5/18/22, 8:53 AM My Last Duchess by Robert Browning I Poetry Foundation

POETRY FOUNDATION

My Last Duchess
BY ROBERT BROWNING

FERRARA
ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: implied subservience to Duchess
That's my last Duchess painted on the wall, ("my")
Looking as if she were alive. I call

That piece a wonder, now; Fra Pandolf's hands

ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: every two lines rhymes

Worked busily a day, and there she stands.

ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: Detailed painting but also implies
Will't please you sit and look at her? I said
she is no longer around, similar to how "last" implies
"Fra Pandolf" by design, for never read she is no longer
Strangers like you that pictured countenance,
The depth and passion of its earnest glance, ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: Fictitious person but supposedly
But to myself they turned (since none puts by famous, shows status
The curtain I have drawn for you, but I)

And seemed as they would ask me, if they durst,

ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: narrator is someone who
commands the painter to paint the Duchess, perhaps
How such a glance came there; so, not the first
her husband
Are you to turn and ask thus. Sir, 'twas not

Her husband's presence only, called that spot ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: paintings sometimes covered by
Of joy into the Duchess' cheek; perhaps curtains, so maybe the painting is only revealed when
Fra Pandolf chanced to say, "Her mantle laps the narrator is there
Over my lady's wrist too much," or "Paint
Must never hope to reproduce the faint ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: The Duchess seems happy and
alive in her painting, but why was she happy?
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
ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: The Duchess was flattered
A heart—how shall I say?— too soon made glad,
easily, self-centered?
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 offcious fool
ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: Everyone served her, very spoiled
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,

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43768/my-last-duchess 1/3
5/18/22, 8:53 AM My Last Duchess by Robert Browning I Poetry Foundation

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.
This sort of trifling? Even had you
ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: The narrator, her husband, gave
her a noble title, but she doesn't appreciate it more
Who'd stoop to blame than all the other stuff that is done for her
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, ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: She smiled at everyone who
Whene'er I passed her; but who passed without passed her, so the husband didn't feel special
Much the same smile? This grew; I gave commands;
Then all smiles stopped together. There she stands
ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: Narrator did something to stop
her smiling, possibly killed her. Next line he mentions
As if alive. Will't please you rise? We'll meet
painting again to reemphasize the Duchess is dead
The company below, then. I repeat,
The Count your master's known munificence ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: lavishly generous
Is ample warrant that no just pretense

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
ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: Narrator sees his wife as just
another symbol of his wealth, an object
Together down, sir. Notice Neptune, though,
Taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity,
ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: taming rare things shows power,
Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me!
taming his wife

ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: Mentioning a bronze statue once

again shows the importance of wealth.

ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: Telling the story of a

CONTACT US nobelwoman getting herself painted on a wall. Who is
NEWSLETTERS the narrator?
PRESS
ANNIKA DAMSTEDT: Now that I've read it again, I
PRIVACY POLICY
realize it is a story of a Duke who has someone paint
TERMS OF USE his wife, symbolizing his wealth and power
POETRY MOBILE APP

61 West Superior Street,

Chicago, IL 60654

0 2022 Poetry Foundation

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43768/my-last-duchess 2/3