-
My Last Duchess
Browning's poem is an excellent example of a dramatic monologue. It is a monologue because the entire poem consists of the words spoken by a single voice, Duke Ferrara's. It is dramatic because it...
-
My Last Duchess
In this dramatic monolog, the Duke shows a portrait of his late wife to a visitor. As he talks of her, demeaning her character, he reveals that she in actuality had been a lovely, sensitive woman,...
-
My Last Duchess
The Duke seems to be an absolutely cold, unloving, insensitive, and cruel person who would be dissatisfied with a wife regardless of what she was like. He complains that she was too friendly and...
-
My Last Duchess
"My Last Duchess" is about the power that the speaker, a Duke, had and still has over his dead wife, the eponymous Duchess. The Duke keeps a painting of the Duchess behind a curtain which "none...
-
My Last Duchess
There most definitely is a special significance to the sea-horse reference. Through the entire poem, the Duke's obesession with control is revealed. He even had his first wife murdered because...
-
My Last Duchess
From his description of his last duchess, you would think the duke would adore her. She is sweet and kind and easy to please. However, quite the contrary is true of the duke. The following lines...
-
My Last Duchess
The tone of Robert Browning`s `My Last Duchess' is not a simple matter. The poem is a dramatic monologue spoken in the voice of the Duke. Thus we can talk about the tone the Duke uses, but the...
-
My Last Duchess
"My Last Duchess" a subtly patterned poem in pentameter that steps into the next line is the dramatic monologue of the Duke Ferrara as he negotiates a new marriage with the emissary for another...
-
My Last Duchess
Robert Browning’s main point in “My Last Duchess” is that the Duke values art but cannot appreciate beauty in reality. The truth is that reality contains infinitely more beauty than art, and no...
-
My Last Duchess
The problem here is just that it's part of an incredibly long sentence. Fra Pandolf is the painter who actually painted the painting of the Duchess: Frà Pandolf's handsWorked busily a day, and...
-
My Last Duchess
The way Browning used the dramatic monologue was very often hugely ironic, simply in the way it was deployed. The form gives you a - usually, at least - uninterrupted monologue in a character's...
-
My Last Duchess
The Duke, who narrates the poem, is an unreliable narrator. Thus in trying to determine the character of the Duchess, we have the problem that we cannot trust our only source of information. The...
-
My Last Duchess
The line in question simply means that the Duke ordered his wife killed. Now he is looking for another wife, and the person he is speaking to in this dramatic monologue is a representative of the...
-
My Last Duchess
There is a suggestion that the painter was "making a pass" at the Duchess: Fra Pandolf chanced to say 'Her mantle laps Over my lady's wrist too much," or Paint Must never hope to...
-
My Last Duchess
In "My Last Duchess," the "blush" or "spot of joy" is the Duchess blushing. The Duke indicates that this blush is not because the Duchess is embarrassed or shy. Rather, he claims it is a...
-
My Last Duchess
The true significance of the title is only discovered at the end of the poem, when the dramatic monologue is placed into context and the reader realises who the duke is speaking to about his former...
-
My Last Duchess
You don't ask a question in your question, so I assume you just want the details of "My Last Duchess" as a dramatic monologue. The poem features one speaker speaking to a silent listener in a...
-
My Last Duchess
Do not confuse dramatic monologue here with dramatic irony. This poem is considered a dramatic monologue because the voice is but one speaker who is also a character, the Duke of Ferrara, who is...
-
My Last Duchess
Part of the mastery of Browning's art in this poem is that we are only told who the audience of the Duke's dramatic monologue is at the end of the poem, after he has seemingly quite cheerfully...
-
My Last Duchess
The title of the poem is derived from the first sentence uttered by the Duke who is showing the painting to an important visitor. His way of describing his late wife characterizes him as...
-
My Last Duchess
In these lines from "My Last Duchess," the Duke is speculating on why the Duchess blushed ("spot of joy") while the portrait was being painted. The Duke notes that the Duchess was too flirtatious...
-
My Last Duchess
According to the article on "Historical Context" in the eNotes Study Guide: The incident the poem dramatizes comes from the life of Alfonso II, a nobleman of Spanish origin who was Duke of Ferrara...
-
My Last Duchess
This is a very astute observation you have made. Let us remember that the dramatic monologue reveals the way in which the Duke tried to gain mastery over his last wife. His perceived inability to...
-
My Last Duchess
That would certainly appear to be the case. The count is going to marry his daughter off to the duke and has sent an emissary to negotiate the impending nuptials. The duke shows the emissary a...
-
My Last Duchess
"My Last Duchess" is one of Robert Browning dramatic monologues. He invented this form and excelled in it. His dramatic monologues have had a strong influence on literature, not only in poetry but...
