Dramatic monologue
Encyclopedia
M. H. Abrams
notes the following three features of the dramatic monologue as it applies to poetry:
poets. The long, personal lyrics typical of the Romantic period are not dramatic monologues, in the sense that they do not, for the most part, imply a concentrated narrative. However, poems such as William Wordsworth
's Tintern Abbey
and Percy Bysshe Shelley
's Mont Blanc
, to name two famous examples, offered a model of close psychological observation and philosophical or pseudo-philosophical inquiry described in a specific setting.
The novel and plays have also been important influences on the dramatic monologue, particularly as a means of characterisation. Dramatic monologues are a way of expressing the views of a character and offering the audience greater insight into that character's feelings. Dramatic monologues can also be used in novels to tell stories, as in Mary Shelley
's Frankenstein
, and to implicate the audience in moral judgments, as in Albert Camus
' The Fall and Mohsin Hamid
's The Reluctant Fundamentalist
.
Monologues are also linked with soliliquys- Such as in Macbeth, when Lady Macbeth reads a letter to herself and then speaks her thoughts as though she is thinking.
period represented the high point of the dramatic monologue in English poetry.
Other Victorian poets also used the form. Dante Gabriel Rossetti
wrote several, including Jenny and The Blessed Damozel; Christina Rossetti
wrote a number, including The Convent Threshold. Algernon Charles Swinburne
's Hymn to Proserpine
has been called a dramatic monologue vaguely reminiscent of Browning's work.
include The Stronger
(1898) by August Strindberg
, Krapp's Last Tape
(1958) by Samuel Beckett
and Landscape
by Harold Pinter
.
M. H. Abrams
Meyer Howard Abrams is an American literary critic, known for works on Romanticism, in particular his book The Mirror and the Lamp. Under Abrams' editorship, the Norton Anthology of English Literature became the standard text for undergraduate survey courses across the U.S...
notes the following three features of the dramatic monologue as it applies to poetry:
Types of monologues
One of the most important influences on the development of the dramatic monologue is the RomanticRomantic poetry
Romanticism, a philosophical, literary, artistic and cultural era which began in the mid/late-1700s as a reaction against the prevailing Enlightenment ideals of the day , also influenced poetry...
poets. The long, personal lyrics typical of the Romantic period are not dramatic monologues, in the sense that they do not, for the most part, imply a concentrated narrative. However, poems such as William Wordsworth
William Wordsworth
William Wordsworth was a major English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with the 1798 joint publication Lyrical Ballads....
's Tintern Abbey
Tintern Abbey
Tintern Abbey was founded by Walter de Clare, Lord of Chepstow, on 9 May 1131. It is situated in the village of Tintern, on the Welsh bank of the River Wye in Monmouthshire, which forms the border between Monmouthshire in Wales and Gloucestershire in England. It was only the second Cistercian...
and Percy Bysshe Shelley
Percy Bysshe Shelley
Percy Bysshe Shelley was one of the major English Romantic poets and is critically regarded as among the finest lyric poets in the English language. Shelley was famous for his association with John Keats and Lord Byron...
's Mont Blanc
Mont Blanc (poem)
"Mont Blanc: Lines Written in the Vale of Chamouni" is an ode by the Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley. The poem was composed between 22 July 1816 and 29 August 1816 during Percy Shelley's journey to the Chamonix Valley, and intended to reflect the scenery through which he travelled...
, to name two famous examples, offered a model of close psychological observation and philosophical or pseudo-philosophical inquiry described in a specific setting.
The novel and plays have also been important influences on the dramatic monologue, particularly as a means of characterisation. Dramatic monologues are a way of expressing the views of a character and offering the audience greater insight into that character's feelings. Dramatic monologues can also be used in novels to tell stories, as in Mary Shelley
Mary Shelley
Mary Shelley was a British novelist, short story writer, dramatist, essayist, biographer, and travel writer, best known for her Gothic novel Frankenstein: or, The Modern Prometheus . She also edited and promoted the works of her husband, the Romantic poet and philosopher Percy Bysshe Shelley...
