Porphyrias Lover - Sympathy

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Porphyria is a youngish woman with 'yellow' or blonde hair who though she doesn’t say much in the poem, has the power to block out the storm outside. She manages to change her lovers gloom demeanour into joy. She first takes quite a dominant role in the relationship with her and her lover. He sits around quite, waiting and moping around, until she arrives and lights up the mood & atmosphere in the room. I think porphyria is quite controlling and maybe a bit selfish. This is shown in the way that she comes and goes to his cottage as she pleases, and then goes back home, to her husband. I think the title has a meaning to it, 'Porphyrias Lover' this shows that he is her lover making the impression she is again quite controlling ; he is her bit on the side, She has a family and another home, he doesn’t have anything else but her. Porphyrias Lover is a very possessive man. He spends his days sitting around waiting for Porphyria to come around and spend time with him. I think he’s a very selfish man in the way that he takes her life and doesn’t really have in mind the impact it could have on her family, all he thinks about in that short period of time from when she arrives to when he kills her is that he wants her to himself ; he doesn’t want her to go back to her husband. I don’t really sympathise for Porphyria. I think she is selfish for what she is doing ; she is going behind her husbands back and having an affair with another man. However I do sympathise for her in the way that she cant get a divorce. I fell sorry for her because if she wanted to split up with her husband it couldn’t be in her choices because in the Victorian times it was frowned upon, and people would think differently of her if she was to get a divorce. Another reason I don’t really sympathise for porphyria is that she knows in those days that if you were to sleep with someone else outside of
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