Justice, Women, and Power in English Renaissance Drama

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Author: Andrew J. Majeske | Emily Detmer-Goebel

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Justice, Women, and Power in English Renaissance Drama

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Edited by Andrew Majeske and Emily Detmer-Goebel

Madison • Teaneck Fairleigh Dickinson University Press

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2009 by Rosemont Publishing & Printing Corp. All rights reserved. Authorization to photocopy items for internal or personal use, or the internal or personal use of specific clients, is granted by the copyright owner, provided that a base fee of $10.00, plus eight cents per page, per copy is paid directly to the Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, Massachusetts 01923. [978-0-8386-4169-9/09 $10.00 8¢ pp, pc.]

Associated University Presses 2010 Eastpark Boulevard Cranbury, NJ 08512

The paper used in this publication meets the requirements of the American National Standard for Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials Z39.48-1984.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Justice, women, and power in English Renaissance drama / edited by Andrew Majeske and Emily Detmer-Goebel. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-8386-4169-9 (alk. paper) 1. English drama—Early modern and Elizabethan, 1500–1600—History and criticism. 2. English drama—17th century—History and criticism. 3. Justice in literature. 4. Women in literature. 5. Law and literature—History—16th century. 6. Law and literature—History—17th century. 7. Power (Social sciences) in literature. I. Majeske, Andrew J. II. Detmer-Goebel, Emily, 1961– PR658.W6J87 2009 822⬘.309355—dc22 2008046003

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Contents Acknowledgments

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Introduction Andrew Majeske and Emily Detmer-Goebel

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Performative Subversions: Portia, Language, and the Law in The Merchant of Venice Kathryn R. Finin

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‘‘Proceed in justice’’: Narratives of Marital Betrayal in The Winter’s Tale Cristina Leo´ n Alfar

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Poisoned Justice: Passion and Politics in The Winter’s Tale Catherine E. Thomas

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The Trials of Mary Stuart: Anxious Circulations in John Webster’s Drama Carol Blessing

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Forensic Performances: Evidentiary Narrative in Arden of Faversham Cheryl Dudgeon

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Shakespeare’s Bed-tricks: Finding Justice in Lies? Emily A. Detmer-Goebel

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‘‘What Is Yours Is Mine’’: Sexual and Social Complementarity in the Trial Scenes of Measure for Measure David Evett

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CONTENTS

Striking a Deal: Portia’s Trial Strategy in Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice Andrew Majeske

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Bibliography

174

Notes on Contributors

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Index

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Acknowledgments WE FIRST WOULD LIKE TO THANK W. DAVID KAY FOR ORGANIZING THE seminar, Staging Justice, for the annual meeting of the Shakespeare Association of America in April of 2006, from which the current essays were drawn. We would also like to acknowledge the contribution of all of the members of that seminar: Kevin Curran, David George, Pierre Hecker, Harry Keyishian, Lisa Klotz, Heather Murray, Eric V. Spencer, Holger Schott Syme, Polya Tocheva, Christopher Warley as well as all of the authors of this current volume. We are grateful to the editors at the Associated University Presses for their help in bringing this volume forward. We would especially like to thank Harry Keyishian for his encouragement throughout this process. We would also like to express our gratitude to our contributors, colleagues and families who have supported us in this endeavor. Andrew Majeske wishes to thank John Jay College of Criminal Justice for its support. He would also like to thank his wife, Andrea, and son, Owen, whose patient support was invaluable. Emily DetmerGoebel wishes to thank Northern Kentucky University for the support that it provided to complete this project. She also thanks her husband, Scott, and daughter, Ella, for their continuous support and love. Finally, we both would like to thank our friend and colleague Fran Dolan for all of her support.

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Introduction Andrew Majeske and Emily Detmer-Goebel

The Transformation of Justice in Renaissance Europe

THE CONCEPT OF JUSTICE UNDERGOES AN AMAZING TRANSFORMATION over the course of the sixteenth century, especially in northern Europe. Charting the progress of this transformation is, however, surprisingly difficult, especially if one were to look only at sixteenthcentury legal and political treatises or what pass for such. From these it would appear that little or no change was taking place during this time period. The dramatic shift towards a more positivistic view of law and justice is more a seventeenth-century phenomenon, and is visible especially in the works of Francis Bacon, Hugo Grotius, and later, Thomas Hobbes. This contemporary lack of recognition of change is in itself noteworthy—was it reasonable to continue believing that the conception of justice could remain constant when so much else was in flux as a result of events and developments such as the dissemination of Machiavelli’s political works, the outbreak of the Reformation, and the rise of the new science and its method? Whatever the answer to this question, the lack of sixteenth-century recognition of change by supposed experts on the subject of justice presents tremendous difficulty for contemporary scholars trying to assess the shifting meaning of the concept of justice in the era. If in fact the concept was changing, how do we ‘‘document’’ the change? One rather obvious answer is that we need to expand our examination of sixteenth-century documents to include documents that reflect justice in action. Reports of particular legal cases would seem to be a good source, but these tend to be constrained by their unique facts and circumstances. Consequently, actual legal cases will be very slow to reflect changes to a theoretical construct like justice. Instead we must look to dramatic representation of justice evident in representational art and drama, where visual and verbal pictures 11

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ANDREW MAJESKE AND EMILY DETMER-GOEBEL

reflecting justice’s transformation are captured and recorded. It should not be surprising that artists may be among the most adept at recognizing fundamental societal change as it is occurring, while it is still novel, or cutting edge, and relating this change in attractive ways for consumption by a larger populace—isn’t this one of the things we value most about art? A striking example of art’s cutting edge documentation of justice’s transformation in meaning can be seen in early Renaissance renderings of the figure of Lady Justice, whose image is familiar to most people in the West. Lady Justice is typically depicted in a classical gown or toga; she holds scales in her left hand. The scales weigh the justice of a cause or case—the side that weighs heavier being the more just side. She typically carries a sword in her right hand, with which she executes punishment upon the party who comes up light in her scales. Very frequently she is depicted as blindfolded, which is customarily interpreted as meaning that she is impartial in her rendering of justice—the blindfold signifies in this context that justice can and should be blind to facts and circumstances that might engender partiality. For present purposes this last characteristic is particularly noteworthy. Prior to the beginning of the sixteenth century, Lady Justice was uniformly depicted as clear sighted. Upon reflection, a clearsighted Lady Justice as the norm should not be surprising. After all, her scales are invariably the sort that function from a central pivot. Sight is required to determine which side weighs heavier—the hand holding the scales will feel the weight indiscriminately. Moreover, sight is also needed to inflict the appropriate punishment with the sword—otherwise the innocent are as likely to be mowed down as the guilty. Perhaps most importantly, however, and related to the problem of the scales, is that Lady Justice required clear-sightedness to assess the facts and circumstances of each case to determine the appropriate result. She needed to identify what factors were to weigh for and against each party. Unfortunately, some of the same facts and circumstances that dictate the just result also can be the basis for pre-determining a partial outcome. A question arises as to which evil is worse: the danger of a predetermined, partial outcome, or the application of intentionally blinded justice. The ultimate answer to this depends upon whether we trust Lady Justice, and those acting in her name, with the broad discretion necessary to assess all of the facts and circumstances in particular cases, or whether we

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must rely upon others to dictate to Lady Justice what the relevant facts and circumstances are, to inform her of which way her scales are leaning, and to guide her sword in execution.1 When viewed in light of all of these difficulties it is quite puzzling how or why a widely accepted blindfolded Lady Justice could suddenly arise and capture the popular imagination. Determining what precisely such a figure represents, if it in fact represents anything specific, is also a challenge. That such a figure did indeed develop we know, and we also know with considerable specificity the chronology of its development. The first known depiction of a blindfolded Lady Justice figure, the cover piece for this volume, appears in Sebastian Brandt’s Das Narrenschiff (Ship of Fools), published in Basel Switzerland in 1494. Both this depiction and the text that accompany it are unambiguously negative. In the picture a fool is blindfolding Lady Justice’s eyes. As he does so, the fool is stepping upon, and previously has sat upon, hechels—primitive farming implements with sharp spikes. The text reads ‘‘he who litigates like a child and tries to make truth blind will feel the teeth of the hechel.’’ Neither picture nor text leave room for misinterpretation. Brandt’s book, which includes Durer’s first commissioned engravings, was immensely popular, the early European Renaissance equivalent of a bestseller. It was quickly translated into Latin (as well as French and English), and enjoyed six authorized and at least seven pirated editions by 1521. Thus, the image of a blindfolded Lady Justice (albeit a negative one) traveled widely during the first decades of the sixteenth century. Then something strange happened. By about 1550 book illustrations and statuary had begun to appear, largely in northern Europe, depicting a blindfolded Lady Justice in an unambiguously positive light. What precisely caused this transformation is not known though, obviously, the Reformation and Machiavelli’s political innovations probably played significant roles.2 In any event, within half a century of the first known depiction of a blindfolded Lady Justice figure—one that was unambiguously negative—positive depictions had become commonplace. Clearly a fundamental reconception of what justice involved was underway in northern Europe, and the change first appeared in representational art. Not only does the art of the time reflect the ongoing change, it also highlights the tensions intrinsic in it—though it does little to resolve these tensions. Perhaps the best early example of a tensionwrought rendering is Breughel’s 1550 depiction of ‘‘Justice.’’ In this

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picture the illustration and its accompanying text are in direct and pointed conflict. The picture shows a blindfolded Lady Justice figure, surrounded by inquisition-type tortures and killings. These painful images not only fill the foreground immediately around the Lady Justice figure, they also stretch all the way to a seemingly endless series of fully-utilized gallows and crucifixes on the horizon. To perhaps emphasize the tensions even more, Breughel has the Lady Justice figure wearing what appears to be a courtesan’s headdress, which is then topped by a soldier’s helmet. The accompanying text, assuredly not Breughel’s, as though nothing were amiss, simply and straightforwardly provides, ‘‘The aim of the law is either through punishment to correct him who is punished, or to improve the others by his example, or to protect the generality by overcoming the evil.’’3 A mid-twentieth-century art book reproducing Breughel’s image editorially resolves the tension by replacing the original accompanying text with the following words, much more in keeping with what the picture actually shows: ‘‘Blindfolded for impartiality, this gowned figure does not see the awful tortures committed in the name of truth-finding, correction and good example.’’ While most Renaissance depictions seem to treat Lady Justice’s blindfolding positively, many reflect the tensions inherent in the representation in various ways. Often Lady Justice can be seen peeking from beneath her blindfold. Sometimes the blindfold is depicted as transparent. Other ways artists have dealt with the tension involve having two rather than one Lady Justice—one blindfolded and one clear sighted. An intriguing variation on this is a Janus-headed Lady Justice, with one face clear sighted, and the other blindfolded.

Justice, Gender, and the Modern Shift Leaving aside the multi-faceted implications of the blindfolding being of a female rather than male figure, are there fundamental issues of gender equity involved in this reconception of justice? This question proves to be very difficult—indeed there do not appear to be any clear answers. Certainly, the shift toward impartiality seems like it might benefit women oppressed by political and social orders almost invariably controlled by men. This appearance is in itself deceptive, though, fashioned as it is in significant part by that master manipulator and architect of the modern political and legal orders

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of the West, Nicolo Machiavelli. In his work, we can perceive tantalizing clues that belie this innocent appearance of impartiality. We can do no more than gesture towards what Machiavelli is attempting in this brief introduction, but Machiavelli’s election to locate part of his political and legal teaching in a work of drama provides a compelling justification for the sorts of explorations conducted by the essays in the present volume. In his Mandragola, Machiavelli obliquely approaches the same issue he addresses so provocatively at the end of chapter 25 of The Prince, where fortune is to be treated like a woman and beaten into submission. In the Mandragola, however, Machiavelli is more precise about the role of women generally in his vision of the new politics—a topic about which he is markedly silent in his explicitly political treatises, The Prince and The Discourses. His objective in Mandragola, truly breathtaking in its audacity, is, at least in part, to persuade and/or compel women to participate in his peculiar program of political reform. Machiavelli’s reform, in essence, involves creating new political orders—or rather, essential guidance for those creating new political orders. This guidance directs that more stable political orders be formed based upon the principle that people can be relied upon to act predictably; all idealistic notions are completely set aside. The foundation of political orders must be based on something reliable—namely, how ‘‘men’’ can typically be expected to act in most situations, most of the time, the emphasis, of course, being upon ‘‘men.’’ Where women fit in does not get addressed in The Prince or The Discourses, it only gets addressed in his dramas—especially the Mandragola. Lucrezia, the principal female character of the Mandragola, is pressured in every conceivable way short of open force—though the threat of compulsion lurks in the near background—to be guided by her husband, priest, and mother (her mother, as might be expected is controlled by the men), even when she is told to sleep with another man, and despite her own conscientious objections to doing so. This other man, after making love to her, reveals his true identity and the trick by which he gained access to her, proclaims his love for her, and encourages her to continue the affair. She agrees, in part to spite her husband, and in part in anticipation of the pleasure the affair will entail (this later motivation seemed foreign to her character at the outset of the play). Machiavelli’s play suggests that women cannot be entrusted in certain situations to act

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in the sort of predictable way necessary to produce a reliably stable political order; to put it another way, they will not act according to what is most pleasurable as reliably as men would.4 Men can be relied upon to act predictably, the play makes clear, even in a situation that involves them arranging their own cuckolding. Machiavelli’s deeper point seems to be that women, as the central episode of the play reveals, tend to react differently than men would in certain situations—their characters or essential natures are different from men’s in some critical respect. At this juncture it does not matter whether we agree that such differences actually exist, or if they do, whether they are or should be politically meaningful. Rather, it is important to note that Machiavelli certainly seems to think such differences exist and are critically important to the development of stable political orders. The significance of the difference between men and women for Machiavelli is that women, if left to their own devices, may act in ways that tend to undermine the stable political orders Machiavelli is trying to help establish. Most specifically, Machiavelli cannot afford for women to behave according to the model of the classical Lucrece—a modern, more pliable version must replace her, such as the Mandragola’s Lucretia. This modern woman must fully subscribe to the pleasure principle for Machiavelli’s reliable political orders to become possible. Ultimately, behaving according to how men with power over them want women to behave is more pleasant than the unstated, though clear, alternative—being compelled to act this way. With shocking directness, Machiavelli raises this issue in his own voice in the prologue, when he wishes that the women in the audience enjoy the same fate as Lucretia endured in the play. If, as seems to be the case, Machiavelli’s larger project of political reform requires the subjection of women by men, the implications are widespread and extremely disturbing. Few would argue that, for better or worse, Machiavelli has profoundly influenced the basic legal and political structures in the West. The notion that predictable political orders are an unqualified good, and that politics can therefore be treated more appropriately as a ‘‘science,’’ are ideas that have become virtually unassailable. The rejection of idealistic notions or models, especially in the political context, in favor of what actually goes on in the ‘‘real’’ world (at least for men), has become a fundamental tenet of Western thought. If Machiavelli’s predictable politics, the fundamental basis of po-

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litical ‘‘science’’ in the modern rather than Aristotelian sense, and a keystone for most Western political and legal systems, relies for its effectiveness upon the more or usually less apparent subjection of women by men, as seems to be the case, we are truly faced with a profoundly troubling problem. A good place to begin assessing this problem, perhaps, is in volumes like the present one that closely examine works of Renaissance drama and explore the political and legal issues addressed in them. As has been suggested, and as perhaps proven by Machiavelli’s choice to conceal his political teaching respecting women in his drama, works of drama may have a more immediate and profound connection to reality than non-artistic works. Ultimately, efforts such as Amy Louise Erickson’s (discussed below), which seek to recover the materials for alternative narratives, rather than directly challenge the dominant patriarchal narrative itself, may constitute a good way to begin addressing the problem posed by Machiavelli’s teachings and influence, particularly if these recoveries encompass the idealistic perspectives that have so imprudently been swept aside and lost to political thought for so long. The radical equality that women are shown to enjoy in Plato’s Republic, however one interprets this work, appears to be far more conducive to advance the cause of gender equity in reimagined and reengineered Western political and social orders, than the sort of impartiality that results from the blindfolding of Lady Justice. While the essays in the present volume do not deal specifically with representational art, like the depictions of Lady Justice dealt with above, they all deal with Renaissance dramatic works that are addressing in some way the troubling tensions inherent in the changing notion of justice. The artists who wrote these dramas all seem more in tune with the forces that are producing such changes—even though they probably did not fully appreciate the theoretical implications of these changes—than do the authors of most legal and political treatises written at the time. Exploring the legal content and context of these dramas, as these essays do, is an intrinsically worthwhile and necessary endeavor. These dramas record, virtually in real time, the dynamics of change that give this era its peculiar connection to the present—its early ‘‘modern’’ character. The essays in this volume are pieces of a conversation loosely described as the interdisciplinary law and literature movement, which is now well into its third decade. This movement, since its inception,

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has reflected powerful internal tensions.5 Among the tensions are the implicit claims that literature infuses the otherwise cold, sterile law with ‘‘emotion[], sensitivity to context, respect for variety and otherness in human nature.’’6 Some further claim that approaching the law through literature also has an ethical dimension in that it helps ‘‘train people in the reflection, consciousness, choice, and responsibility that make up the ability to engage in moral decision making.’’7 Others, as might be expected, see law as more dynamic, and little in need of whatever literature has to offer.8 Making no claim to originality, I would like to suggest that literature, from a somewhat less tension-fraught perspective, may simply offer a way of understanding or appreciating law—especially its possibilities and limitations—a way that is not readily available within the discipline of law itself as traditionally understood. Literature can act as a bridge between the more or less universal principles that many believe underlie concepts such as justice, and the enactment and application of particular laws, from which the law gets its often undeserved reputation as being cold and sterile.9 Literature, we hope, may supply both the texts upon which these beliefs in justice are based, as well as the dynamism that the law must appear to possess in order to establish, maintain, and preserve regimes that aspire to be governed ultimately by the rule of law.10 The current volume seeks to build upon and join several other collections that have made somewhat similar explorations into the literature, law, and politics of the era, including Constance Jordan and Karen Cunningham’s The Law in Shakespeare (2007), Erica Sheen and Lorna Hutson’s Literature, Politics and Law in Renaissance England (2005), and Victoria Kahn and Lorna Hutson’s Rhetoric and Law in Early Modern Europe (2001).

Feminism, Law, and Literature When the Yale Journal of Law and Feminism first began in 1989, the editors selected a logo, created by Jacqueline Coy Charlesworth, that challenged the iconic image of blind Justice, the same one that graces our cover. Ursula Werner describes why the journal saw a need for three women of different ethnicities who are not passively blindfolded as follows: ‘‘Blindfolded, Justice cannot see that she is a

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INTRODUCTION

Figure 1. Copyright 2005 Yale Journal of Law & Feminism. All rights reserved.

woman; not realizing that she is different from other women, she is deprived of all the advantages and disadvantages such recognition would bring. It may be true, as many have observed, that the blindfold ensures Justice’s impartiality towards those with more power and influence than she. But at the same time, the blindfold ensures Justice’s impartiality towards those with less power than she, those who are, in some sense, disadvantaged.’’11 Over the past twenty-five years, feminist critique of law, legal education, and legal institutions clearly has tried to enlighten those who make and enforce laws about the difference gender makes. While there is still a great deal of work to be done around the globe in terms of gender and justice, the link between feminism, law, and literature is now quite strong. This has not always been the case. In an oft-quoted essay first published in 1990 in The Yale Law Journal, Carolyn Heilbrun and Judith Resnik complained that the field of law and literature had basically ‘‘excluded feminist perspectives.’’12 Even though feminist literary criticism was quite active by 1990, the law and literature field, as they saw it, was adopting a canon of texts that excluded the issues and concerns of women. Since then, the convergence of the fields of law, literature, and feminism has grown rapidly, both in Renaissance literary studies (the focus of this collection) and in countless other literary periods and cultures. As just one barometer of interest in feminism and law are the number of specialized law journals such as Berkeley Women’s Law Journal; Columbia Journal of Gender and Law; Duke Journal of Gender, Law, and Policy; Feminist Legal Studies; Harvard Women Law Journal; and Yale Journal of Law and Feminism, to name a few. Feminist literary criticism began with the study of images of

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women. While much of feminist literary criticism of the 1970s and early ’80s dealt with nineteenth- and twentieth-century texts, such as The Madwoman in the Attic: The Woman Writer and the Nineteenth Century Literary Imagination (1979), two texts stand out as breaking the ground for feminist studies in Shakespeare: Juliet Dusinberre’s Shakespeare and the Nature of Women (1975) and the first collection of feminist criticism on Shakespeare, The Women’s Part, edited by Carolyn Ruth Swift Lenz, Gayle Greene, and Carol Thomas Neely in 1980. The central issues of the ever-growing field of feminist literary inquiry might be summarized as follows: the study of gender, sexuality, race, and class in general and more specifically topics related to women and identity, subjectivity, agency, language, authorship, work, property, crime, violence, family, marriage, motherhood, and religion. These topics have fueled a wealth of literary criticism within the study of English Renaissance drama and the essays collected in this book bring together many of these lines of inquiry gravitating towards the issues of law and power. Looking back over the last thirty years of work on women and the law in Renaissance studies, one is struck by a shift in perspective regarding just how much agency women were allotted in the dominant patriarchal culture. Like much of the feminist literary work in the early part of this time range, Renaissance feminist critics were actively publishing essays that documented again and again how representations of women oppressed and limited actual women. This is not to suggest that early critique was one dimensional; on the contrary, I mean that evidence of misogyny was everywhere in all sorts of texts, from the plays of Shakespeare and his contemporaries, in the sermons, in the conduct books, in the paintings, in the ballads, and in medical and legal texts. In terms of our particular interest in women and the law, one primary text that is used by many studies to demonstrate the extent of women’s oppression under the law was the 1632 text, The Lawes Resolutions of Womens Rights. This work unequivocally states that women beginning with Eve were under the jurisdiction of men and that they have no official role in making, consenting or administering law. Yet even this patriarchal text registers a form of agency, if not granted, at least enacted by ordinary women; the author writes that while all women are subject to the men in their lives, ‘‘I know no remedy [to this subjection], though some women can shift it well enough.’’13 While the early work of feminist literary critics of Renais-

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sance drama may have focused on the ways that institutions and texts oppressed women, more recently scholars have looked for ways that women were seen as shifting it, so to speak. For example, a 1990 landmark survey of women’s history by Sara Mendelson and Patricia Crawford’s Women in Early Modern England: 1550–1720 explores the multiple discourses that shape and are shaped by women of the period. While the text fully documents the ways that the dominant culture viewed women as inferior and in need of subjection, they also highlight the ways that women’s agency, although limited, was revealed through a range of behaviors and texts that underscore the complexity of women’s lives. As the authors bluntly put it: ‘‘No one nowadays mistakes prescriptive ideals for experience.’’ So while the dictum for women to be ‘‘chaste, silent and obedient’’ surely existed in the period, so too did the discourses and experiences that ‘‘reversed, combined, modified, or ignored’’ such discourses.14 By the end of the twentieth century, feminist criticism in general was moving away from a discourse that focused on women as simply victims of patriarchy. Phyllis Rackin’s essay ‘‘Misogyny Everywhere’’ (published in A Feminist Companion to Shakespeare, 2000) nicely represents this moment. Here Rackin challenges feminist literary critics to question why we are so enamored of telling the story of our oppression. She suggests that the above mentioned dictum has probably appeared more often in recent scholarship than it did in the Renaissance. Rackin highlights the work of some feminist cultural historians such as Amy Louise Erickson’s Women and Property in Early Modern England (1993) who are ‘‘challenging the patriarchal narrative itself, [and] recovering the materials for alternative narratives.’’15 Rackin’s example of Erickson is particularly apt when considering the shift in perspective regarding the issues of women, law, and power. Erickson’s book was one of the first to examine women’s relationship to property in a way that documented avenues of agency that were previously unexamined. She argues that unlike earlier studies that focused on statute law or examined criminal courts records, when turning to laws and records regarding property, Erickson finds that women were able to understand the law and were using it to their benefit. Moreover her work shows how coverture, ‘‘while impossible to overemphasize the ramifications,’’ in practice did not leave women without agency; ‘‘wives of all social levels—not

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just Lady Margaret Hoby and the Dame Anne Filmers—managed finances on their own behalf and jointly with their husbands.’’16 Likewise, Tim Stretton in Women Waging Law in Elizabethan England (1998) finds that in the Court of Requests women were able to transcend the boundaries that historians thought limited women’s ability to bring suits on their own. While Stretton documents the cultural ideas and laws that discourage women from litigation, he also explores the way such ideas shaped litigation itself, such as different pleading strategies. Building on the work of Erickson and Stretton, and other social and legal historians, is the collection of interdisciplinary essays found in Women, Property, and the Letters of the Law in Early Modern England (2004), edited by Nancy E. Wright, Margaret W. Ferguson, and A. R. Buck. This collection wonderfully demonstrates, through readings of a variety of texts including court documents, Shakespearean plays, and personal letters, the ways that our concept of women’s relationship to property and legal agency is growing more nuanced and complex. Cited by several of the essays collected here, Laura Gowing’s Domestic Dangers: Women, Words, and Sex in Early Modern London (1996) examines church court testimony on slander, breach of marriage contract, and marital conflict to argue for a more nuanced understanding of women’s agency. For example, in her examination of slander, Gowing notes how women maximized their legal and moral agency through the language of public insult and testimony: ‘‘women also emerged as brokers of several kinds of power in neighborhood, social, and gender relations. The exchanges of words in which women contested reputation in the neighborhood gained an added power by their legal significance. But women also emerged as legal agents in their own right, a role which early modern institutions were not always willing to grant them.’’17 As Gowing’s evidence makes clear, women were central actors in slander trials and thereby claimed an agency as arbiters of a moral system. An important contribution to our understanding of gender and justice is Garthine Walker’s Crime, Gender and Social Order in Early Modern England (2003). Walker challenges past accounts of gender roles in terms of crime and punishment to argue that paying attention to such gender assumptions more fully informs the representations of victims and perpetrators of crime. Walker attends to the ‘‘multivocal’’ quality of court records and testimony. For example, she shows how an account of infanticide is informed by various as-

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sumptions about law, motherhood, violence, and burial, not to mention gender and class. Walker’s approach is to listen to all of these ‘‘voices’’ in order to learn how ‘‘people position themselves in their narratives and learn something of their subject position.’’18 This unique approach successfully produces a sensitive interpretation of crime and subjectivity in early modern England. While Gowing and Walker usefully contribute to our understanding of agency within the area of law, Bernard Capp’s social history, When Gossips Meet: Women, Family, and Neighbourhood in Early Modern England (2003), examines the ways women’s agency was located within community. He argues that women created networks that ‘‘offered them an identity beyond the narrowly domestic, a temporary escape, a means of coping with patriarchal pressures and alleviating them, and a powerful weapon for both defense and attack’’ of those with whom they disapprove or those who have attacked them.19 Although Capp cautions readers from a too optimistic reading of these networks, his work does explore another source of agency that informs those interested in women’s relationship to justice, power, and the law. The essays collected in this book all grow out of this ongoing examination of women’s relation to justice and agency as represented in English Renaissance drama. While The Merchant of Venice has often been the center of discussions about law and literature, especially within the field of Shakespeare studies, gender has not always been at the forefront of the discussion. Our collection opens and closes with an essay about how Merchant pays attention to the difference gender makes. Even as the play dramatizes the deeply gendered arena of law, Kathryn R. Finan argues that Portia locates a form of agency through the ‘‘subversive potential within language.’’ Finan also suggests that the play counters the idea that the law operates for only elite men; when Portia refuses to be powerless, she seeks a kind of justice for more than just Antonio. While Finan’s essay considers the subversive potential in Portia’s agency as a critique of both gender and legal norms, Cristina Leon Alfar explores how Paulina and Hermione become the ‘‘moral voice’’ in The Winter’s Tale. Building on the feminist tradition of viewing women’s voice as a source of power as seen in the work of Judith Butler, Alfar suggests Paulina and Hermione craft a compelling narrative that calls, not just Leontes, but all of the masculinist system of

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political authority into question. In this way, the play creates a space that sees women as defenders of justice. Catherine E. Thomas also pursues the nature of justice and power in her reading of The Winter’s Tale. Thomas is interested in the play’s portrayal of the damage that unruly passions seem to do to the justice system. In contrast to Leontes’s private concerns, Paulina dramatizes an equally emotional response, but it is directed for a public good; Thomas finds Paulina’s outbursts ultimately politically healing. While Paulina’s female authority is politically healing for Thomas, Carol Blessing claims that other powerful and problematic women figures whom are given a voice in the plays of John Webster can be seen as connected to cultural anxieties to Mary Stuart. Blessing reviews how attacks of Mary centered on her dangerous violations of the boundaries of power, religion, and sexual desire, and she traces these same anxieties in the trial scenes of The White Devil, The Duchess of Malfi, and The Devil’s Lawcase. Anxieties about women’s sexual desire and reputation also surface in Cheryl Dudgeon’s exploration about nature of evidence as depicted in Arden of Faversham. For Dudgeon, the play dramatizes the ‘‘manipulable and often indistinct quality of evidentiary categories’’ and underscores the way that evidence is always a matter of interpretation. The manipulation of evidence is also at work in the bed-trick plays that Emily Detmer-Goebel examines. While women characters in All’s Well That Ends Well and Measure for Measure might seem to be given power to heal unruly men such as Bertram and Angelo, Detmer-Goebel questions if this female power should be seen as entirely positive, given that this power is located in the women’s ability to be deceptive. David Evett also examines the representation of the women’s power in Measure for Measure. Rather than focus on the deceptions as Detmer-Goebel does, Evett argues that the women, especially Mariana, provide balance and demonstrate the willingness to forgive and forge new unions, a key theme in the play. Balance is at the heart of Andrew J. Majeske’s essay regarding The Merchant of Venice. Majeske argues that Portia’s treatment of Shylock signals a certain ‘‘flexibility’’ as she manipulates the law to her advantage. Majeske speculates that Shakespeare might have used Portia to point to the need for balance and equity in legal matters. Like

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INTRODUCTION

many of the essays in this collection, this dramatic representation of female power in a legal setting is open to varied interpretations.

