What is the dominant point of view in "My Last Duchess" by Robert Browning?

In terms of a first person, second person, third person point of view, "My Last Duchess" is told from the first person perspective. This means that the speaker or narrator is also a character. This poem is a monologue spoken by the Duke to an unknown listener who does not verbally respond in any way. Readers are alerted to the first person point of view in the first two lines when we see the usage of "my" and "I."

That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall,

Looking as if she were alive. I call

That piece a wonder, now;

What is the dominant point of view in "My Last Duchess" by Robert Browning?

Browning's "My Last Duchess" is a dramatic monologue.  The speaker is the Duke, and he is speaking to a silent listener.

Monologue refers to one person speaking, of course.  In this case the Duke is speaking to a representative of the father of the Duke's bride-to-be. 

The Duke is in the process of negotiating the marriage.  He basically is establishing what kind of behavior will be expected of his new wife.  In short, he is establishing that if she doesn't behave with proper deference toward him--put him far, far above everyone and everything else--he will have her executed the same as he did his first wife.  He wants a showpiece he can exhibit just like his works of art. 

So everything you read in the poem is from the Duke's point of view.  And it is a warped point of view.

What is the point of view in the poem "My Last Duchess"?

Robert Browning's poem "My Last Duchess" is what is known as a dramatic monologue. It consists of an extended speech given in the voice of a first person narrator, the Duke of Ferrara. It is set in Renaissance Italy. He is addressing an envoy sent by a count to negotiate the terms on which the Duke will marry the Count's daughter. As the Duke talks, he appears to be showing the Count's envoy around his castle. The point of this tour is probably to impress the envoy with his wealth and good taste (what is sometimes called "cultural capital"). 

The Duke had been married in the past and is now a widower. The poem suggests, although does not absolutely confirm, that the Duke may have killed his previous wife. 

Browning uses the dramatic monologue to have characters, in a sense, incriminate themselves. Although the Duke is trying to impress his immediate audience, the longer he speaks, the more we find him cold-hearted, jealous, and even cruel in the way he thinks of his deceased wife as a possession rather than as a person.

What is the point of view in the poem "My Last Duchess"?

This poem uses a first person subjective point of view.  This means that it is narrated by a participant in the story, someone who uses the first person pronoun "I," and that it is narrated in the present tense, as events occur.  Though the duke is telling a representative of the count, whose daughter he now wishes to marry, of some events in the past -- as regards the life of his last duchess who is now dead -- the text occurs in the present, as he is negotiating the terms of his next marriage. 

It is, actually, the duke's ability to so blithely pass between a discussion of his now-dead wife to the present that makes him such a chilling figure.  Near the poem's end, he says,

"I gave commands; / Then all smiles stopped together. There she stands / As if alive. Will’t please you rise? We’ll meet / The company below, then." 

In other words, dissatisfied with the too-joyful behavior of his former wife, he "gave commands" -- either to her, to stop being so uniformly happy with everything, or perhaps even to have her killed so that he could start afresh with someone new -- and so "all smiles stopped" because she died.  In the next breath, he's back to the present, asking this man to come downstairs with him and rejoin their party.  It's quite disturbing, really, and this particular point of view helps make it possible.

What is the dominant point of view of "My Last Duchess"?

The dominant point of view is that of the Duke, who is the sole speaker in this famous dramatic monologue. What is unusual about the point of view is that, although the Duke is speaking to a visitor representing the father of his fiancee, the speaker, throughout most of the poem, appears to be looking at the portrait of the beautiful young wife he had murdered. The excellent portrait by Fra Pandolf is so lifelike that the Duke seems to be seeing his living last duchess standing before him. Early in the poem he says, "...and there she stands," and towards the end he says, "And there she stands / As if alive." It is an indication of his insensitive nature that he would even consider showing the portrait to his visitor, whom he had brought upstairs to a private room to discuss the dowry he expected to be brought by the young woman he intends to marry next (unless the visitor is so horrified by this scene and this interview that he urges his master to call the wedding off). It is a further indication of the Duke's wicked character that he would even keep the portrait, or that he would be able to look at it and remember what he had done to a beautiful young woman whose character was as angelic as his description of her reveals.

What is the dominant point of view of "My Last Duchess"?

Let us remember that this excellent poem is written as a dramatic monologue, which is a poem where one character addresses one or more listeners who remain silent. Thus, when we consider the point of view of the poem, it is clear that it is first person, as is made evident from the reference to "I" and "my" in the opening of the poem:

That's my last Duchess painted on the wall,

Looking as if she were alive. I call

That piece a wonder, now...

It is the Duke's narrative and his personality that clearly dominates and characterises the poem. We are able to see things from his point of view, and of course, as we hear, just as the envoy hears, the Duke's story about what happened to his last duchess, we are left to fill in the gaps of the rather curtailed description we are given, suggesting that the last duchess met a rather more brutal end at the hand of the duke than is overtly suggested.

From what point of view is "My Last Duchess" told, and is it about Browning's late wife?  

It is told in the 3rd person, with a limited narrator.  It is the duke himself speaking, and that is the only perspective we get.  It is just a monologue of his thoughts and perspectives.  So, his guest's thoughts are never portrayed, and we have to infer what the guest is thinking based on what the duke says.  For example, at the end, we can guess that the guest was attempting to leave when the duke states, "Nay, we'll go together down, sir,".  He wants his guest to wait, to not be so anxious to leave.  Because of this limited perspective, it gives us a really great glimpse into the psyche of the duke, but very little into the actual reality or facts of what he is speaking about.  We don't know for sure if his first wife was too flirtatious or unfaithful as the duke implies, because it is just his perceptions.

There is no evidence to suggest that the poem is about Robert Browning's first wife; rather, it is speaking of the narrator's first wife,the man that Browning creates to tell the story.  Browning had a knack for creating creepy characters who go to great lengths to secure love, and the duke is a great example of that.