Analyzing John Milton’s Paradise Lost, Robert Browning’s “My Last Duchess”, Christopher Marlowe’s The Tragical History of Dr. Faustus, and Alexander Pope’s An Essay on Criticism

1. MUSIC OF
A POEM
By: Morgan Lee
Analyzing John Milton’s Paradise Lost, Robert
Browning’s “My Last Duchess”, Christopher
Marlowe’s The Tragical History of Dr. Faustus, and
Alexander Pope’s An Essay on Criticism

2. Musicality in Poetry
• “Music” (effects of sounds alone) gives
poetry its power
• Poetry is a musical language
– Poetry is a distinct style of writing that
demonstrates a sense of musicality
– a musical form of writing; flow

3. Paradise
Lost by
John Milton
An Essay
on Criticism
by
Alexander
Pope
Iambic
Pentameter
The Tragical
History of Dr.
Faustus by
Christopher
Marlowe
“My Last
Duchess”
by Robert
Browning

4. What is Iambic
Pentameter?
• Consists of five iambs
– Iamb: 1 unstressed syllable followed by 1
stressed syllable
• 10 syllables in each line
Blank Verse vs. Heroic Couplet

5. Blank
verse
• unrhymed iambic pentameter
• Ex: Paradise Lost and The
Tragical History of Dr.
Faustus
Heroic
couplet
• two rhymed lines of iambic
pentameter
• Ex: An Essay on Criticism
and “My Last Duchess”
Both give
musicality a poem
to

6. John Milton’s
“….. Farewell happy Fields
Paradise Where Joy for ever dwells: Hail horrours, hail
Infernal world, and thou profoundest Hell
Lost
Receive thy new Possessor: One who brings
Blank verse
A mind not to be chang'd by Place or Time.
The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heav'n.
What matter where, if I be still the same,
And what I should be, all but less then he
Whom Thunder hath made greater? Here at least
We shall be free; th' Almighty hath not built
Here for his envy, will not drive us hence:
Here we may reign secure, and in my choyce
To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, then serve in Heav'n”
From Paradise Lost by John Milton (1667)

7. Christopher Marlowe’s The
Tragical History of Dr. Faustus
“Was this the face that launch'd a thousand ships,
And burnt the topless towers of Ilium?
Sweet Helen, make me immortal with a kiss.
Her lips suck forth my soul: see where it flies!
Come, Helen, come, give me my soul again.
Here will I dwell, for heaven is in these lips,
And all is dross that is not Helena.
Blank
I will be Paris, and for love of thee,
Instead of Troy, shall Wittenberg be sack'd;
And I will combat with weak Menelaus,
And wear thy colours on my plumed crest;
Yea, I will wound Achilles in the heel,
And then return to Helen for a kiss.
From The Tragical History of Dr. Faustus by
Christopher Marlowe (1592)
verse

8. Robert Browning’s
“ ….. She had
A heart -- how shall I say? -- too soon made glad,
“My Last
Too easily impressed; she liked whate'er
She looked on, and her looks went everywhere. Duchess”
Sir, 't was all one! My favour at her breast,
The dropping of the daylight in the West,
The bough of cherries some officious fool
Broke in the orchard for her, the white mule
She rode with round the terrace -- all and each
Would draw from her alike the approving speech,
Or blush, at least. She thanked men, -- good! but thanked
Somehow -- I know not how -- as if she ranked
My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old name
With anybody's gift.”
From “My Last Duchess” by Robert Browning (1842)
Heroic
Couplets

9. Alexander Pope’s
“True ease in writing comes from art, not chance, An Essay on
As those move easiest who have learned to dance.
Criticism
'Tis not enough no harshness gives offense,
The sound must seem an echo to the sense:
Soft is the strain when Zephyr gently blows,
And the smooth stream in smoother numbers flows;
But when loud surges lash the sounding shore,
The hoarse, rough verse should like the torrent roar;
When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to throw,
The line too labors, and the words move slow;
Not so, when swift Camilla scours the plain,
Flies o'er the unbending corn, and skims along the main.
Hear how Timotheus' varied lays surprise,
And bid alternate passions fall and rise!”
Heroic
couplets
From An Essay on Criticism by Alexander Pope (1711)