-
My Last Duchess
Through the use of symbols, the Duke reveals himself to be a man who desires total and complete power and submission from those around him. This desire for power and control is symbolized in the...
-
My Last Duchess
In Robert Browning's dramatic monologue "My Last Duchess," the speaker, Duke Ferrara, is shown to be an extremely jealous man whose jealousy has led him to commit murder. Yet he does not believe...
-
My Last Duchess
Here the Duke is showing the painting of the Duchess to the messenger and is explaining that it has been completed very successfully by 'Fra Pandolf'. The Duke normally looks at the painting alone...
-
My Last Duchess
The speaker in the poem "My Last Duchess" is presumably the Duke, her husband. Throughout the poem, he expresses his displeasure at the young lady's joy. She finds joy in things like a sunset...
-
My Last Duchess
In a superior display of rhetoric, the Duke Ferrera enumerates that which he will and will not permit in a wife as he displays the portrait of his "last duchess" to the agent of the father of a...
-
My Last Duchess
The literary techniques and figures of speech included in Robert Browning’s poem “My Last Duchess” include the following (highlighted with italics): Looking as if she were alive. I call...
-
My Last Duchess
“My Last Duchess” by Robert Browning comes from an actual historical incident. In the sixteenth century Italy, Duke Ferrara married fourteen year-old Lucrezia, who died within two years. The Duke...
-
My Last Duchess
In Browning's "My Last Duchess," clues to the nature of relationships with regard to the Duke (the speaker in the poem) can be found in the poem's many verses—and its title. The title, "My Last...
-
My Last Duchess
Duke Ferrara, the speaker in Robert Browning's dramatic monologue "My Last Duchess," wields absolute power within his sphere of influence. The poem gives insight into his power over artists and...
-
My Last Duchess
This is such a complicated but wonderful poem. The Duke of Ferrara is a very selfish man who considers everything within his grasp "his". He owns many things...the bronze statue, for...
-
My Last Duchess
"My Last Duchess" by Robert Browning is narrated in the first person by the Duke of Ferrara. Although he attempts to convey a positive impression, as with many of Browning's dramatic monologues,...
-
My Last Duchess
The Duke is obviously proud and very concerned with his own importance and nobility. It is the Duchess' friendly behavior that really irritates him because it elevates others to his equal...
-
My Last Duchess
Yours is certainly a legitimate question. The Duke tries to explain why he didn't make his displeasure known in the following lines from the poem: Who'd stoop to blameThis sort of trifling? Even...
-
My Last Duchess
To his guest the duke, says, The Count your master's known munificence Is ample warrant that no just pretenseOf mine for dowry will be disallowed;Though his fair daughter's self, as I avowedAt...
-
My Last Duchess
"My Last Duchess" is a narrative poem by Robert Browning that is structured as a dramatic monolog. The speaker is the cold and arrogant Duke Ferrara who escorts a visitor through his castle,...
-
My Last Duchess
A metaphor is a strong comparison between two things, saying not that one thing is "like" the other (a simile), but instead that the one thing "is" the other. Check the link...
-
My Last Duchess
In "My Last Duchess," the main poetic devices are: Verbal Irony: "She had A heart--how shall I say?--too soon made glad, Too easily impressed;" (How can being a happy, charitable person be bad?)...
-
My Last Duchess
It is clear from the extract that the Duchess had no prejudice and that she treated everyone equally. She would compliment anyone and everyone she felt deserved praise for doing her a kindness. Her...
-
My Last Duchess
Because this poem centers on the contrast between arrogance, jealousy, and control, on one hand, and purity, joy, modesty and kindness, on the other, one can argue that the portait of the Duchess...
-
My Last Duchess
There are many examples of caesurae in Robert Browning's "My Last Duchess." The first appears in the third line: That piece a wonder, now. Fra Pandolf's hands The next glaring one is: Are you to...
-
My Last Duchess
The former, now deceased, wife of the speaker in "My Last Duchess" was, in life, polite, respectful, friendly, and beautiful. She was, unfortunately for her, not a snob, which is what her husband...
-
My Last Duchess
The entire poem is geared toward a “portrait” of the Duke’s inhumanity and greed. The casual remark “I gave commands and all smiles stopped together” is a sinister hint as to his power and...
-
My Last Duchess
In the poem, the duke was unhappy with his wife for a number of reasons. First of all, in lines 14–15, the duke says that his wife often blushed at others. Specifically, this "spot of joy" on her...
-
My Last Duchess
At first, it seems that the duke responded to the duchess's behavior by taking note of everything that seemed to make her happy: a cherry tree branch, a white mule, a sunset, the duke himself. The...
-
My Last Duchess
The Duke acknowledges that he lacks skill in expresssing himself. He says, "Even had you skill in speech which I have not..." Therefore his entire explanation of what he objected to in his wife's...