's Frankenstein
Frankenstein
Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus is a novel about a failed experiment that produced a monster, written by Mary Shelley, with inserts of poems by Percy Bysshe Shelley. Shelley started writing the story when she was eighteen, and the novel was published when she was twenty-one. The first...
, and to implicate the audience in moral judgments, as in Albert Camus
Albert Camus
Albert Camus was a French author, journalist, and key philosopher of the 20th century. In 1949, Camus founded the Group for International Liaisons within the Revolutionary Union Movement, which was opposed to some tendencies of the Surrealist movement of André Breton.Camus was awarded the 1957...
' The Fall and Mohsin Hamid
Mohsin Hamid
Mohsin Hamid is a Pakistani author best known for his novels Moth Smoke and The Reluctant Fundamentalist .- Biography :...
's The Reluctant Fundamentalist
The Reluctant Fundamentalist
The Reluctant Fundamentalist is a novel by Mohsin Hamid, published in 2007.The novel uses the technique of a frame story, which takes place during the course of a single evening in an outdoor Lahore cafe, where a bearded Pakistani man called Changez tells a nervous American stranger about his love...
.
Monologues are also linked with soliliquys- Such as in Macbeth, when Lady Macbeth reads a letter to herself and then speaks her thoughts as though she is thinking.
The Victorian Period
The VictorianVictorian era
The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...
period represented the high point of the dramatic monologue in English poetry.
- Alfred, Lord Tennyson's UlyssesUlysses (poem)"Ulysses" is a poem in blank verse by the Victorian poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson , written in 1833 and published in 1842 in Tennyson's well-received second volume of poetry. An oft-quoted poem, it is popularly used to illustrate the dramatic monologue form...
, published in 1842, has been called the first true dramatic monologue. After Ulysses, Tennyson's most famous efforts in this vein are Tithonus, The Lotos-Eaters, and St. Simon Stylites, all from the 1842 Poems; later monologues appear in other volumes, notably Idylls of the KingIdylls of the KingIdylls of the King, published between 1856 and 1885, is a cycle of twelve narrative poems by the English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson which retells the legend of King Arthur, his knights, his love for Guinevere and her tragic betrayal of him, and the rise and fall of Arthur's kingdom...
.
- Matthew ArnoldMatthew ArnoldMatthew Arnold was a British poet and cultural critic who worked as an inspector of schools. He was the son of Thomas Arnold, the famed headmaster of Rugby School, and brother to both Tom Arnold, literary professor, and William Delafield Arnold, novelist and colonial administrator...
's Dover BeachDover Beach"Dover Beach" is a short lyric poem by the English poet Matthew Arnold. It was first published in 1867 in the collection New Poems, but surviving notes indicate its composition may have begun as early as 1849...
and Stanzas from the Grand Chartreuse are famous, semi-autobiographical monologues. The former, usually regarded as the supreme expression of the growing skepticism of the mid-Victorian period, was published along with the later in 1867's New Poems.
- Robert BrowningRobert BrowningRobert Browning was an English poet and playwright whose mastery of dramatic verse, especially dramatic monologues, made him one of the foremost Victorian poets.-Early years:...
is usually credited with perfecting the form; certainly, Browning is the poet who, above all, produced his finest and most famous work in this form. While My Last DuchessMy Last Duchess"My Last Duchess" is a poem by Robert Browning, frequently anthologized as an example of the dramatic monologue. It first appeared in 1842 in Browning's Dramatic Lyrics.-Poem structure and historical background:...
is the most famous of his monologues, the form dominated his writing career. Fra Lippo LippiFra Lippo Lippi (poem)Fra Lippo Lippi is an 1855 dramatic monologue written by the Victorian poet Robert Browning. Throughout this poem, Browning depicts a 15th century real-life painter, Filippo Lippi, who faces the conflict of a religious life committed to the Church or a life of leisure. The poem asks the question...
