My Last Duchess by Robert Browning: GCSE poem guide

This is ‘My Last Duchess’ by Robert Browning, from the Power and Conflict cluster of the AQA anthology. I’m Hannah, and I teach English. The question we’ll answer: How does every part of ‘My Last Duchess’ show the Duke’s need to control? We’ll go through the context, the poem section by section, one quotation explored closely, a model paragraph, the quotations to learn and which poems to compare it with. First, the context.

Victorian readers. Robert Browning published ‘My Last Duchess’ in 1842, early in the reign of Queen Victoria. The poem takes his readers back three hundred years, to Italy in the 1500s. Art as power. In the Renaissance, wealthy nobles paid artists to paint them and their families.

A portrait or a statue showed off a family’s power, wealth and taste to anyone who entered the room. A real duke. The speaker is a Duke of Ferrara, thought to be based on Alfonso II d’Este. His young first wife died in suspicious circumstances. A dramatic monologue.

Only the Duke speaks. He shows his late wife’s portrait to an envoy who is arranging his next marriage, to a Count’s daughter. There is no narrator, so readers must judge him from his own words. Here’s the poem. Read it with me.

That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall, Looking as if she were alive. I call That piece a wonder, now: Fra Pandolf’s hands Worked busily a day, and there she stands. Will’t please you sit and look at her? I said “Fra Pandolf” by design, for never read Strangers like you that pictured countenance, The depth and passion of its earnest glance, But to myself they turned (since none puts by The curtain I have drawn for you, but I) And seemed as they would ask me, if they durst, How such a glance came there; so, not the first Are you to turn and ask thus. Sir, ’twas not Her husband’s presence only, called that spot Of joy into the Duchess’ cheek: perhaps Fra Pandolf chanced to say “Her mantle laps Over my lady’s wrist too much,” or “Paint Must never hope to reproduce the faint Half-flush that dies along her throat”: such stuff Was courtesy, she thought, and cause enough For calling up that spot of joy.

She had A heart—how shall I say?—too soon made glad, Too easily impressed; she liked whate’er She looked on, and her looks went everywhere. Sir, ’twas all one! My favour at her breast, The dropping of the daylight in the West, The bough of cherries some officious fool Broke in the orchard for her, the white mule She rode with round the terrace—all and each Would draw from her alike the approving speech, Or blush, at least. She thanked men,—good! but thanked Somehow—I know not how—as if she ranked My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old name With anybody’s gift.

Who’d stoop to blame This sort of trifling? Even had you skill In speech—(which I have not)—to make your will Quite clear to such an one, and say, “Just this Or that in you disgusts me; here you miss, Or there exceed the mark”—and if she let Herself be lessoned so, nor plainly set Her wits to yours, forsooth, and made excuse, —E’en then would be some stooping; and I choose Never to stoop. Oh sir, she smiled, no doubt, Whene’er I passed her; but who passed without Much the same smile? This grew; 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. I repeat, The Count your master’s known munificence Is ample warrant that no just pretence Of mine for dowry will be disallowed; Though his fair daughter’s self, as I avowed At starting, is my object. Nay, we’ll go Together down, sir. Notice Neptune, though, Taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity, Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me!

Lines 1 to 13: The portrait and curtain. “That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall”. The possessive “my” and the adjective “last” open the poem: she is one wife in a series, owned like the painting on his wall. “Looking as if she were alive”. The Duke praises how lifelike the painting is.

The reader starts to ask why the painted woman is here and the living one is gone. “The curtain I have drawn for you, but I”. The brackets slip in a proud aside: nobody else opens the curtain. He now decides who sees her face and when. “Fra Pandolf’s hands”.

Renaissance nobles paid artists to show off their wealth and taste. The Duke names his painter to impress the envoy with his collection. Lines 14 to 24: The spot of joy. “Her husband’s presence only”. The Duke is thought to be based on Alfonso II d’Este, whose young wife died in suspicious circumstances.

