Essay on A Comparison Between My Last Duchess and Porphyria's Lover

Comparing and Contrasting the Theme of power and control between Porphyrias Lover, La Belle Dame Sans Merci and My Last Duchess

Both ‘London’ and ‘My Last Duchess’ explore the ideas of power through social structures, hierarchy and synecdoche.

involving him with her life and would only use him as an escape from "vainer

My book,Anastasia: The Last Grand Duchess, by Carolyn Meyer, follows the life of Anastasia Nikolavena Romanov through her fictional diary from 1914-1918, the year she died. Anastasia's father was Tsar Nicolas II, the absolute ruler of Russia. The main parts of this book were World War I and When the family was under arrest. At the begining of the book, the Romanov children basically lived in a bubble. they did not interact very much with people outside their palaces. towards the middle of the book there bubble pops and they realize not everyone likes them.

does to her lover because he loves her so much and can not be with

The speakers of Browning’s “My Last Duchess” and Marvell’s “To His Coy Mistress” are both men who are accustomed to having what they want and when they want it. Both speakers show that they have little to no intention for women other than to please themselves. The poets show their speaker’s true character with literary devises throughout the poems by alluding to their desire for power, their self-serving nature, and their attitudes that they are superior to women.

In literature, when reading two or more poems for a poet, they often share some similarities in terms of themes, feelings, or concepts that the poet tries to express and deliver to the reader. The two poems “Porphyria’s Lover” and “My Last Duchess,” are written by Robert Browning in 1842. In "Porphyria’s Lover”, the narrator sits alone in his house in a cold and stormy night. Then, his lover, Porphyria, comes to his house and make it warm by starting a fire. She starts to cuddle with him and puts his head over her shoulder, the narrator feels her love towards him.

Love is the most dominant theme in Shakespeare’s ‘Romeo and Juliet’. It is presented as infatuation which is proven to be a force so strong that it literally consumes the two lovers. Although it is only alluded in Browning’s dramatic monologues The Laboratory, the speaker arguably loves her husband as she seeks to rid herself of his lover thereby reclaiming him as her own. Narcissism is seen in both Porphyria’s Lover and My Last Duchess as both characters empower themselves by making them the central focus of the monologue. The Duke is the least emotional of all the characters depicted, yet his actions show a determination and strength of purpose which is evident in the poems.

only way this is possible is to kill her. This occurs to him after he

How has love been presented by the poets in the poems: My Last Duchess, Porphyria’s Lover, Sonnet 116 and 18, A mother in a Refugee Camp and Mother any Distance? the true capacity of his obsession. The curtain in itself shows the Dukes craving for control as he wishes to restrict who is able to view the painting, instead of leaving it for all to admire. He didn’t want the Duchess, likewise the painting, to receive praise from different men because he didn't want the kind words of others to distract the Duchess from, what he viewed as, her main purpose of belonging to him and him only.

Williams Shakespeare’s Tragedy of Macbeth, opens with a strong relationship between the main characters Lady Macbeth and Macbeth that is based on concern, love and devotion to each other. As the play continues there is a change in their relationship.

the personality of his duchess, he is shown to be a heartless, arrogant man. His complete

Robert Browning is an amazing poet. He wrote many poems in the late 1800’s that are connected with storylines, characters and plot. “My Last Duchess” and “Porphyria’s Lover” are examples of Browning’s connected poems. Both are considered to be dramatic monologues in which the character narrates his story of love. The Duke from “My Last Duchess” and the speaker from “Porphyria’s Lover” are known as “brothers in character and action”. They share many similar personality traits and the make many of the same actions. Both the Duke and speaker manipulate other characters from the poem. They are both possessive over women and objects, love the feeling of power are both over confident. Manipulation is a very important action of both the

sense that a man has the leading role, and all of the power in any

Question : What is a dramatic monologue? Which of the two, in your opinion, is the stronger dramatic monologue in Tennyson’s “Ulysses” or Browning's “My Last Duchess”?