My Last Duchess
● Control of superiors over insubordinate
● Iambic pentameter with the variation of trochees like the work never
● Caesuras
● Interjections
● Compare to:
● Ozymandias(main speaker)
● London (authority)
● Kamikaze (orders from above)
● Charge of the light brigade (corruption / bad orders from above)
● Volta
● The reader is manipulated - deceived until the volta
● Robert Browning, message about people with impunity
● Duke can’t be contained, higher than structure
● Social message
One way in which power is presented in My Last Duchess is through the duke’s
mistreatment of his insubordination. He has a strong sense of superiority and doesn’t
hesitate to show it. Throughout the poem, he belittles the people around him and pushes
his views onto them. ‘Since none puts by the curtain I have drawn for you, but I’. This quote
shows his controlling side and his entitlement. Only he can look at the painting or show it
to others. He also talks about other men with spite and belittling language. ‘The bough of
cherries some officious fool broke in the orchard for her’. The words ‘some officious fool’
shows the lack of respect he has for everyone beneath him.
Robert Browning also withholds information from the reader to portray a sense of
superiority. The reader is manipulated and deceived. Firstly, it is not made clear to the
reader who the duke is talking to. During the majority of the poem, we are manipulated into
believing the duke is speaking to us however at the end we realise that he is not. ‘Will’t you
please rise?’. The reader is also deceived and not told until the volta that the duchess no
longer lives. The change in tone and pace of the poem is extremely sudden, allowing the
reader to feel the same shock that the count would have. ‘This grew; I gave commands;
Then all smiles stopped together. There she stands as if alive’.
When we are shown the duke's view of women we can see that it is very dehumanising
and objectifying. He has no respect for them and wants to ‘tame’ them. ‘Notice Neptune,
though, taming a sea-horse’, this phrase shows how he enforces his control on women.
● Control of superiors over insubordinate
● Iambic pentameter with the variation of trochees like the work never
● Caesuras
● Interjections
● Compare to:
● Ozymandias(main speaker)
● London (authority)
● Kamikaze (orders from above)
● Charge of the light brigade (corruption / bad orders from above)
● Volta
● The reader is manipulated - deceived until the volta
● Robert Browning, message about people with impunity
● Duke can’t be contained, higher than structure
● Social message
One way in which power is presented in My Last Duchess is through the duke’s
mistreatment of his insubordination. He has a strong sense of superiority and doesn’t
hesitate to show it. Throughout the poem, he belittles the people around him and pushes
his views onto them. ‘Since none puts by the curtain I have drawn for you, but I’. This quote
shows his controlling side and his entitlement. Only he can look at the painting or show it
to others. He also talks about other men with spite and belittling language. ‘The bough of
cherries some officious fool broke in the orchard for her’. The words ‘some officious fool’
shows the lack of respect he has for everyone beneath him.
Robert Browning also withholds information from the reader to portray a sense of
superiority. The reader is manipulated and deceived. Firstly, it is not made clear to the
reader who the duke is talking to. During the majority of the poem, we are manipulated into
believing the duke is speaking to us however at the end we realise that he is not. ‘Will’t you
please rise?’. The reader is also deceived and not told until the volta that the duchess no
longer lives. The change in tone and pace of the poem is extremely sudden, allowing the
reader to feel the same shock that the count would have. ‘This grew; I gave commands;
Then all smiles stopped together. There she stands as if alive’.
When we are shown the duke's view of women we can see that it is very dehumanising
and objectifying. He has no respect for them and wants to ‘tame’ them. ‘Notice Neptune,
though, taming a sea-horse’, this phrase shows how he enforces his control on women.
