Porphyria's Lover Themes

Sure, the speaker ends up killing Porphyria, but the poem includes "lover" in the title, so you have to figure that "love" is going to play some kind of role. You're right, though what passes for "...

There's some pretty obvious sinning going on in "Porphyria's Lover" – after all, the speaker describes how he strangled his lover. But there's some less obvious sin here, too. Victorian moral...

The "love" between the speaker and Porphyria turns pretty quickly into a power play. Porphyria seems to be the one who's in control at the beginning of the poem, then the speaker completely reverse...

Porphyria and the speaker keep switching places. At the beginning, the speaker is passive, and allows Porphyria to move his arms around as she sees fit. She does everything, while he just sits on t...

This is one of the more understated themes of this poem. Porphyria seems to be of a higher social class than the speaker. Her reluctance to be with him might have to do with her reluctance to give...