There are fifteen poems in the GCSE Love and Relationships anthology.

For your exam, you will be given one poem in full, printed on the page, and you will be asked to compare this poem to another from the anthology.

All of the GCSE English Literature course is closed-book, meaning that you will need to learn at least three lines from each poem.

It is possible to get top marks for this question by making sure that you know the following:

• What the poem is about

• What the poem means

• The methods the poet uses to convey their message

• The links between the ideas of other poems in the anthology

Synopsis

This section includes:

• A general overview of the poem

• A detailed look at the poem line-by-line

• Analysis of the poem, giving Robert Browning’s intention and message

A General Overview of the Poem

"Porphyria’s Lover," a dark dramatic monologue by Victorian poet Robert Browning, was written in 1836. The poem's speaker recounts the night he strangles his lover, Porphyria, driven by his intense emotions and jealous desire.

Line-by-Line

The rain set early in to-night,

       The sullen wind was soon awake,

It tore the elm-tops down for spite,

       And did its worst to vex the lake:

The poem opens with a description of setting as we’re introduced to the night Porphyria visits.

There a clear use of pathetic fallacy to build a sense of gloom and darkness right at the beginning.

The natural world appears angry – this is achieved through personification. It creates an ominous tone and an immediate sense of violence.

There is a certain disconnection amongst the nature presented here – possibly reflecting the mood of the speaker.

       I listened with heart fit to break.

When glided in Porphyria; straight

       She shut the cold out and the storm,

The speaker explains they have a broken heart.

The emotional pain is softened by the arrival of Porphyria.

There are painful emotions on show, again reflected by the weather – this is pathetic fallacy.

The arrival of his lover brings relief.

The use of the word ‘gliding’ creates a sense of the supernatural in Porphyria – the disease was known to cause hallucinations.

And kneeled and made the cheerless grate

       Blaze up, and all the cottage warm;

Porphyria lights the fire.

There is an obvious change in tone as she brings warmth.

This warmth could also be reflective of physical desire.

       Which done, she rose, and from her form

Withdrew the dripping cloak and shawl,

       And laid her soiled gloves by, untied

Her hat and let the damp hair fall,

We focus in on Porphyria removing her wet clothes.

The speaker is transfixed by these actions – the descriptions show her to be active whilst the speaker is passive.

       And, last, she sat down by my side

       And called me. When no voice replied,

Porphyria joins the speaker – she speaks to him but he does not reply.

The silence of the speaker in the narrative contrasts the verbose nature of the poem – there is a clear power imbalance.

She put my arm about her waist,

       And made her smooth white shoulder bare,

And all her yellow hair displaced,

       And, stooping, made my cheek lie there,

       And spread, o'er all, her yellow hair,

The speaker lists the actions that Porphyria undertakes – these are intimate moments with a hint of sexuality.

Porphyria continues to be in control, with deliberate actions.

This flirtatious depiction subverts the stereotypes of Victorian poetry and social norms of the time – the woman is leading this instead of the man.

Murmuring how she loved me — she

       Too weak, for all her heart's endeavour,

To set its struggling passion free

       From pride, and vainer ties dissever,

       And give herself to me for ever.

The speaker explores Porphyria’s feelings of love for the speaker.

However, we learn that she is struggles to fully commit.

This may be to do with her status and reputation – that are hints the she may be married.

The speaker’s tone turns as he considers her weakness – namely, her lack of commitment to him.

His jealousy begins to grow.

But passion sometimes would prevail,

       Nor could to-night's gay feast restrain

A sudden thought of one so pale

       For love of her, and all in vain:

       So, she was come through wind and rain.

The speaker explains that Porphyria cannot resist him – even when a ‘gay feast’ is occurring.

She has even travelled through bad weather.

The speaker is clearly aware of Porphyria’s passion – she is giving something up to be with him.

Be sure I looked up at her eyes

       Happy and proud; at last I knew

Porphyria worshipped me; surprise

       Made my heart swell, and still it grew

       While I debated what to do.

The speaker explains how pleased he is to learn that she loves him.

