Comparing My Last Duchess And My Ex-Husband By Gabriel Spera

The pain of betrayal transcends all boundaries. Two complementary poems illustrate this fact, despite being written 150 years apart. Robert Browning’s “My Last Duchess” is set in 16th Century Italy. The Duke of Ferrara is discussing the portrait of his last duchess to an envoy of a nobleman, whose daughter he is planning to marry. Similarly, the contemporary woman in Gabriel Spera’s “My Ex-Husband,” relates the details of her first marriage to the man in her new relationship. Throughout both dramatic monologues, jealousy, pride, and control blur the lines between illusion and reality. “Jealousy”
The current of jealousy is evident throughout the dialogue. In “My Last Duchess” the Duke’s possessive nature rails at not having his wife’s total attention. He criticizes that, “She had a heart-how shall I say? – too soon make glad. Too easily impressed; she liked whate’er she looked on, and her looks went everywhere. Sir,
‘twas all one!” () Everything she enjoy apart from him, was an affront to what he thought he deserved. He is so paranoid that even her good nature is a mark against her, “Oh, sir, she smiled, no doubt, whene’er I passed her; but who passed without much the same smile?” Such betrayal is intolerable for the Duke of Ferrara. Likewise, the jilted lover in “My Ex-Husband” sarcastically states that her ex-husband “flirted-fine! but flirted somehow a bit ardently, too blatantly.” The love she thought was theirs alone gives rise to the burning jealousy. She bitterly states that he “could flush the throat of any woman not just mine.” His “whispering the sweetest things” and knowing “the most romantic spots” were not reserved just for her. She recalls with pain and disgust that she “soon enough found out,” how “slobbishly on he carried on affairs”().” The mockery of her marriage was intolerable. In both poems, the illusions of the marriage relationship are shattered by the reality of unmet expectations, which fuel the fires of jealousy. “Pride”
In addition, pride escalates the conflict and extinguishes any hope of reconciliation.
The Duke’s arrogance is an immovable barrier to communication. His self importance is impugned when she ranks his gift “of a nine-hundred-years-old name with anybody’s gift.” He cannot bring himself to try to “lesson” her and say, “Just this or that in you disgusts me; or here you miss, or there exceed the mark.” Even the acknowledgement of her infractions is an insult to his aristocratic status, as he states it, “E’en then would be some stooping, and I chose never to stoop.” Conceit is the Duke’s downfall. In like fashion, the central character in “My Ex-Husband” sees herself above the necessity to address her husband’s duplicity. She refuses to “lower herself” to negotiate with a “lout.” Haughtily, she remarks that, “Even if you’d the patience-which I have not-to go see some counselor,” that would amount her being left “on the short end of the stick,” and she will not let that happen. In the two stories, pride is the catalyst that tears apart the
relationships.

“Control”
Such jealousy and pride are interwoven with the desire to take control. This manifests itself in how the Duke chooses not to “set her wits” against his. Elimination of the problem is preferable to stooping. Nonchalantly he states, “I gave commands; then all smiles stopped together.”Even though he had her killed he is still enamored with controlling her. There in her portrait, “looking as if she were alive,” she acquiesces to his every desire, giving him the illusion of control, “Since none puts by the curtain I have drawn for you, but I.” His position of authority is now secure. In a comparable way, the scorned wife in “My-Husband” also eliminates her problem, albeit in a more modern and socially acceptable manner. Indifferently she says, “So I made some calls, filed some claims, all kisses stopped together.” Divorce has relegated her ex-husband to a picture “on the shelf, smiling as if in love.” She is in control “never ever to get stuck” again.