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Showing posts with the label Robert Browning

Browning’s Optimism

Robert Browning, (1812-1899), one of the major Victorian poets, is an optimist and as an optimist he places himself above almost all writers of his era. We, in his poems, find his optimistic attitude towards love which make him optimist in every aspects of life. Browning, as an optimist, tends to believe in essential goodness of man and the salvation of man through the hard struggles. Now we will look into his optimistic views scattered in his poems especially in his dramatic monologue. Browning’s optimistic attitude towards love is clearly disclosed in the poem “ The Last Ride Together ”, one of his greatest love poems. In the poem the rejected lover is manly, brave and optimistic like a typical Browning’s character. He consoles himself for his failure to gain his beloved’s love with great optimism. The lover does not consider his failure as defeat rather it is “ written and needs must be ”. He even blesses his beloved   “ in pride and thankfulness ”. He now appeals a last ride to

“My Last Duchess” as a Dramatic Monologue

 What is dramatic monologue? Evaluate Robert Browning's  “My Last Duchess” as a Dramatic Monologue “My Last Duchess” is a fantastic dramatic monologue comp osed by a great Victorian poet Robert Robert Browning . A dramatic monologue, traditionally, includes lyrical strain, abrupt beginning, single speaker, silent listener, psychological analysis and clues to suggest what the silent listener says or does . Now we will see how the poem contains all these elements of a dramatic monologue. The poem begins with the dramatic suddenness : “That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall, Looking as if she were alive.” The readers can understand that the event has begun earlier.  But the poem begins from the middle to make the start dramatic.  As the poem progress, it becomes clear that only a single person speaks . The speaker is the Duke of Ferrara talking about his dead duchess’ portrait painted by Fra Pandlof. At several points of the poem, it becomes evident that there