Ever heard of the sonnet " How do I love thee? Let me count the ways… "? That's Elizabeth Barrett Browning, writing about her love for her husband, Robert.
During the Victorian period i. You might usually hit the snooze button as soon as you hear the words " Victorian " and "poem" uttered in the same breath.
But "Porphyria's Lover" isn't your typical Victorian poem. This is one of the creepiest poems you'll ever read: it's from the point of view of a psychotic murderer, and explores the complex madness of the speaker, but without offering any definitive answer as to his ultimate motivation.
Where does the madness come from? Why does he murder his lover? And why, in the final lines, does he gloat that "God has not said a word"?
Does that mean that he gets away with it? So even if you're not usually a fan of Victorian poetry, give this one a chance. This page has links to a lot of information on Robert Browning's life and works. They have loads of interesting information on the Brownings. Dramatization of "Porphyria's Lover" This video is a dramatization of the action of the poem without the words. It is also interesting how Browning uses so much stock, melodramatic imagery to set his poem up.
While the storm certainly suits his ideas as a symbol of chaos as opposed to the order of society , it is akin to the 'dark and stormy night' setups of traditional stories. However, once Porphyria enters, the poem moves to a more explicitly sexual place — notice the imagery as she undresses and dries herself — that suddenly equates those natural forces with the human forces of sexuality.
The speaker, who had "listen'd with heart fit to break" to the storm, seems to recognize in both of these parallel forces the existence of the uncontrollable. Considering the Victorian period in which Browning wrote, this sense of sexual freedom could be expected to prompt a judgment from his audience on Porphyria as an unwed sexual woman, a judgment that is quickly reversed when she becomes the victim of an even darker human impulse than sexuality though one most certainly tied in with it.
It is worth mentioning that the speaker does not take any sexual license with her dead body, but instead tries to maintain a sense of the purity he had glimpsed in her, creating a tableaux with her head on his shoulder that evokes childish affection rather than adult depravity.
As with all things, Browning complicates rather than simplifies. The overarching message of the poem is thus that humans are full of contradictions. We are drawn to both the things we love and the things we hate, and we are eminently capable of rationalizing either choice. Through such measured and considered language, we are invited to approve of the murder even as it disgusts us, and in the murder itself we are to forgive the woman for what we at least if we were Victorian might have otherwise judged her.
Humans are creatures of transience and chaos, even as we belabor the attempt to convince ourselves that we are rational and that our choices are sound. The Question and Answer section for Robert Browning: Poems is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel. Comment on the imagery use by Browning in the poem with suitable example.
Themes in Robert Browning's poems? Much of Browning's work contemplates death and the way that it frames our life choices. Many poems consider the impending nature of death as a melancholy context to balance the joy of life. The poem the Pied Piper of Hamelin is dedicated to "W. What is the relationship between the two? And he typically does not offer any answers to them: Browning is no moralist, although he is no libertine either. SparkTeach Teacher's Handbook.
Themes Motifs Symbols. Complete Text The rain set early in tonight, The sullen wind was soon awake, It tore the elm-tops down for spite, and did its worst to vex the lake: I listened with heart fit to break. When glided in Porphyria; straight She shut the cold out and the storm, And kneeled and made the cheerless grate Blaze up, and all the cottage warm; Which done, she rose, and from her form Withdrew the dripping cloak and shawl, And laid her soiled gloves by, untied Her hat and let the damp hair fall, And, last, she sat down by my side And called me.
Be sure I looked up at her eyes Happy and proud; at last I knew Porphyria worshiped me: surprise Made my heart swell, and still it grew While I debated what to do. That moment she was mine, mine, fair, Perfectly pure and good: I found A thing to do, and all her hair In one long yellow string I wound Three times her little throat around, And strangled her.
No pain felt she; I am quite sure she felt no pain. As a shut bud that holds a bee, I warily oped her lids: again Laughed the blue eyes without a stain. And I untightened next the tress About her neck; her cheek once more Blushed bright beneath my burning kiss: I propped her head up as before Only, this time my shoulder bore Her head, which droops upon it still: The smiling rosy little head, So glad it has its utmost will, That all it scorned at once is fled, And I, its love, am gained instead!
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