Here his jealousy of anyone else pleasing her begins to show. “Of joy into the Duchess’ cheek”. A painter’s compliment made her blush with pleasure. The Duke resents it, but the reader sees a warm, happy young woman. “too soon made glad”.

The Duke pauses with dashes, as if choosing his words with care. The adverb “soon” turns her happiness into a fault. “and her looks went everywhere”. He means she was too friendly with everyone. Many readers see innocence and kindness, and a husband who wanted every look for himself.

Lines 25 to 34: All one to her. “Sir, ’twas all one!”. A short exclamation after a long, smooth sentence. For a moment the Duke’s anger breaks through his polite manner. “The dropping of the daylight in the West”.

A list sets the Duke’s own gift beside a sunset, some cherries and a mule. To her they were equal, and that is what he cannot forgive. “some officious fool”. The servant who picked cherries for her is a “fool” to the Duke. The reader sees his contempt for anyone below him.

“My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old name”. For a Renaissance noble, an old family name meant power and status. The Duke treats marrying into it as the greatest gift a woman could receive. Lines 35 to 46: Never to stoop. “which I have not”.

A parenthesis of false modesty. He claims he has no skill in speech while he controls every word he says to the envoy. “Never to stoop”. Pride stops him talking to his wife. Telling her what upset him would lower him, so he chose another way to deal with her.

“This grew; I gave commands;”. Short clauses and semicolons make the line flat and quick. The worst event in the poem takes three words, and he never says what the commands were. “Then all smiles stopped together”. Like the real duke’s first wife, the Duchess dies with no explanation.

With no narrator, Victorian readers had to judge a great nobleman from his own calm words. And lines 47 to 56. “Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me!”. The poem ends on “me” and on another work of art he paid for. As in Renaissance Italy, art shows off his power.

So, to sum it up in one sentence: Browning lets the Duke’s polite, controlled voice give away a proud and jealous man who treated his wife as a possession and had her silenced, so readers judge him by his own words. One quotation, explored closely: “I gave commands; / Then all smiles stopped together”. Try it yourself first: method, zoom in, effect, and the context or purpose. Method: A short main clause, a semicolon, then enjambment that carries the reader into the next line. Zoom in: “commands” is plural and vague.

The Duke never says what he ordered, and he does not need to. Effect: The calm tone is chilling. The reader realises that the Duchess was silenced or killed, and that the Duke feels no guilt. Context: The Duke of Ferrara is thought to be based on Alfonso II d’Este, whose young first wife died in suspicious circumstances. And here’s a model What–How–Why paragraph for the question: How does Browning let the Duke reveal more than he means to in ‘My Last Duchess’?

Browning lets the Duke reveal that his pride matters more to him than his wife’s life. The Duke complains that she treated “My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old name” like any small gift. The long, hyphenated adjective shows how heavily he values his family name. He then says “I choose / Never to stoop”. The enjambment makes the reader wait on “choose”, so his refusal to speak to her sounds cold and deliberate.

Soon after comes “I gave commands”, spoken as calmly as a list of chores. Because this is a dramatic monologue, the Duke never hears himself. The reader does. The Duke of Ferrara is thought to be based on Alfonso II d’Este, whose young first wife died in suspicious circumstances, so Browning makes us fear for the next Duchess. The quotations from ‘My Last Duchess’ worth learning by heart.

“I gave commands; / Then all smiles stopped together”. The Duke admits, calmly, that he had his wife silenced or killed. “I choose / Never to stoop”. Pride: the enjambment makes the reader wait for his refusal. In our scheme, ‘My Last Duchess’ is compared with ‘Ozymandias’.

The question: How do Shelley and Browning present men with great power, and what do they want us to think of them? In the exam you choose your own second poem, so have two or three ready for each theme. Everything in this video comes from our Power and Conflict poetry scheme of learning for schools. If you’re a teacher, Lesson 3 of every scheme is free at btl.education. Thank you for watching.