“…But passion sometimes would prevail…”: Deconstruction of Robert Browning’s “Porphyria’s Lover” Anonymous College

Robert Browning’s “Porphyria’s Lover” has conflicting interpretations that include : unrequited love, doomed love, passion, opportunism, sacrifice, betrayal and murder. “Porphyria’s Lover” exemplifies the concept of undecidability due to the focus on multiple, parallel themes that contribute to contradictory conclusions about the poem’s meaning. A Deconstruction of Porphyria’s actions, in the poem, are antithesis for pure true love whereas the actions of Porphyria’s Lover are an antithesis of love. Alternatively, deconstruction demonstrates passion is not comparable to love.

Porphyria is in love with the persona based on her actions. To illustrate, the persona says “And, last, she sat down by my side/And called me. When no voice replied ,/She put my arm about her waist/And made her smooth white shoulder bare”(Lines 14-17).Here, it is evident that Porphyria wants the person to reciprocate her love; she initiates contact with the persona by calling him, sitting beside him and encouraging him to hold her waist. The persona fails Porphyria because he neither responds to her call nor holds her arm voluntarily. These lines allude to an interpretation of unrequited love, whereby, the persona is reluctant to return the love that...