Notes 1. This problem is particularly relevant today in the wake of the withholding of evidence by prosecutors in the so-called Duke lacrosse case, and in the overturning of wrongful convictions by the use of DNA evidence in Dallas County, Texas and elsewhere, where critical evidence withheld by prosecutors may have avoided convictions in the first place. See, for instance, ‘‘DA urges sanctions for prosecutors who withhold evidence.’’ Associated Press, May 4, 2008; and ‘‘Former Duke Lacrosse ‘Rape’’ Prosecutor Charged With Withholding Evidence, Misleading Court.’’ http://www.foxnews.com. January 4, 2007. 2. Martin Jay points to Vischer’s ‘‘Allegorical Representation of the Reformation’’ as a possible intermediate step—but that drawing shows a clear-sighted justice figure blindfolding the Holy Roman Emperor. Martin Jay, ‘‘Must Justice Be Blind?: The Challenge of Images To The Law,’’ in Law and the Image, eds. Costas Douzinas and Lynda Nead (Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1999), 19–20. 3. The Latin reads: Scopus legis est, aut ut eu que punit emendet aut poena eius caeteros meliores reddet aut sublatis malis caeteri securiores vivat. 4. Of course there is a problem as to whether women find intrinsically pleasurable the same things men do. It is possible that Machiavelli is also asserting that women need to enjoy what is pleasurable to men. 5. See generally Jane B. Baron, ‘‘Law, Literature, and the Problems of Interdisciplinarity.’’ Yale Law Journal 1059 (1999): 108. 6. Jane B. Baron, ‘‘The Rhetoric of Law and Literature: A Skeptical View.’’ Cardozo Law Review 26 (2005): 2273. While Baron intends this description to be a caricature, it quite succinctly and accurately captures one of these tensions. A good place to begin exploring claims of the ethical content that literature can add to law is Richard Weisberg’s Poethics: And Other Strategies of Law & Literature (New York: Columbia University Press, 1992). 7. Baron, ‘‘Rhetoric,’’ at 2280. Baron is quoting from Weisberg’s The Failure of the Word: The Protagonist as Lawyer in Modern Fiction. (Yale University Press, 1989). A good place to begin exploring claims of the ethical content that literature can add to law is Richard Weisberg’s Poethics. (See note 6 above.) See also Richard H. Weisberg, ‘‘Law and Literature as Survivor’’ Cardozo Legal Studies Research Paper No. 221 (2008). 8. Baron, ‘‘Rhetoric,’’ at 2277. 9. See, for example, Weisberg ‘‘Law and Literature’’ at 9. ‘‘. . . [H]uman rights and the humanities have been grappling, less or more self-consciously, with some of the same issues in the last two decades—first and foremost, perhaps, the tensions between the universal and the particular, the local, the culturally relative. Human rights discourse openly embraces the universal (‘‘the Universal Declaration of Human Rights’’), though it is far from clear what the term specifically means in covenants and charters and, most especially, in practice . . .’’ Weisberg is quoting

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from Domna C. Stanton’s ‘‘The Humanities in Human Rights: Critique, Language, Politics,’’ PMLA 121 (2006): 1515, 1519–20. 10. Andrew Majeske, Equity in English Renaissance Literature: Thomas More and Edmund Spenser Routledge Press (2006), 13–18. The present volume, in some real sense, should be thought of in educative rather than theoretical terms, in line with Ian Ward’s prescient observation about the law and literature movement. ‘‘Of the many intriguing characteristics of the Law and Literature movement, one of the most exciting and most valuable, is the fact that, unlike many other theoretical approaches to the problems of law, the ambition of Law and Literature is firstly educative, and only then, secondly, social and political.’’ Ian Ward, ‘‘The Educative Ambition of Law and Literature,’’ Legal Studies 13 (1993): 323. 11. ‘‘Dis-covering Our Cover,’’ Yale Journal of Law and Feminism, 1 (1989). Rpt. ‘‘The Story of the Law and Feminism Logo’’ (http://www.yale.edu/lawnfem/feminists.html). 12. ‘‘Convergences: Law, Literature, and Feminism,’’ in Feminist Jurisprudence, Women and the Law: Critical Essays, Research Agenda, and Bibliography, eds. Betty Taylor, Sharon Rush, and Robert J. Munro. (Littleton, CO: Rothman & Co., 1999), 78. 13. T. E., The Lawes Resolutions of Womens Rights (London, 1632), book 1, sec. 3; emphasis added. 14. Sara Mendelson and Patricia Crawford, Women in Early Modern England: 1550–1720 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990), 12. 15. Phyllis Rackin, ‘‘Misogyny Everywhere,’’ A Feminist Companion to Shakespeare, ed. Dympha Callaghan (London: Blackwell, 2000), 49. Rackin develops this critique further in her book Shakespeare and Women (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005). 16. Amy Louise Erickson, Women and Property in Early Modern England (London: Routledge, 1993), 229, 225. 17. Laura Gowing, Domestic Dangers: Women, Words, and Sex in Early Modern London (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), 268. 18. Garthine Walker, Crime, Gender and Social Order in Early Modern England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 8. 19. Bernard Capp, When Gossips Meet: Women, Family, and Neighbourhood in Early Modern England (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), 381.

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Performative Subversions: Portia, Language, and the Law in The Merchant of Venice Kathryn R. Finin

‘‘THE MERCHANT OF VENICE,’’ HARLEY GRANVILLE-BARKER WROTE ‘‘IS THE simplest of plays, so long as we do not bedevil it with sophistries.’’1 That Granville-Barker attributes these bedeviling sophistries to readers belies the complex way in which this text investigates law’s privileged status as a disinterested pursuit of justice. On the one hand, Shylock treats law as a kind of ‘‘equal access’’ commodity which he can use to challenge the ruling elite’s power. As his repeated calls for ‘‘justice’’ and ‘‘the law’’ suggest, once Shylock establishes a contractual agreement with Antonio, he displays a profound belief in law’s textuality as a route toward justice, despite his status as an alien(ated) member of Venetian society. Fully accepting what Carol Smart describes as law’s ‘‘own terms of reference,’’ then, this Jewish moneylender concedes too much to the very system he seeks to challenge. Portia, on the other hand, who is fully aware of law’s gendered power, chooses to expose the law’s profound partiality, even as she pursues a course of subversive collusion. Foregrounding language as a powerful site of social and political struggle, Portia provides a hyperliteral reading of Shylock’s bond which effectively severs his hold on Antonio, but simultaneously portrays justice as a staged event: a dramatic ‘‘production’’ which favors particular interpretations. Thus, this play which is so famous for its trial scenes becomes a kind of trial of justice and, more profoundly, its textual counterpart, law.2

I ‘‘Oh me the word choose!’’: Fashioning Female Will As The Merchant of Venice opens, we find Portia located in a liminal space between her dead father and future husband, and she har27

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nesses the multivalent possibilities of language in order to construct a discursive space from which to participate in her father’s postmortem marriage game.3 Portia’s complex relationship to law and language is established in the first act with her multivalent use of the word ‘‘will.’’ In addition to the formal document which details the disposal of a person’s property after his or her death, this word denotes ‘‘desire, wish, longing,’’ particularly ‘‘carnal desire or appetite’’; along with ‘‘intention, intent, purpose, [and] determination’’ (Oxford English Dictionary). Emphasizing a contestatory and gendered relationship between these aspects of the word ‘‘will,’’ Portia laments the way in which ‘‘the will of a living daughter [is] curbed by the will of a dead father’’ (1.2.24–25).4 That is, she articulates a female desire which is separate from, and therefore potentially opposed to patriarchal writ: her father’s will. Well aware of how female desires that veer away from male interests are construed as willful, that is, as violating proper female behavior, Portia asserts her seeming obedience: ‘‘I will die as chaste as Diana,’’ she claims, ‘‘unless I be obtain’d by the manner of my father’s will’’ (1.2.106–8). This legal document, then, determines the flow of primogenitural wealth by circumscribing the flow of female desire. Portia is well aware of the congruence between law and dominate masculine culture, but uninterested in outright rebellion, she pursues a more subtle and ultimately more culturally dangerous path of resistance: she looks to the subversive potential within language as a way to pursue her desire without appearing to violate patriarchal will. Nerissa’s attempt to comfort Portia, who laments ‘‘the word choose’’ (1.2.22), only highlights the way in which this daughter is subjected at a linguistic level. Affirming the father’s ‘‘virtuous’’ intentions, Nerissa claims, ‘‘the lott’ry that he hath devis’d in these three chests of gold, silver, and lead, whereof who chooses his meaning chooses you, will no doubt never be chosen by any rightly but one who you shall rightly love’’ (1.2.29–33, italics added). Despite the intent or eventual outcome, Portia understands that this lottery effaces the living daughter by requiring her to embody the dead father’s meaning. The riddle upon which Portia’s father relies to secure his daughter’s exchange is no fanciful notion. Not only does it establish his power over the suitors, the riddle also requires the subordination of the daughter who ‘‘has no participation in the speech act’’ even while she is its ‘‘derivative third object.’’5 While the riddle denies Portia any legitimate mode of intervention, she harnesses the lin-

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PERFORMATIVE SUBVERSIONS

guistic indeterminancy unleashed by the riddle in order to establish a subject position for herself within the very discourse which seeks to exclude her.6 Riddles work precisely because language is not always directly referential; they depend on the ability of language to obscure meaning as much as they do on its ability to eventually locate some obvious truth which leads us to the riddle’s meaning. That the father requires each suitor to take an oath before trying the riddle, however, demonstrates his need to circumscribe the very fluidity his riddle demands. Oaths are by nature overmotivated speech acts which depend upon the fixity of language: its instrumental ability to bind the speaker to an act through his word. In the event of failure, for example, Prince Arragon, like all the other suitors, vows: ‘‘never to unfold to any one / Which casket ’twas I chose’’; ‘‘never in my life / To woo a maid in way of marriage’’; and ‘‘immediately to leave you, and be gone’’ (2.9.10–16). The absoluteness of such words as ‘‘never’’ and ‘‘immediately’’ highlights the contrast between the two modes of speech. The father depends upon the oaths, then, to limit the play of meaning and to control the exchange of his propertied goods, most notably his daughter. Portia’s rhetorically complex exchange with Morocco demonstrates the radically different way in which she and her father engage language. She uses her father’s will to evade Morocco’s unwelcome suit, even as she relies upon the culturally untenable specter of a black man marrying a white woman to sanction her unruly critique of patriarchy’s gendered restrictions. Noting that ‘‘the lott’ry of my destiny / Bars me the right of voluntary choosing’’ (2.1.15–16), Portia claims, But if my father had not scanted me, And hedg’ed me by his wish to yield myself His wife who wins me by that means I told you, Yourself, renowned Prince, then stood as fair As any comer I have look’d on yet For my affection. (2.1.17–22)

Portia’s language is quite literally true and totally misleading, and her breach of decorum is not limited to the rhetorical here. She violates social decorum as well, flouting the kind of domestic absolut-

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ism which ‘‘requires that women be able to speak in order to acquiesce,’’ but not to ‘‘protest or make demands.’’7 The word ‘‘scanted’’ in particular, defined as ‘‘furnish[ing] with an inadequate supply’’ (OED), registers Portia’s attempt to assert a subject position apart from her father’s will: what he has failed to provide her with, she suggests, is an adequate supply of autonomy. Nevertheless, this text ranges the threat of a white woman’s disallowed speech against the cultural threats posed by Morocco’s blackness. The racial context within which Portia’s protest is lodged has the effect of deemphasizing the threat posed by her unruly language. Indeed, this text continually distracts us from the Portia’s linguistic power plays by aligning the object of her ‘‘willful’’ desire with patriarchal expectations. When Bassanio—described by Nerissa as ‘‘a Venetian, a scholar and a soldier’’ who ‘‘of all the men that ever my foolish eyes look’d upon, was the best deserving a fair lady’’ (1.2,113, 118–19)—arrives in Belmont, Portia turns to the ambiguity of language in order to influence the outcome without becoming forsworn. She calls for a song which furnishes such rhymes for lead as ‘‘bred,’’ ‘‘head,’’ ‘‘nourished,’’ and ‘‘fed,’’ thereby prompting the long-standing critical debate over whether Portia engineers a trick to provide Bassanio with the information he needs in order to choose correctly. The very indeterminancy of this linguistic hint is precisely what renders it such a brilliant ploy: no one can ‘‘prove’’ Portia’s disloyalty because no one can prove her intent from the information in the text.8 While Portia’s behavior here is not subject to legal intervention, the whole notion of what Luke Wilson calls ‘‘intentional action’’ was an increasingly contested site of debate in this period as English Common Law sought to constrain the jurisdiction of the Chancery court, which historically had controlled the application of equity and the consideration of intent when considering the circumstances of a case.9 Legal issues figure everywhere in Merchant, of course, not just in the courtroom scene, and this strategy of diffusing issues that were of interest to contemporary audiences throughout the play is one of the ways the text offers the audience multiple, and at times contradictory, perspectives from which to evaluate such topics. Portia’s linguistic prowess not only enables her to insert herself within the closed economy of exchange through which patriarchy reproduces itself, in this case her father’s riddled will, but, as the ring trick demonstrates, also complicates Bassanio’s dominant posi-

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tion.10 While Portia uses the language of surrender, she ‘‘retains her power as the giver . . . [and constructs] Bassanio’s lordship over her as her gift.’’11 Indeed, as the subsequent scenes demonstrate, what was originally a controlled linguistic game between men will become Portia’s mode of operation in multiple contexts. She continually appropriates and refigures male discourse; in so doing, she enlarges the sphere of language’s promiscuous and volatile impropriety— including the idealized discourse of law.

II Legal Myths: ‘‘If law, authority and power deny not’’ In contrast to Portia, who depends upon the ambiguity of language to disrupt patriarchal writ, Shylock maintains a profound confidence in the sanctity of the written word, the legal contract which relies upon the transparency and stability of words. As we learn from Salerio, whose arrival disrupts the prenuptial festivities, all of Antonio’s ventures have failed, and even if he had the money to pay his debt, Shylock ‘‘would not take it . . . none can drive him from the envious plea / Of forfeiture, of justice, and his bond’’ (3.2.279–83). Portia’s much touted money, then, is rendered useless: this is, finally, a rhetorical crisis which depends upon the debased coinage that words are to dissolve Shylock’s seemingly intractable hold on Antonio. That Shylock believes in a highly referential mode of language is not surprising given that his livelihood depends upon the ability of words to ensure his material good(s). More remarkable, however is his attempt to extend the referential capacities of language to ‘‘the live body,’’ what Elaine Scarry describes as ‘‘the most extreme locus of materialization,’’ particularly the body of a rich, white, Christian man.12 Less concerned with the repayment than the forfeiture itself, Shylock proposes to lend Antonio the requested three thousand ducats if he agrees that the forfeit ‘‘Be nominated for an equal pound / Of your fair flesh, to be cut off and taken / In what part of your body pleaseth me. (1.3.149–51). The genuineness of linguistic currency is central to this contractual exchange of Antonio’s weighty flesh for Shylock’s much needed money because it certifies his legal right to Antonio’s newly commodified body. While Shylock is en-

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tirely correct in realizing the ‘‘material effect of law,’’ that is, the ‘‘power of its judgements,’’ he mistakenly believes that the exercise of this power is consistent and/or neutral.13 Shylock’s daughter Jessica, however, demonstrates a much more astute understanding of the interested nature of legal discourse. Far from viewing law as an impartial means of securing justice, Jessica presents law as an interested expression of power: ‘‘If law, authority, and power deny not, / It will go hard with poor Antonio (3.2.89–90, italics added). As Carol Smart argues so convincingly, however, law’s privileged status stems from its ability to ‘‘establish the truth of events,’’ which under law’s ideology inevitably leads to justice or ‘‘correct decisions.’’ The pervasive quality of law’s ‘‘claim to truth’’ is best displayed by the way in which we explain a failure of justice as a ‘‘travesty’’: such a depiction conveys an individual and localized breakdown in the route from ‘‘truth’’ to ‘‘correct decisions,’’ thus leaving the ideal itself unchallenged.14 The Merchant of Venice, however, where truth is never the issue, legally speaking, confronts the partiality of legal practice. As Jessica’s statement suggests, the force of law as an authorized agent of state power must intervene in order to deny Shylock’s entirely legal bond. Emerging legal histories of early modern England, we should note, provide an important corrective to the somewhat pervasive view that law operates exclusively as a tool of the ruling elite. Increasingly, scholars are emphasizing the nuanced role of law in English people’s lived experience. Garthine Walker, for example, traces various studies which demonstrate that law was a ‘‘multiple use-right available to most Englishmen [sic].’’15 The notion that law ‘‘provided a resource to which many sorts of people might turn to bolster their own claims of legitimacy for their own ends’’ provides a way to better understand both Shylock’s and Portia’s relationship to and engagement with law in Merchant. Nevertheless, this text repeatedly privileges the coercive rather than protective nature of law: law in The Merchant of Venice ultimately shores up the power of the ruling elite, albeit not always in a seamless or univocal way.16 The tension between these two aspects of law—coercion and protection—pervades the legal conflict represented in this play.17 That Shylock confuses the ideal of law with its practical application is bourn out in his brief meeting with the jailed Antonio. Refusing to let Antonio speak, for example, Shylock claims, ‘‘I’ll have my bond, speak not against my bond, / I have sworn an oath that I will

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have my bond’’ (3.3.4–5). This oath which binds the speaker to an act through his spoken word parallels the legal bond, which produces the same effect through the written word. Presenting himself as doubly bound to the bond by this convergence of linguistic fixity, Shylock can only conceive of a single outcome: ‘‘The Duke shall grant me justice’’ (3.3.8). In the end, however, this alien(ated) member of Venetian society fails to realize that law cannot be divorced from the symbolic economies which support the cultural hegemony of a man like Antonio and render Shylock’s access to the law and/or justice precarious.18

III (Cross)Dressing for Success: ‘‘They shall think we are accomplished With what we lack’’ Sorely tried by Shylock’s relentless demand for ‘‘justice’’ and ‘‘the law,’’ the men who dominate Venetian society seem unable to protect both Antonio and the appearance of law’s legitimacy. Portia’s ability to wield the indirect and multivalent possibilities of language provides an option which satisfies both of these demands, yet her motivations are of an entirely different order. She seeks to sever Shylock’s legal and anatomical hold on Antonio because it marks the overdetermined nature of Antonio’s relationship with Bassanio. In the end, Portia uses her money as a kind of diversionary tactic, sending Bassanio away from Belmont so that she can activate the disguise which will enable her to disrupt this triangular exchange at the source of its conception and reroute masculine desire into the conventional channel of marriage. Precluded from participating in such public proceedings by virtue of her sex, however, Portia must redress her body and adopt a male disguise. While clearly recognizing the gendered power of law, then, Portia refuses to regard herself as powerless before the law. Such a stance necessarily challenges the contemporary ideology concerning women’s ‘‘natural’’ exclusion from the legal arena and displays the complex nature of her salvific participation. A growing body of work on gender and law in early modern England suggests that women’s lived experience may well have allowed for more involvement than was customarily conveyed by official legal

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commentaries and treatises; nevertheless, women were still completely excluded from any official role representing the legal system such as advocate or magistrate: the very kind of official role Portia takes up in Merchant. Natural, civil, and canon law all promulgated the view that ‘‘woman’’ is mentally and physically weaker than her male counterpart. Officially defined as chattel rather than as individuals precisely because of these ‘‘essential’’ weaknesses, wives and daughters typically had no status as legal subjects.19 Moreover, these exclusions are supported by cultural codes which link women and speech. As Patricia Parker observes, ‘‘women were to be not only silent but identified with the property of the home and with the private sphere, with a private rather than a common place’’: through a tropological linking, a woman’s ‘‘private places’’ necessarily become common property when she argues her ‘‘case,’’ a term which conflated female genitalia with legal terminology, in public. Thus, there is no proper way for a woman to take on the ‘‘traditional male role of the public orator pleading a ‘cause’ or ‘case’ in court.’’20 Women’s access to the legal arena, however, particularly as regards property issues, is less absolute than such official discourses suggest. Tim Stretton, for example, analyzes both single and married women’s involvement in various kinds of litigation.21 ‘‘According to the letter of the law, a feme sole or singlewoman, either never married or widowed, had access to the law as a ‘forum of action’ in a manner denied a married woman, who, because of the common law doctrine of coverture, was dissociated from ownership of property and agency derived from litigation in courts of law’’ and, yet, records from the Court of Requests show that even many married women ‘‘waged law’’ with the assistance and support of their husbands, brothers, and fathers. ‘‘Although they could not act independently of their male relatives, married women with assistance and cooperation of men in their families did obtain access to the courts and the law.’’22 Indeed, as Subha Mukherji demonstrates so convincingly with archival and other kinds of evidence, ‘‘certain jurisdictions, notably canon law and equity, were more favorable to women’’ than common and criminal law arenas’’ and that ‘‘across several jurisdictions, more and more women took part in litigation directly or indirectly.’’23 Women’s ‘‘lived experience,’’ then, shows ‘‘women who managed to shift the boundaries placed upon them by legal disabilities’’ and ‘‘indicated that the letter of the law was neither definitive nor irremediable.’’24

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Such historical evidence provides a context for both Portia’s response to her father’s will and her decision to transform herself in the young lawyer Balthazar. She dismisses gender as a legitimate ground for exclusion from acting as advocate: ‘‘We’ll see our husbands / Before they think of us’’ she explains to Nerissa, ‘‘but in such a habit / That they shall think we are accomplished / With that we lack’’ (3.4.58–62). What they lack, of course, is the right genital equipment, along with the phallocratic authority such possession permits.25 Far from supporting such ‘‘natural’’ positions, Portia raises the specter that clothes literally make the man, that manliness is merely a matter of role-playing. Portia’s move from linguistic to sexual indeterminancy, we should note, is no coincidence given that transvestism, like language, depends upon signification—in this case, the signifying ability of clothes as well as the body they adorn. As Shoshana Felman argues: ‘‘If transvestism . . . refers sexuality to clothes to the cultural institution of the sign, travesty is possible because signs function not just grammatically, according to a norm, but rhetorically, through substitutions. Transvestism is indeed an arbitrary sign whose signifier is displaced on to a signified not ‘its own’. . . . transvestism . . . [is] conditioned by the function of language . . . masculine and feminine can be exchanged, or travestied, because words can be’’ (28– 29). Already experienced at finding a place for herself within the restraints of patriarchal writ, Portia successfully revises the ideologically motivated signs of masculinity and femininity to create a space within the deeply gendered realm of law. Portia’s comic tone in 3.4, we should note, belies the seriousness of what is at stake in her decision to trade these restrictive signs of femininity for the uninhibited ways and words enjoyed by men.26 She promises: I’ll . . . . turn two mincing stops Into a manly stride; . . . . . . . . . . . . I have within my mind A thousand raw tricks of these bragging Jacks, Which I will practice. (3.4.67–78)

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Defined as ‘‘moderating one’s language’’ as well as one’s ‘‘steps’’ (OED), the word ‘‘mincing’’ denotes the intersecting nature of the restrictions placed upon women’s movement and speech in early modern England, restrictions that are imposed in the name of decorum and which certify female propriety. If ‘‘mincing steps’’ can so easily be exchanged for ‘‘a manly stride,’’ then such gendered categories are deprived of their essential status and can no longer be hierarchically arranged as a legitimate means through which the members of one sex dominate the other. Once again, however, the text simultaneously establishes and distracts us from Portia’s subversive challenge to the established order of things, in this case through the use of humor.

