Women In Shakespeare

Introduction

It is an established view that Shakespeare cannot be read in a gender-blind way and this view has prompted an immense volume of feminist criticism about Shakespeare’s works. Authors of feminist work on Shakespeare are many but the most notable ones are Marianne Novy, Carole Neely, Janet Adelman, Jean Howard, Coppelia Kahn, Mary Beth Rose and Ann Slater. It is to be confessed that such wealth of feminist criticism has brought palpable gains to our understanding of Shakespeare’s works. My aim in this essay is to offer an analysis of Shakespeare’s of women’s representation in his works with particular reference to King Lear, Twelfth Night and Merchant of Venice. The topic of my dissertation has been motivated and even inspired by the title of a critical essay by Sarah Beckwith: “Are there any women in Shakespeare’s plays?

Fiction, Representation and Reality in feminist criticism. ”An understanding of the metaphysical and spiritual bases of Shakespeare’s conception of women will certainly shed immense light on our understanding of his works. The main concern of Shakespeare in his works is man. As created beings, men and women sharp a common entelechy, that of being humans. The masculine principle is rigorous, stern, strict and contractive (the father figure) while the feminine principle is tender, gentle, caring and expensive (the mother figure). It is clear that Shakespeare acknowledges the essential differences in the two sexes as well as the unique possibilities and special prerogatives of each sex. It is for no reason that Shakespeare has enthroned women as queen of comedies as it is only in women that Shakespeare finds the necessary equipoise leading to happiness. In the other hand, men are the king of tragedies for though they are possessed with a powerful conscience and great intellect, yet they are out of harmony with themselves and thus are prone to tragic doom.

“King Lear”, a Tragic Comedy

Goneril and Regan

At their first appearance in the play, these sisters create the impression that they have come to Lear’s love-test fully prepared with hyperbolical protestations to flatter their father. Cordelia’s asides have a choric function in warning the audience against accepting their elaborate declarations of love at their face value. When Lear does accept them thus, and consequently divides the kingdom between them, Kent pleads with the king to check this “hideous rashness” (I. i. 169) because he knows that Goneril and Regan have no love for their father and will, therefore, ill-treat him when he is reduced to a condition of powerlessness. When Cordelia bids them farewell, she is equally clear-sighted about their true nature which she knows has been carefully concealed from Lear. The parallelism between Goneril and Regan is apparent and the Fool’s words are quite true when he says concerning Regan: “she’s as like this as a crab’s like an apple. ” (I. v. 15-16) They are both “dog-hearted;” (IV. iv. 55) “Tigers, not daughters;” (IV. iv. 49) “more hideous than monsters of the deep” (I. iv. 271-272) in their ingratitude to their father. They are machiavellic and will use every means however unethical to achieve their ends. They are both autocratic, cold and ambitious. They lust after Edmund in unfeminine ways. They exhibit a vicious and masculine cruelty throughout the play. Goneril refuses Albany’s authority and arrogantly declares “the laws are mine, not thine. ” (V. iii. 189) Renaissance models of femininity demand that women are gentle, soft and submissive. Regan and Goneril are completely against all the accepted codes of feminine behavior. The two sisters are equally vicious. They both participate in what many consider to be the most horrific scene in the play, that of the plucking out of the eyes of Gloucester. It is Goneril who speaks out the method of torture, “Pluck out his eyes” (III. vii. 6) and this is immediately followed by Regan assaulting Gloucester and inciting her husband to further cruelty. So, lacking are Goneril and Regan in the ordinary feminine emotions that it seems impossible to consider them as normal women. It seems that as if they are female forms assumed by the devil: LEAR. Down from the waist they are centaurs, though women all above. But to the girdle do the gods inherit; beneath is all the fiend’s. There’s hell,there’s darkness, there is the sulphurous pit; (IV. vi. 140-143)Infact Goneril and Regan are several times associated with the source of all evil. In Albany’s remonstrance with Goneril: ALBANY. See thyself, devil! Proper deformity shows not in the fiend So horrid as in woman. (IV. ii. 73-75)…Howe’er thou art a fiend, A woman’s shape doth shield thee. (IV. ii. 81-82)and in his reference to her as “This gilded serpent. ” (V. iii. 100) The two had united only for the purpose of destroying others but ultimately, they turn against each other. Their deaths, unlike that of Edmund, have no touch of redemption. They are the active agents of chaos and darkness. They are machiavellic people, treacherous and immoral. They display all the most hideous features of inhumanity, killing, torturing, lustful and without any sense of inner guilt. According to Bradley, they are the hideous human beings (if ever they are!) that Shakespeare has even drawn. In the overall context of the play, they are the direct consequences of Lear’s folly in dividing his kingdom. They serve as a kind of value judgement on Lear’s unethical act in the first scene of Act I.

Cordelia

“Her voice was ever soft, Gentle, and low, an excellent thing in woman. ” (VI. iii. 328-329)

Cordelia is undoubtedly one of the tenderest creations of Shakespeare. The above quotation, spoken by the dying Lear is a tribute to her feminine simplicity and modesty. Yet at the beginning of the play, in Act I scene i, the royal Lear fails to understand the honest and sincerity of Cordelia when she fails to flatter him. Unlike her two sisters, Cordelia does not possess the “glib and oily art to speak and purpose not. ” (I. i. 258-259) Her asides serve as a double choric purpose: they alert us to the falseness of the declarations by her sisters and also reveal her essential reserve which prevents her from parading her love for her father in public in expectation of a material reward. Her refusal to take part in the glib public – speaking contest not only reveals her integrity of character, but it also serves to warn Lear of his poor judgement.

