My Last Duchess was written in 1842 by Robert Browning. It is the most representative example of dramatic monologue. It take palce in Ferrara, a a Renaissance's court.

Right from the title the reader immediately focuses his attention on the adjective "last": the word is different from "latest". On one hand "last" means something that cannot come out another time, on the other "latest" means the most recent. In addition the adjective "my" underlines a possessive attitude towards the woman.

The writer tells about the scene through a deictic (time or space reference like there, now or never). The Duke didn't consider the fresco a wonder before ('That piece a wonder, now') and the adverb never is in key position to underline his strong personality. He reveals a lot about his personality because he has the decision to show his fresco to someone. ('Frà Pandolf by design, for never read')

In the dramatic monologue there is just one person, the protagonist, who speaks to a silence audience composed by one or more people. The interlocutor is present but doesn't speak, he/she just listen to the speaker.

The Duke shows the fresco of his 'last Duchess' to his messanger: he is the first that looks at the picture. He gives some pieces of information about the wall picture: ('Fra Pandolph" had done it and he had worked busily a day'). He is very proud of the fresco and underlines that the listener is privileged to admire it. In addition he invites his messanger to sit and look at his duchess: he does not answer.

The duke describes his duchess: she had got a honest and passionate glance and she liked all the things at the same way, thus her husband was completely jealous of her attention towards somebody else. It is the reason why he covers the wall painting with a curtain: he wants to keep her glance only for himself.

The Duke didn't understand her behaviour. He wanted at all costs to posses her, as if she were an object and, especially, to possess her feelings and emotions. During his monologue he tells about his point of view according to the Duchess behaviour. He gives negative judgements like "too soon made glad".

The characterization of the Duke highlights, right from the first lines, his self centred and possessive figure, with a patronizing attitude.

He criticizes Duchess's behaviour. Indeed, she was kind and cheerful with everyone and at the same time with his husband. Her attitued makes him jealous because she doesn't understand the most important gift she got: her marriage with a duke ('My gift of a nine-hundred -years old name').

To tell the true, thanks to this line the reader understands the authority mentality of the duke.

At the end of the extract the reader can understand why the Duke shows his secret picture: he is getting married another time. The reader undertands that the messanger was probably the father of

new wife.

You can realize that his last duchess was murdered by the duke after Fra Pandolph's words. ('Paint must never hope to reproduce the faint half-flush that dies along her throat')

Robert Browning points out the women violence through the story of My Last Duchess. Nowadays this problem is still current. Indeed, too much men are violent with their women and have a patronizing attitued.