IV Trying Justice: ‘‘This bond doth give thee here no jot of blood’’ At the heart of Portia’s ability to dissolve Shylock’s seemingly intractable hold on Antonio is her awareness of how what Lorenzo calls the ‘‘tricksy word’’ can ‘‘defy the matter’’ (3.5.69–70).27 Unlike the Venetian men who focus on the legality of the bond and its material effects, that is, the action it promises rather than the language of which it is composed, Portia attends to the materiality of signification. In so doing, this disguised female body decenters legal discourse and undermines law’s overinflated position as a neutral and disinterested pursuit of ‘‘truth’’ and/or ‘‘justice.’’ The opening of this trial returns us to the tension between an idealized view of law and its practical application. On the one hand, Antonio’s assertion ‘‘that no lawful means can carry me / Out of [Shylock’s] envy’s reach’’ attests to the supposedly impartial and inexorable nature of law. Indeed, Shylock’s relentless pursuit of his forfeiture itself displays this ideal of law. He claims, The pound of flesh which I demand of him Is dearly bought as mine, and I will have it. If you deny me, fie upon your law! There is no force in the decrees of Venice. I stand for judgment. Answer—shall I have it? (4.1.99–103)

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Emboldened by the ‘‘truth’’ of his claim, then, Shylock resists the Duke’s coercive measures and confronts his partiality head-on. The Duke, on the other hand, attempts to forestall Shylock’s unrelenting claim by calling attention to the interested nature of this legal proceeding. He announces, Upon my power I may dismiss this court, Unless Bellario, a learned doctor, Whom I have sent for to determine this, come here to-day. (4.1.104–7)

Establishing such procedural biases is one of the fundamental ways that law exercises power and serves the interests of the dominant group.28 Because Shylock ‘‘preserves law’s place in the hierarchy of discourse which maintains that law has access to truth and justice,’’29 he unwittingly shores up the central apparatus through which the ruling elite dominates the institution of law, and finally, him. In a strategic ploy reminiscent of her attitude in act 1, Portia refuses to flaunt the force of law, relying instead, on the subversive potential of language to sever Shylock’s contractual hold upon Antonio’s body. When Bassanio suggests the Duke ‘‘Wrest once the law to your authority: / To do a great right, do a little wrong’’ (4.1.215– 16), Portia proclaims, It must not be, there is no power in Venice Can alter a decree established. ‘Twill be recorded for a precedent, And many an error by the same example Will rush into the state. It cannot be. (4.1.218–22).

Portia rejects Bassanio’s proposal to openly wield the force of law with language which reveals law’s complex relationship to the state. Noting that this precedent would allow ‘‘many an error’’ to ‘‘rush into the state,’’ Portia evokes an image of invasion, emphasizing the threat such an errant act poses for the impenetrability of the body politic. Transgressing the chaste body of the law, then, its idealized quality as ‘‘being cut off from contact or contamination,’’30 is intimately linked to compromising the chastity of the state. Portia’s decision to affirm the importance of law’s inviolability to

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the state, we should note, effectively obscures the way in which the force of law finally operates precisely as Bassanio suggests: as an agent of state power. Initially, however, her declaration that ‘‘lawfully by this [bond] the Jew may claim / A pound of flesh,’’ combined with her command for Antonio to ‘‘lay bare [his] bosom’’ (4.1.231–32, 252), further emphasizes the seeming neutrality of law. Responding to Portia’s apparent support, Shylock exclaims, ‘‘so says the bond, doth it not, noble judge? / ‘Nearest his heart, those are the very words’’ (4.1.253–54. italics added). While Shylock directs Portia’s attention to the explicit nature of words, which he believes will secure a reliable and ‘‘just’’ outcome, Portia harnesses the slipperiness of language to turn against Shylock ‘‘the very words’’ upon which he fixates. Despite Portia’s apparent support for law’s neutrality, then, the course she pursues reveals that law is a discursive field with ‘‘different applications . . . and different effects, depending on who is the subject.’’31 Expressing a moral obligation located outside that which is literally and plainly articulated in the bond, Portia indicates that Shylock should provide a surgeon ‘‘To stop [Antonio’s] wounds, lest he do bleed to death’’ (4.1.258). Suspicious of such an interpretive approach, Shylock reasserts the bond’s fixed specifications: ‘‘Is it so nominated in the bond? . . . . I cannot find it, ‘tis not in the bond’’ (4.1.259, 262). Portia replies, ‘‘It is not so express’d, but what of that? / ‘Twere good you do so much for charity’’ (4.1.260–61, italics added). While her recourse to charity proves obviously and predictably ineffective in persuading Shylock, this emphasis on what is absent in legal discourse enables Portia to complicate Shylock’s seemingly unambiguous claim. Using Shylock’s rigid mode of reasoning to set the fixity of patriarchal writ against him, Portia awards Shylock his pound of flesh, but observes: Tarry a little, there is something else. This bond doth give thee here no jot of blood; The words expressly are ‘a pound of flesh.’ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . But in the cutting of it, if thou dost shed One drop of Christian blood, thy lands and goods Are by the laws of Venice confiscate Unto the state of Venice. (4.1.305–12, italics added)

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That Shylock’s pound of flesh would include the blood produced by such a cut seems self-evident. Marking the state’s interest in Antonio’s specifically ‘‘Christian’’ blood, however, Portia proceeds to enforce a truly literal connection between the word ‘‘flesh’’ and its (single) referent; in the process, she severs that which, properly speaking, should be joined: flesh and blood. Historically, literal language becomes the privileged discourse precisely because of its ability to convey a clear and stable meaning. Nevertheless, Portia’s hyperliteral reading of the bond undoes the literal by overdoing it. Rather than displaying the kind of ‘‘plain meaning’’ which typically accompanies literal language, the kind of meaning the words of the bond are meant to convey, Portia emphasizes the dense opacity of signs which finally ‘‘prevents language from ever fulfilling itself in the determination of one, true, final meaning.’’32 This emphasis on the inability of contractual language to ever fully state its case or articulate all contingencies presents a profoundly problematic precedent. Thus, while Portia’s reading saves Antonio, there are larger issues at stake both for law and the cultural assumptions which law enforces.33 Critics have long noted the relationship between this scene’s legal conflict and the contemporary conflict between the strict impartiality of common law courts and corrective effects imposed through the courts of equity. Stephen Cohen, for example, locates this jurisprudential debate within the economic and political conflicts of the period, noting that the rising economic class relied upon the ‘‘predictability and inviolability’’ of common law to ‘‘protect [their] profits from royal exploitation,’’ which took the form of ‘‘ad hoc financial and commercial regulation, extra-parliamentary taxation and forced loans that were never repaid.’’34 Equity, on the other hand, functioned as one of the ‘‘most powerful ideological tools in [the Crown’s] efforts to stave off the political implications’’ of common law; that is, its ‘‘leveling effect that placed even the sovereign under the law.’’35 The strategy Portia employs, as Cohen observes, is typical of equity courts which often ‘‘place[d] such stringent restrictions and protections on the property to be seized’’ that ‘‘ ‘voluntary’ non-collection of the award’’ was the only possible option.36 While critical discussions that are focused on the equity versus law debate within The Merchant of Venice provide an important historical context, they tend to ignore the way in which Portia’s attention to language exposes the interested nature of law itself. Indeed, while Portia col-

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ludes with the dominant group to deny Shylock his forfeiture, her salvific wordplay actually deflates law’s status, described so phallically by Sir Edward Coke as the ‘‘straight mete-wand of the law’’ in his effort to discredit ‘‘the incertain and crooked cord of discretion.’’37 In the end, Portia’s strategy reveals that there is ‘‘no neutral terrain,’’ and ‘‘law least of all occupies this mythical space.’’38 Moreover, Portia’s very participation in this legal proceeding, particularly her final decision to adopt the ‘‘inexorable, unemotional, impersonal and objective’’ mode which is culturally synonymous with both ‘‘masculinity’’ and ‘‘justice,’’39 finally challenges such gendered differences, which are read hierarchically to support the prerogatives of masculine authority. Indeed, as the ring trick demonstrates, this text prefers to emphasize the disruptive potential of words and women, whose culturally constructed waywardness threatens the (re)established order.

V Promiscuous Subversions: ‘‘Swear by your double self And there’s an oath of credit’’ While act 5 often feels anti-climatic after the drama of the courtroom scene, Portia, in effect, brings the courtroom drama back with her to Belmont as she and Nerissa initiate a mock trial in an effort to penalize their husbands’ breach of faith. Situating themselves as both prosecutor and judge, these women confront Bassanio and Gratiano with their willingness to give away the rings with which they vowed never to part. Nerissa makes the first charge, pointing out, ‘‘Though not for me, yet for your vehement oaths, / You should have been respective and have kept it’’ (5.3.155–56). Portia takes the case one step further when Bassanio admits, ‘‘I would deny it; but you see my finger / hath not the ring upon it, it is gone’’ (5.1.187–88). She declares: ‘‘even so void is your false heart of truth. / By heaven, I will ne’er come in your bed / Until I see the ring!’’ (5.1.189–91). Such a denial not only frustrates Bassanio’s gendered prerogative to her female body, but, since their marriage has not yet been consummated, her denial also defers the possession of her material goods; it is a multiply inflected violation of his proper(ty) rights.40

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Portia continually plays upon the cultural anxieties surrounding female chastity, even as she investigates the mode of language men use: performative kinds of speech acts which certify male honor. Indeed, while Portia’s case against Bassanio is based upon the sanctity of oaths, she repeatedly undercuts the very language upon which oaths depend. Returning to language which is literally true and totally misleading, for example, she proclaims, Let not that doctor e’er come near my house. Since he hath got that jewel that I loved, And that which you did swear to keep for me, I will become as liberal as you, I’ll not deny him any thing I have, No, not my body, nor my husband’s bed. (5.1.223–28)

As Portia’s use of the word ‘‘since’’ suggests, she posits a causal relationship between Bassanio’s broken word and the prospective loss of her chastity. In fact, she uses the breach of male honor to legitimate the breach of female chasitity. The leveling effect of such a proposed arrangement calls into question Bassanio’s privileged status and displays a ‘‘potentially dangerous invasion of linguistic into social possibility.’’41 Bassanio’s reaction to Portia’s censure demonstrates that the obfuscating potential of language successfully enables Portia to delay his assumption of authority. Completely unaware that he has been subjected to a series of linguistic tricks, Bassanio attempts to placate Portia with another oath of fidelity. Portia cuts him off, however, with a dismissive comment on the genuineness of his promises: ‘‘Swear by your double self, / And there’s an oath of credit’’ (5.1.245–46). Given Portia’s propensity to undercut the very kind of language upon which oaths depend, a reaffirmation of his oath is not quite what she is after. That is, she judges Bassanio by the standards he respects, but repeatedly puts the language of oaths and contracts on trial, finding it inadequate, inaccurate, and destructive.42 In an exchange reminiscent of the exchange with Morocco, Portia confesses to an imaginary infidelity, which is both absolutely true and totally misleading: ‘‘Pardon me, Bassanio,’’ she says, ‘‘For by this ring, the doctor lay with me’’ (5.1.258–59).43 Portia’s subsequent at-

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tempt to resolve the very confusion she fosters here is dubious at best. While she presents a letter that reveals ‘‘Portia was the doctor, / Nerissa there her clerk’’ (5.1.269–70), she anticipates that Bassanio and the other men will not be ‘‘satisfied of these events at full,’’ and suggests, ‘‘Let us go in, / And charge us there upon inter’gatories, / And we will answer all things faithfully’’ (5.1.296–99). Yet how can we return to this comforting zone with any degree of confidence after Portia’s promiscuous subversions? How can these men be satisfied ‘‘at full’’ when Portia’s salvific wordplay has exposed the absence inherent in both written and spoken discourse—an absence which prevents the very kind of meaningful experience Portia promises? Moreover, how can we measure Portia’s faithfulness when she takes up her proper role by way of a detour which so decidedly flouts early modern codes for feminine behavior? Indeed, swearing by her ‘‘double self ’’ renders Portia’s promise less than reassuring. Given her past performance, such an ‘‘oath of credit’’ is more likely to be another counterfeit deception, rather than a genuine offer of submission. Thus, from beginning to end, Portia’s transgressive performances render gender and legal norms suspect on multiple counts. While this makes for deeply entertaining stage theater, it also suggests that The Merchant of Venice serves as an accomplice in the cultural interrogations of those very theaters of justice under investigation in early modern England.

Notes 1. Prefaces, 67. All quotations of The Merchant of Venice are from The Riverside Shakespeare. Text references are to act, scene, and line of this edition. 2. The Merchant of Venice is, we should note, part of a pervasive trend in early modern English drama to encode what Subha Mukherji terms the ‘‘theatre-as-court metaphor . . . sometimes suggesting the theatricality of trials, at other times the judicial structure of drama,’’ Law and Representation, 1. For more on the complex connections between representation, rhetoric, law and literature, see Kahn and Hutson’s Rhetoric and Law; Goodrich’s Languages of Law; and Wilson’s Theaters of Intention. 3. Moreover, Portia does so without compromising her chaste position even as she enters the legal sphere that denies women any official status as subjects. Thus, this text repeatedly refuses the narrative logic involved in the idealized codes for proper female behavior that so many scholars have addressed over the past three decades—a logic described, for example, by Karen Newman as ‘‘an open mouth and immodest speech are tantamount to open genitals and immodest acts,’’ 11.

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4. For more on the topic of will, see Willbern, Poetic Will, and Wojciehowski, Old Master, New Subjects. 5. Bal, ‘‘The Rape of Narrative,’’ 12. 6. See Alfar’s essay on The Winter’s Tale in this collection for a related reading of how the slipperiness of language opens a space for married women ‘‘that resists and revises their traditional roles as witnesses and guarantors of male power’’ (‘‘ ‘Proceed in justice’,’’ 47). 7. Belsey, Subject of Tragedy, 180–81. 8. For an analysis of the legal significance of intent as it relates to economic issues—particularly with Shylock and the trial scene in act 4—see Majeske’s essay in this collection, ‘‘Striking a Deal: Portia’s Trial Stategy in Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice.’’ 9. Theaters of Intention, 4. For more on equity in the period, see Sheen and Hutson, Literature, Politics and Law, 4, and Majeske’s Equity in English Renaissance Literature. The topic resurfaces in act 4 of Merchant as Portia engenders suspicion about the intent behind Shylock’s bond. 10. Emily Detmer-Goebel focuses on a related area in her essay later in this collection, ‘‘where she considers Shakespeare’s use of bedtricks and the ‘‘implication of the apparent affirmation of women’s power through deception,’’ (Shakespeare’s Bedtricks: Finding Justice in Lies?’’ 121). 11. Mukherji, 38. 12. Literature and the Body, xxi. 13. Smart, 11. 14. 10–11, italics added. 15. See Wood, ‘‘Custom, Identity and Resistance,’’ qtd. in Walker, Crime, Gender and Social Order, 2. 16. See also McMullen, who reviews a wide range of studies dealing with crime, law, and order in this period, and concludes, the basic ‘‘sanction of the state is coercion,’’ a coercion which is ‘‘legitimated, however imperfectly, through the cultural practices and institutions . . . especially legal ones . . . whose very character is a crystallization of complex social processes that are controls for particular powerful groups,’’ 270, italics added; and Sharpe, who notes, law must appear to operate fairly in order to function effectively, Early Modern, 12. 17. For a detailed discussion of how Shylock’s infamous response to Jessica’s defection (‘‘My daughter, my ducats’’) displays his view of law as an impartial force, see Finin, Justice, Language, the Law. 18. See Shapiro, Shakespeare and the Jews; Gross, Shylock; and Cohen, ‘‘ ‘Quality of Mercy.’ ’’ 19. Civil and Canon law characterized women’s mental attributes as ‘‘lunata leviatas, inconstantia menis and consilii incertitude et imbecillitas’’ and were generally excluded from ‘‘all civil and public offices,’’ which include such roles as magistrate and advocate, along with ‘‘a wide variety of legal functions, including acting as witness, making contracts and administering property’’ Maclean, Renaissance Notion of Woman, 72, 76–77. See also Jordan, Renaissance Feminism, 66–67. 20. Parker, Literary Fat Ladies, 104, 106. 21. Stretton, Woman Waging War; see also Staves Married Women’s Separate Property. 22. Wright and Ferguson, Women, Property, and Letters of Law, 9.

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23. Law and Representation, 209. 24. Wright and Ferguson, Women, Property, and Letters of Law, 4; see also Mendelson and Crawford, Early Modern England; and Burks, ‘‘I’ll Want My Will Else.’’ 25. Historically, as so much of the criticism over the past three decades has illustrated, this bodily ‘‘lack’’ has been used to ‘‘relegate women to the negative pole of binary oppositions that justify masculine supremacy,’’ Jones, ‘‘Inscribing Femininity,’’ 80–81. 26. As Hendricks and Parker demonstrate, not all men enjoyed the same level of freedom in relation to each other, and even the stability of gender differences are affected by differences in class and race, despite the highly unstable nature of these terms in the early modern period, Women, ‘Race,’ and Writing. 27. For more on this kind of tricksiness as characteristic of women’s relation to the law, see Mukherji’s chapter, ‘‘Women, law and dramatic realism,’’ where she provides a deeply engaging and persuasive analysis of women’s paradoxical legal position in the late Elizabethan period: ‘‘Excluded from the centre of legal authority, yet subject to law,’’ she argues, ‘‘women managed to circumvent their disadvantages; they used influence and dealt indirectly, or quasi-legally. This earned them the reputation of manipulators and undercover dealers.’’ Law and Representation, 214. 28. My thinking on the procedural biases of legal systems is informed by several feminist legal theorists. In addition to Smart, and Jed whom I cite earlier, see also Edwards, Female Sexuality and the Law; MacKinnon, Feminism Unmodified, O’Donovan, Sexaul Divisions in Law, and Sachs and Wilson, Sexism and the Law. 29. Smart, 88. 30. Jed, 12. 31. Smart, 164. 32. Nouvet, 129. 33. O. Hood Phillips’s Shakespeare and the Lawyers provides a good summary of the critical debate. See also Tucker, ‘‘Letter of the Law’’; and Jordan. For a discussion of fraudulent conveyance as relates to Shylock’s penalty, see Ross, 113–31. 34. ‘‘Quality of Mercy,’’ 38. 35. Ibid., 39, 45. 36. Ibid., 48. 37. Qtd. in Cohen, 37. 38. Smart, 80–81. 39. Ibid., 73. 40. As Mukherji notes, it is ‘‘hard to fix [the ring’s] signification to any one economy’’ since it ‘‘evokes . . . disparate associations according to the needs of particular stages of Portia’s operations.’’ Law and Representation, 38; see also Jardine, ‘‘Cultural Confusions,’’ 13. 41. Parker, 111. See both Alfar and Detmer-Goebel essays which analyze this aspect of early modern English culture, focusing, respectively, on the counternarrative women provide in The Winter’s Tale and the complicated nature of truth/ deception involved in the use of bedtricks. 42. Interestingly, Bassanio insists upon a sworn declaration: ‘‘I never more will break an oath with thee’’ (5.1.248, italics added). While Bassanio attempts to mitigate the effect of his broken word by specifically emphasizing his allegiance to Por-

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tia, the wording of his promise suggests that he does not necessarily feel obliged to maintain his other oaths. Thus, the rhetorical effect is to reinforce Portia’s derogatory attitude toward the sworn word through which men certify their honor. 43. For a discussion of the multiple ‘‘meanings and associations’’ the ring accumulates, see Newman, ‘‘Portia’s Ring.’’

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‘‘Proceed in justice’’: Narratives of Marital Betrayal in The Winter’s Tale Cristina Leoń Alfar

WORDS IN THE WINTER’S TALE 1 HAVE POWER TO PERSUADE, TO ACCUSE, to defend, to rebuke, to remind, to reiterate, to repent, and to atone. The progression of these verbal acts from Hermione’s persuasion of Polixenes to stay, to Leontes’s wish that his friend and wife greet one another without fear of his wrath, traces a narrative of marital betrayal first written by Leontes, who fantasizes Hermione’s adultery with his friend, and finally rewritten by Hermione and Paulina who insist on marital and monarchical justice. The women’s narrative competes with that of Leontes, therefore contradicting his account of marital betrayal and replacing it with their own. The distance between these narratives is the distance between fiction and nonfiction, the slippery distance between fantasy and reality.2 I argue that the play, contrary to Renaissance cultural assumptions about the natural faithlessness of women and honor of men, insists on the fantasy of Leontes’s narrative and on the truth of Hermione’s and Paulina’s counter-narratives, so that masculinist systems of authority and the narratives they depend on are called into question. My essay focuses on the women’s revision of Leontes’s story. Paulina, left to confront Leontes after Hermione’s ‘‘death,’’ becomes the interpretive director of the king’s understanding of that narrative and of the damage done to his credibility and authority as both husband and king.3 I argue that Paulina and Hermione become the moral voices of the play, setting limits for Leontes’ power. Hermione abandons her husband when his tyranny threatens not just her life and reputation, but the lives of her children. Confronted with a deluded tyrant, Paulina takes upon herself the role of physician to cure the state of domestic and state tyranny.4 In a world in which women are not supposed to question male authority, to be able to envision the world differently, or to have agency, Hermione and Paulina es46

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tablish a counter-narrative of marital betrayal that casts Leontes as a tyrant, both as husband and king. Just when Leontes’s speech—his performative making of Hermione into a ‘‘hobby-horse’’ and ‘‘adulteress’’ and of Paulina into a ‘‘mankind witch’’ and ‘‘intelligencing bawd’’—is meant to control, to neutralize both women, the effect of his accusation is, instead, a release of female power, an opportunity for agency, for the women to speak back (1.2.273, 2.1.78, 2.3.67– 68). Thus the play rejects the inequitable relations between men and women that it stages in Leontes’s and Hermione’s marriage and in Leontes’ relationship to Paulina as his subject and opens a space for women’s voices that resists and revises their traditional roles as witnesses and guarantors of male power. In her article on The Winter’s Tale, Lynne Enterline reads the play in light of the Pygmalion myth to examine ‘‘the difference between speech and silence—or, for that matter, the difference between agency and impotence, male and female, often allied with it.’’5 Interested in the ‘‘female voice’’ as a ‘‘pervasive and seductive trope—a discursive effect, not as a prediscursive fact,’’ she argues that ‘‘female and male voices in this very Ovidian play are locked in a mutually defining, differential embrace. An analysis of the ‘female voice’ in The Winter’s Tale is important precisely because it must change our understanding of that term.’’6 My argument is indebted to Enterline’s, and we come to many of the same conclusions regarding the slippery nature of language in the play and the characterization by both Hermione and Paulina of Leontes as a tyrant. I believe our purposes are different, however, because Enterline persuasively shows the ways in which, as she puts it: Through its constant meditation on the failures of its own language to reveal the truth or to act as intended, the play turns the secret of ‘‘female’’ sexuality—the question raised by Hermione’s pregnancy—into what Lacan calls the missed encounter. Disjunction defines the subject’s mediated eccentric relation to ‘‘the real.’’ One might say of the play’s relation to Hermione what Lacan says of the speaking subject’s relation to the real: ‘‘Misfiring is the object.’’ . . . That is, Shakespeare is exploring the (Cartesian) problem of radical doubt by representing a specific body—the maternal body—as the privileged object that resists the play’s knowledge and its verbal action.7

My argument is also interested in the female voice in the play, as a discursive effect, as a way of rereading and rethinking the way we

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imagine female agency in the period. I am not so much interested in the Cartesian problem of radical doubt—though Enterline is correct in her claim—as I am interested in the ways in which doubt about domestic and state power is voiced through the play’s female characters, through the verbal acts of Hermione and Paulina that change the way we think about female power. In the face of what ought to be unequivocal monarchical and marital power in Leontes’s hands, both women shift the conception not only of what might be challenged but that women, specifically, could challenge anything. That these challenges are primarily verbal in action, and not physical or violent, revises not only the binaries of agency and silence / male and female Enterline describes, but also links agency with speech, empowering the verbal utterance over and above definitive action, such as violent rebellion. While we know that patrilineal monarchy survives unscathed in The Winter’s Tale, I will show that the women point to that political system as that which underpins the injustice of Leontes’s proceeding against his wife. Acts of speech in The Winter’s Tale correspond to what Judith Butler has called the performative power of the linguistic utterance.8 Her examination is relevant to my study of the play because she, too, is interested in the use of words, particularly those that are meant to bring harm. Such utterances depend on familiar narratives, but narratives can contradict one another, so that intended harm can sometimes miss its mark. The slipperiness of narrative, because it depends on language—itself a slippery medium—opens the possibility for agency in the face of utterances spoken with the intent to injure. She writes, If utterances bear equivocal meanings, then their power is, in principle, less unilateral and sure than it appears. Indeed, the equivocity of the utterance means that it might not always mean in the same way, that its meaning might be turned or derailed in some significant way and, most importantly, that the very words that seek to injure might well miss their mark and produce an effect counter to the one intended. The disjuncture between utterance and meaning is the condition of possibility for revising the performative, of the performative as the repetition of its prior instance, a repetition that is at once a reformulation. Indeed, testimony would not be possible without citing the injury for which one seeks compensation. . . . The citationality of the performative produces that possibility for agency and expropriation at the same time.9

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Butler calls attention to the unpredictable effect of language, regardless of intent. Meaning, in this regard, becomes unstable because in the process of speaking and hearing the utterance, a mark can be missed, or even if it is hit, the effects of that mark may not be what the speaker intended. When Leontes calls his wife ‘‘slippery,’’ a ‘‘hobby horse,’’ and compares her to a pond that has been illegally fished by his neighbor, and when he calls Paulina a ‘‘man-kind witch’’ and traitor, his intent is to injure both women as a way of saving himself, of removing harm from himself and relocating it to these women (1.1.270, 273; 2.3.67). Thus the intent is to stop them with accusations that have a familiar ring and the validity of accepted narratives about female nature. Contrarily, his utterances miss their mark and, rather than deactivating them, he activates the women who respond to his accusations by becoming powerful and articulate defenders of their own positions, reputations, and innocence. As Paulina and Hermione respond to Leontes, each woman resembles the subject who, as Butler describes it: ‘‘with no authority to speak within and as the universal nevertheless lays claim to the term. Or, perhaps more appropriately phrased, one who is excluded from the universal, and yet belongs to it nevertheless, speaks from a split situation of being at once authorized and deauthorized . . . . That speaking is not a simple assimilation to an existing norm, for that norm is predicated on the exclusion of the one who speaks, and whose speech calls into question the foundation of the universal itself ’’ (91). Butler works through the logic by which the idea of a universal right to speak is contradicted by exclusions of persons from universal subjecthood. The concept of a universal assumes a fundamental truth or norm as the foundation of its narrative. Contrary to the term, universals inevitably exclude those who do not, cannot identify with those truths and norms. When one who does not have access to the universal nonetheless claims universal rights, then the exclusion that defines a universal is called into question. For example, a married woman’s exclusion from rights is seen, in the Renaissance, as a legal imperative, as a way of preserving male prerogative reaching from the king to the master of house; thus her exclusion functions as a universal narrative, a norm, the universal ‘‘truth’’ of married women’s legal subjection. Thus when a woman interrupts the narrative—the norm embedded in laws on marriage—to demand legal rights or redress, she contradicts that narrative’s universality with a counter-narrative, so that an alternative

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‘‘truth’’ that threatens existing systems of law, custom, and power emerges. I argue, borrowing from Butler, that the crisis occasioned by the woman’s realization of her exclusion opens an opportunity for agency, for a claim to rights that turns the logic of the universal on its head. That claim lays bare the exclusion the universal narrative is founded on and puts pressure on concepts of normality and truth. Thus in The Winter’s Tale, Leontes’s injurious speech is undermined and defused by the women at whom his speech is directed. Butler describes this process of neutralization in her analysis of racist hate speech: ‘‘the undetermined relation between saying and doing is successfully exploited in depriving the saying of its projected performative power. And if that same speech is taken up by the one to whom it is addressed, and turned, becoming the occasion of a speaking back and a speaking through, is that racist speech, to some extent, unmoored from its racist origins? . . . That the utterance can be turned, untethered from its origin, is one way to shift the locus of authority in relation to the utterance’’ (93). Butler’s argument has relevance beyond twenty-first-century juridical uses. The redirection of language, of the norm, in The Winter’s Tale, demonstrates Butler’s point that speech is essentially always citational, is always a reference to speech that has come before it and can be repeated in ways that interrupt and redirect prior utterances (49– 52). Speech depends, then, on narratives. Like Butler’s example of hate speech, the false accusations spoken in The Winter’s Tale do injury and cite (re-cite) age-old biases about female nature. But the play rejects Leontes’s narrative, so that rather than endorsing familiar stories about the unreliability of female loyalty, the unreliability of male loyalty takes up the major subject of the play. In this regard, the play speaks from the women’s points of view, staging a female narrative that reflects the anxieties expressed by female characters in many of Shakespeare’s plays, and reiterates and redirects injurious speech acts—linguistic performatives making good women into bad women—as a way of re-negotiating the terms under which women can be understood.10 The play’s re-negotiation of these terms opens a space for female agency, making it possible for characters such as Paulina and Hermione to speak out and against a set of beliefs about women and their place in a patrilineal socioeconomic system that both produces and depends on contradictory and simultaneous narratives of female bodily continence and inconti-

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nence. Their speech acts defy at least two Renaissance political theories about the subjection of wives to husbands and of subjects to monarchs. Under these theories, Paulina and Hermione ought not to speak at all. Their refusal to remain silent, in this regard, contradicts theories of subjection at both the domestic and state levels, uncovering the tyranny of Leontes’s false accusations as both husband and king and the potential power of women and subjects to fight that tyranny.

