Title: “I-You” Relationship: On the Drama of Browning’s Dramatic Monologues

Abstract: Robert Browning establishes himself as the great dramatic monologue poet with the dramatic nature of his monologues. He inherits the subjectivity of Romantic lyrics, devoting himself to psychological explorations, while at the same time rebels against its monologic nature by presenting a split personality in dialogues, which lays the foundation for the study of drama within the monologue. The interaction between the inner “I-You” forms dialogues, in which the speaker’s personality is dramatically presented; the unconquerable “You” has many identities yet is mysterious, possessing basic features of the unconscious in the theory of modern psychology. The psychological drama demonstrated by his dramatic monologues faithfully captures human psychology in society, and is one of the most important elements of literary modernity, pushing the development of humanism in literature a step further.

Keywords: “I-You” relationship, Robert Browning, dramatic monologue, drama within monologue

Author: Li Liu, PhD candidate, School of Foreign Studies, Hunan Normal University, Changsha, Hunan, China.