‘The perpetrator of crime is always hated by
the readers of crime writing.ʼ
‘The perpetrator of crime is always hated by the readers of crime writing.ʼ
Explore the significance of the presentation of the perpetrator in two crime texts you have
studied. [25 marks]
Poetry Collection and Atonement
The method in which Browningʼs narrators make the reader hate them.
Brionyʼs own ironic attitude towards her younger self.
The way in which Paul Marshall is so dislikable.
The criminal being regarded with sympathy – Ballad of Reading Gaol.
In crime writing there has been a constant fluctuation between making the perpetrator of the
crime a character to be entirely hated by audience or relatable in some respects, and even
likeable at moments. In the Poetry Collection and Atonement, the authors take different
interpretations to this. Therefore, in this essay I will discuss to what extent ‘the perpetrator(s) of
the crime is/are always hated by the readers of crime writingʼ.
In My Last Duchess, the critic Clyde De Ryals stated that the “Duke reveals all” in his
“unguarded moment”. As by attempting to tell the story of the Duchess who the Duke attempts
to patriarchally present as a ‘harlottʼ and woman “-too soon made glad, Too easily impressed”,
he instead presents an in-depth psychological portrait of his own egotistical self-reflecting the
poems greatest achievement; “the decline of an ego most subtle and auditous” (Clyde De
Ryals) which causes the readers hatred to be exemplified. On Line 26, as the Duke describes
how the Duchess found joy in even the “dropping of the daylight”, the soft repeated plosive ‘dʼ
sounds which create an onomatopoeic rhymical effect suggest a gentle nature in the Duchess
similar to that of the line used to describe her. Through this the Dukeʼs juxtaposing language to
describe his own actions as “I gave commands; Then all smiles stopped together.” Reflects both
a harsh, cold, and uncaring attitude to human life not dissimilar to that in Porphyriaʼs Lover who
“three times her little throat around” signifying Porphyriaʼs swift death, and of Edgar Allen Poeʼs
narrators in ‘The Tell-Tale Heartʼ and ‘The Black Catʼ. The blunt use of a full stop after the line
further emphasises the lack of significance that the Duke gives the Duchessʼs life, as though he
was simply giving out any other order. Through this Browning therefore presents the
perpetrator of the crime, the Duke, as a vile and arrogant character. He appears to care about
nothing more that maintaining power and rejecting any accusations of “stopping” which he
intently repeats as a motif throughout the poem. As he kills the innocent Duchess, he also
destroys any possibility of the reader liking him making him hatred through his presentation as
the vilest and more grotesque parts of the upper-class society further emphasised by his name
‘Ferraraʼ where the Duke of Ferrara was believed to have poisoned his young bride – Lucrezia
Cosimo Di Medici in the 17th century, a history disliked figure also.
the readers of crime writing.ʼ
‘The perpetrator of crime is always hated by the readers of crime writing.ʼ
Explore the significance of the presentation of the perpetrator in two crime texts you have
studied. [25 marks]
Poetry Collection and Atonement
The method in which Browningʼs narrators make the reader hate them.
Brionyʼs own ironic attitude towards her younger self.
The way in which Paul Marshall is so dislikable.
The criminal being regarded with sympathy – Ballad of Reading Gaol.
In crime writing there has been a constant fluctuation between making the perpetrator of the
crime a character to be entirely hated by audience or relatable in some respects, and even
likeable at moments. In the Poetry Collection and Atonement, the authors take different
interpretations to this. Therefore, in this essay I will discuss to what extent ‘the perpetrator(s) of
the crime is/are always hated by the readers of crime writingʼ.
In My Last Duchess, the critic Clyde De Ryals stated that the “Duke reveals all” in his
“unguarded moment”. As by attempting to tell the story of the Duchess who the Duke attempts
to patriarchally present as a ‘harlottʼ and woman “-too soon made glad, Too easily impressed”,
he instead presents an in-depth psychological portrait of his own egotistical self-reflecting the
poems greatest achievement; “the decline of an ego most subtle and auditous” (Clyde De
Ryals) which causes the readers hatred to be exemplified. On Line 26, as the Duke describes
how the Duchess found joy in even the “dropping of the daylight”, the soft repeated plosive ‘dʼ
sounds which create an onomatopoeic rhymical effect suggest a gentle nature in the Duchess
similar to that of the line used to describe her. Through this the Dukeʼs juxtaposing language to
describe his own actions as “I gave commands; Then all smiles stopped together.” Reflects both
a harsh, cold, and uncaring attitude to human life not dissimilar to that in Porphyriaʼs Lover who
“three times her little throat around” signifying Porphyriaʼs swift death, and of Edgar Allen Poeʼs
narrators in ‘The Tell-Tale Heartʼ and ‘The Black Catʼ. The blunt use of a full stop after the line
further emphasises the lack of significance that the Duke gives the Duchessʼs life, as though he
was simply giving out any other order. Through this Browning therefore presents the
perpetrator of the crime, the Duke, as a vile and arrogant character. He appears to care about
nothing more that maintaining power and rejecting any accusations of “stopping” which he
intently repeats as a motif throughout the poem. As he kills the innocent Duchess, he also
destroys any possibility of the reader liking him making him hatred through his presentation as
the vilest and more grotesque parts of the upper-class society further emphasised by his name
‘Ferraraʼ where the Duke of Ferrara was believed to have poisoned his young bride – Lucrezia
Cosimo Di Medici in the 17th century, a history disliked figure also.