Lear is obsessed with his own claims upon his daughters and this is why inevitably he fails to understand the argument of Cordelia. Cordelia’s “Nothing” in answer to Lear’s pressing demands for flattering words can be seen as an act of defiance on her part. But we should bear in mind that her answer springs from the noblest motives. In no way should we interpret her refusal to comply to Lear’s demands as a conflict with patriarchy or even as an act of disobedience. The portrayal of Cordelia’s character in Acts IV and V throws light on her virtuous character. She is consistently being held in high esteem by the good characters in the play and we should never forget that France accepts to take Cordelia as his wife on her virtues alone. Though Lear casts her off peremptorily,

Cordelia leaves her father more in sorrow than in anger. She knows that Lear will soon discover the hypocrisy of Goneril and Regan and will be bitterly disillusioned. She, therefore, keeps in touch with affairs in England through Kent and we are given the impression that her love for her father is completely unaffected by the manner in which he has treated her. Hers is not passive love as she herself takes the initiative in sending the French army to Dover. She attacks England with a French force in order to restore her father. In Act IV scene vii she is full of love and respect for her father. When Lear carries on her corpse, we are really shocked and like Lear we want to know why “a dog, a horse, a rat have life, And thou no breath at all? ” (V. iii. 370-371) We remember Cordelia as the selfless daughter, full of pity and love. Cordelia’s death needs and explanation for we might justly ask where lies the justice of Cordelia’s death? Cordelia’s death can be as an expression of Shakespeare’s tragic vision. Her death reveals the full horror of the consequences of Lear’s folly and shameful act of dividing his kingdom. Cordelia’s death can be as the real tragedy of “King Lear”. Concerning Regan and Goneril, Lear is forced to ask the following question: “Is there any cause in nature that make these hard hearts? ” (III. vi. 81-82) Concerning Cordelia, we on our part as readers (or the audience) can ask the following question: “Is there any cause in nature for this soft heart? ”

“Twelfth Night” and “The Merchant of Venice”, the Romantic Comedies

Shakespeare has honored women by enthroning them as queen of his comedies and there are several reasons as to why. Shakespeare conceives women as representing the reintegrating principle and as a symbol of divine beauty and mercy. By divine beauty, we mean harmony, a sense of proportion and that which is ethically and morally right. Mercy means love, caring and tenderness and it also implies poetic justice both distributive and retributive justice. In Shakespearean comedies, it is the function of women as the heroines to use their intellectual wit to see to it that characters who are somewhat abnormal are brought back to a state of normally. Unlike in classical comedies where deviants are whipped into accepted norm of propriety and decorum by subjecting their foibles and excesses to monkery and scorn, in Romantic Comedies, it is the function of the heroines to hold to them a sort of Edenic state to which they willingly and gladly opt to embrace. The comic journey of both “Twelfth Night” and “The Merchant of Venice” is to dispel the gloom which threatens both cities through the redeeming power of love. Viola has to rescue Orsino and Olivia from the gloom in which they find themselves and in a like manner, Portia has to rescue Antonio from the vengeful grip of Shylock. In both plays, the heroines have to disguise themselves as men to reveal their intellectual brilliance.

Shakespeare also finds in women the necessary equipoise and attributes of personality such as an agile wit, a rich reservoir of common sense and human feelings, intuitive insight and a kind of guarded optimism to guide them in their task of restoring harmony. As the reintegrating principle, the role of these women characters is in harmony with the spirit of comedy as an art as as a mode of thought. Comedy is a mode of thought as the accepted norm of behavior and proper decorum is a philosophical concept only. The rigorous and rapid style of speaking of the heroines revealed their intellectual wit, rhetoric and sensuous poetry and this is proper to the world of comedy. The heroines of Shakespearean comedies possess certain virtuous traits of character worth mentioning and substantiated. They possess the talent of inspiring and returning affection. They are trusted by all those who come into contact with them. They are wholly human and natural in their reaction to crises such as falling in love. They are clear as to what are their priorities and once they have defined their priorities, they work heart and soul to achieve their goal. Viola seeks to remedy her situation by being employed by Orsino and she succeeds in surmounting all obstacles to be accepted by Olivia.

Whenever they are involved in crises, they make use of their intuitive sight but accompanied by a heavy dose of intelligence, judging the captain, Viola is quick to tell him, VIOLA. There is a fair behavior in thee, captain, And though that nature with a beauteous wall Doth oft close in pollution, yet of thee I will believe thou hast a mind that suits With this thy fair and outward character. (I. ii. 50-54)Viola is confident but she is wise to be on her guard and she knows her limits in what she can do: “O time, thou must untangle this, not I. It is too hard a knot for me t’ untie!” (II. iii. 40-41)Shakespeare’s heroines are also the touchstones of the worth of other characters. The sheer force of their charismatic personality reveals the extent of worth and worthlessness in characters in their immediate environment.