“Talk you of killing?”: Rhetorical Construction of Tragic Femininity in William Shakespeare’s Othello, Elizabeth Cary’s The Tragedy of Mariam and John Webster’s The Duchess of Malfi
Over the last four decades, critical endeavours to restore women’s voice in early modern drama have paradoxically stressed the silence and absence of female tragic heroines, revealing that victimization works as a site of resistance (Callaghan 1989, 2007, Jankowski 1992, Luckyj 2002). Before they ar...
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| Publicat a: | URI:https://journals.openedition.org/shakespeare, |
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| Autors principals: | , |
| Format: | Article ou chapitre numérique |
| Idioma: | Anglais |
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Actes des congrès de la Société française Shakespeare
2024
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| Accés en línia: | Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM |
| Sumari: | Over the last four decades, critical endeavours to restore women’s voice in early modern drama have paradoxically stressed the silence and absence of female tragic heroines, revealing that victimization works as a site of resistance (Callaghan 1989, 2007, Jankowski 1992, Luckyj 2002). Before they are condemned to the ultimate silence though, tragic heroines eloquently defend their innocence and confound their persecutors. Such is the case of Desdemona, Mariam and the Duchess of Malfi who, between 1603 and 1613 on page and on stage, share a common fate as they suffer a violent guiltless death at the hand of a mad and jealous husband or brother. In this paper, we challenge the classic opposition between silence and speech to suggest that the two sometimes overlap in these Stoic heroines, as they manipulate the strict moral and social constraints of the time to try and open up a space that allows them to exist. Focusing on the grammar, syntax and mode of their plea and stoic suffering, we highlight the rhetorical and poetic dimension of this female tragic “voice”. A common pattern of tropes produces a reverberation effect that unites the individuated voices of the three heroines in their liminal moments and reshapes tragic femininity. |
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