INVESTIGATING GRAPHOLOGICAL PARALLELISM: A STYLISTIC ANALYSIS OF ROBERT BROWNING’S MY LAST DUCHESS (1993)

Abstract

The chief objective of the study is to analyze the stylistic features of the poem My Last Duchess by Robert Browning. The poem has multilayered meaning which is investigated through different tools of analysis. Graphological Parallelism is being applied to the poem to find out the themes. The poem is interpreted through parallelism to find out the themes. Moreover, the study focuses on the male supremacy in the Victorian age in Robert Browning My Last Duchess by using the theory of foregrounding to highlight the prominent and foregrounded element in the text. The thesis portrayed the main controversy of the Victorian age that is male supremacy and found that graphic patterns of the poem corresponded to social problems. The model of stylistic element of the same pattern and form of the words, as well as other markings of the poetry, are described in detail. This research explored the suggestivity through punctuations, commas, exclamation, and questions marks. It found that graphic and typographic patterns of the poem corresponded to the social problems of the Victorian era. The thesis attempts to explore the ways Robert Browning uses graphological patterns in his poem, My Last Duchess.