The use of the word ‘worshipped’ presents a sense of extreme desire and imbalance within the relationship – the speaker is deciding what to do.

There is an emerging narcissistic feeling – the speaker has absolute control over the narrative.

That moment she was mine, mine, fair,

       Perfectly pure and good: I found

A thing to do, and all her hair

The speaker sees Porphyria as a possession, an object, something that he owns.

The speaker realizes they must make a decision.

There is a growing excitement at this desire.

       In one long yellow string I wound

       Three times her little throat around,

The speaker begins to strangle Porphyria.

There is a calmness in tone here, emphasising the evil of the act.

We see Porphyria’s physical vulnerability.

This is a shocking scene.

And strangled her. No pain felt she;

       I am quite sure she felt no pain.

The speaker strangles Porphyria. He convinces himself that this did not hurt her.

The speaker shows themselves to be mad and deluded.

As a shut bud that holds a bee,

       I warily oped her lids: again

       Laughed the blue eyes without a stain.

The speaker compares Porphyria’s closed eyes to a flower.

The references to a bee suggest feeling of anger.

The cruel madness of the speaker once again emerges.

The speaker sees the actions as natural and love, even though the action is itself violent.

And I untightened next the tress

       About her neck; her cheek once more

Blushed bright beneath my burning kiss:

The speaker takes off the string from the neck of Porphyria and kisses her.

He imagines her responding to this.

There is a continued unreliability in the speaker.

This is a sinister image of a murderer’s actions.

       I propped her head up as before,

       Only, this time my shoulder bore

Her head, which droops upon it still:

The speaker now describes Porphyria’s lifeless head as it leans upon his shoulder.

The speaker takes pleasure in controlling her movements. This suggests a clear abuse of power.

       The smiling rosy little head,

So glad it has its utmost will,

       That all it scorned at once is fled,

       And I, its love, am gained instead!

The speaker sees Porphyria as though she were still alive.

Now that she is dead, his worries are over.

There is clear destructive behaviour as a result of his jealousy.

Porphyria's love: she guessed not how

       Her darling one wish would be heard.

The speaker believes that he has granted her wish – they are now together forever.

The speaker feels pleasure at the power he has over her.

And thus we sit together now,

       And all night long we have not stirred,

       And yet God has not said a word!

The speaker concludes by explaining that he spent the night with the dead body of Porphyria, and nothing happened – therefore God must have accepted his actions.

This clearly shows his insanity, and the way in which his desire, wrapped up with his jealousy, has led to tragedy.

The speaker feels they have gotten away with murder.

Writer’s Methods

This section aims to support your revision by providing you with concrete and clear examples of methods that Robert Browning uses.

Remember: methods support meaning, not the other way round. You will gain more marks focusing your essays on the big ideas of the poems and then supporting these ideas with the methods that the writer uses.

Form

"Porphyria’s Lover" unfolds as a chronological narrative, structured as a dramatic monologue. In keeping with Robert Browning’s signature style, the speaker addresses a silent listener, gradually revealing his disturbed nature and obsessive view of love through a commanding yet unstable voice. He controls the narrative, recounting his version of events from the fateful night with Porphyria, which exposes his delusion and warped perspective.

Notably, the first-person speaker refers to Porphyria in the third person, only once using the plural “we.” This linguistic choice reflects the emotional detachment he feels from her, reinforcing his disconnected and possessive mindset. Through this extended monologue, Browning crafts a powerful and dominant speaker who exerts control over both the story and the fatal events he describes.

Structure

The poem unfolds as a continuous stream of consciousness, with the speaker meticulously recounting each event of the fateful night. However, his unstable voice conveys intense emotions, revealing a love that is both dangerous and destructive. The stream-of-consciousness form reflects the speaker’s shifting thoughts and feelings, emphasizing his turbulent state of mind.

Structurally, the poem transitions from a rigid, controlled tone to one marked by emotional enjambment. The speaker’s tone shifts upon Porphyria’s arrival, mirroring his fixation on her every movement. Midway through, his narration becomes increasingly obsessive, marked by the repeated use of “And” to list each event. His detached, almost clinical observation of Porphyria hints at a growing sinister intent. By the poem’s conclusion, his tone oscillates between eerie calm and bursts of excitement. After strangling Porphyria, he becomes erratic yet strangely elated, relishing his newfound possession of her while remaining disturbingly indifferent to her death.

