The Dramatic Monologues Of Browning And Tennyson

The Dramatic Monologues Of Browning And Tennyson Capture The Mood And Personality Of The Characters. One Can Imagine The Speakers Repeating Their Points Of View Time After Time. Do You Agree? Essay, Research Paper English Literature – The Dramatic Monologues of Robert Browning and Alfred Lord Tennyson. Of the monologues I will be analysing, I feel some capture the mood and personality of the main characters better than others do. Often, a particular mood will be carried on throughout the monologue, making it obvious to the reader of the character’s traits. It is very much dependant on how well the writer provides us with a clear persona, whether it be an arrogant character or a pathetic one. Of course, being monologues, we are presented with four very biased accounts of

events. I agree with the idea that Browning and Tennyson capture the mood and personality of the characters, however, I feel they achieve this in some monologues better than in others. Each monologue essentially, tries to grasp a mood that is representative of the speaker. ‘Andrea Del Sarto by Browning is a monologue, which I feel captures the mood of the speaker very well. We are given clear evidence of his pathetic personality. It deals with a man who is superior as an artist, but feels he is inferior as a man. He is jealous of others that are able to combine art with a happy life, with the love of a woman. These are the main moods expressed in this monologue, also by Robert Browning. It is clear that Andrea is jealous of others and by the end of the poem, we feel he is

pathetic and ridiculous. We are given bits of evidence that suggest his wife, Lucrezia, is having an affair – My everybody s moon,/Which everybody looks on and calls his. It is clear from the beginning that Andrea knows full well that his wife sleeps around and lies. He also says things such as Tomorrow satisfy your friend , which make him appear so unbelievably pathetic. Del Sarto actually wants very simple things out of his life. He is regarded as a fantastic painter and he knows he is, however he feels his paintings do not carry soul, because he has not the love of his wife – which is all he actually wants. And thus we half-men struggle , explains clearly that he feels incomplete without her love. He certainly blames his wife for not having achieved his full potential. The

entire monologue has a depressed mood to it. It is very obvious he is unhappy with his situation, and so from the things he asks of his wife, his personality gives itself away. He seems pathetic and even past pitiable. We come away from this monologue blaming nobody but Andrea and feeling no sympathy for him whatsoever. Whilst reading ‘Andrea Del Sarto’, it is very easy to imagine him repeating his feeling again and again. There is a feeling of repetition throughout the monologue. It seems as though it is all their relationship exists of, him getting a few minutes with his wife to explain to her how he feels, once again, and the her leaving him to perhaps visit her lover. It is clear that Andrea is upset about the choices he has made, and wants so desperately to get his wife

to understand how he is feeling, making him talk to his wife about the same thing any time he gets a chance. The repetitive nature of the speaker in Andrea is almost mirrored in ‘Tithonus’, which although is by a different writer – Tennyson, is very similar in terms of hopelessness and desperation. Tithonus deals with a Trojan Prince who is beloved by the goddess of dawn – Aurora. As she was immortal, but he wasn t, she begs Zeus to grant him immortal life, forgetting to ask for immortal youth to go with it. This proves to be a big problem for Tithonus for the obvious reasons. Although he will never die, with every day that passes, he will become weaker, frailer. The entire monologue has a miserable mood to it, and we can tell from the beginning of the poem that Tithonus