My Last Dutchess by Robert Browning

The rhythm of "My Last Duchess" is that of an Iambic pentameter with a dramatic monologue. The writer is expressing the inner thoughts of the individual speaker, who is believed to be Alfonso II the Duke of Ferrara ( a city in northeast Italy). It was believed that the Duke murdered his wife the Duchess, but he was never found guilty. The poem is about a painting of the Duchess as she sits smiling.
As the Duke speaks to the messenger about the painting, he reveals some hints that he himself may have been the murderer, but it appears he doesn't want this to be known. He comes accross as very jealous (line 31) "she thanked men-good, but thanked them somehow, I know not how, as if she ranked my gift of a nine-hundred year old name with anybody's gift". This implies he was not happy with the way she didn't honor him for the great man he was. He portrays himself in a favorable light to make himself look good, as if he's feeling guilty about something. His jealousy of her smiles to other men seems to grow (line 45) when he says she smiled at him, but then again she smiled at everyone that way. He was nothing special. He won't come out and say he murdered her, but in line 45 he writes "I gave commands;then all smiles stopped together". Now he owns the painting, or so it seems, and he covers it with a curtain, and only reveals the smile when he wants to (line 9-10); he has complete control over the smile, finally. At the end of the poem, the Duke prepares to meet his next wife's family downstairs from where the paining sits. He comments on the dowry he is perhaps about to receive, and the reader gets a chill when thinking of the life of his next wife, and hopes the truth can be revealed before she ends up another painting on the wall.