Abstract
Abstract Of all Browning's poems, ‘My Last Duchess’ is probably the one that has received the most critical attention. Critics have produced any number of essays discussing the Duke's character as alternatively shrewd or witless, speculating on the affective force of the dramatic monologue, and pursuing real-life sources for the dramatis personre. In spite of all this activity, very little has emerged that seems to enhance our initial recognition of the power of this extraordinary poem. The portrait of the Duchess with her ‘spot/Of joy’ (II. 14–15) remains the literary equivalent of Leonardo's Mona Lisa with her enigmatic smile. In this article, I would like to re-examine the poem in a way that accounts for its haunting power, but in doing this I also want to suggest reasons why this monologue might be properly regarded as Browning's signature piece, typifying a mode of representation which is as yet critically unacknowledged.
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