‘Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister’ is one of Robert Browning’s most celebrated dramatic monologues: it first appeared in Browning’s 1842 collection Dramatic Lyrics. As ‘Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister’ is a relatively long poem, perhaps the best way to offer an analysis of the poem is by going through it, […]
Probably Robert Browning’s most famous (and widely studied) dramatic monologue, ‘My Last Duchess’ is spoken by the Duke of Ferrara, chatting away to an acquaintance (for whom we, the reader, are the stand-in) and revealing a sinister back-story lurking behind the portrait of his late wife, the Duchess, that adorns […]
Selected by Dr Oliver Tearle The dramatic monologue is a literary form that really came of age in the 1830s, thanks to Tennyson and Browning most of all. Below, we’ve selected some of the greatest examples of the dramatic monologue: a poem spoken by a character (rather than the poet […]