The mood and tone of My Last Duchess and the character of the
             narrator are immediately and concisely revealed in Browning's (1842) first
             line, "That's my last Duchess painted on the wall, Looking as if she were
             alive" (1-2). Kennedy (1982) claims that "Browning may have modeled his
             speaker after Alonzo, Duke of Ferrara" (295). In this poem, the speaker
             narrates an account of his former wife, the titular Duchess of the poem,
             who the speaker has murdered. While the opening line demonstrates the
             materialistic, controlling, and murderous nature of the narrator, Browning
             uses a variety of poetic devices from rhythm and imagery to allusion and
             symbolism to fully characterize the nature of his speaker. In the end, the
             poem is wholly ironic in that the speaker finds himself a maligned and
             abused man, when in actuality he is a remorseless, controlling, and
             The poem is in the form of a dramatic monologue, with the speaker
             describing what he found to be his dead wife's lascivious behavior. He
             speaks of his deceased wife as a woman whose smiles were granted too
             generously to others than him, "Sir, twas not Her husband's presence
             only, called that spot Of joy into the Duchess' cheek" (Browning 1842, 13-
             15). Browning uses irony through having the speaker act as if he were a
             wronged husband, when he is a materialistic, manipulative and controlling
             murderer. We see this clearly in the use of language and imagery. The
             speaker refers to artists to show he is cultured and refined, like that of
             Fra Pandolf. We see he is manipulative and controlling when he expressed
             that only he is in charge of who now sees his former wife's countenance,
             "â€since none puts by The curtain I have drawn for you" (Browning 1842, 9-
             10). The Duke has put a curtain over his dead wife's portrait and only he
             reveals it when and to whom he choose.
             We see that the Duke is materialistic ...