The connection between state and domestic power are evident in many Renaissance texts from Juan Luis Vives’ Instruction of a Christen Woman (1523) to Sir Robert Filmer’s Patriarchia, or the Natural Power of Kings (1630). Like the king’s subjects, women are subject to their husbands’ authority, and their duty is to obey. Their use of speech can be read as obedience, as when Hermione obeys Leontes’s command to persuade Polixenes to stay. It can also be read as treason, as when Hermione succeeds in persuading Polixenes to stay, calls him her friend, and thereby becomes an adulteress. Significantly, several critics have read Leontes’s tyranny through the lens of Henry VIII’s accusations of adultery against his wives and his creation of treason laws specifically having to do with speech.11 Under Henry VIII, words were imbued with political resonance and weight. Karen Cunningham argues that Henry’s series of treason laws ‘‘made traitorous words the centerpiece. To wish or attempt bodily harm to the king, queen, or royal heir or to try to deprive the king of his title by malicious deeds, writings, or spoken words was now laid down as treason.’’12 Cunningham connects Henry’s treason laws to his ‘‘matrimonial arrangements.’’ She notes that the acts made it treason to slander the marriage [with Anne] or the succession in writing or print, (25 Hen. VIII c.22), to attempt bodily harm against the king or to slander the marriage or succession in spoken words (26 Hen. VIII c.7), and finally (in order to prosecute Boleyn) to commit adultery while married to the king, a wholly new form of treason. . . . Finally, the prosecution of Henry’s fifth queen, Katherine Howard, became the source of yet another unprecedented piece of legislation (33 Hen. VIII c.23) making it treason for subjects to fail to reveal any knowledge they might have of the ‘‘lightness of body’’ of any woman the king might intend to marry.13

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For Cunningham, Henry’s acts reveal anxieties about the private self that exists beyond the arm of the law, beyond the state.14 But what is interesting for the purpose of my argument is the overt connection in English sixteenth-century laws between spoken words, adultery, and treason. The relationship of Leontes’s accusations against Hermione to Henry’s multiple treason laws suggests that links between marriage, adultery, treason, and law resonated as a familiar and compelling narrative in Shakespeare’s culture.15 As we know, The Winter’s Tale stages a husband’s formal accusation of adultery against his wife, but it also stages a king’s formal accusation of treason against a subject. These are accusations Hermione is made to answer in court. As with Henry’s accusations against his wives, treason is made one with adultery in a slippery leap in logic that assumes Hermione and Polixenes are traitors to the crown once Leontes convinces himself of their adultery. In both Henry’s reign and the play, the facts of the wives’ guilt are in question. Henry’s self-interest in finding ways of separating himself irrevocably from women he no longer finds useful and the shock and guarded counsel expressed by Leontes’s advisors call into question the credibility of both kings. As Catherine E. Thomas argues in her essay in this collection, Jamesian definitions of tyranny argue that ‘‘The tyrant’s focus is inward, on the satisfaction of the self, rather than outward, toward promoting the welfare of his people. . . . a ‘usurping Tyrant’ may be understood not only as an intruder on state power and the management of justice, but also as someone whose very faculties have been overthrown.’’16 The convergence of adultery and treason with false accusation and tyranny in English law under Henry opens up new ways of reading the conflicts that are staged in Shakespeare’s play. Leontes’s accusations are never credible; no character believes him (except the doomed Antigonus). As a result, his relentless pursuit of Hermione’s guilt is called tyranny not only by Paulina, but also by Apollo. Yet the play also relentlessly takes us through the paces, dramatizing the king’s accusations and systematically rejecting them through an increasing authorization of Paulina’s and Hermione’s credibility. Thus the play reverses the logic of Leontes’s accusations and the cultural capital on which they are built by making its women speakers of moral and political justice. Given the legal powerlessness of married women in the Renaissance (and of the monarch’s power over subjects), we might expect that women were overwhelmed and unable to act in their own inter-

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ests. Yet as Maria Cioni, Amy Erickson, Martin Ingram, Laura Gowing, and Tim Stretton have shown, women took advantage of all levels of the legal system to defend their reputations, to seek the right of inheritance and ownership of property, and to seek divorce and the protection of economic security. Briefly, I wish to examine a particular case as an example of a woman’s agency as she appealed directly to the Privy Council for the right to divorce her husband. In 1582, Mistress Elizabeth Bourne wrote to Sir Julius Caesar, who was throughout his career an Admiralty judge, a Master of Requests and, later, Master of the Rolls in the Court of Chancery.17 In her complaint, Bourne cited as her reasons for a divorce Anthony Bourne’s refusal to live with her, his continual adultery, his financial negligence, and his threats against her life. ‘‘Mr. Bourne,’’ she alleged, was ‘‘in breach of his holy vowes of chast matrimonie; and hath lived, and still continueth in open sinne and shame with harlots, to the ruinne and spoile of himselfe, mee, and my children.’’18 Bourne’s complaint asked formally for the right to divorce her husband, a man whose philandering brought her into contact with humiliation, poverty, hired assassins, and the pox. The significance of Bourne’s request cannot be overestimated. Sixteenth-century English law did not allow wives to divorce their husbands. Bourne’s self-assurance in her petition, however, speaks both to her desperation and to her sense of entitlement, so that it cannot be said with any comfort that married women’s official legal powerlessness automatically bred in them a sense of victimization or inaction. In fact, as historians have shown, women sued their husbands for separation and divorce relatively frequently in Ecclesiastical courts and also sued for financial independence in equity courts.19 The gap between the theory and practice of the law in early modern England allows Bourne to make her petition, allows her, in Butler’s terms, to ‘‘seize the language . . . and set into motion a ‘performative contradiction’ ’’ of the universal assumption of married women’s legal limits under coverture (89). Her petition functions, then, as a redirection of language, of Renaissance narratives on law and gender. The performative power of the linguistic utterance is on full display in the Bournes’ case, so that it is not a surprise when in the middle of her complaint, Bourne recounts how her husband, in his own effort to defend himself, counter-accused his wife of adultery:

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hee complained to sundrie personages of honorable estate both men and women; that Sir John Conway20 lived as ill with mee, as hee did with Mistress Pagnam; and that all, which he did defend in right of my children, was in wrong of her Majestie, and through unlawfull love and affection towards mee. To aggravate this cause, and to make his reports the more credible, hee informed sondrie great estates, that my former loose life with one Mr. Ffrier of Oxford, was cause of his fall and fault with Mistress Pagnam; otherwise, as hee gave fourth, hee had never gone astray. To confirrme the whole, he named Mr. Ffrier to bee father of my yongest daughter, and delivered the substance of all this both in speach and writing to be delivered her Majestie for a truthe. (ff. 8)

The birth of a child, compounded by what Bourne describes as an illness, some time later, that swelled her belly and gave her the appearance of pregnancy, prompted Anthony Bourne’s counter-accusation. And it is clear that when the dispute seemed to move in his wife’s favor, he made an accusation he believed might help him defend himself. A tension arises in the case, therefore, between each party’s conflicting and contradictory accusation of marital betrayal. Both husband and wife feel wronged; and the accusation of adultery seems to act as the central anxiety for both of them, with concerns about property and safety extending out from that basis. In Bourne’s case, according to L. M. Hill in an e-mail reply to my inquiry, ‘‘There was no ‘divorce’ as such—even a legal separation— but there was an interesting application of the P[rivy] C[ouncil]’s quasi-judicial authority which left her protected from her husband.’’21 Bourne’s case is notable for her direct application to the Privy Council. While a suit in the equity Courts of Requests or Chancery might have protected Bourne’s financial interests, her retention of counsel and application to the Privy Council shows both her resourcefulness and the council’s interests in ‘‘the marital affairs of the gentry and nobility.’’22 Thus Bourne’s chief complaint against her husband—that he engages continually in adultery with harlots, has children with one Mistress Pagnum, repudiates financial responsibilities, and repeatedly threatens Bourne’s life—demonstrates her sense of the justice of her complaint and her right to seek an utter divorce from him. The legal restrictions she faces are evident in her request, but they do not stop her from her laying claim to rights that she does not have under the period’s assumptions about the universal ‘‘truth’’ of married women’s legal subjection.

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Bourne’s case and Henry VIII’s treason laws provide a backdrop to The Winter’s Tale that opens an opportunity for thinking about two issues: First, while we have spent many years concerned with women’s silence and obedience in Renaissance literature and culture, women of the Renaissance were often vocal and rebellious. The power men have under patrilineal laws is certainly demonstrated by Henry’s treatment of his wives and of his interest in the treasonous potential of words. Yet Elizabeth Bourne defies the historical and legal logic of that power when she begs Queen Elizabeth for assistance in fighting her husband, and many female characters on the stage show the same defiance. Second, legal disputes of all kinds, but here specifically those concerned with treason and marriage, depend on stories. How much elaboration is included in Bourne’s complaint is unknown, but the Privy Council’s protection of her property suggests some truth was on her side (along with Protestant sympathies, according to Hill). There are few who do not see Henry’s accusations as having been helped along by fictionalizing. We know the imaginary nature of Leontes’s indictment of his wife, and I wish to contrast his accusations with the material, substantive responses of Hermione and Paulina. In Shakespeare’s cuckoldry plays, including The Winter’s Tale, women are innocent of the sexual license of which men accuse them. Hero and Desdemona, like Hermione, suffer the pain, humiliation, and violence of men’s anxieties about cuckoldry put into motion by accusations that in Much Ado About Nothing and Othello are overtly staged as stories, imaginative and deadly fabrications of men’s minds.23 These stories are countered by Beatrice and Emilia who, in different ways, defend Hero and Desdemona and bring attention to particular and acute inequities in systems of justice for women. Similarly, Paulina defends Hermione before, during, and after her trial and points relentlessly to the tyranny of Leontes’s accusations. In this regard, notwithstanding the pain and tragedy of events for Hero, Desdemona, and Hermione, the plays stage the women’s voices as crucial and necessary antidotes to both the men’s paranoia about the female body and their tyrannical abuses of their authority.24 Like the cases brought before the church courts by women suing for slander that Laura Gowing argues became a forum for women’s public speaking otherwise not open to them (an opportunity on display throughout Elizabeth

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Bourne’s complaint), Beatrice and Emilia take the opportunity of men’s accusations to defend women and to define the tyranny of a sex-gender system through a female lens.25 Similarly, Hermione and Paulina emerge in The Winter’s Tale as powerful defenders of justice for women, so that two narratives emerge: Leontes’s fantasy and Hermione’s and Paulina’s reality. Each narrative depends on the other, and each narrative is shaped by laws, customs, common cultural stories, and anxieties, so that they are not so much binaries as they are dialectical and reciprocal productions. Thus I suggest, in contrast to Valerie Traub who argues that genres of Shakespearean tragedy ‘‘never step out of the masculine ethos’’ (232), that the play’s relationship to English laws on marriage, and to contemporary anxieties about power in the monarchy, become a venue for women to speak back, in Butler’s terms.26 The moment of crisis occasioned by Leontes’s suspicions of adultery opens a space of agency for the two women, so that even as the king displays his power theatrically for his subjects, the limitations of that power are brought home by the power of the women’s words.

Paulina’s quest for justice begins in act two, scene one, when she determines to take Perdita from Hermione and bring her to Leontes. Both Hermione and her lady in waiting, Emilia, entrust the infant to Paulina because, according to Emilia, her ‘‘honor and . . . goodness is so evident / That [her] free undertaking cannot miss / A thriving issue—there is no lady living / So meet for this great errand’’ (2.2.42–45). The jailor, too, recognizes Paulina as ‘‘a worthy lady / And one who much [he] honour[s]’’ (2.2.5–6). Paulina believes that telling Leontes he is wrong is an ‘‘office’’ that ‘‘[b]ecomes a woman best’’ (2.2.30–31). She will act as Hermione’s ‘‘advocate to the loud’st’’ to ‘‘do good’’ (2.2.38, 53). Paulina’s action, born out of Leontes’s false accusation of treason and adultery against his wife, gives the lie to the assumption that male assertions of power overwhelm and disempower women. Challenging male authority, here the authority of a king, is woman’s work. The power Paulina invokes is that of the tongue, and she redirects women’s connections to verbal excess, to being loose of tongue—to the scold—in order to enable her self-authorization as advocate and protector through the strength of her voice. The image of the scold, present for Leontes, is reimagined here through the justice Paulina seeks. Her promise

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to the jailor that he need not fear having allowed her to take the child because ‘‘upon my honour, I / Will stand betwixt you and danger,’’ encapsulates her role within the play (2.2.64–65). Paulina places herself at the center of the conflict in the hope of resolving it, of healing the king’s reason and right rule, and of renewing Hermione’s right honor. Paulina’s place in the conflict in act two, scene three, centers on her role as advisor to the king, however unwelcome, in the face of the failure of Antigonus and the other men to sway Leontes from his revenge. Indeed, the pressure he brings to bear at court galvanizes the women while the men—though they object unequivocally to his accusation—seem strangely enervated and unnerved by Leontes’s allegations against his wife and Polixenes. She defies the king’s and our expectations for what women do and say as she seizes this moment for verbal action. When she confronts the king with the child, Paulina sees herself as his healer, coming to him ‘‘with words as medicinal, as true—/ Honest as either—to purge him of that humour / That presses him from sleep’’ (2.3.37–39). But Leontes’s violent rejection of her medicine, her words, and the child escalate the crisis. When he refuses to speak with her and accuses Paulina of being a ‘‘mankind witch’’ (2.3.67), Paulina becomes a knight, Hermione’s knight who, she declares, ‘‘would by combat make her good, so were I / A man, the worst about you’’ (2.3.60–61). The ineffectiveness of the other men and the increasing pressure on Hermione have created the space for Paulina’s strength against her king. When Leontes calls them all ‘‘A nest of traitors’’ (2.3.81), Antigonus denies the accusation, and Paulina follows suit, observing that none present in the room is a traitor save himself; for he The sacred honour of himself, his Queen’s, His hopeful son’s, his babe’s betrays to slander, Whose sting is sharper than the sword’s; and will not— For, as the case now stands, it is a curse He cannot be compell’d to’t—once remove The root of his opinion, which is rotten As ever oak or stone was sound (2.3.83–90)

Any marital betrayal in this play, in Paulina’s estimation, is committed by Leontes against his wife, against the honor of his family in his

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stubborn and fallacious belief in his wife’s guilt. Moreover, any treason committed belongs to Leontes as he also betrays the trust of his subjects and abuses the law. Like her reference to Leontes’s ‘‘weakhing’d fancy’’ (2.3.117), Paulina’s vision of the king’s rotten opinion and of herself as the king’s healer, identifies anxiety about cuckoldry as a disease rooted in the minds of men. She connects this disease to his power as king and, therefore, to the tyranny of his monarchy. In this regard the text refuses Leontes’s vision of Paulina. Calling and not calling the king a tyrant (2.3.115),27 accusing him of slander, she enters the courtroom with Hermione and, I suggest, comes to the queen’s rescue when it appears that Leontes’s accusation will result in her execution. Paulina’s defense of the queen rejects the tyranny of male power over women and traces an alternative to women’s subjection to men in the power of female speech. The courtroom scene provides a heightened venue for the collision of narratives.28 Hermione attempts a self-defense at court which, even in its power and logic, she acknowledges will fail to be heard with any credit: Since what I am to say must be but that Which contradicts my accusation, and The testimony on my part no other But what comes from myself, it shall scarce boot me To say ‘not guilty’; mine integrity, Being counted falsehood, shall, as I express it, Be so received. But thus: if powers divine Behold our human actions, as they do, I doubt not then but innocence shall make False accusation blush and tyranny Tremble at patience. (3.2.21–31)

Hermione’s speech is significant on three levels. First, it self-consciously attends to the culpability built into women’s acts of speech. As Gowing notes, women’s testimony at court was often discredited precisely because it was public speech.29 Hermione’s awareness of the futility of her self-defense speaks to the injustice of the law and of common attitudes about female speech. Second, the speech signals the play’s separation of monarchy and divine right. That monarchy in the Renaissance is based on an assumption of divine right is undeniable, but here Hermione sees her husband’s accusation

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against her as something that divine powers have not revealed to him, have not sanctioned, and will not reward. As she accuses her husband of tyranny, she connects the divine to her own speech and false accusation to tyranny. Finally, Hermione claims the right to speak in the face of common cultural narratives that deny her that right: narratives that automatically discredit her, narratives that assume the fact of female sexual depravity, and narratives that make it treason to speak against the divine right of the king. Her recitation of Leontes’s accusation in order to refute it, redirects the utterance, just as Butler argues, and becomes Hermione’s opportunity for agency. Thus true and false narratives collide in Leontes’s courtroom, but whereas truth would appear to reside commonly on the side of the monarch whose connection to divine powers guides his knowledge, Hermione makes it clear that divine power will side with her, with her innocence, and that her innocence will vanquish tyranny.30 Thus it is Hermione who points to the way in which Leontes’s courtroom does not, as he claims, ‘‘proceed in justice’’ (3.2.6). The verbal power of Hermione’s speech has the evidence of truth behind it, so that the scene treats Leontes’s anxieties about adultery as paranoid fantasy. Her counter-accusation points to the marital betrayal she experiences as a woman who has behaved as appropriately and virtuously as any wife is expected to behave. Thus the scene presents competing claims of truth, competing narratives of marital betrayal that find their sympathy in Hermione’s claim and confirm her vision of her husband through Apollo’s divine revelation. Gowing asserts that in church court cases on slander and marital injustice, ‘‘the confrontation between [men and women] translated into a contest for the meaning of their actions, as each produced a story for the court and struggled to make its meaning stick there. In a society where the circulation of oral stories and rumours was an important part of the fabric of gender and social relations, the conflicting narratives told at the church courts had wide resonances outside the law.’’31 Like these cases, the confrontation between Hermione and Leontes becomes a contest for control over a narrative about their marriage and about Leontes’s kingship. For Leontes, the narrative is simple and focuses on his wife’s and his friend’s treasonous betrayal of his trust and love. For Hermione, however, the narrative is much more complex. It is indelibly imbued with her husband’s power as king and in the cultural currency of stories of cuckoldry.32 But her narrative is no less about marital betrayal than

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that of Leontes for Hermione has been wronged by her husband, whose false accusations against her betray her trust, her obedience, and her lawful performance of wifely duty and loyalty. Thus the scene stages the inherent imbalance in the justice system for women whose testimony is always suspect, whose rights are mitigated by their sex and marital status, and whose power to fight is, therefore, limited. If her testimony is ‘‘counted falsehood’’ before she speaks, then the truth of her testimony ought to be irrelevant. Leontes’s power, regardless of the erroneous nature of his accusation, ought to be incontestable. Yet the play stages Leontes’s accusation as unwarranted, so that his power becomes appalling in its tyranny. As a result, the women’s fight against him, which escalates as Hermione abandons hope and Paulina takes over her battle, increases their rhetorical and moral power just when it ought to be the most diminished. As is already evident, Paulina’s fight is less restrained than Hermione’s, whose self-defense remains eloquently controlled. But Paulina is no less artful in her ability to call her king a tyrant even as she restrains herself from doing so. When she returns from seeing Hermione safely carried off, Paulina turns the tables on the courtroom indictment read against the queen to read her own against the king: he is accused of betraying Polixenes, ‘‘poison[ing]’’ Camillo’s ‘‘honour,’’ ‘‘the casting forth to crows [his] baby daughter,’’ and ‘‘the death / Of the young prince’’ (3.2.183–93). Yet Paulina dismisses these as secondary, incidental in comparison to the death of his queen, for which she wishes him ‘‘nothing but despair’’ (3.2.208). Her indictment is just. The events of the play, the commands Leontes has given out, and the proceedings of the court all bear out Paulina’s allegations. Her veracity shifts the balance of power in the play, so that contrary to common knowledge and political ideology, women’s words cannot be dismissed or discredited. For Leontes has in every way shown himself to rule in specious and illegitimate ways that would animate anxieties in an audience whose history of monarchical tyranny attunes them to injustices and the overextension of state power. The competing claims of injustice between Hermione’s and Paulina’s complaints and the accusations of Leontes’s courtroom work out of a dialectical relationship between female anxieties about men’s potential abuse of their power and male anxieties about men’s positions in society. Men’s anxieties focus on the power of

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women to erode their standing, diminish their reputations, make them, as Leontes makes acutely clear, play ‘‘so disgraced a part, whose issue / Will hiss me to my grave; contempt and clamour / Will be my knell’’ (1.2.186–88). Women’s anxieties point to the indelibility of accusations that, once made, in the words of Hermione, ‘‘scarce can right me throughly’’ when Leontes later says he ‘‘did mistake’’ (2.1.99–100) and in the words of Paulina are ‘‘such ado to make no stain a stain / As passes colouring’’ (2.2.18–19). The common concern of men and women for their public reputations demonstrates the reciprocal nature of their fears and of the narratives they use to defend themselves. At the same time, the play’s unrelenting indictment of Leontes begs questions about the power of husbands and of the monarch to fabricate evidence of treasons when no treasons have been committed.33 Paulina, as she points her finger at her king and calls him ‘‘tyrant’’ (2.3.115; 3.2.173; 3.2.205), marks the play’s moral and political center and forces a rupture between the apparent reinforcement of inequitable relations that the play stages and the inauguration of justice the play demands. Notably, The Winter’s Tale, in contrast to Othello, and more thoroughly than Much Ado about Nothing, demands the public contrition of the husband. Leontes’s immediate repentance once his wife and son are taken from him repeats in reverse the sudden onset of his suspicions. Apollo’s justice deprives Leontes of his heirs and of the woman who might give him another heir. A second woman awaits him, however, waits on him, and attends to his conscience and to the penance assigned to him for his tyranny. In its most powerful move against Leontes’s power, the play installs Paulina in an official capacity as Leontes’s counselor. ‘‘Prithee,’’ he asks of Paulina, ‘‘bring me / To the dead bodies of my queen and son: / One grave shall be for both: upon them shall / The causes of their death appear, unto / Our shame perpetual’’ (3.2.232–36). The loss of reputation Leontes feared is indeed lost, but through his own actions. Rather than experiencing the shame of the cuckold, Leontes is dishonored by the wrongs he committed against his family, against his subjects. Paulina’s reminder to him that her own husband has also been lost as a result of his tyranny compounds his guilt as a king who has recklessly endangered his subjects. Thus the play unequivocally authorizes Paulina’s authority and discredits the king. The justice the play seeks is delayed both temporally and dramatically. Nearly two acts and sixteen years pass before we learn that Her-

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mione, rather than dying in act three, lived in hiding in order to escape her husband’s despotism. Her return is staged, as I have argued previously, not as a reward to the reformed monarch but as her own free return occasioned by her daughter’s miraculous homecoming. She tells Perdita, ‘‘I / Knowing by Paulina that the oracle / Gave hope thou wast in being, have preserv’d / Myself to see the issue’’ (5.3.125–28).34 The play’s staging of Hermione’s return as a conscious choice, one made and not compelled by another, amplifies its interests in female agency. Paulina’s engineering of Hermione’s escape suggests the power women might take to change their lives and their relationship to marriage. Leontes’s contrition also underscores the play’s interest in alternative visions of male/female relationships. Like real Renaissance women who demanded and received some relief from the abuse they experienced at their husband’s hands, Paulina and Hermione demand and receive their king’s re-vision of the power he wields as monarch and husband. The Winter’s Tale stages a competition for meaning and rhetorical power. Unambiguous in its portrayal of Leontes’s wrong, of his fabrication of events, acts, and treasons, it creates a dramatic crisis that works both to repeat, re-cite familiar contemporary assumptions about female inconstancy and to imagine the women’s redirection of those recitations. In this regard, the play grants the women power, making them the moral and political voices of the play. Paulina and Hermione both respond to Leontes’s narrative with their own, rejecting his more powerful but violently flawed account of events. His confusion contradicts Renaissance theories about monarchical justice and points to the tyranny of absolutist systems of state. But the play also points to the possibility—the necessity—of resistance, especially for women, despite the apparent intractability of masculinist power to construct the world. Hermione’s and Paulina’s reconstructions of Leontes’s world, their persistent revision of his narrative, lays bare the slippery and malleable nature of language, even when language comes loaded with familiar meanings, beliefs, and values— and with the authority of the speaker. Thus the play stages the power of stories to harm and the power of those targeted for injury to refuse such harm, to redirect such intents—in Butler’s terms—and to claim for themselves the power of words. The Winter’s Tale both dramatizes linguistic performatives in revision and the process whereby drama itself can be part of revising performatives, for the play disputes the stories of female incontinence and male authority that

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ought not to be problematic or questionable. While the play does not overturn masculinist power altogether, it teaches us about the fluidity of meaning and of hierarchy, for those who seem most powerless ultimately have most power.