Browning presents a speaker whose desire intensifies once he asserts complete control over Porphyria, punishing her perceived lack of devotion. Through this, Browning critiques the toxic imbalance of power in relationships, illustrating how obsessive desire can spiral into jealousy, manipulation, and cruelty.

Language

Browning’s poem Porphyria’s Lover employs vivid imagery to explore the power dynamics and heightened emotions within a strained and obsessive affair. Through the thoughts and brutal actions of a jealous, insecure lover, Browning critiques destructive relationships. The poem opens with pathetic fallacy, mirroring the speaker’s dark mood in conflict with his surroundings: the “sullen wind” acts out of “spite” to “vex the lake.” This personification of nature as angry and vengeful sets an ominous tone for the unfolding narrative.

Initially, the speaker portrays Porphyria as affectionate and flirtatious. She braves difficult circumstances to visit him, warms the cottage, and takes control of the interaction:

“And made her smooth white shoulder bare,”

“And made my cheek lie there.”

Although she appears dominant in this moment, her seduction is met with silence, introducing a subtle tension in their relationship. The speaker remains unresponsive, inwardly debating his course of action. When he ultimately reclaims control, deciding how to ensure Porphyria remains his, he shifts his depiction of her to one of vulnerability and purity:

She is described as “pale,” and he ties the string around her “little throat.” Here, Browning presents a chilling image of a man who exerts power over a weaker, smaller lover, resorting to violence as a means of possession. The speaker’s obsessive emotions culminate in a shocking act of brutality against an unsuspecting and defenceless woman.

Through this portrayal of possessive love, Browning exposes the dangers of imbalanced relationships, illustrating how unchecked desire can escalate into dominance, cruelty, and destruction.

Context

At MyEdSpace, we use this analogy to discuss context – ketchup, salt and chips.

If you ordered a portion of chips, and asked for salt, you wouldn’t then dump the salt into the corner of your chips and start dipping each individual chip into the salt.

When you put salt on your chips, you sprinkle it over, sparingly, so as to give a good coverage of salt across the chips as a whole. Context is just like salt on chips.

Context is not ketchup – because it would be appropriate to squeeze ketchup into the corner of your plate and dip each chip in (and in fact, that is advised).

So when you’re including contextual information in your essays, sprinkle it across the essay, just like you sprinkle salt on your chips.

Let’s link the context to the key ideas and themes of the poem.

Complex Relationships

Robert Browning’s Porphyria’s Lover was written during the Victorian era, a time when British society upheld rigid expectations for relationships, favoring respectability and adherence to strict moral codes.

Among the upper class, marriages were often transactional, determined by status and social mobility rather than personal affection. This social rigidity led to a concealed world where desires that fell outside of these sanctioned unions were pursued in secrecy.

In the poem, Browning explores a forbidden affair between an upper-class woman and the speaker, who is subtly implied to be of lower status. However, rather than a romantic escapade, the poem reveals the tragic consequences of the speaker’s jealousy and insecurity, exposing the dangers of power imbalances within relationships dictated by restrictive social norms.

Victorian society also repressed female sexuality, discouraging any deviation from the ideal of modesty and obedience. Porphyria’s Lover presents a woman who is flirtatious and seemingly unfaithful—though affectionate toward the speaker, she is ultimately punished for her sexual freedom.

Browning conveys the speaker’s intense and conflicting emotions—both exhilarated and disturbed by her desire for him—to provoke reflection on contemporary attitudes toward gender, power, and control in relationships.

Love

Robert Browning’s Porphyria’s Lover explores the unsettling connection between sex and violence in a society bound by rigid social conventions. During the Victorian era, upper-class marriages were often arranged for status and financial gain, leading to clandestine affairs driven by passion and secrecy—much like the one depicted in the poem.

