"Porphyria's Lover"

In Robert Browning’s poem “Porphyria’s Lover,” he uses dramatic irony to tell us how she loves and worships him and then he kills her. In actuality Porphyria does not have an interest in him. He makes himself believe that she loves and worships him. Then he proceeds to kill her to make her his forever. In the first few stanzas of the poem Browning sets the mood as gloomy, stormy and dismal, this reflects how he is feeling. He wants Porphyria to be his lover and she does not feel the same, describing the setting is like describing his feelings. The line, “I listened with heart fit to break,” (719) meant that he wanted her so much he was ready to have his heart broken for a chance with her, which is ironic since he actually kills her in the end not to have his heart broken. If he can’t have her no one else could have her either as the following line states, “That moment she was mine, mine, fair, Perfectly pure and good.” (720) The diction used in this poem is formal and creates a solemn, serious mood.