Notes 1. William Shakespeare, The Winter’s Tale, 3.1.6. All quotes from and references to The Winter’s Tale will be from this edition and cited parenthetically in the text. 2. Carol Thomas Neely argues, ‘‘Leontes begins by analyzing his emotions and proceeds to justify them by insisting on the reality of their objects: adultery and cuckoldry; having heaved his gorge, he conjures up a spider to explain his sickness’’ (245). See also Gourlay, 266. 3. Janet Adelman argues that ‘‘initially Leontes could see in Paulina’s management only the signs of her emasculating control; but in the end, he can find himself as husband and father only by giving himself into her hands, rediscovering his masculine potency and authority through trust in her and in the female process she speaks for’’ (219). 4. See Rebecca Bushnell’s study of the tyrant on stage where, she argues, the tyrant becomes a problematic authority figure even as legitimate sovereignty is reestablished, (5). 5. Lynne Enterline, ‘‘ ‘You speak a language that I understand not’: The Rhetoric of Animation in The Winter’s Tale,’’ 18. 6. Ibid., 19. 7. Ibid., 38. 8. See also Enterline’s reading of J. L. Austin’s ‘‘theory of the difference between constantive and performative utterances’’ (32). 9. Judith Butler, Excitable Speech, 87. All references to and quotes from Excitable Speech will be cited parenthetically in the text. See Ina Habermann, Staging Slander, who also reads Butler in light of the linguistic injury of slander, especially sexual slander against female characters. 10. Female anxieties may be thought of as complementary to and produced by the ubiquitous male anxieties in the period about the female body and female fidelity. While male anxieties come out of the pressures of reputation and honor that make men competitive in Renaissance society, they produce, in Shakespeare’s plays, fictions of female infidelity. Women’s anxieties complement, but are also produced by, male anxieties, but are also significantly different because they express concrete concerns: the loss of social and economic security that accompanies men’s accusation. For a sustained analysis of male anxiety in Shakespeare’s plays, see Mark Breitenberg. See also Collington’s reading of cuckoldry anxiety in Two Gentlemen of Verona, which he argues is bred into young men. 11. In their study of Shakespeare, law, and marriage, B. J. Sokol and Mary Sokol read The Winter’s Tale through the lens of Henry VIII’s accusations of treason against Anne Boleyn and Katherine Howard. See also M. Lindsay Kaplan and Katherine Eggert whose study of The Winter’s Tale locates an origin for anxieties about

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female sexuality in Henry’s accusation against Anne Boleyn, ‘‘whose career provides a kind of prototype and a warning for all subsequent slandered women in positions of authority’’ (92). Kaplan and Eggert also read The Winter’s Tale as taking ‘‘a feminist stance in relation to early modern law‘‘ (110); and Ruth Vanita, ‘‘Mariological Memory’’ who also reads the play through Henry VIII’s marital tyranny and sees Hermione’s choice to leave Leontes as a ‘‘powerful alternative to marriage’’ (314). Barbara Krepps’ reading of Shakespeare’s King Henry VIII (All is True) provides very useful legal and historical information on Henry’s legal maneuvers. 12. Cunningham, 8–9. 13. Ibid., 40. 14. Ibid. 15. See Frances Dolan on the history of domestic or petty treason, (‘‘The Subordinate[’s] Plot, 317–40). 16. Thomas, 68. 17. Tim Stretton calls Sir Julius Caesar ‘‘[Request’s] most influential master’’ (8). All quotes from and references to Stretton’s study will be cited parenthetically. For Caesar’s extraordinary rise to Master of the Rolls (Court of Chancery), see L. M. Hill, Bench and Bureaucracy. On the Privy Council’s interests in maintaining order through attention to familial disputes (including an analysis of the Bourne case) see Hill’s ‘‘The Privy Council and Private Morality in the Reign of Elizabeth I,’’ 205–8. While both courts of Requests and Chancery were arms of the Privy Council, the Privy Council also heard pleas independently from the courts. Hill’s Mistress Bourne’s Complaint: The Failure of a Sixteenth-Century Marriage is in progress. Hill believes that connections to Sir Frances Walsingham on the parts of both Sir Julius Caesar and Elizabeth Bourne brought these two into contact (email to the author, 31 July 2004). 18. British Library. Add. MS 38170, fols. 14–28. I am currently transcribing and co-editing this manuscript with Emily Sherwood. In regard to Elizabeth Bourne’s appeal to the Privy Council rather than to a court of law, Hill argues that ‘‘In Elizabeth’s case, a recourse to a competent court would have been only marginally useful to her. A court could have granted her a divorce a mensa et thoro (a legal separation) but, under the circumstances, it probably could not have protected her interests in her husband’s estate’’ (‘‘The Privy Council’’ 207). 19. See Cioni, Erickson, Gowing, Stone, and Stretton. And on the English church courts’ treatment of marriage, see Martin Ingram. 20. Sir John Conway was a family friend who tried to mediate the dispute between the Bournes. 21. L. M. Hill, e-mail to the author, 26 July 2004. In Hill’s ‘‘The Privy Council,’’ he argues that the Privy Council was particularly sympathetic to women’s claims, acting much like the courts of Requests and Chancery (which were initially judicial arms of the Privy Council), often granting women money and lands as protection from irresponsible husbands (210–11). 22. Hill, 207. 23. See also Derek Cohen, who also points to fantasy as the root of Leontes’s accusations (208). 24. Eamon Grennan has also argued for the importance of listening to female voices in Othello to understand the play’s moral center. Patricia Southard Gourlay

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sees Hermione, Paulina, and Perdita as ‘‘the subversive and creative power love, art, and nature’’ which Shakespeare uses to oppose ‘‘Leontes’ dark vision’’ (260). Vanita connects Paulina’s defense of Hermione to a medieval tradition of female saints (passim). Enterline notes crucially that Paulina’s ultimate and most successful defense of Hermione is based on a lie (32). 25. Gowing, 37, 109. 26. Clearly, The Winter’s Tale is not exactly a tragedy. However, Traub’s analysis of the play places it squarely within the masculine ethos she is concerned with, so that ‘‘rather than being a victory for the wronged heroine, the final scene works as a wish fulfillment for Leontes.’’ (230). 27. Gowing notes that ‘‘I will not call you whore’’ functioned in the period as a dodge around defamation, and here Paulina uses that dodge, ‘‘I’ll not call you tyrant’’ (2.3.115). 28. See Kathryn R. Finin’s essay in this collection on the use of language in The Merchant of Venice, particularly her reading of Portia’s ‘‘mock trial’’ of Bassanio and Gratianio in which Portia ‘‘repeatedly undercuts the very language upon which oaths depend[, r]eturning to language which is literally true and totally misleading’’ 41. 29. Gowing,50–52. See also Enterline’s reading of ‘‘the inevitable misfiring of [Hermione’s] ‘not guilty’ ’’(34–39). 30. See Kaplan and Eggert, 104. 31. Gowing, 43. 32. Gowing sees such narratives as also playing a part in legal testimonies, where ‘‘[t]he stories of witnesses and litigants depended for their power, as much on vivid, apparently authentic detail, as on the chords they struck by what they said in contemporary minds. Narratives made sense, both in court and out of it, through their similarity to familiar plots in the stock of common knowledge: defamatory exchanges, contracts of marriage, or incidents of illicit sex were conveyed through well-known devices’’ (56). 33. See also Thomas, 74. 34. See my Fantasies of Female Evil, 163–85.

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Poisoned Justice: Passion and Politics in The Winter’s Tale Catherine E. Thomas

HOW CAN YOU SOLVE A PROBLEM LIKE LEONTES? MY STUDENTS LAST SEmester urged me to consider this question more carefully, for the minute we began discussing The Winter’s Tale in my upper-level Shakespeare course, hands went up. ‘‘I don’t get it. One minute, Leontes is friendly with Polixenes and thinks Hermione is the best wife in the world, and then five minutes later, he freaks out!’’ ‘‘Why is Leontes so jealous?’’ ‘‘Why won’t he listen to his advisors and just CHILL?’’ These responses all register the puzzling and terrifyingly abrupt behavior that the King of Sicilia demonstrates, as he goes on wrongly to accuse and publicly try his wife for adultery and secretly plot the death of his friend and fellow king, Polixenes. His actions, in effect, cause the real death of his son, Mamillius; the abandonment of his daughter, Perdita; the estrangement of his servants; and finally, the ‘‘death’’ of his wife, Hermione. The kingdom, the family, and the man are in shambles. How are we to solve a problem like Leontes, indeed. Early modern concerns about leadership—how to achieve proper governance and how to correctly execute justice—are expressed most strikingly in tragic depictions of rule gone wrong. One way to make sense of these dramatic moments is to think more widely about the consequences of poor governance, both individual and political. The Winter’s Tale in particular is illustrative of the dangers of excessive emotion and the effects that the ruler’s composure has on the body politic. Here I will show how a reading of Leontes’s jealousy and his insistence on the public performance of justice can be understood in light of period anxieties about tyranny and passionate influence. Many of the conflicts revolve around idealized notions of masculine and feminine sexual roles and the ways in which emotions corrupt leaders’ judgments. Thus we can interpret the play’s 66

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tyrannical bodies in multiply useful ways: as the physical forms belonging to tyrannical leaders, as subversive, seditious individuals who usurp political power, and as bodies marked by an overthrow of physical faculties. The Winter’s Tale uses the language and model of tyranny to describe the relationship between passionate corruption, physical decay, and acts of political injustice. We might begin with asking, how do the passions, and especially jealousy, erupt and cause tyrannical behavior? What effects does a tyrannical body have on society and especially, on the execution of justice? Mary Ann McGrail addresses The Winter’s Tale’s concern with ‘‘the problem of tyranny’’ with further inquiries: ‘‘What causes tyranny? What excessive desires provoke tyranny? What does the tyrant want? . . . [A]re there remedies for tyranny?’’1 While McGrail ultimately contends that Leontes is ‘‘educated’’ in piety and therefore reformed from his erroneous ways, for this argument, I am more interested in her first questions about causality and influence. In this play, male competition, whether intended or not, results in poisonous jealousy, an infectious, passionate interiority that invades the public world through the bodies and wills of its victims. As early modern accounts relate, the passion of jealousy was understood very literally as a poison to the body and soul. R.T.’s translation of Benedetto Varchi’s The Blazon of Iealouvsie (1615) calls it a ‘‘deadly Poyson’’ born of selfish desire.2 Jealousy’s power is pervasive, corruptive, and overwhelming. In addition, having selfishness as its root source closely allies it with the principle property of tyrants, rule by personal desire. If we acknowledge the materiality of the poisoning jealousy effects, the words and behaviors of characters such as Leontes suddenly seem even more sinister and invasive. The tension created by their manipulation and precarious balance of passions drives the motion of individuals and the plot itself. As we watch, the play methodically unravels Leontes’s machinations and rationality. It proclaims the vulnerability of the human passions and the potential deadliness of their effects.3 Roger Boesche’s study of Plato’s work on the ‘‘psychology of tyranny’’ becomes an important link to the figuration of misrule as both personal and social illness. Speaking of the dialogue Gorgias, Boesche notes that Plato compares justice directly to bodily wellbeing and describes it as a form of ‘‘mental health’’ and equilibrium of the soul.4 If justice preserves harmony, thereby creating a peaceful and ‘‘healthy’’ society, then ‘‘Tyranny, by contrast, is obviously

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both disharmony and disease,’’ both for the individual and the country.5 What we see in The Winter’s Tale is a repeated figuring of injustice through the bodies of the kingdom’s subjects. The imagined and actual poisonings, illnesses, and deaths demonstrate the repercussions of tyrannical rule on the body politic. The reigning English monarch at the time of the play’s creation, King James I, recognized and wrote repeatedly about this connection between just rule and the public good in Basilikon Doron (1599), as well as other texts. His speech to Parliament in 1603 is particularly instructive: ‘‘I do acknowledge that the special and greatest point of difference that is betwixt a rightful King and an usurping Tyrant is this: That whereas the proud and ambitious Tyrant doth think his Kingdom and People, are only ordained for satisfaction of his desires, and unreasonable appetites; The righteous and just King doth by the contrary acknowledge himself to be ordained for the procuring of the wealth and prosperity of his people.’’6 King James directly ties the problem of tyranny to a personal, passionate imbalance, specifically pointing out pride, ambition, and selfish desire as motivating factors. The tyrant’s focus is inward, on the satisfaction of the self, rather than outward, toward promoting the welfare of his people. The acknowledged relationship between sensual influence and personal behavior during this period makes James’s warning appreciable: a ‘‘usurping Tyrant’’ may be understood not only as an intruder on state power and the management of justice, but also as someone whose very faculties have been overthrown and may overthrow others. With this in mind, Leontes’s tyranny begins to make more sense—both literally and figuratively. Turning to the play, it would seem that seeing is believing, and believing is what spurs the frightening emotions to which Leontes succumbs. In act 1, scene 2, Leontes urges his friend and fellow king, Polixenes, to extend his stay in Sicilia. Polixenes, feeling that it is past time to return to the administration of his kingdom, as well as the care of his family, resists the entreaties. As a second line of defense, Leontes asks Hermione to make another plea. Hermione and Polixenes exchange courtesies and conversation, and eventually with her graceful and pointed words, she is able to convince the Bohemian king to stay on a bit longer. Leontes, however, begins to ruminate upon this winning of agreement, and as he does so, Hermione gives her hand to Polixenes—ostensibly in a gesture of

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hospitality and friendship. Leontes is suddenly overcome with suspicion that their relationship is much more than amicable: Too hot, too hot! To mingle friendship far is mingling bloods. I have tremor cordis on me. My heart dances, But not for joy, not joy . . . (1.2.110–13)7

Leontes’s unsettlement registers as bodily unease and humoral heat. Further, the language figures his emotional distress as ‘‘dancing,’’ but that spinning movement here connotes tremulous confusion and dismay. In the sensual experience of watching the gesture of Polixenes’s accession to Hermione, Leontes’s rational faculties are literally moved. As quickly as the sight pervades the king’s senses, so do his stirred emotions affect his reasoning and catalyze a false chain of logic. Leontes nervously turns to his son, Mamillius, to playfully (and not so playfully) question whether he is, in fact, his own flesh and blood. As his feelings become more agitated, his asides get more and more broken: Affection, thy intention stabs the centre. Thou dost make possible things not so held, Communicat’st with dreams—how can this be?— With what’s unreal thou coactive art, And fellow’st nothing. Then ’tis very credent Thou may’st co-join with something; and thou dost— And that beyond commission; and I find it— And that to the infection of my brains And hard’ning of my brows. (1.2.140–48)

His ‘‘affection’’ pierces him in a violent way, and he clearly notes the infectious, spreading quality of the negative emotions plaguing him. While on the one hand doubting the credibility of these thoughts and feelings, he is nonetheless unable to stave off his burning doubts. Leontes, in effect, undergoes a very psycho-physiological transformation. In the introduction to Reading the Early Modern Passions (2004), Gail Kern Paster, Katherine Rowe, and Mary Floyd-Wilson uncover

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the early moderns’s more complex understanding of the passions. ‘‘[T]he passions are not ‘internal objects,’ or even ‘bodily states,’: they comprise, instead, an ecology or a transaction. . . . [P]assions characterize the microcosm’s shifting interaction with a continuously changing macrocosm.’’8 The Winter’s Tale clearly exemplifies the transactional nature of human emotions. The exterior sociopolitical world influences the interior, bodily world and vice versa. They are symbiotically connected, and this notion is imagined through the apparent emotional overthrow of Leontes. Leontes does not think when he sees his wife touching hands with his friend; or rather, maybe he thinks too much. What Leontes has seen poisons his runaway mind and heart. The logic of what he can prove about this sight is, to an extent, moot. McGrail states that the king’s quest to establish that Mamillius and Perdita are his children stems from a deep concern with justice and the problem of how one can ‘‘ ‘justify’ love in the sense of vindicate or prove.’’9 This issue of proof feeds directly into Leontes’s need for public affirmation of his suspicions, although he seems both to misread his wife’s and friend’s actions, as well as mistake in insisting on a public trial of his recently delivered queen and wife. As McGrail aptly comments, ‘‘Considerations of justice must prevail in public affairs, even if the justice is artificial or false, but such considerations find an awkward place in private affairs.’’10 This ‘‘awkward’’ misreading of Hermione’s and Polixenes’s actions ends up being magnified into public political drama, much to everyone’s chagrin (excepting, perhaps, Leontes). The king accosts a number of his retainers, asking for their assistance in bringing the couple ‘‘to justice.’’ Later in 1.2, for example, he employs Camillo to poison the Bohemian king. Camillo, ever confident in Hermione’s faithfulness and worried about his liege’s state of mind, recommends, ‘‘Good my lord, be cured / Of this diseased opinion, and betimes, / For ’tis most dangerous’’ (1.2.298–300). Here, Camillo remarks that Leontes’s ideas are corrupt and warns that greater danger may result if he continues in this way of thinking. This servant realizes the potential upheaval and disorder that could be caused by slanderous and false thoughts. Because it is the king, the head of the country and chief executor of justice, whose head is clouded, the ramifications are that much larger. It thus is quite interesting both that Leontes wishes to poison (rather than stab, for example) his friend and that Camillo talks about the king’s thoughts as dangerous

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and ill. Recalling the relations between passionate imbalance, unjust governance, and a diseased body politic, we see that Camillo intrinsically warns Leontes that he is bordering on the kind of abuse of rule associated with a tyrant. But Camillo is not the only one who recognizes Leontes’s slide into tyranny. In act 2, scene 1, Antigonus counsels the king, swearing to Hermione’s loyalty and cautioning the ruler about his plans for publicly shaming her in a trial: ‘‘Be certain what you do, sir, lest your justice / Prove violence, in the which three great ones suffer—/ Yourself, your queen, your son’’ (2.1.15129–31). Antigonus is more than aware of the connection between sanctioned uses of power in the cause of justice and the looming potential of misuse to violent ends. His emphasis on Leontes’s being certain is particularly apt, as it suggests that the servant detects the king’s faulty, impassioned logic. Indeed, to be certain is to be ‘‘settled’’ and ‘‘not variable or fluctuating.’’11 As we have seen, Leontes is not certain emotionally, at least from the standpoint of being temperate and well governed in his reasoning faculties. Antigonus makes this tie between personal and political governance even clearer by reminding his liege that his actions have grave consequences. One of the other key characters who makes a stand against the king’s rash behavior is, of course, Paulina. Rather than simply judging from afar, she takes a public and politicized stance. She dismisses all fear and warnings and calls on others to support her efforts to counter Leontes and defend Queen Hermione. A Lord: Paulina:

You must not enter. Nay rather, good my lords, be second to me. Fear you his tyrannous passion more, alas, Than the Queen’s life?—a gracious, innocent soul, More free than he is jealous. (2.3.26–30)

Paulina not only justifies her actions by using the queen’s innocence as a rallying point, but also through challenging their loyalties and even manhood. Who and what are they more afraid of ? Who are they really serving in their offices as lords of the kingdom? Which side are they on? She implies, in effect, that to side with an intemperate, unjust man is to participate in Hermione’s persecution and potential execution. Paulina makes it a matter of honor and righ-

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teousness. Further, she deploys the language of fear and intimidation that the tyrannical Leontes uses and appropriates it for good causes. Subha Mukherji notes that, ‘‘The definition of the masterservant relationship in a household is posited on a harmonious relationship between husband and wife; once that goes askew, the surrounding nexus of subsidiary relations is thrown into confusion.’’12 Paulina steps into this power vacuum and seeks to align her fellow subjects’s interests. She wrests away political authority to save her mistress and morally re-center the court. Later in act 2, scene 3, she goes on the offensive through stridently and openly opposing Leontes’s judgment to his face: Leontes: Paulina:

Leontes:

I’ll ha’ thee burnt. I care not. It is an heretic that makes the fire, Not she which burns in’t. I’ll not call you tyrant; But this most cruel usage of your queen— Not able to produce more accusation Than your own weak-hinged fancy—something savours Of tyranny, and will ignoble make you, Yea, scandalous to the world. On your allegiance, Out of the chamber with her! Were I a tyrant, Where were her life? She durst not call me so If she did know me one. Away with her! (2.3.113–24)

Paulina pulls no punches in marking the king as a decision-maker ruled by his ‘‘weak-hinged fancy.’’ She holds back from explicitly calling him a tyrant, but as much as does so, employing the language of sensual influence—‘‘savours’’—to invoke the association of corrupt passionate influence and misguided judgment. Like Antigonus, she reminds Leontes of not only the personal cost of badly enacted ‘‘justice’’ (it will make him ‘‘ignoble’’), but also the very damaging public one (it will produce a giant scandal). Unfortunately, Leontes remains in denial about his looming political failures, suggesting that it is Paulina’s understanding of tyranny that is faulty. Whether or not he at all realizes the effects that Paulina’s words might have had on his subjects, Leontes begins Hermione’s trial with an effort to regain popular support and reestablish monarchi-

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cal authority. What he gives us though is a seemingly disingenuous pronouncement of sorrow over having to try Hermione at all: This sessions, to our great grief we pronounce, Even pushes ‘gainst our heart: the party tried The daughter of a king, our wife, and one Of us too much beloved. Let us be cleared Of being tyrannous since we so openly Proceed in justice, which shall have due course Even to the guilt or the purgation. Produce the prisoner. (3.2.1–8)

While the king’s consternation might be understandable in his own frame of reference, the result more likely is that the people find his words contradictory with his actions to prosecute her.13 His statement encouraging the ‘‘clear[ance]’’ of tyranny from his name smacks of insecurity and a clingy need for absolute loyalty and service, rather than obedience stemming from respect and merit. The public and performative nature of the trial thus serves less as an ‘‘open’’ and fair hearing and more of a rhetorical power play. Hermione clearly recognizes this fact and uses her fine speech abilities to make a compelling case for her innocence and faith in divine justice: But thus: if powers divine Behold our human actions—as they do— I doubt not then but innocence shall make False accusation blush, and tyranny Tremble at patience. (3.2.26–30)

She firmly believes that her innocence and patience—if not her life—will not only challenge but also subdue the passionate irrationality of tyrannical action. Her clear, cogent confidence makes Leontes’s overstated efforts for public acceptance look desperate.14 When we go to the scene where Leontes calls for the Oracle’s report—that sine qua non to back his ‘‘legitimate’’ accusation—we find only a confirmation of our fears that the king has overreached

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the bounds of proper rule. The Oracle pronounces that ‘‘Hermione is chaste, Polixenes blameless, Camillo a true subject, Leontes a jealous tyrant, his innocent babe truly begotten’’ (3.2.131–33). Notably Leontes now is marked by divine proclamation as a ‘‘jealous tyrant.’’ While he technically may be legitimate in his claim to the throne, he still is considered tyrannical for his serious abuse of power. That abuse finds its center in privileging private passions and desires over the good of the kingdom. What Leontes really needs is a wakeup call. And fortunately for the other characters and the audience, he gets one. Paulina again takes center stage, orchestrating the king’s awakening to the truth, despite other failed attempts. While he repeatedly tries to downplay her accusations and eradicate her influence on the court, she remains an irrepressible force for the cause of righteousness. Shakespeare’s play, like many classical tragedies, depicts tyrants as ‘‘a secondary character, opposed to the hero or paired with a woman who threatens his masculinity. . . . The plays in which the tyrant is paired with a woman suggest that the tyrant’s actions parallel the scandalous rule of women.’’15 Paulina’s role as Leontes’s scourge—so to speak—thereby takes on more significance. Even as the king roundly accuses her of being a shrew and out of her right place (both in the gender and political hierarchies), she refuses to be silenced and give in. As Cristina Leoń Alfar remarks, ‘‘she redirects women’s connections to verbal excess . . . in order to enable her self-authorization as advocate and protector through the strength of her voice.’’16 Alfar’s point is well taken, although I would argue that Paulina’s vocal opposition is not primarily an act of self-authorization, but an appeal to an alternative political discourse of resistance against tyranny. She realizes the tangible and representative stakes of the royal family’s ‘‘illness’’ and disruption, as well as the public trial. Through her aggressive language, Paulina tries to build solidarity with her fellow subjects under the banner of justice, and regulate the monarch, whose unruly passions threaten the lives of not just his family, but also the kingdom and its inhabitants. After Hermione hears of her son’s death and falls to the ground (notably, his death is attributed to emotional trauma from her ‘‘fortune’’), Paulina checks on her and reenters only to hissingly accuse Leontes of wrongdoing. When he asks what the cause of her railing is, she turns on him:

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What studied torments, tyrant, hast for me? What wheels, racks, fires? What flaying, boiling In leads or oils? . . . Thy tyranny, Together working with thy jealousies— Fancies too weak for boys, too green and idle For girls of nine—O think what they have done, And then run mad indeed, stark mad, for all Thy bygone fooleries were but spices of it. (3.2.173–74, 177–82)

