In Shakespearian society, the “perfect” female is cherished beyond their physique, beauty and wholesomeness. These virtues are appreciated and these limitations are set up to shield the ingénue. An acquiescent woman assents to the standards and inhabits to the space that is created for her. Ophelia is repetitively admired by her prettiness and purity, as Gertrude states, “And for your part, Ophelia, I do wish that your good beauties be the happy cause of Hamlet’s wildness. So shall I hope your virtues will bring him to his wonted way again to both your honours,” (Hamlet
In his painting, Fuseli sought to capture arguably the most comedic moment in the play, which occurs when Titania awakens and falls in love with the donkey-headed Bottom. He does not simply represent the scene as Shakespeare portrays it in his words; instead, Fuseli interprets it, sometimes taking the figurative and making it literal and other times exaggerating Shakespeare’s portrayal of the beautiful Titania falling for the ludicrous Nick
The titular bride herself narrates the story “The Tiger’s Bride” and she begins her story with the statement, “My father lost me to The Beast at cards” (BYB 154). The first line of the tale itself points to the idea of women as objects of exchange between men. This is further accentuated when she states that her mother had also been bartered for her dowry to the Russian nobility and died young owing to her father’s gaming, whoring and agonizing repentances (BYB 155). The story begins with the girl and her father travelling from Russia to Milan, where, the girl helplessly watches her father lose all her inheritance to the Beast in a game of cards. She states, “I watched with the furious cynicism peculiar to women whom circumstances force mutely to witness folly,
Nineteenth-century fin-de-siècle witnessed the emergence of the New Woman who is “an outspoken, independent and thoroughly modern woman, whose “masculine” behaviours made her something of a monster” (199). In fact, monstrosity in nineteenth-century gothic productions is “largely interpellated by the Symbolic gaze” that relegates the New Woman’s transgressive acts to oddity (Hock-soon Ng 2). Women’s assertive and aggressive behaviours contradict with “the Symbolic normative” that inscribes them within the discourse of monstrosity (2). In The Madwoman in the Attic, Gilbert and Gubar explain that women’s “assertiveness, aggressiveness – all characteristics of male life of “significant action” - are “monstrous” in women precisely because “unfeminine” and therefore unsuited to a gentle life of “contemplative purity” (28). The she-monster thus, not only crosses the boundaries of normativity but also jeopardizes the constructed conception of femininity and humanity.
His work ‘A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful’ introduces the idea of the sublime state on the mind. He believes that in order to experience the sublime, pain and pleasure must both be initially present. You must experience mental pain and fear with the recognition that this distress is of a fictional nature. It is then that the sense of pleasure is introduced in the delight of relief. (Burke 71) He also states that “If one gets too close to the perception, they no longer experience sublime emotions, only fear” (Burke 30) By this, he is stating that if a bizarre creature comes into contact which is too close, there will be no sense of a sublime relief, only the emotion of fear.
Titania has stolen a boy from the Indian king as Puck mentions “she as her attendant hath / A lovely boy, stolen from an Indian king / She never had so sweet a changeling” (Act 2, Scene 1). She indeed have a changeling but she has not been presented as a devilish fairy rather she has been presented as a fairy queen who protects
Monsters that resemble familial bodies receive our attention through appearing as a construct of both, the understood and unthinkable, commanding to be seen. This existence demands the participation of the audience to define and categorise what it is to be normal, suggesting that the image of the monster is never fixed; constantly evolving through interpretation. When considering the monstrous within the Middle Ages, this is best represented in the depiction of the Sheela-na-gig that exist today often eroded or decayed due to the excess of human touch. The utmost importance of this source is that it reveals an audience desired contact and domestication of the obscene which may or may not have occurred in the medieval period. When scholars interpret the Sheela-na-gig to be representative of the offensive, analysis is thus partly superficial as it deals with investing their own narrative within an imperfect material.
In “Female Deification: The Epic of Gilgamesh” I formulate an argument against a feminist critique of the epic using an in-depth analysis of the female characters and their positions within the text itself. Although it seems female characters play a passive role in the epic, in reality they are mentioned within the text actively as either goddesses, immortal, or as godlike. How male characters interact with them and how they interact with one another shows the surprising power behind the women's behavior, especially in comparison with their male counterparts. I labeled this process of character development as “female deification” to express how these seemingly insignificant characters become godlike in their placement and expression in the
In act 2, scene one, Portia’s deepest frustration is revealed in her inability to choose her suitor due to her father 's previously established test. This means that she sees that she have the potential to choose her own husband. She wants freedom and control over her own destiny. This tells us how she isn’t a very docile type who easily follows rules and readily accepts control. In act 2, scene 7, Portia evidently judges the Prince of Morocco by his skin colour, hoping that suitors of the same complexion would choose the wrong casket.
Imagine having one of your friends die while giving birth and having to take care of the child. In Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream Titania, queen of fairies is married to Oberon, king of fairies, who wants to use the boy as his own personal servant and Oberon tries to do whatever it takes to get the boy for himself. Both are constantly fighting over the little boy and what to do with him. Titania is displayed as a loyal, determined, and powerful mother figure to the little boy who tries her best to care for everyone. Titania remains loyal to the little boy’s mother by keeping the promises she made before the mother died.