On the Entrapment and Incarceration of the Victorian Woman Essay

Thomas Blackburn describes the two Victorian poets, Robert Browning and Alfred, Lord Tennyson as being vast contemporaries (47). As much(prenominal) it is apt that their works should muse upon and explore similar topics and themes. Their connection is especially evident in Brownings My end Duchess and Tennysons The peeress of Shalott. The themes of entrapment and incarceration feature heavily in both of these works. Specifically, it is the entrapment and incarceration of women which pervade their respective compositions. When taking into consideration the way in which women were viewed at this juncture in history- being nothing more than beautiful objects (Gilbert and Gubar 54), it is quite easy to see how the literary representations of the nineteenth century woman would be responses to such confines. While My Last Duchess can be looked upon as an investigation of the captor, represented by the Duke The wench of Shalott can be considered an exploration into the captive, represe nted by the Lady that gives the poem its title. Both poems are an analysis into the Victorian woman as an incarcerated and entrapped sub-culture of a predominately patriarchal society. It is no surprise then that the methods of which these fictional women take to consort comes at the cost of their lives.The doomed Duchess of Robert Brownings dramatic monologue, My Last Duchess is the embodiment of the incarcerated woman taken to the eternal extreme. The setting for this poem is the Italy of the Middle Ages, a time when women had still less freedom than in the Victorian era. Women were regarded as possessions, a form of imprisonment within itself. As Johnson states the theme of marriage as bondage is consistently explored throughout Brownings early wor... ...y 16.1 (1978) 70-87.Jospeh, Gerhard. Tennysons Optics The Eagles Gaze. PMLA 92.3 (1977) 420-428.Langbaum, Robert. The Poetry of Experience The Dramatic Monologue in Modern Literary Tradition. New York W.W. Norton & Company, Inc ., 1957.McGhee, Richard. Marriage, Duty, & rely in Victorian Poetry and Drama. Lawrence The Regents Press of Kansas, 1980.Orr, Mrs. Sutherland. Handbook to Robert Brownings Works. 6th Edition. London George Bell and Sons, 1899.Plasa, Carl. Cracked from Side to Side Sexual Politics in The Lady of Shalott. Victorian Poetry 30.3 (1992) 247-263.Ricks, Christopher. Tennyson. London The Macmillan Press Ltd, 1972.Showalter, Elaine and English Showalter. Victorian Women and Menstruation. Victorian Studies 14.1 (1970) 83-89.Showalter, Elaine. Victorian Women and Insanity. Victorian Studies 23.2 (1980) 157-181.