Here, Paulina infantilizes Leontes and his reasons for unjust action and yokes together his tyrannical behavior and jealousy as the prime movers of the mad tragedy. Fury-like, she taunts him to punish her loud, public pronouncement of his fault. Her emotional outrage and aggressive (even potentially treasonous) behavior are in many ways just as socially disruptive as Leontes’s staging of the public trial and denial of fault. However, she acts as a moral foil to the impassioned king, and works actively throughout the play to reinstate the health of the broken relationships and to moderate tyrannical state rule. Perhaps ironically, she employs topsy-turvy gender behaviors to right the topsy-turvy political climate. During the early modern period, Rebecca Bushnell observes, this link between femininity (as excess of passion and desire) and tyranny still pertains.17 The shrewish woman reads as a mirror of the tyrant figure in her usurpation of verbal and social power. We see this in The Winter’s Tale with Paulina’s sharp rebuking of the court and the king and later, her ‘‘educational’’ dominance over Leontes as he mourns his lost family. Both are models of illegitimate sovereignty, and yet the hopeful future of the romance subgenre requires that all troubles be amended by the conclusion of the play. Paulina takes it into her own hands to effect a more positive ending to this initially gloomy tale. So we circle back to the question with which I began: how do we solve a problem like Leontes? He won’t listen to his friend, his royal wife, his advisors, or even a divine Oracle. I concur with McGrail that Paulina is the key player who finally recognizes that ‘‘a passionate nature must be reformed, not by dialectic, but by a rhetoric suited to the passions.’’18 I would extend this contention, however, by arguing that what Leontes really needs is ‘‘ocular proof ’’ to influence his corrupted emotions.19 Sensual influence is more powerful a rem-

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edy than any amount of scolding launched at him. Thus, Paulina cleverly arranges the ‘‘death’’ of the queen, which strikes home with Leontes’s awareness; this physical shock registers as ill-doing to him, and he finally begins to recognize something is terribly wrong in his judgment: Paulina:

Leontes:

I say she’s dead. I’ll swear’t. If word nor oath Prevail not, go and see. . . . But O thou tyrant, Do not repent these things, for they are heavier Than all thy woes can stir. Therefore betake thee To nothing but despair. . . . Go on, go on. Thou canst not speak too much. I have deserved All tongues to talk their bitt’rest. (3.3.201–2, 205–8, 212–14)

At this moment of shock and despair, Leontes licenses Paulina’s sharp tongue as an agent of his punishment. Further, he magnifies the retribution to a public/social level, to allow ‘‘All tongues’’ the opportunity to chastise him. Through this constant, repetitive tongue-lashing, Leontes’s tyrannical passions may revert to more orderly and subdued forms. For sixteen years afterward, he mourns and is ‘‘justly’’ educated by Paulina on how best to express his loss and guilt. She well understands that, as Mukherji reminds us, ‘‘The manipulation of appearances . . . extends beyond the specifically physical or legal into ritualistic self-presentation.’’20 Through Paulina’s emotional schooling and the construction of a reality where Leontes has lost all that was precious to him, the jealous tyrant transforms and reforms. At last, at the play’s end, his humble faith in love and magic are reawakened for the glorious return of Hermione and Perdita. The penitent husband and father is open to the ameliorative, mysterious powers of affection: I am ashamed. Does not the stone rebuke me For being more stone than it? O royal piece! There’s magic in thy majesty, which has My evils conjured to remembrance, and From thy admiring daughter took the spirits, Standing like stone with thee. (5.3.37–42)

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Here, Leontes visually and emotionally realizes his fault and wrongdoing. Instead of thinking selfishly and through his limited perspective, he sympathizes with those he has wronged. This suggests that his tyrannical ways have been corrected and that both his personal and political aims have been restored to their appropriate channels. The magic imagery employed in this passage works by effectively juxtaposing memories of Leontes’s ‘‘stony’’ justice and passionate evils with the ‘‘majesty’’ (true integrity, royal aspect) of his wife and daughter’s looks. Hermione’s ‘‘statue’’ stares down on him, to his eyes, in reverse judgment. The queen’s patience, in the end, does indeed make the reformed tyrant tremble and ask for a second chance. The magic of time and the coolness of Hermione’s forgiveness additionally temper Leontes’s jealous passions and unjust tyrannical behavior. Through this staged ‘‘healing ritual’’ at the play’s end, we see the complex ways that literary representations of tyranny and justice employ the discourse of the passions to bring about resolution. ‘‘[In] tragicomedies, trials and recognitions coincide. Legal procedure, after all, has the same structure as anagnoristic plots, proceeding from uncertainty or ignorance to knowledge or disclosure.’’21 Here, we witness an amazing conflation of confession, verdict, punishment, and reconciliation. The judge becomes the accused, the king becomes the supplicant, and everyone lives happily ever after. Perhaps that is what makes the ending of this play so ‘‘magical’’—time and love seem to have made all sins forgivable, and the king is given a second chance to be a better ruler, husband, and father. Justice appears to have been served. I must admit that I am not fully persuaded by the happy ending of The Winter’s Tale. The glossy reconciliation is haunted by Hermione’s lackluster welcome of her husband; the shadow of Ferdinand’s earlier rebellion against his duties as a prince to follow his own passions (in this case, a relationship with Perdita); and the complicated friendship between the two (formerly?) tyrannical kings. Is this a bright, hopeful future? I think the play wants us to believe so, but the undercurrents I mentioned belie such a reading. I agree with Mukherji’s assessment that ‘‘Penitence as a legal trick transmutes to spectacular self-fashioning’’ (220). This play’s ending is actively working on its audience to fashion a particular narrative of personal healing, political stability, and social continuance. I would like to conclude with an observation that may help us at-

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tend more closely to the issues I’ve raised here. In his seventeenthcentury treatise A Treatise of the Passions and Faculties of the Soule of Man (1642), Bishop Edward Reynolds writes that governance is not about eradicating the passions but about being ‘‘above them.’’22 He continues that, ‘‘So Passion[s] . . . yet if once they flye out beyond their bounds, and become subject onely to their owne Lawes, and encroach upon Reasons right, there is nothing more tumultuous and tyrannicall.’’23 The language of passions out of control, outside the bounds of ‘‘law,’’ is in effect one of tyranny. What The Winter’s Tale and pamphlet literature of the time reveal is that the personal governance of the individual is never divorceable from the realm of sociopolitical governance. Through time, through love, and through public recognition, tyrannical bodies must be transformed, always with an eye to the public good and its just ordering.

Notes 1. Mary Ann McGrail, Tyranny in Shakespeare (Lanham, MD and Oxford: Lexington Books, 2001), 80. 2. Benedetto Varchi. The Blazon of Iealousie. Trans. R. T. London (London: T[homas] S[nodham] for John Busbie, 1615), 5. 3. For further discussion of the materiality of the passions, see Susan James, ‘‘The Passions in Metaphysics and the Theory of Action,’’ in The Cambridge History of Seventeenth-Century Philosophy, ed. Daniel Garber and Michael Ayers (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), Susan James, ‘‘Reason, the Passions, and the Good Life,’’ in The Cambridge History of Seventeenth-Century Philosophy, ed. Daniel Garber and Michael Ayers (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), Gail Kern Paster, ‘‘The Body and Its Passions,’’ Shakespeare Studies 29 (2001): 44–50. 4. Roger Boesche, Theories of Tyranny from Plato to Arendt (University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1996), 28. 5. Ibid. 6. James I and VI, James’s Opinion of a King, of a Tyrant, and of the English Laws, Rights, and Privildeges. In Two Speeches, The First to the Parliament, 1603, the Second, 1609 (London: Printed for R. Baldwin, near the Black Bull in the Old-Baily, 1689), sig. A. 7. All citations from Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale will be from The Norton Shakespeare: Romances and Poems, ed. Stephen Greenblatt, Walter Cohen, Jean E. Howard, and Katharine Eisaman Maus (New York and London: W. W. Norton & Company, 1997). 8. Gail Kern Paster, Katherine Rowe, and Mary Floyd-Wilson, ed. Reading the Early Modern Passions: Essays in the Cultural History of Emotion (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004), 18. 9. McGrail, 84.

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10. Ibid. 11. ‘‘Certain,’’ OED definition 1a. Oxford English Dictionary Online. January 4, 2006. College of Charleston, http://dictionary.oed.com.nuncio.cofc.edu/. 12. Subha Mukherji, Law and Representation in Early Modern Drama (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 72. 13. My fellow contributors’s work is particularly helpful in better understanding why Leontes insists on a public trial and why he is so unsuccessful in the end. As Carol Blessing notes (‘‘The Trials of Mary Stuart’’), both real and literary trials often threw into question a woman’s chastity and thus ruined her reputation through the process of even questioning it. This phenomenon was at least in part based on the cultural stereotype of women’s ‘‘beautiful exteriors masking disloyal, possibly even murderous wives’’ 88. I maintain that Leontes truly thinks he has been betrayed, and his insistence on a public trial stems from a belief that the ‘‘truths’’ of Hermione’s desires and duplicity are obvious to all. Because she is Queen, she must be made an example to all wives as to what not to do. Of course, this backfires because Hermione refuses to confess, nor will other individuals stand by Leontes’s accusations. Cristina Leoń Alfar (‘‘Narratives of Marital Betrayal’’) argues that the king’s actions are a scapegoating or displacing move that is meant both to ‘‘injure’’ the women and ‘‘[remove] harm from himself ’’ 49. As we both note though, it doesn’t seem like Hermione and Paulina suffer much from the trial. Rather, they are empowered and become forces of rebellion. I agree with Alfar’s contentions about the gender/power dynamics of this moment; however, I wish to focus our attention on the ways that the charge of tyranny against Leontes and the problem of his imbalanced passions authorize the women’s active resistance. 14. Blessing discusses this notion of ‘‘strong women [being] often set up as victims, but transcending that status’’ 83. In this trial, Leontes tries to make Hermione into the stereotypical wayward, lusty wife, but her reputation as a wholesome, upstanding, and loyal one precedes her. She cleverly walks the line between casting herself as victim (gathering her audience’s sympathies by explaining the abrupt termination of her childbed recovery) and reinforcing her indisputable noble bearing. She thus ‘‘transcends’’ her status as both prisoner and accused by appealing to higher divine authority and Truth itself. 15. Rebecca W. Bushnell, Tragedies of Tyrants: Political Thought and Theater in the English Renaissance (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1990), 23. 16. Alfar, 12. 17. Bushnell, 68–69. 18. McGrail, 98. 19. See Othello 3.3.365. Similar to Leontes, Othello’s belief about his wife’s infidelity is primarily solidified by what he sees—Cassio and Desdemona talking; his love gift, the handkerchief, in another man’s hands; his wife’s repeated visits to entreat him for Cassio’s reinstatement. It is only after Desdemona lies dead in their wedding bed, and Emilia reveals Iago’s complicity, that Othello fully accepts his guilt and takes tragic reparative measures. 20. Mukherji, 220. 21. Ibid., 229. 22. Quoted in Michael C. Schoenfeldt, Bodies and Selves in Early Modern England: Physiology and Inwardness in Spenser, Shakespeare, Herbert, and Milton (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), 52. 23. Ibid.

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The Trials of Mary Stuart: Anxious Circulations in John Webster’s Drama Carol Blessing

EIGHTY-FIVE YEARS AGO, IN LILIAN WINSTANLEY’S 1922 WORK, MACBETH, King Lear, and Contemporary History, the author asserted: ‘‘It is inconceivable that any work can mean exactly the same for all men [sic] in all ages.’’1 Long the contention of cultural poetics, this statement is certainly true for drama, which often enacts topical concerns in the form of a staged debate. Theater draws from events as they are presented textually, and those events and texts are shaped correspondingly in dramatic fashion. One of the more famous events of Elizabeth’s era was the execution of Mary Stuart, shaped into historical accounts and woven into sermons, ballads, and literature. Using Leah Marcus’s concept of ‘‘local’’ readings,2 conjoined with Stephen Greenblatt’s idea of ‘‘social energy,’’3 I will examine the ways in which the concerns of monarchical legitimacy and female authority unite in the problem of Mary Stuart, rival to Elizabeth I and mother of James I. The theatrical qualities of Mary’s life and trials draw their own drama from the theater and are replicated in the drama of early modern England. Lisa Hopkins, who discusses both Elizabeth I and Mary, Queen of Scots both in terms of their own writings and the writings of others, provides research foundational to this study,4 which proceeds to cover some plays that she has not. Further, in his very helpful 1965 volume Images of a Queen: Mary Stuart in Sixteenth Century Literature,5 James Emerson Phillips surveys Marian images in printed works during the reign of Elizabeth I. He includes French drama about Mary but not more covert depictions of the Scottish queen in English theatrical works of the era. Certainly, Edmund Spenser, in the Faerie Queene, is infamous for maligning Mary through his Duessa allegory, and both Phillips and Jayne Elizabeth Lewis6 discuss this well-known depiction of Mary’s threat to Protestant England and Elizabeth I. 80

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This essay, however, explores the Marian allusions during the drama of Elizabeth’s reign and the ways Mary’s representations changed with the accession of her son James I to the throne. It is my contention that, rather than the examined plays containing broad or universal applications to the place and power of women in the periods, they more directly reference the tensions of Mary Stuart, re-enacting and problematizing female authority and behavior. The coronation of her son James I actually revitalized the ‘‘daughter of debate’’ in English theater by creating dialogue through presentations of female characters on trial.

Pamphlets, Sermons, Speeches, and Popular Literature about Mary Stuart Feminist scholars through the 1980s and ’90s, including Linda Woodbridge, Suzanne Hull, and others, read and published the querelle des femmes popular literature circulating in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.7 Hyperbolic tracts, whose authors wished to construct females according to their own desires, engaged in general dialogue about females, many openly misogynistic, others portraying Woman as a male-constructed ideal. Similar, more specific print dialogues focused on Mary Stuart and her guilt or innocence, as well as legitimacy to rule. Many Elizabethan contributions to this discussion are surveyed in Phillips’s Images of a Queen. Certainly the most famous declamation of Mary Stuart is John Knox’s 1558 The First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous Regiment of Women. The work takes on both ‘‘evil’’ Mary rulers of Knox’s time, Mary Tudor and Stuart, in arguing against the right of females to rule, condemning them for both usurping man’s place and adhering to Catholicism. Citing St. Paul and the writings of medieval Church patriarchs, Knox cries, ‘‘Beware Chrystostom [who strongly enforced male headship] what thou sayest; thou shalt be reputed a traitor if Englishmen hear thee, for they must have my sovereign lady and mistress, and Scotland hath drunken also the enchantment and venom of Circes.’’8 Further, to those who would cite Hebrew female leaders as examples, Knox retorts that ‘‘how unlike our mischievous Maries be unto Deborah, under whom were strangers chased out of Israel, God so raising her up to be a mother and deliverer to his oppressed people. But, alas, he hath raised up these Jezebels to be the utter-

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most of his plagues, the which man’s unthankfulness hath long deserved.’’9 Mary’s heretical adherence to her pre-Reformation faith is augmented in a later work, James I’s tutor George Buchanan’s De Maria Scotorum Regina, translated in A Detection of the Actions of Mary, Queen of Scots. Buchanan finds Mary utterly guilty of murder, adultery, and treason. In his long and very detailed recreation of Mary’s actions which draw upon the possibly spurious casket letters used to attack Mary, he compares her to Medea and cries, ‘‘May we commit our safety to her, who a Sister, hath butcherly slaughtered her Brother, a Wife her Husband, a Queen her King? May we commit our safety to her, whom never shame restrained from unchastity, woman-kind from cruelty, nor religion from impiety?’’10 Mary is demonized; a dangerous, loose, and heretical woman, she formed the perfect foil for the virginal Queen Elizabeth I. Attacks on Mary centered on her dangerous violations of boundaries of power, religion, and certainly, sexual desire.

Mary Stuart in Elizabethan and Jacobean Drama Although Elizabeth I prohibited the licensing of writings directly about Mary Stuart, some early modern dramatic works replay her biography covertly, most likely stirring recognition in the audience. James Phillips discusses the tragedy Horestes, presented at court in 1567, based on the Clytemnestra legend, noting strong ties between the play and the recent abdication of Mary.11 Shakespeare may have alluded to Mary as well. For example, Shakespeare’s Richard II, with its deposed and assassinated king, parallels Mary’s imprisonment and execution. Richard III also contains possible parallels to Mary Stuart. One of the Elizabethan pamphlet attacks on Mary, A Short declaration of the ende of Traytors, and false Conspirators against the state, Wherein are also breefely toughed, sundry offences of the S. Queene, committed against the crowne of this land, 1587, links Mary Stuart’s ‘‘plots’’ against Elizabeth with Richard III’s murder of the two young princes, citing Mary’s and Richard’s subsequent deaths as the proper punishment for those who would oppose or ‘‘lay violent handes upon the Lordes annointed.’’12 Hamlet’s Queen Gertrude has further been posited as paralleling Mary Stuart’s capricious love life. Lilian Winstanley sees both Macbeth and King Lear as directly based on incidents relating to Mary Stuart.13 Elizabeth Mazzola develops

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the connections to King Lear, comparing the Elizabeth/Mary conflict to the Regan/Goneril competition.14 Further, Lisa Hopkins lists several Jacobean Shakespearean works that point to Marian allusions, including the Viola/Olivia dichotomy of Twelfth Night.15 Hopkins sees the interplay of an androgynous Elizabeth and the continuously mourning Mary Stuart being enacted in the comedy. More openly referring to Mary Stuart, Thomas Dekker stages the threatening power of Edmund Spenser’s Duessa through his allegorical drama The Whore of Babylon. As probable writer of the tract The Double PP, a work condemning the gunpowder plot, Dekker continued his expose´ of the dangers of papism in this play. The tract echoes not only The Faerie Queene but also Holinshed’s Chronicles’ treatment of Mary. However, as Cyrus Hoy writes, ‘‘in his zeal at dramatizing the chronicle material, the playwright seems to have forgotten that Mary’s son now wore the English crown.’’16 As James’s rule continued, it was less common to vilify Mary; apparently others did remember her son’s authority rested in part upon his mother’s reputation. Dekker collaborated on at least one play, Westward Ho, with John Webster, who demonstrates a similar interest in the Mary Stuart story. Webster, whose works include the lost play The Duke of Guise, set in the French court of Mary’s maternal lineage, brings the subject of Mary to even greater examination, specifically her dangerous femaleness. Several of his plays can be seen as representing Mary, both in her guilt and innocence, as well as showing her as the source of James I’s legitimacy. The dramatized trial scenes recreate Mary’s own trials, providing a glimpse at strong women, often set up as victims, but transcending that status. Webster’s work combines sensationalistic novellas with recent events to show the Marian analogues superior to their accusers. While his sources are ostensibly Italian, based in part on historical events and personages, they become recontextualized in the light of the late Mary Stuart.

Women on Trial in John Webster’s Plays John Webster’s works raise a number of important questions regarding the Jacobean period and the relation of drama to culture. Reading the plays, two things are immediately apparent. The first is the overwhelming evidence of courtroom trials, law cases, lawyers,

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judges, discussions about the law, and legal jargon; in short, the law in its many dimensions is intrinsic to each play. As a playwright, Webster no doubt recognized the dramatic potential of the courtroom: the melodramatic qualities of a suspenseful trial—in which, for example, at the last minute an important witness shows up with important information—have made legal proceedings a source of drama from the Renaissance up to today’s television series. Webster certainly uses all the dramatic potential of his subject to good effect, and carefully centers the trial at the climactic moment of each play. In addition to Webster’s stagecraft, though, lies the discussion of law as an important ideological, historical, political, and sociological construct. Critics frequently examine the plays in relation to English law. Ralph Berry summarizes that each play ‘‘hinges on the central concept of the Law’’17 and Dena Goldberg’s astute volume presents cogent insights on the legal aspects of the plays.18 More recently, works by Lorna Hutson and Subha Mukherji analyze the intersections of legal and dramatic realms in Renaissance drama, including Webster’s.19 Controversy abounded in several areas of seventeenth-century law. The civil law, which was increasing in power and popularity, at times conflicted with common law. Ecclesiastical law and authority was again a topic of the day. Women increasingly employed the law (particularly in Chancery Court) to settle disputes and gain economic equity. The origin and definition of sovereignty were being reexamined. Webster’s plays raise all of these issues, in addition to discussing the nature and qualities of good lawyers, judges, and evidence. The second important feature of Webster’s plays is the central place women take in the drama. As many critics have observed, Webster rivals and perhaps surpasses Shakespeare in the creation of three dimensional, interesting, and major roles for women. Goldberg writes, ‘‘Shakespeare did not write a single tragedy in which the hero is a woman (Cleopatra shares the honours with Antony).’’20 Webster features a wide range of females: the famous Duchess of Malfi, the infamous Vittoria Colombina from The White Devil, a frustrated mother Leonora in The Devil’s Lawcase, and the Roman virgin martyr Virginia, creating intelligent, articulate women, able to verbally defend themselves, debate legal issues, accuse men of injustice, and challenge stereotyping. Bakhtin’s notion of ‘‘competing voices,’’ though originally focused on the novel, seems apropos for Webster’s dramas. Here, peo-

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ple at different levels of society, including women, and of the political spectrum are given voice, argue, and most often, do not reach closure. The courtroom becomes the arena for this panoply of views, which reproduces the querelle des femmes produced in pamphlet literature that proliferated, regarding the place and behavioral standards of women. As Lisa Klotz demonstrates in regard to pamphlets focused on notorious crimes, ‘‘Jurors and spectators at court, readers of pamphlets, and playgoers cannot be neatly segregated.’’21 Theater dramatized and dialogued with pamphlets, enacting polarized debates as well as sensational examples and rhetoric. Lorna Hutson’s discussion of the construction of early modern tragedy in terms of the English jury system22 aptly fits the structure and dialogues of Webster’s works. Each of his plays is carefully constructed as a court trial, of which the audience is the ultimate judge and jury. The formal court trial presented in the center of each play (in the Duchess’s case, an arraignment conducted in absentia by her brother the Duke) functions as a trial within a trial to deal with the major questions of the play. The plays raise more debates than they resolve, creating tension. Forced to grapple with controversial issues, the audience sees more than one side of each case. These progressive dramas open dialogues about the topics of women, law, and authority, which could initiate change, or at least create an excess of tension not contained within the conventional endings, possibly shaping rather than passively reflecting history. Once again, one of the controversies Webster re-creates is that regarding Mary Stuart— her guilt or innocence, and, in the process, the question of her son James’ legitimacy to the throne. Her famous trials became the stuff of legend, providing ripe material for Webster’s law scenes.

‘‘The Deuil Blanc’’ and The White Devil The ambiguous title of John Webster’s 1611 tragedy The White Devil fuels critical debate: to which character does it refer: the beautifully unfaithful Vittoria Corombona or the wealthy count Brachiano, who are both named in the lengthy subtitle, Vittoria’s Machiavellian brother Flamineo, or a combination of these? With its genesis in Italian history retold through the sensationalistic Palace of Pleasure by William Painter, The White Devil’s plot features adultery and murder in an enticing manner, the adulteress metamorphosed

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to heroine. The connections between Italian history, its romanticized fictions, and an intrigue closer to Webster’s native locale, the Mary Stuart affair, warrant a second look. Francois Clouet’s 1567 portrait of Mary Queen of Scots named ‘‘Le Deuil Blanc’’ reinforces the idea that Vittoria may be Webster’s title character. Although ‘‘deuil’’ in French means ‘‘mourning,’’ in the context of mourning attire, its resemblance in print to the English word ‘‘devil’’ may have incited Webster to wordplay. The customary mourning attire of the French court became the trademark of Mary, whose infamous affairs mirror Webster’s provocative heroine Vittoria; virginal white highlights the unchaste state of both women. Although a great deal of scholarly research traces Webster’s sources, this portrait has not been cited as a possible influence on the tragedy’s title. F. L. Lucas, introducing The White Devil in his multi-volume edition of Webster’s plays, briefly raises but does not pursue the parallels between Vittoria and Mary Stuart. In a note, he hypothesizes, ‘‘The general resemblance between the tragedy of Vittoria, Camillo, and Brachiano, and that of Mary, Darnley, and Bothwell, may well have struck some of Webster’s hearers. It was, as it happens, only a year after Vittoria’s [the historical Vittoria Corombona’s] death that Mary Stuart went to the block at Fotheringay (Feb. 8th 1597).’’23 The ‘‘Deuil Blanc’’ portrait, on display at Windsor Castle and reproduced here (see fig. 2) depicts Mary Stuart in black mourning dress, following the death of her father-in law, Henri II, who died in 1559. Over the blackness, she wears a white veil flowing down from a headpiece. The description in Cust’s edition of her portraits expresses the still sensual nature of Mary’s appearance: ‘‘. . . a white gauze veil completely covers the body from the neck downward. . . . Through the gauze veil can be seen the black dress cut low in the neck and rising in a curve to cover the boson.’’24 Discussions of Mary frequently emphasize her sexuality rather than her grief, as exampled by Cust. Although the ‘‘White Deuil’’ portrait was painted prior to the death of her first husband, the subsequent events from Mary’s life would have been well known at the time of Webster’s 1611 writing. Following within a year of her father-in-law’s death, Mary’s first husband François II died. In 1565, she married Lord Darnley, who was murdered the next year. Soon after, in 1567, Bothwell divorced his wife and married Mary. She was essentially dressed in mourning

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Figure 2. The ‘‘Deuil Blanc’’ portrait of Mary, Queen of Scots by François Clouet, c. 1559–60, reproduced by permission of The Royal Collection 2007 Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.