Browning presents forbidden love as inherently dangerous, illustrating this through the tragic fate of Porphyria, a vulnerable woman who is murdered and left in the arms of her killer for the remainder of the night.

The poem challenges a traditionally religious Victorian audience to reflect on Christian values and attitudes toward female sexuality. At the time, British society condemned female promiscuity, viewing sexual desire in women as sinful. Porphyria, depicted as seductive and flirtatious, embodies this transgression.

The speaker, however, believes himself to be without sin, justifying his violent act as a form of punishment for Porphyria’s perceived vanity and sexual freedom. His final blasphemous exclamation—claiming that “God has not said a word”—delivers a shocking critique of the way religion can be twisted to rationalize cruelty, exposing the dangers of power, obsession, and moral hypocrisy.

Comparison

You are required to write an essay in your exam that is a comparison of the ideas and themes explored in two poems from the Love and Relationships anthology. Therefore, it is very important to revise the poems in pairs and to enter the exam with an idea of what poem you will choose to compare once you know what the named poem is.

‘Porphyria’s Lover’ and ‘The Farmer’s Bride’

Both Browning’s Porphyria’s Lover and Mew’s The Farmer’s Bride convey powerful feelings of frustrated desire in romantic relationships. They both suggest a power imbalance which leads to aggression.

Both of these poems explore the frustration individuals can feel in romantic relationship. This in turns leads to a power imbalance which can lead to aggression.

Similarities:

Both poems explore the way frustration and jealousy in imbalanced romantic relationships can lead to violence.

In Browning’s poem, the speaker expresses jealousy and frustration, believing that Porphyria is too weak to fully commit to him: “That moment she was mine, mine, fair,” he repeats, emphasizing his obsessive need for possession. Similarly, Mew’s speaker conveys his frustration at the emotional and physical distance between himself and his bride: “Sweet as the first wild violets, she,/To her wild self. But what to me?” Both poets use repetition to underscore their speakers’ desperation—Browning’s speaker fixates on ownership, while Mew’s speaker echoes his longing with the exclamation, “her hair, her hair!”

Nature imagery further reflects the speakers’ emotional turmoil. In Porphyria’s Lover, the “sullen wind” vexing the lake and tearing down trees in spite mirrors the speaker’s growing jealousy and frustration. Likewise, in The Farmer’s Bride, natural imagery conveys the speaker’s bitterness at his bride’s rejection: her smiles vanish “Like the shut of a winter’s day.” In both poems, nature becomes a reflection of the growing emotional and physical distance between the lovers, foreshadowing the darkness in these relationships.

Ultimately, both speakers turn to violence in response to their frustration and possessive love. Browning’s speaker strangles Porphyria, manipulates her lifeless body, and spends the night with her as though she is now fully his. Similarly, Mew’s speaker describes the violent entrapment of his bride: “We caught her, fetched her home at last,/And turned the key upon her, fast.” Through these disturbing portrayals, both poets expose the toxic consequences of power imbalances in relationships, where unreciprocated desire manifests as control, aggression, and destruction.

Differences:

Browning presents an intimate and sensual encounter between Porphyria and the speaker, as she warms his cottage with a fire and seduces him with her pale bare shoulder and cascading yellow hair. In contrast, Mew uses natural imagery to highlight the fear and emotional distance within the relationship between the farmer and his bride. The bride is compared to a “mouse,” a “leveret,” and a “larch tree,” thriving only “so long as men-folk keep away,” emphasizing her instinct to withdraw from male presence.

While Browning’s speaker believes Porphyria worships him, treating her lifeless body as though she were still alive—stroking her “rosy little head” and placing a “burning kiss” on her cheek—Mew’s speaker remains painfully aware of the emotional divide between himself and his wife, who is locked away in the attic: “Alone, poor maid. ’Tis but a stair/Betwixt us.”

Browning’s poem portrays a night of passion, albeit a twisted one, while Mew’s depicts an absence of intimacy that forms an unspoken barrier between the farmer and his reluctant bride. However, whereas Browning’s speaker succumbs to delusional violence to preserve his illusion of love, Mew’s speaker is left frustrated and resigned, fully aware of his wife’s lack of affection for him.