LECTURE 11 

ROBERT BROWNING (1812-1889)
The Dramatic Monologue: Political? Private? Both?
--First-person speech with ironic distance
--Contentious issues of the day
--Unlimited variety in subjectivity; masks
--Deluded threatened egos/lang.=control?
--Circular discourse

1253/1350 "Soliloquy..." (1842)
--The setting, actors, circumstances?
--Brother Lawrence & Speaker: literally from the speaker? figuratively through irony?
--Circularity: begins and ends with a growl!
--Roman Catholicism? why now? (1839 ... 1842)? [See NA 984-88/1048-52 and 1033-35/1119-21]

1255/1352 "My Last Duchess" (1842)
--The setting ... etc.
--Class relations and marital relations?

1123/1213TENNYSON"Ulysses" (1842)
--Different use of dram. mon.: past myths
--Passion not eccentricity is the issue
--Recognition not manipulation nor control

For Hard Times, we'll be covering roughly one of the three books per lecture, so you should pace your reading accordingly.