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from the age of seventeen onward, appearing in widow’s weeds at her second and third marriages. Similarly, Webster’s Vittoria married two men in rapid succession, the first of whom she is accused of murdering. Mary, like Vittoria, is a beautiful, alluring woman, described overwhelmingly in terms of her appearance. English loyalists to Elizabeth may see Mary’s virginally white covering as a way of presenting a false purity or innocence. Neither the character Vittoria nor Queen Mary Stuart is unmistakably either guilty or innocent, although editor David Gunby finds Vittoria’s role in the death of her husband Camillo ‘‘less clear cut’’25 than Mary’s. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, ‘‘the White Devil’’ signified hypocrisy, as shown by Thomas Adams’s 1613 sermon of the same name, discussed in Federick O. Waage’s The White Devil Discover’d.26 Simon Trussler’s commentary in the Methuen Student Edition of the play cites the early modern proverb ‘‘The white devil is worse than the black,’’27 which again draws upon the idea of appearance versus reality that runs through Webster’s characterization of Vittoria. Within these contexts, the term would still apply to Mary Stuart’s and Vittoria’s beautiful exteriors masking disloyal, possibly even murderous wives. At the dramatic center of Webster’s tragedy is a trial scene in which Vittoria is initially to be accused of the murder of her husband. She is the easiest target of Cardinal and prosecutor Monticelso, who admits later that he has no evidence with which to charge Duke Brachiano and her brother Flamineo with (who actually plotted the murder), and thus has to attack Vittoria. Monticelso and Duke Francisco also realize at the outset that they have no evidence that would stand up in court to convict Vittoria of her husband Camillo’s murder (or even participation in his murder). Thus, Monticelso reveals to Francisco before the arraignment that he will charge Vittoria with unchastity, rather than murder. Monticelso later discloses a letter that plots a rendezvous between Brachiano and herself, but as Vittoria says, ‘‘temptation to lust proves not the act.’’28 The reference brings to mind Mary’s first trial, for murder and adultery, with the casket letters used as evidence; these documents supposedly confirmed the Mary Stuart / Bothwell affair, including love letters from Mary to Bothwell. Whether or not they were forgeries or letters between Bothwell and another woman is still debated. Cheryl

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Dudgeon’s research on Arden of Faversham, elsewhere in this volume, shows the slippery nature of evidence in the early modern English courtroom, as testimony and objects carry equal weight against the condemned.29 The evidence in Vittoria’s trial is also only conjecture, as Monticelso admits, For sir you know we have naught but circumstances To charge her with, about her husbands death, Their approbation therefore to the proofes Of her black lust, shall make her infamous To all our neighbouring kingdomes.30

Vittoria’s reputation, like Mary’s, becomes the crucial issue; early modern woman’s honor was demonstrated through chastity, and both females’ reputations are ruined through their trials. Other characters in The White Devil whose guilt is certain, including Vittoria’s brother, are not examined in court. The judge Monticelso finds Vittoria guilty of adultery, the conclusion already evident from the onset of the kangaroo-court hearing. However, Vittoria never admits to or repents of her crime, thus negating, in her case, the title of her place of incarceration, the ‘‘house of penitent whores.’’ Foucault’s discussion of European legal proceedings in Discipline and Punish concludes that one of the most critical aspects of the trial and subsequent sentencing is the admission and remorse of the accused, with the goal of deterring spectators from committing a similar offence. The confession, real or not, was the goal of torture, whether physical or presented through the penal system.31 Vittoria’s insistent refusal to admit guilt, despite her questioners’ desire to force a confession from her, frustrates the attempt once again to force her into submission and use her as a negative example. In fact, the arraignment ends with Vittoria having the last word in her own defense, calling upon her ‘‘Womans poore revenge / Which dwels but in the tongue.’’ In opposition to the many contemporary pamphlets on gender expectations that tell women to remain silent, reinforcing meekness and passivity as feminine virtues, Vittoria speaks out. Writes Gayle Greene: ‘‘her heroism represents the very antithesis of the Renaissance ideal of woman: disobedient, defiant of convention, sexual, subversive, she displays the assertion rather than the subordination of self.’’32 Vittoria argues with and

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questions the prosecution lawyer and judge, deconstructing their case, their mode of rhetoric, and their legal proceedings. Says Mukherji, ‘‘by making fun of the lawyer and exposing the rhetorical strategies of her prosecutor Monticelso, Vittoria at once relocates legal procedure in artifice and turns the traditional hierarchy upside down by claiming the superior role of rhetoric for her own affective defence plea.’’33 Finally, in her breathtakingly dramatic ending speech, she eliminates her accusers’ power over her by re-visioning her punishment. In reply to her sentence at the ‘‘house of convertites,’’ she declares, It shall not be a house of convertites— My minde shall make it honester to mee Then the Popes Pallace, and more peaceable Then thy soule, though thou art a Cardinall— Know this, and let it somewhat raise your spight, Through darkenesse Diamonds spred their ritchest light.34

Sentenced to a ‘‘house of penitent whores,’’ echoing the cries against Mary at her execution to ‘‘kill the whore,’’ Vittoria heroically stands up to her accusers as the character stands before the play’s audience. The Vittoria Corombona / Mary Stuart figure is ultimately not condemned for flaunting social constraints, but neither is she cleared of the charges. This climactic moment is repeated once more, at the end of the play, with Vittoria’s death scene. This portion of act 5, scene 6, aptly complements the arraignment scene, as the resolve and unwavering strength she shows in court is borne out when put to the test. Her actions under extreme circumstances demonstrate even more graphically this time Vittoria’s courage, as she is sentenced not to a house of penitent whores, but to death. As Lodovico and Gasparo come as executioners for her, she repeats her courtroom resolve not to ‘‘call up one poore teare,’’35 and commands them to kill her before they murder her servant Zanche. Unlike the courtroom exit, though, she now provokes a response from one of the witnesses, her brother Flamineo. Echoing the actions of Mary’s illegitimate brother James, Flamineo has sought to raise his position through plotting to have his sister marry a higher noble, but here Flamineo repents, applauding the ability, at least, that Vittoria has to cover her dark deeds with a white veil:

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Know many glorious woeman that are fam’d For masculine vertue, have bin vitious, Onely a happier silence did betyde them. Shee hath no faults, who hath the art to hide them.36

Throughout the courtroom scene, Webster has provided both stage and actual audience the opportunity to evaluate Vittoria’s charges and her behavior, both in words and actions. The play provides a forum for reevaluation of Mary as well. If she is ‘‘the white devil,’’ she has also shown herself as a strong woman and has been treated unjustly. Vittoria’s cry in The White Devil: ‘‘A rape, a rape! . . . Yes, you have ravisht justice, forc’t her to do your pleasure’’37 seems to both echo Mary’s case and sound through the trial scenes in the subsequent plays.

The Duchess of Malfi and the Danger of Remarriage In Webster’s 1613 tragedy The Duchess of Malfi, a female ruler decides to remarry despite her family’s orders. She chooses her household steward, paralleling Mary’s supposed dalliance with her secretary David Rizzio. Some twentieth-century literary commentators censure the Duchess’s actions for weakening her power to rule by marrying Antonio,38 as current historicists criticize Mary for committing political suicide through her amores. In the opening of The Duchess of Malfi, Antonio applauds the French court (from which Mary has descended) as a model of rule and integrity. The Duchess dares to see her personal life as political, as Mary Stuart was accused of doing, and is executed by the henchman of her threatened brother, paralleling at several levels those who would control Mary. Foremost is Mary’s bastard half-brother James, who bears striking resemblances to Ferdinand, as seen in The Historie of the Life and Death of Mary Stuart Queene of Scotland, London 1624. Mary’s half-brother James at first agreed with her decision to marry Darnley, as he thought he was pliable and ‘‘would be ruled by him in all things. Yet when hee saw the Queene to love Darly exceedingly, and he himself to grow out of her favour, hee repented him of his counsell hee had given, and willed Queene Elizabeth to hinder her mariage by one meanes or other.’’39 James desired to become king himself, invoking

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Knox’s injunction against female rulers. He wanted his sister to remain single to keep her husband from attaining power, much as Ferdinand does in The Duchess of Malfi. When the Duchess tries to make her own way by ‘‘going into a wildernesse,’’40 as she terms it in act 1, she is caught, sentenced, and executed. The heroine’s covert remarriage and motherhood presents a challenge to her brothers. She has ventured outside the rigid barriers that they have imposed on her, and now faces retribution, beginning with a peculiarly twisted trial presided over by Ferdinand and his henchman Bosola. Gayle Greene accurately observes that Bosola ‘‘kills the Duchess in a spirit of fascination, almost of scientific inquiry, testing, probing, observing her reactions. . . . he must push her to extremity, to the limit and beyond, to be sure of her mettle.’’41 The final verdict of the play depends upon the Duchess’s response to this testing, and, subjected to inhumane treatment, she bears up extraordinarily well. Subjected to visions of her dead husband and children, (a remembrance of Darnley’s murder of Rizzio before Mary’s eyes) a dead man’s hand, madmen who berate women, Bosola’s cynicism, and finally the sight of her own coffin and executioners, she refuses, like her Websterian sister Vittoria, to capitulate to the torturer. The Duchess does not admit her ‘‘guilt’’ or confess to having committed a crime, thus thwarting the apparent purpose of Ferdinand’s weird pseudo-judicial machinations. Her trial recreates elements of the trials and execution of Mary, who stands firm in her innocence of murder, adultery, and treason. In fact, her brother Ferdinand’s reaction after the execution provides a dramatic foil for the Duchess’s fortitude. When he sees the results of his orders, in the eyes of his dead sister, he denies his guilt and responsibility, and goes mad, thinking he is a wolf. Most tellingly, Ferdinand recognizes that justice has not been served by the Duchess’s death, as he condemns Bosola for carrying out the sentence that he himself has ordered. The Duchess’s execution in act 4 leaves a final act for the consequences. Without her as the moral center, chaos ensues, as both guilty (Ferdinand, the Cardinal, Bosola as henchman and revenger) and innocent (Antonio, Julia, and Bosola as penitent) are killed. The audience sees the wrongness of her death reinforced, and the final movement ties together her unjust murder with Mary Stuart’s. Webster most significantly altered his source material to allow the

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Duchess’s eldest son by Antonio to inherit the dukedom, rather than her son from her first marriage. Mary’s supposed lover Rizzio was rumored the biological father of James I, showing the dangerous power of woman to create havoc with noble lineage. Unions regarded as unequal, morally suspect, and foolish by the play’s characters and the detractors of Mary produce the heir to power, either fictionally, in The Duchess of Malfi, or speculatively, in Mary Stuart’s case.

The Devil’s Lawcase and the Bounds of Legitimacy Webster’s 1623 tragicomedy The Devil’s Lawcase focuses on widow Leonora declaring her son Romelio illegitimate in court in order to void his inheritance and remove his Machiavellian control over her. The Mary/James issue comes to the forefront again in this play dealing with issues of legitimacy. Romelio perceives correctly that his mother’s suit springs from the motive of revenge and not her purported desire for repentance, as he is aware of Leonora’s knowledge of his attempt to murder her beloved, Contarino. Obviously the devil named in the play’s title, Leonora is humiliated and chastised in the outcome of the court trial, as her deception comes to light. However, in the overall play, she is exonerated and her son punished. Webster’s moral viewpoint throughout his canon continually engages in slippage: the females are not neatly tied to convention in terms of sexual behavior, plot action, or play outcome, with the plays reversing audience expectations. The remainder of The Devil’s Lawcase does not condemn Leonora, as, instead of living out the rest of her life in a convent, as she initially plans for her penitence, she wins the man she wishes to remarry. From Contarino’s statement to Leonora that to this ‘‘deare Lady, I have entirely vowed my life,’’ we surmise that she has ended up with him as a husband. Instead of condemnation for her lawsuit, she gains exactly what she wants. The message this result sends to the play’s audience is inestimable, for instead of being condemned for her crimes against the home and State, Leonora fares better than her son, who is forced to marry a nun he has impregnated, to prevent the production of a bastard. The play links the courtroom events to the dangers of female authority and the topic of legitimacy, as Romelio says

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this suite of hers Springs from a devillish malice, and her pretence, Of a grieved Conscience, and Religion, Like to the horrid Powder-Treason in England, Has a most bloody unnaturall revenge Hid under it: Oh the violencies of women!42

The reference to the Gunpowder Plot of 1605 seems a jarring allusion in the midst of the courtroom scene. Yet at stake in the incident was the matter of legitimacy—the Gunpowder Plot supporters argued that James was not the rightful heir to the throne of England. The topical allusion is apropos for Webster’s court trial concerning the issue of bastardy and a woman’s power to declare her son illegitimate. F. L. Lucas goes to some length ferreting out details about Thomas Percy and his desire for ‘‘private vendetta’’ which might be alluded to in Romelio’s mention of ‘‘a devillish malice.’’43 However, he makes no mention of the appropriateness of the event to the action of the play. The Gunpowder Plot represents the potentialities of the English people to declare their son/husband/father James illegitimate, voiding his claim to the throne. James took special pains to emphasize that his power did not under any circumstance stem from the English people, to avoid the possibilities of just such an event from occurring. In his work that outlined his conception of his own absolute authority, The True Lawe of Free Monarchies, James states that a king ‘‘by byrth, not by any right in the coronation, commeth to his crowne; it is a like unlawfull . . . to displace him that succeedeth thereto, as to eject the former.’’44 Yet, if his birth is not legitimate, as the danger is enacted in this play, James’s absolutist rhetoric and rule is invalidated. James I’s right to rule, his mother’s claim to the throne, her marriages, and her execution are all on trial, as issues of legitimacy circulate, moving from the drama of the events to the drama on stage.

Conclusions In 1612, James I moved his mother’s body to Westminster Abbey from its original entombment in Peterborough Cathedral.45 The new marble monument both honored his mother and placed her in the same chamber as her arch rival, Queen Elizabeth, for the centu-

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ries to come, renewing the image of Mary for older citizens and introducing it to a new generation of Londoners. The action showed that Mary was never far from her son’s remembrance; whether for ill or good, reopening her resting place reanimated her story for the English people. Her trials had concluded with her sentence overturned, on one hand, as her elaborate new monument, in which she is piously presented in prayer, properly honored the mother of a king. Yet on the other hand, her death allowed her son to reign, assured of no competition from her. Webster most strikingly re-presents the complexities of Mary Stuart after her son’s succession. Through placing females on trial, highlighting their sexuality, showing remarriage as dangerous, and even invoking incestuous desires of male relatives that represent rigid control of lineage, the works re-create and call into question Mary, her trials, her affairs, her imprisonment, and ultimately, her execution. They negotiate the dangerous territory between exonerating Mary, on one hand, and thus invalidating Elizabeth’s rule, and condemning her, on the other, and invalidating James’s inheritance. The works raise potentially subversive questions. Could The Duchess of Malfi be showing James I’s relation to his mother as mirroring Ferdinand’s who, seeing himself in his sister, wants to control her to assure his legitimacy? A famous mother/son portrait of Mary and James shows them as virtually identical, as Jonathan Goldberg remarks, ‘‘this picture conveys hauntingly the son as mirror of his mother . . . At best, he is his mother’s equal, but the double portrait suggests that equality is achieved by reproduction, literally and figuratively.’’46 This duality echoes Ferdinand’s proclamation upon gazing into the dead eyes of the Duchess: ‘‘She, and I were Twinnes’’ (4.2.284), and his obsession with the purity of his bloodline. Similarly, does The Devil’s Lawcase show an attempted revenge on James by Mary, in payback for his complicity in her execution? Ultimately, though, the unruly Marys, that is, the female characters enacting her trials, are silenced and eliminated, and the questions of the plays and their subversive potentials are contained. The topic of Mary Stuart is raised in Elizabethan plays and explored in Jacobean dramas, culminating in the trial scenes of John Webster’s plays. Mary provides a focal point for anxieties about James’s succession, who, however, continued to rule, both because of, and in spite of, his mother.

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Notes 1. Lilian Winstanley, Macbeth, King Lear, & Contemporary History (Folcroft, PA: Folcroft Press, 1969), 3. 2. Leah S. Marcus, Puzzling Shakespeare: local reading and its discontents (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988), 1. 3. Stephen Greenblatt, Shakespearean Negotiations: the circulation of social energy in Renaissance England (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988), 1–20. 4. Lisa Hopkins, Writing Renaissance Queens: Texts by and about Elizabeth I and Mary, Queen of Scots (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 2002). 5. James Emerson Phillips, Images of a Queen; Mary Stuart in Sixteenth-Century Literature (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1964). 6. Jayne Elizabeth Lewis, Mary Queen of Scots (London: Routledge, 1998), 53–56. 7. See Linda Woodbridge, Women and the English Renaissance (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1984), and Suzanne W. Hull, Chaste, Silent and Obedient: English Books for Women 1475–1640 (San Marino: Huntington Library Press, 1982). 8. Marvin A. Breslow, ed., The Political Writings of John Knox (Cranbury, NJ: Associated University Presses, 1985), 57. 9. Ibid., 66. 10. George Buchanan, De Maria Scotorum regina. English trans. A detection of the actions of Mary Queen of Scots (London: 1689), 43. 11. Phillips, Images of a Queen, 46. 12. Richard Crompton, A short declaration of the ende of traytors and false conspirators against the state (London: 1587), D1v. 13. Winstanley, Macbeth, King Lear, & Contemporary History. 14. Elizabeth Mazzola, ‘‘ ‘O Unityng Confounding’: Elizabeth I, Mary Stuart, and the Matrix of Renaissance Gender,’’ in Exemplaria 12.2 (2000): 399–406. 15. Hopkins, Writing Renaissance Queens, 110–11. 16. Cyrus Hoy, Introductions, notes, and commentaries to texts in The Dramatic Works of Thomas Dekker, Volume 2 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979), 304. 17. Ralph Berry, The Art of John Webster (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972), 168. 18. Dena Goldberg, Between Worlds: A Study of the Plays of John Webster (Waterloo, ON: Wilfred Laurier University Press, 1987). 19. I began my research on Webster and the Law in graduate school (see Carol Blessing, Women and the Law in the Plays of John Webster, PhD diss., University of California at Riverside, 1991). Since then, the field has increased dramatically, most notably with the works of Lorna Hutson, including ‘‘Rethinking the ‘Spectacle of the Scaffold’: Juridical Epistemologies and English Revenge Tragedy,’’ Representations 89 (2005): 30–60, and the volume by Subha Mukherji, Law and Representation in Early Modern Drama (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006). 20. Ibid., 104. 21. Lisa Klotz, ‘‘Grammatical Laments and Feminine Arguments: Judging Vittoria in The White Devil,’’ (Paper presented at Shakespeare Association of American Seminar on Staging Justice, Philadelphia, PA. April, 13–16, 2006). 22. Lorna Hutson, ‘‘Rethinking the ‘Spectacle of the Scaffold’: Juridical Epistemologies and English Revenge Tragedy.’’

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23. F. L. Lucas, ed., The Complete Works of John Webster, vols. 1 and 2 (London: Chatto and Windus, 1927; Rpt. New York: Gordian Press, 1966), vol. 1, 96. 24. Lionel Cust, Notes on the authentic portraits of Mary, Queen of Scots (London: J. Murray, 1903), 26. 25. David Gunby, ‘‘Critical Introduction’’ in The Works of John Webster, vol. 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 59. 26. Frederick O. Waage, The White Devil Discover’d (New York: Peter Lang, 1984), 139–46. 27. Simon Trussler, ‘‘Commentary’’ in The White Devil (London: Methuen London Limited, 1986), xxviii. 28. John Webster, The White Devil, Edited by F. L. Lucas (London: Chatto and Windus 1927; rpt. New York: Gordian Press, 1966, vol. 1), 3.2.207. References are to act, scene, and line. 29. Cheryl Dudgeon, ‘‘Forensic Performances: Evidentiary Narrative in Arden of Faversham,’’ Justice, Women and Power in English Renaissance Drama (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2008). 30. Ibid., 3.1.4–8. 31. Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish, (New York: Vintage Books, 1979), 36–44. 32. Gayle Greene, ‘‘Women on Trial in Shakespeare and Webster: ‘The Mettle of [their] Sex,’ ’’ Topic: 36, The Elizabethan Woman, Fall 1982, 5–19, 15. 33. Mukherji, Law and Representation in Early Modern Drama, 5. 34. Webster, The White Devil, 3.2.300–306. 35. Ibid., 3.2.296. 36. Ibid., 5.6.241–47. 37. Ibid., 3.2.285–86. 38. Joyce E. Peterson, Curs’d Example: The Duchess of Malfi and Commonweal Tragedy (University of Missouri Press, 1978), 78; Clifford Leech, John Webster: A Critical Study (London: Hogarth Press, 1951), 72; Gunnar Boklund, The Duchess of Malfi: Sources, Themes, Characters (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1962), 89. 39. William Camden, Annales rerum Anglicarum et Hibernicarum regnante Elizabetha, English trans., The historie of the life and death of Mary Stuart Queene of Scotland (London: 1624), 32. 40. John Webster, The Duchess of Malfi, edited by F. L. Lucas (London: Chatto and Windus 1927; rpt. New York: Gordian Press, 1966, vol. 2), 1.1.404. References are to act, scene, and line. 41. Greene, ‘‘Women on Trial,’’ 16. 42. John Webster, The Devils Law-Case, edited by F. L. Lucas (London: Chatto and Windus 1927; rpt. New York: Gordian Press, 1966, vol. 2), 4.2.321–26. 43. Lucas, Complete Works of John Webster, vol. 2, 353n. 44. James I, The True Lawe of Free Monarchies (London, 1603), N. pag. 45. Phillips, Images of a Queen, 226. 46. Jonathan Goldberg, James I and the politics of literature: Jonson, Shakespeare, Donne, and their contemporaries (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1983), 14.

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Forensic Performances: Evidentiary Narrative in Arden of Faversham Cheryl Dudgeon

DOMESTIC

TRAGEDIES THAT TAKE THEIR INSPIRATION FROM ACTUAL

crimes such as the anonymous Arden of Faversham (c. 1590) dramatize forensic inquiry and evidence-based narrative elements. The account in Holinshed’s Chronicles of the murder of the historical Arden of Faversham committed in 1551 furnished the Arden dramatist with the basic plot for the play: Arden is murdered in his own house, and the crime is instigated by his wife Alice and her lover Mosby. Holinshed’s version of the Arden story includes a vast array of evidentiary details generated to induce belief in the minds of readers as to the guilt of the murderers. Part of the appeal of Arden for those interested in the field of law and drama is the manner in which the playwright grants complexity to the representation of evidence and its interpretation in scenes of forensic investigation and household life. Adeptly exploring both Alice’s desire for Mosby and Arden’s roles as greedy landowner, husband, and head of household, the Arden dramatist creates a representation of the crime (and its domestic scene) that is socially and locally contextualized. Recent scholarship has highlighted the workings of evidence in early modern drama; however, Arden has not been at the center of these analyses.1 This essay explores the construction, interpretation and gendering of evidence in Arden.2 Arden dramatizes the intersection of two categories of evidence that today would be called testimonial and real. Real evidence is a legal term of art used to refer to material objects produced for inspection by a forensic tribunal. This category of evidence includes the physical appearance of a corpse or crime scene, weapons, blood, and bodily imprints. Arden’s preoccupation with real evidence casts it as integral to the play’s representation of forensic inquiry; yet, at the time of Arden’s composition, England did not yet have a stable body of evidentiary law, and devel98

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oping legal conceptions of evidence did not clearly distinguish between testimonial evidence and the evidence produced by objects themselves.3 Ian Hacking submits that in the period, ‘‘testimony and authority were primary, and things could count as evidence only insofar as they resembled the witness of observers and the authority of books.’’4 Hacking does not deny that Renaissance jurors were able to draw inferences from objects; however, he maintains that contemporary descriptions of this practice do not fit neatly into modern evidentiary categories. It is my suggestion that Arden underscores the manipulable and often indistinct quality of evidentiary categories in the early modern period: in legal settings, real evidence could be made visible by means of the actual production of the material object in question; however, the intervention of accompanying witness testimony makes it difficult to conclude that an item had probative value as evidence in and of itself. In Arden, it is narrative that renders the representations of real evidence intelligible, as characters intervene and construct stories about the objects that they use or refer to. Real evidence often slips into testimonial evidence; the evidentiary force of objects placed before the senses of the characters is dependent upon narrative to disclose but also to withhold information regarding the discovery of criminal acts. Ultimately, Arden suggests that the generation of all evidence in the play requires interpretation. The play’s focus on material objects of evidence raises interesting questions about its staging. We know very little about how Arden was staged in the early modern period, and we cannot state with certainty which stage properties would have been visible to early modern spectators.5 For example, while stage blood may have been used in early modern performances of Arden, it is possible that its presence may have been evoked primarily through dramatic dialogue. The staging of the play in the period may well have, at times, blurred the distinction between testimony and object of evidence, indicating that evidence did not always concern observables. In order to gain insight into the developing legal conception of evidence in law in the early modern period, literary and legal scholars have turned to classical writing. Classical treatises of forensic rhetoric influenced Renaissance English legal concepts closely allied with the subject of evidence in law such as proof, suspicion, probability, and the credibility of witnesses.6 Recent work on the relationship between law and drama by Subha Mukherji and Lorna

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Hutson shows that the rhetorics acquired a broader sphere of influence because of the impact they had on techniques used by dramatists.7 The rhetorics consider the questions of how material objects figure as instruments of proof, and to what extent they facilitate a movement from ignorance to knowledge (Aristotle’s anagnorisis or ‘‘recognition’’).8 In Aristotle’s treatises, the classification of the means of recognitions and proofs is hierarchical, and physical proofs, signs or tokens, are inferior to all others. As Subha Mukherji explains, ‘‘The best methods are ‘probable incidents’ and the worst are ‘inartistic’, where the signs are material objects—‘the artifice of signs and necklaces’. This corresponds to the hierarchy of proofs in the Rhetoric . . . here, the best proofs are entechnic or artistic, constituted by probabilities; the worst are ta semia or atechnic, material signs divorced from rhetorical demonstration.’’9 While Aristotle evaluates signs as inferior in his classification, scholars note the presence of ambivalence in the manner in which he deals with signs. In the context of outlining the disagreement among classicists about whether real evidence was presented to the senses of Athenian juries without accompanying witness testimony, Kathy Eden demonstrates that in the Rhetoric, Aristotle does ‘‘take account of the enormous psychagogic power of objects . . . such as the clothing of the victim, exhibited directly before the eyes of the jury.’’10 Mukherji shows how Aristotle cannot distance himself completely from the force of signs: drawing our attention to Aristotle’s consideration of the marvellous in the Poetics, she argues that he ‘‘makes a narrative handling of improbables rather like a recognition through semia.’’11 Material signs, Mukherji contends, are not ‘‘free of rhetoric.’’12 Proof in Aristotle is essential both to trial procedure and the composition of literary tragedy. The influence of Aristotle’s hierarchy of proofs can be discerned in the English common law distinction between direct and indirect proof at law; however, this distinction was still developing in the early modern period.13 In this paper, part of my task is to explore how material items of evidence in Arden become caught up in characters’ narration. The dramatization of real evidence in the play indicates that narrative imbues it with probative value. In the play’s implication that an object unmediated by the force of narrative may not, in and of itself, constitute sufficient proof, we see the influence of the Aristotelian hierarchy with its declaration of the inferiority of signs. Indeed, signs and tokens in Arden are often simultaneously embedded in legal and providential narra-

