Mary Stuart And Elizabeth Character Analysis

Mary Stuart and Elizabeth

Mary and Elizabeth – cousins, queens, rivals. They both descended from Henry VII – Mary as her great-grandchild and Elizabeth as his granddaughter. They both were claimants to the English throne – one ascended to it, while the other ended up on the executioner’s block. Throughout the years various misconceptions have been stuck to their personas: Mary, the Catholic martyr who ‘put the personal increasingly before the political’ (Dunn 41) and Elizabeth, the cruel oppressor who ‘sacrificed the personal and placed her responsibilities as queen at the centre of her life’ (ibid.).
The two queens have been likened to one another since the sixteenth century: their private life, their attitude towards the country they ruled and governance

Mary’s aggressive attitude, on the one hand, is the very first information the spectator encounters: on the bill of the play the Scottish Queen shows the middle finger to Elizabeth, while they are both staring out of the window. During the play Mary is the one who spits at Elizabeth, and she communicates mainly with increased volume, furthermore, with screaming. In the way of speaking Elizabeth is not dissimilar: she often lashes out at her servants and councillors and at one point in one of her monologues about Mary, Queen of Scots she angrily cries out: ‘Ó, hogy dögölnél meg!’ .
Other part of their behaviour that provides basis for comparison is their gestures which are most salient during the confrontation scene. During that event Mary and Elizabeth mirror each other: they walk alongside an invisible circle and use not only the same gestures, but the same facial expressions. They mimic each other to the finest details: when Mary adjusts her wig so does Elizabeth although her bun is not disrupted whatsoever. At this point of the play, the spectators sense that the two queens are in fact one but in two