1. Background: Robert Browning was known as a mediocre poet with a gift for dramatic monologues until he became associated with Elizabeth Barrett, who was the most famous poet in England at the time. After reading her flattering reference to him in her Poems, Browning wrote to her in January 1845. At that time, Barrett was an invalid confined to her room by a nervous disorder. Browning to came see her in May 1845, and so began one of the most famous courtships in literature. Six years his elder and an invalid, she could not believe that the vigorous and worldly Browning really loved her as much as he professed to, and her doubts are expressed in the Sonnets from the Portuguese which she wrote over the next two years.
2. Have the students read: “How Do I Love Thee?” (Sonnet 43 from Sonnets from the Portuguese) by Elizabeth Barrett Browning on page 862 in the purple literature book.
3. Can they sense any feelings of doubt or desperation in this sonnet? How does knowing that Elizabeth was an invalid color their interpretation of the line:
and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.
4. Love conquered all, however, and Browning imitated his hero Shelley (Percy Bysshe Shelley, who married Mary Shelley who wrote Frankenstein) by spiriting his beloved off to Italy in August 1846. Since they were proper Victorians, however, they got married a week beforehand.
5. Mr. Barrett disinherited her (as he did each one of his children who got married without his permission, and he never gave his permission). Unlike her brothers and sisters, Elizabeth had inherited some money of her own, so the Brownings were reasonably comfortable in Italy. In 1849, they had a son, Robert Wiedeman Barrett Browning.
6. It is still unclear what sort of affliction Elizabeth Barrett Browning had, although medical and literary scholars have enjoyed speculating. Whatever it was, the opium which she was repeatedly prescribed probably made it worse; and Browning almost certainly lengthened her life by taking her south and by his solicitous attention. She died in his arms on June 29, 1861.
7. There was a play written that was made into a movie about the love affair between EBB and Robert Browning. It is called The Barretts of Wimpole Street.
8. Robert wrote his best work during the time that he was with Elizabeth, although he was more famous as Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s husband than he was as a writer until after her death. He dabbled with writing plays, wherein he perfected the use of the dramatic monologue.
9. Usually written in blank verse (unrhymed verse), the dramatic monologue is the speech of a single character in a moment of some dramatic significance. In the course of his monologue, the speaker reveals what the situation is, as well as the setting of the situation and to whom he is speaking. Of greatest interest, however, is what he reveals about his own motives and personality. Often the speaker, while trying to justify himself to his listeners, actually reveals the faults of his character to the reader. Such works as "My Last Duchess," "Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister," and "The Bishop Orders His Tomb" are poems in which the reader is given the pleasure of discovering more about the speaker than the speaker understands about himself.
10. Read through Browning’s “My Last Duchess” on page 855 as a class. Come to a general consensus about the poem’s meaning. Who is the speaker and how would you characterize him? Who is he addressing and what is the topic of his address? Where and when does the poem seem to be set? Tell the students that they are going to create dramatic monologues of their own to help them find the hidden faults of the speaker (the duke) in this poem.
11. Have students create a list of all possible characters and objects the poem either contains directly or indirectly refers to on the whiteboard. (Possibilities are the Duke, Fra Pandolf, the Count, the Count’s envoi, a servant in the Duke’s household, a visiting minister of state, Claus of Innsbruck, the bronze statue of Neptune, the Count’s daughter, the cherry bough from the orchard guy, the white mule, and the last Duchess.)
12. Assign each student a character from the list. Ask them to compose a monologue (1/4 to 1/2 page or so) which would fit the character’s personality, using what they perceive to be the appropriate diction and point of view. They will have to use more imagination for some characters than others.
13. What should be in a monologue? The thoughts and feelings, expressed and unexpressed, that each character would have about what is happening. They may describe their own life or the observations they make of others’ lives.
14. Share with the students this example monologue. This monologue is by Absalom from the novel, Cry the Beloved Country. This is what he has to say about the murder he accidentally commits at the beginning of the book:
"What did I do? I see the white man falling, blood forcing its way into the world it was never meant to see. The gun, hot in my hand, stings. Then everything stings, everything is so clear and sharp, my body aches with sudden exhaustion, physically rejecting what it just witnessed. My mind burns, I see it happening again, the white man jumps out yelling, then he starts screaming, and everything hurts. The guilt sears my head with the image. White, chemical, smoke blurs everything, but it’s sharp smoke, painful smoke, a signal to the world, visible to only a few. I hurt, I seek comfort within, father what did I do? All the pain vanishes, except the pain in my heart, it amplifies a hundred fold, the shame I brought my father hurts more than anything, what will he say? What did I do? The whole city must be listening to this pain in my chest, this silent pain. And inside I hear my voice taken from me, my soul lost in the shambles of who I once was, and now, am no more. All the good in the world has been locked away, all that I loved is tainted with the image of this terrible weight I now carry. All happiness is now a silent reminder of how much I no longer deserve to feel warmth in my cold soul. Reach out to me, please beg for me, allow me to grow once more. I’ve sold myself without a price; I have served a master who despises all else. There I see the shame running across my hands like a lake of fire and brimstone. Oh forgive me, Oh Father, what have I done?"
15. If any students wish to share, let them perform their monologues at the end of class, if you have time. Monologues may be turned in today or Monday.
Homework Collected: Dramatic Monologue, may also be turned in on Monday
Homework Given: Webquest presentations starting on Monday, April 13th, Independent Reading, try to finish book by the last week of school,
Handouts given out: None
To Read: “How Do I Love Thee?” (Sonnet 43 from Sonnets from the Portuguese) by Elizabeth Barrett Browning on page 862 in the purple literature book, Browning’s “My Last Duchess” on page 855