, Caliban upon SetebosCaliban upon SetebosCaliban upon Setebos is an 1864 poem written by the British poet Robert Browning. It deals with Caliban, a character from Shakespeare's The Tempest, and his reflections on Setebos, the brutal god he believes in. Some scholars see Browning as being of the belief that God is in the eye of the...
, Soliloquy of the Spanish CloisterSoliloquy of the Spanish CloisterSoliloquy of the Spanish Cloister is a dramatic monologue written by Robert Browning, first published in his collection Dramatic Lyrics . It is written in the voice of an unnamed Spanish monk. The poem consists of nine eight-line stanzas and is written in iambic tetrameter...
and Porphyria's LoverPorphyria's Lover"Porphyria's Lover" is a poem by Robert Browning and it was first published as "Porphyria" in the January 1836 issue of Monthly Repository. Browning later republished it in Dramatic Lyrics paired with "Johannes Agricola in Meditation" under the title "Madhouse Cells." The poem did not receive its...
, as well as the other poems in Men and WomenMen and Women (poetry collection)Men and Women is a collection of fifty-one poems in two volumes by Robert Browning, first published in 1855. While now generally considered to contain some of the best of Browning's poetry, at the time it was not received well and sold poorly....
are just a handful of Browning's monologues.
Other Victorian poets also used the form. Dante Gabriel Rossetti
Dante Gabriel Rossetti
Dante Gabriel Rossetti was an English poet, illustrator, painter and translator. He founded the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood in 1848 with William Holman Hunt and John Everett Millais, and was later to be the main inspiration for a second generation of artists and writers influenced by the movement,...
wrote several, including Jenny and The Blessed Damozel; Christina Rossetti
Christina Rossetti
Christina Georgina Rossetti was an English poet who wrote a variety of romantic, devotional, and children's poems...
wrote a number, including The Convent Threshold. Algernon Charles Swinburne
Algernon Charles Swinburne
Algernon Charles Swinburne was an English poet, playwright, novelist, and critic. He invented the roundel form, wrote several novels, and contributed to the famous Eleventh Edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica...
's Hymn to Proserpine
Hymn to Proserpine
"Hymn to Proserpine" is a poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne, published in 1866. The poem is addressed to the goddess Proserpina, the Roman equivalent of Persephone....
has been called a dramatic monologue vaguely reminiscent of Browning's work.
Drama
Examples of dramatic monologues in the theatreTheatre
Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...
include The Stronger
The Stronger
The Stronger is a famous 1889 play by August Strindberg. The play is quite short, consisting of only one scene that can be performed in approximately 10 minutes. The characters consist of only two women: a "Mrs. X" and a "Miss. Y", only one of whom speak, an example of a dramatic monologue...
(1898) by August Strindberg
August Strindberg
Johan August Strindberg was a Swedish playwright, novelist, poet, essayist and painter. A prolific writer who often drew directly on his personal experience, Strindberg's career spanned four decades, during which time he wrote over 60 plays and more than 30 works of fiction, autobiography,...
, Krapp's Last Tape
Krapp's Last Tape
Krapp's Last Tape is a one-act play, written in English, by Samuel Beckett. Consisting of a cast of one man, it was originally written for Northern Irish actor Patrick Magee and first titled "Magee monologue"...
(1958) by Samuel Beckett
Samuel Beckett
Samuel Barclay Beckett was an Irish avant-garde novelist, playwright, theatre director, and poet. He wrote both in English and French. His work offers a bleak, tragicomic outlook on human nature, often coupled with black comedy and gallows humour.Beckett is widely regarded as among the most...
and Landscape
Landscape (play)
Landscape is a one-act play by Harold Pinter that was first broadcast on radio in 1968 and first performed on stage in 1969. The play shows the difficulties of communication between two people in a marriage. This is illustrated through the two characters who appear to be talking to one another...
by Harold Pinter
Harold Pinter
Harold Pinter, CH, CBE was a Nobel Prize–winning English playwright and screenwriter. One of the most influential modern British dramatists, his writing career spanned more than 50 years. His best-known plays include The Birthday Party , The Homecoming , and Betrayal , each of which he adapted to...
.