Discuss The Significance Of The Title In Robert Browning’s ‘my Last Duchess’

Each of the three words in the title of Browning s My Last Duchess serve to introduce the reader to themes and ideas that run throughout the poem. The immediacy of the possessive pronoun, my , for instance, suggests to the reader that the poem will be spoken by a first-person narrator, while also demonstrating the speaker s possessiveness, that the Duchess is something to be owned or acquired. We continue to see the Duke s megalomania (arrogance, self-centredness, selfishness) extend beyond the my of the title: his frequent descri ptions of extravagant wealth ( Fra Pandolf , by design , my gift , Claus of Innsbruck ) highlight his obsession with possession and ownership, and the poem concludes upon the word me , cyclically uniting beginning and ending, serving to centre the poem around the speaker. The inclusion of last , also serves to emphasise the possessiveness of my , as it suggests that this Duchess was the Duke s most recent Duchess, and that this cycle of male dominance will continue to reoccur in the future.

The appearance of the word Duchess in the title is also significant. Referred to by just her title, she is left nameless, also serving to suggest that the ominous nature of her disappearance is one that shall occur for countless other nameless Duchesses in the future. But the word Duchess also directs the reader towards the significance of status in the poem. Written during the Victorian era, Britain was beginning to see social mobility in terms of class, and the word Duchess implies a level of nobility. This is also shown in the line, my gift of a nine-hundred year old name , which suggests that the Duchess only attained her status though the Duke s family name, and relates to the idea that marriage is a transition to ownership. Though the poem is set in another era and country (The Italian Renaissance), Browning is able to subtly criticise his own country by using his nameless Duchess as a vehicle through which to express the issue of patriarchy.