like him without his lover. The writer is also personifying the weather because wind cannot be bad tempered or miserable because it has no human emotions.  

         The language used to describe Porphyria is almost goddess like, she ‘glides’ and as soon as enters the poem the language changes to a slightly warmer and favourable tone as she sets the fire. ‘… And ...

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