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tives, and this dramatic strategy points to the constructedness of evidence. My own focus on real evidence owes much to Lorna Hutson’s admirable scholarship on the contribution of judicial narratio to the mimesis of Renaissance drama, and in particular, to her discussion of the capacity of narratio to produce fact.14 In the course of outlining some characteristics of judicial narrative, Hutson argues that ‘‘the coherence of judicial narratio is linked to the ways in which circumstances and motives might be thought to knit together, and that this coherence, in turn, renders intelligible a set of facts that are themselves incoherent: generated by dispute over facts, narrative is what produces the facts as facts, so to speak.’’15 The way in which real evidence is bound up with narrative in Arden exposes what Hutson’s analysis demonstrates—that proof is a process. In this essay, I will turn first to Franklin’s tale to Arden in scene 9 of the play and explore how it sets the stage for Arden’s focus on evidence-based narrative elements. Shrouded in uncertainty, Franklin’s account of a wife on trial for an unspecified crime foregrounds the adduction of evidence against the accused, evidence that includes witness testimony and a glove. The images that Franklin’s tale evokes demonstrate that the glove is anchored in linguistic narrative. Second, I analyze the workings of evidence in Arden alongside two other literary texts: the report of ‘‘The Trial of Anne Turner, Widow, at the King’s-bench, for the Murder of Sir Thomas Overbury’’ (1615); and a murder pamphlet by Henry Goodcole entitled ‘‘Heaven’s Speedie Hue and Cry Sent After Lust and Murther’’ (1635). These texts are apt accompaniments to Arden precisely because they deal with women’s involvement in murder and provide examples of the manner in which women’s sexuality is deemed relevant to evidentiary considerations. The representations of evidence, especially the material objects of evidence, exhibit a reliance on narrative and imply that knowledge derived from sight may be limited. Finally, I return to Arden’s epilogue and read the representation of title character’s bodily imprint as an example of impression evidence that dramatizes the co-existence of supernatural and empirical evidence in the early modern period. Read alongside the play, the imprint’s spatial manifestation comments on the construction of evidence by inclusion and exclusion in forensic investigation. I will begin my reading of Arden by considering a scene that makes interpretation its very subject, and thus begins to draw out the investigative quality of the drama. While walking to Rainham Down in

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scene 9 of the play, Arden urges his friend Franklin to continue telling the ‘‘pretty tale’’ that he began to ‘‘beguile the weary way’’ (9.92).16 Franklin’s tale is noteworthy both because of the manner in which it is told and its legal content: characterized by instances of abruption, the tale highlights the process of narrative production as it thematizes evidentiary matters and the validity of proof. Figured by Arden as a pleasant diversion, Franklin’s tale is a unique point of departure into an exploration of the way that the play exhibits a preoccupation with the generation and construction of evidence, along with the act of witnessing. Franklin, it seems, has trouble telling his tale, and he explains to Arden that, ‘‘A heavy blood is gathered at [his] heart, / And on the sudden is [his] wind so short / As hindereth the passage of [his] speech’’ (9.64–66). Franklin’s frequent shortness of breath suggests that the telling of tales takes a physical toll. Arden, intent upon hearing the rest of the tale, attempts to discount Franklin’s health concerns saying, ‘‘The annoyance of the dust or else some meat / You ate at dinner cannot brook with you. / I have been often so and soon amended’’ (9.69–71). He then reminds Franklin that he should resume his tale at the point in which ‘‘the gentleman did check his wife’’ (9.73). Interestingly, neither Arden nor the readers or spectators of the drama are privy to Franklin’s whole tale. The play’s context makes clear that Arden has heard the tale’s opening; however, when Franklin’s lack of breath causes him to leave the tale uncompleted (9.89–90), Arden can only wish that Franklin ‘‘were in a state to tell it out’’ (9.93). Audience members are similarly denied the tale’s ending; yet, they are also plunged into the tale in medias res: initially, all that the audience can be certain of is that the tale concerns a gentleman and his wife. The gaps that the audience experiences as a result of the playwright’s structuring of this scene underscore the investigative quality of the drama that results from the way in which characters and the dramatist offer and withhold meaning. Having been reassured of Arden’s desire for the resumption of the tale, Franklin reveals its content in a terse fashion: She, being reprehended for the fact, Witness produced that took her with the deed, Her glove brought in which there she left behind,

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And many other assured arguments, Her husband asked her whether it were not so. (9.74–78)

The episode concerns a wife on trial, although the forum in which the confrontation takes place is not clear. The gentleman, her husband and perhaps her accuser, reproves her for an unspecified crime or ‘‘fact.’’ Franklin’s earlier comment that ‘‘women will be false and wavering’’ taken with the play’s theme of sexual betrayal work to persuade the audience that the wife stands accused of adultery (1.21). In A Culture of Fact, Barbara Shapiro explores the role of ‘‘fact’’ in English intellectual and cultural development during the early modern period, and her argument that ‘‘fact in a legal context . . . did not mean an established truth but an alleged act whose occurrence was in contention’’ is of particular relevance here.17 Fact requires proof; yet, Franklin’s narration offers only the briefest examples of the adduction of testimonial and real evidence: an unspecified ‘‘witness’’ has caught the wife in the act, and a glove (that Franklin identifies as hers) is produced. Franklin’s phrasing implicates the wife even further: his suggestion that she left the glove behind may indicate that she did so willingly, figuring the glove as a token or sign of sexual exchange, and his submission that many other ‘‘assured arguments’’ or evidences were brought in appears to solidify the case against her. According to Franklin’s account, the glove, the real evidence, is not shown to the unspecified decision makers in isolation but in connection with other proofs. The glove’s embedment in narrative is highlighted by the position it occupies in Franklin’s narrative sequence; he refers to the glove after he mentions the production of witness testimony and before he mentions the other ‘‘assured arguments.’’ Franklin’s tale claims to account for the evidence, and it implies that the glove, in conjunction with other testimonial evidence, points to the wife’s guilt. Any suspense that might result from the last line of this segment of the tale appears to be contained: despite the vagueness of the proof that Franklin recounts, the manner in which he crafts the question that the husband asks the wife appears to leave her little room to submit a persuasive defense—indeed, it is designed to lead her to answer in the affirmative. The structure of Franklin’s tale coupled with the terse and fragmentary manner in which he tells it encourages audience members

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and readers to reconstruct the plot of the tale and reconsider interpretive possibilities as new elements come into play. Arden immediately desires that Franklin reveal the wife’s answer; yet, he is also drawn to ask about her demeanor and ‘‘how she looked / Having forsworn [the deed] with such vehement oaths, / And at the instant so approved upon her’’ (9.79–81). While Arden has heard an account of the wife’s protestations, readers have not. As Arden shifts the focus to the wife’s appearance, he registers the significance of one particularly compelling quality of attestation—the legal requirement that it occur in the moment. Arden wants to know how the wife looked as she was denying the accusations made against her at the very ‘‘instant’’ that they proved (in his judgement) the case against her. Perhaps it is helpful to recall Derrida here: to testify, according to Derrida in Demeure: Fiction and Testimony, is ‘‘always on the one hand to do it at present.’’18 The instant, he argues, makes testimony possible; ‘‘for testimony, there must be the instant.’’19 On the other hand, Derrida suggests that this condition of possibility is destroyed by the testimony itself: ‘‘What I say for the first time, if it is a testimony, is already a repetition, at least a repeatability; it is already an iterability.’’20 Can Arden’s desire for an account of the ‘‘instant’’ be linked to a theatergoer’s desire to experience the play in the moment, the present? A theatergoer experiences the performance in the instant; yet, like the testimony that is ‘‘already an iterability,’’ the performance of the play is (usually) repeated more than once. For Derrida, testimony is an ‘‘offering.’’ The performance of a theater actor, I suggest, is also a present act, an offering.21 Franklin’s description of the wife’s appearance while testifying figures her as a performer: First did she cast her eyes down to the earth, Watching the drops that fell amain from thence; Then softly draws she forth her handkerchief, And modestly she wipes her tear stained face; Then hemmed she out, to clear her voice should seem, And with a majesty addressed herself To encounter all their accusations. (9.82–88)

Those who know the play will recall Alice Arden’s many testimonial performances: Frances Dolan highlights several cases in which Alice

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‘‘play[s] the abused wife,’’ for example, by telling Greene that she has endured ‘‘forward looks,’’ ‘‘hard words,’’ and ‘‘blows’’ from Arden (1.494–95).22 Recounting the wife’s gestures as an apparently seamless theatrical exercise, Franklin unfolds the drama of the scene bit by bit; however, just as the wife is about to dispute the allegations against her, Franklin breaks off the narrative denying Arden and the audience the satisfaction of an ending—the wife’s verbal defense remains untellable. The abruption exposes the notion that narrative production is a process; Franklin has constructed his tale selectively, and the performance that the audience is witnessing is Franklin’s narration. Arousing anxiety about interpretation, the desire for proof and women’s public speech, the incomplete tale asks readers to arrive at a judgement of the wife’s case at a moment too early in the forensic process, before all the evidence has been brought in. Is the wife guilty? Is she credible? Is the evidence indeterminate? The tale exposes the constructed quality of the law’s reliance on sequentiality to effect a precise unfolding of a case or evidentiary narrative to facilitate reasoning that leads to efficacious judgment. From the perspective of audience members, any movement from knowledge to judgment is hindered because they do not know the whole story. By including in the play the scene in which Franklin tells his tale, the Arden dramatist raises the question of how one can ever know the whole story. The final scenes of Arden enact a pre-trial investigation of Arden’s murder as undertaken by the characters of the Mayor of Faversham and Franklin. While the role of the mayor may seem unusual—he announces the criminals’ sentences and sends them to execution— John Langbein documents the existence of Mayor’s Courts. In Prosecuting Crime in the Renaissance, Langbein explains that ‘‘Elizabethan borough charters contained a usual clause . . . which makes the Mayor and some of the Aldermen Justices of the Peace, and gives the Borough the power of holding sessions of the peace.’’23 What is more interesting, though, than asking whether the Arden dramatist portrayed the mayor in accordance with contemporary legal practice is the effect of the role of Arden’s friend, Franklin, in the investigatory process. Here, for a moment, I turn to the work of Lorna Hutson in ‘‘Rethinking the ‘Spectacle of the Scaffold’: Juridical Epistemologies and English Revenge Tragedy.’’ Critiquing the application of Foucauldian analyses to the interpretation of English Renaissance drama, Hutson contends that such an approach leaves no

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room ‘‘for any understanding of the working of criminal justice as being thought of historically, as a communal responsibility dependent upon lay investigation and lay participation in judgment.’’24 In the character of Franklin, especially, Arden conveys the idea of participatory justice. Franklin’s tale to Arden in scene 9 of the play challenges the audience to supply missing details as it unfolds—the content of the wife’s testimony, for example. The audience cannot say with certainty who is guilty in Franklin’s tale. Arden’s murder, however, is another story. The murder in the play is staged, and the audience knows which characters are implicated. Spectators approach the representation of evidence in the play’s final scenes with the knowledge that certain characters are guilty. Alice fraudulently asserts to the investigators that the blood they observe is ‘‘pig’s blood’’ (14.389) or ‘‘wine’’ (14.403). Read in the context of her persistent calls for the mayor and Franklin to ‘‘Find out the murderers’’ (14.381, 390), Alice’s failed attempts to render the evidence, the blood, legible by anchoring it in her own linguistic narrative casts her testimonial speech as a desperate rhetorical performance. As I will argue, it is narrative that renders real evidence intelligible in Arden, and evidence, along Quintilian lines, is ‘‘that which emerges from the skilful narration of disputed facts in such a way as to make them seem coherent.’’25 Alice’s unskilled narration at this point in which she fails to make the evidence intelligible in the investigatory setting reveals that evidence is a construct. Recognition in Arden is inevitable (early modern spectators would have been aware of the outcome of the case); yet, the dramatization of forensic inquiry is engaging nonetheless. As Catherine Richardson argues, ‘‘the discovery of the clues is an immensely satisfying narrative scheme for an audience used to such a process of revelation, and translated into a theatrical device it has the additional power of emphatic reiteration: the understanding of the characters eventually, and against all the odds, becomes equal to that of the privileged audience.’’26 Franklin’s forensic investigation produces a vast array of real evidence that eventually persuades him to reveal Alice (firstly) to be one of Arden’s murderers. The final scenes of the play focus on bringing Arden’s corpse ‘‘into visibility.’’27 Arden’s murdered body is embedded in both legal and providential narratives, and its evidentiary force is, to a large extent, dependent upon these narratives. The Arden dramatist’s concentration on the dynamism of the title-

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character’s corpse ensures that it exceeds categorization as a static ‘‘emblem’’ of instruction under both narrative regimes.28 After Arden is murdered, his corpse is inscribed in the evidentiary legal narrative referred to as the chain of custody. This narrative sequence includes references to specific locations and ‘‘track[s] when, where and to whom the control of the body is relinquished.’’29 Initially, Alice tells Black Will and Shakebag to ‘‘lay the body in the countinghouse’’ (14.248).30 After viewing the corpse, Alice asks Susan to help her ‘‘lift [Arden’s] body forth’’ (14.331). When Michael brings the news that ‘‘the mayor and all the watch / Are coming towards [the] house with glaives and bills’’ (14.340–41), Alice directs Greene to ‘‘convey the body to the fields’’ (14.350). Finally, Franklin announces that Arden has been found and that he lies behind the Abbey, murdered, in the ‘‘most piteous case’’ (14.377–78). Like a stage property, Arden’s corpse is placed in motion via its handling by the actors as they desperately try to hide it. The legal evidentiary value of Arden’s corpse, its identity as the murdered body of Arden, is dependent upon its inscription in the chain of custody as presented in the play. Moreover, the narrative sequence maps out which characters are implicated in criminal acts. The chain of custody also has a retrospective aspect, as the play demonstrates. The goal of the retrospective process is to ensure that the investigators (or coronors) view and receive the body in its ‘‘originary’’ state.31 The presence of footprints in the snow allows Franklin to deduce that Arden ‘‘was murdered in [the] house / And carried to the fields’’ (14.93–94), but it is the presence of trace evidence that allows him to pinpoint the exact location of the murder: Franklin says, ‘‘in his slipshoe did I find some rushes / Which argueth he was murdered in this room’’ (14.399–400). The playwright’s inclusion of the detail of the propensity of plant material to linger on a corpse is one of the ‘‘police-court details’’ that Alexander Leggatt argues contributes to the drama’s ‘‘realism.’’32 Rushes, as trace evidence, only possess evidentiary force ‘‘within the discursive limits of a legal narrative that can account . . . for [their] location.’’33 It is Franklin’s retrospective narration that brings the rushes into focus visually by suggesting that he found (observed) them and identified them as rushes. Arden’s corpse is also embedded in providential narrative via the play’s cruentation episode. One of the most intriguing aspects of evidentiary matters in the early modern period is the coexistence of

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what Malcolm Gaskill terms ‘‘stylized’’ (supernatural or symbolic) evidence and ‘‘empirical’’ evidence.34 Gaskill’s superb archival research leads him to conclude that ‘‘natural and supernatural causes should be seen as belonging to a common intellectual system rather than as alternative modes of explanation, and it seems likely that in most people’s minds, the agency of God or the devil was always in some way the cause of fatal losses of reason, drunkenness, and insanity.’’35 The cruentation scene in Arden dramatizes the ‘‘silent corporeality of the corpse’’ in the absence of voice.36 In the presence of Arden’s murdered body, Alice says, Arden, sweet husband, what shall I say? The more I sound his name the more he bleeds. This blood condemns me, and in gushing forth Speaks as it falls and asks me why I did it. Forgive me, Arden; I repent me now; And would my death save thine thou shouldst not die. (16.3–8)

A silent medium of exchange takes place that positions the corpse within a circuit of desire for proof and the elimination of secrecy; as it bleeds, it critiques Alice’s prior fraudulent assertions and questions her motivations for murder. Mukherji notes that ‘‘most dramatic treatments of the ordeal of the bier foreground its visual impact and its rhetorical potential.’’37 In Arden, the evidentiary force of the sign of Arden’s bleeding corpse is reliant upon narratives of God’s providence, justice, and secret purposes to disclose information regarding the discovery of criminal acts. These ideas underlie Alice’s claim that the blood ‘‘speaks’’ and so condemns her as Arden’s murderer. As the stage direction for the cruentation scene makes clear, the mayor, Mosby, Franklin, Michael, and Susan are all present to witness Alice’s encounter with Arden’s corpse. Early modern judicial handbooks show that justices appropriated the results of episodes of cruentation and used them to determine causes of suspicion in pre-trial examinations; however, Gaskill’s study of eyewitness accounts of bleeding corpses suggests that accompanying witness testimony was often presented in courts.38 Testimonial narratives, grounded in providential beliefs, imbue the real evidence, the bleeding body, with probative value. Alice’s confession in the presence of the sign of the bleeding body

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recalls other figurations of blood in the play such as Franklin’s declaration that Arden’s blood is ‘‘guiltless’’ (14.398). Arden’s blood and bloodstains are prominent in the scenes following his murder. Alice and Susan gaze on Arden’s corpse in the countinghouse and see that it is ‘‘smeared in blood and filthy gore’’ (14.329). Afraid that the bloodstains on the floor of the house will give them away, Alice calls upon Susan to wash the surface (14.254). Susan’s remark that ‘‘the blood cleaveth to the ground and will not out’’ (14.255) prompts Alice to ‘‘scrape away the blood with her nails’’; however, ‘‘the more [she] strive[s], the more the blood appears’’ (14.256– 57).39 In Alice’s opinion, the blood’s resistance stems from the fact that she ‘‘blush[es] not at her husband’s death’’ (14.259). Alice interprets her non-blush as a sign of wickedness. The blood, embedded in providential narratives that state that God will produce evidence to expose a murderer, denotes sin and accuses Alice of the crime. The fact that Alice does not turn away from the blood but gazes directly at it implies that she is aware of her culpability. The blood’s accumulation on various sites—Arden’s corpse, the floor of the house (the crime scene), and Alice’s nails—reveals its inscription in the narratives surrounding the trope of the chain of sins. According to Peter Lake, the figuration of the chain of sins symbolizes the notion that sin is cumulative, and therefore one sin leads to another and they all become interlinked.40 Using Lake’s classification of Alice’s sins, I propose the following reading: the blood on Arden’s body reveals the consequence of Alice’s lust; the blood on the floor of the crime scene is associated with her commission of murder; and the blood on her nails denotes her wilfulness and determination to enjoy Mosby.41 The blood that is ‘‘too manifest’’ acquires probative value when it is mediated by the force of providential narrative (14.402). Ultimately, Alice’s supposed desire to meditate on the blood of Christ before she receives her sentence seems insincere given the fact that she has just ignored Bradshaw’s plea for help. The final objects of real evidence present in the play proper are Mosby’s purse and girdle. In the course of checking Mosby’s response to the mayor’s question regarding his involvement in Arden’s murder, Franklin says, Study not for an answer, look not down. His purse and girdle found at thy bed’s head

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Witness sufficiently thou didst the deed. It bootless is to swear thou didst it not. (16.13–16)

Franklin’s speech seems to say that the material objects of evidence, on their own, constitute sufficient proof of Mosby’s guilt; yet, the dramatist does not leave it at that. Mosby immediately intervenes with a confessional narrative stating that he hired Black Will and Shakebag to commit the murder. Mosby’s confession is excessive since the play makes clear that it was Greene who hired the ‘‘ruffians’’ at Alice’s urging. This moment in the play provides an interesting indication of the perceived insufficiency of real evidence, unmediated by the force of narrative, to constitute sufficient proof. The purse and girdle are not evidentiary clues that warrant the dispensation of accompanying narration.42 Several essays in this volume consider the question of whether one can regard the audience to plays containing trials as a pseudo-jury. Lisa Klotz’s essay, in particular, argues that Webster’s White Devil positions the audience as a jury that is encouraged to judge Vittoria’s character. The same dynamic is not, I think, at work in Arden, in which the trial is deflected. Arden does not dramatize the formal arraignment and jury trial of Alice and her co-conspirators. Holinshed mentions the appearance of the criminals at sessions in Faversham, and the Wardmote Book of Faversham (the town record) indicates that Alice, Mosby, and several of the other conspirators were ‘‘arreygned wt thesaid towne and libtyes of Faursham / in the Abbey Halle wch ye said Ardern pchased and there adiudged for to dye.’’43 In the play, however, the mayor speedily announces sentences that order the execution of Mosby, Susan, Michael, and Bradshaw and the burning of Mistress Arden (18.27–32). It is not clear whether the mayor arrives at the decision himself or whether he conveys the judgment of an off-stage tribunal. No scenes of deliberation on a verdict are present in the play—the progression is simply from apprehension to sentence—so there is no opportunity for the theater audience to be drawn into a representation of the deliberative process in which evidence is evaluated that is the key activity of an early modern English jury.44 The play’s epilogue does not ask the audience to pass judgment or sentence on Alice and her accomplices; rather, the actor who plays Franklin submits that the mysterious presence of Arden’s bodily imprint is to be noted above the rest of the information he

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provides about the executions of Alice’s other accomplices such as Black Will and Greene. Since the audience sees the murder dramatized onstage, they know who is guilty. The effect of the play, then, is to engage the audience as knowing spectators of a pre-trial investigation, and such an interpretation is in accordance with Arden’s emphasis on communal participation in the investigatory process. Audience satisfaction comes, as Catherine Richardson says, when the knowledge of the characters onstage equals that of the audience—when Franklin figures out which characters had a hand in Arden’s murder. Arden of Faversham is not the only early modern literary text that underscores the porous quality of evidentiary categories in early modern England. The report of the ‘‘Trial of Anne Turner, Widow, for the Murder of Sir Thomas Overbury’’ (1615) similarly implies that real evidence does not convey essential truths that are not subject to interpretation. The report is noteworthy because it provides an account of an instance in which objects seemingly connected with a murder are produced in court. Arraigned as an accessory before the fact in the poisoning of Sir Thomas Overbury, Turner was ultimately found guilty by a jury and executed at Tyburn. During examination at trial, Turner’s controversial relationship with astrologer Simon Forman occupied center stage. Attorney for the queen, Sir Laurence Hyde produced an astonishing array of real evidence supposedly connected with the case: ‘‘there was also shewed in court certain pictures of a man and a woman in copulation, made in lead, as also the mould of brass, wherein they were cast, a black scarf also full of white crosses, which Mrs. Turner had in her custody.’’45 Other examples of real evidence or ‘‘cunning tricks’’ exhibited in this case include ‘‘enchantments written in parchment’’ and oddly, ‘‘a figure, in which was written this word Corpus; and upon the parchment was fastened a little piece of the skin of a man.’’46 The trial report, itself a reconstructed narrative, describes the reaction of the trial audience to the production of the objects: ‘‘there was heard a crack from the scaffolds, which caused great fear, tumult and confusion among the spectators, and throughout the hall everyone fearing hurt as if the devil had been present, and grown angry to have his workmanship shewed, by such as were not his own scholars.’’47 In addition to the production of real evidence, the case report points out that over the course of the trial examinations of witnesses take place, letters written by the Countess of Essex

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are read openly in the courtroom, and witnesses are produced (some testified viva voce). Documentary evidence, the account implies, was normally read out loud in court. While the report attests to what Kathy Eden terms the ‘‘psychogogic’’ power of the real evidence, the intervention of accompanying witness testimony makes it difficult to ascertain what probative value the objects have in and of themselves. Clearly, in this case, the objects are bound up with discourses of sexuality and witchcraft. Real evidence also figures prominently in early modern murder pamphlets, and Henry Goodcole’s Heaven’s Speedie Hue and Cry Sent After Lust and Murther (1635) provides an apt accompaniment to my discussion of real evidence in Arden given that it includes a fascinating juxtaposition of text and image. Goodcole fashions a narrative around the backgrounds, exploits, confessions and executions of Thomas Shearwood, alias Countrey-Tom, and Elizabeth Evans, alias Canberry Bess. Depicting the pair as partners in crime, Goodcole likens Evans to a ‘‘decoy Ducke’’ (A2v) because it is her task to employ her sexuality to lure unsuspecting ‘‘Gentlemen of great Note, and good quality’’ (B1v) to fields around London where Shearwood would kill them. After the murders, the pair would rob their victims by ‘‘rifling’’ their pockets (B2v). Goodcole’s narration sexualizes the role of Evans and depicts her as a transgressive ‘‘harlot’’ (B2v); the figurative weapon that she uses to entice men is her body; Shearwood’s murder weapon, an object of real evidence, is the ‘‘short Trunchin of Iron’’ (B2v), and there are two woodcut images of it in the pamphlet. The visual representation of Shearwood’s murder weapon in the pamphlet is embedded in narrative that charges it with moral and religious significance. Yet while it is ostensibly ‘‘shown’’ to provide a moral lesson, the object of real evidence entices potential readers into believing that the pamphlet will live up to their expectations by revealing the bloody and lurid details of a spectacular crime. According to Peter Lake, while they are supposedly ‘‘heavily materialised diatribes against sin and dire warnings to the unsuspecting visitor to the great wen, Goodcole’s pamphlets nevertheless luxuriate in the details of the crimes they describe.’’48 In the pamphlet’s opening woodcut image found on A1r, the weapon appears horizontally across the bottom of the page. The description running above the weapon leaves no doubt that it is meant to be a likeness of the object that Sherwood used to commit many

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murders: the caption states declaratively, ‘‘The forme of the instrument of wood and iron that he used to hurt with.’’ Falling directly under the main image of the execution of Countrey-Tom and Canberry-Besse, in which the pair is shown hanging from separate gallows, the weapon underscores the representation of divine justice. Above the main image lies the text of a biblical passage, Numbers 35, verse 16. The initial part of the passage reads as follows: ‘‘If one smite another with an instrument of Iron, that hee Dye, hee is a Murderer, and the Murderer shall dye the Death.’’ Since the text explains the moral and religious consequences of committing murder with the specific weapon used by Shearwood, the embedment of the trunchin in moral and religious discourse seems complete. If the page is regarded as an entry point to the text as a whole, the image also serves to spark the curiosity of readers to discover how and under what circumstances Shearwood actually used the weapon. The second representation of real evidence in the pamphlet is more ambivalent. Located on B2v, the image of the trunchin is positioned vertically in the left margin of the page. Above the weapon’s handle is a caption that states, ‘‘The forme of his weapon which lay secretly in his breeches.’’ Besides amplifying the weapon’s phallic associations, the description’s use of the word ‘‘secretly’’ contrasts with the pamphlet’s impulse to render the object of evidence visible. Implying that readers are privy to an image of an object that cannot, or should not be shown, the woodcut and its caption lure readers into an engagement with Goodcole’s written work. A critical reading of the presentation of the pamphlet implies that real evidence is not unmediated, and readers might do well to ask who presents the object (or representation of an object) and for what purpose. In conclusion, I will turn to one of the most intriguing images in Arden of Faversham, the imprint that Arden’s corpse leaves on the land that he ‘‘by force and violence held from Reede’’ (epilogue 11). Scholars have read the image in various ways. According to Frances Dolan, Arden’s bodily imprint symbolizes his powerful subject position and the impossibility of displacing him.49 Arden’s imprint provides the impetus for Garrett Sullivan’s study of the play’s enactment of a ‘‘cultural conflict between the imperatives of landscapes of stewardship, custom, and absolute property.’’50 Sullivan figures the image as a ‘‘force offended by Arden’s covetousness and social irresponsibility’’; thus, it is a sign of the ‘‘land’s indignation.’’51 In light of my discussion of real evidence in the play, I

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suggest that the imprint can be read as an example of stylized impression evidence. It is Franklin who narrates the image into being in the play’s epilogue, outside the text. In performance, his narration achieves a metatheatrical quality as the actor playing Franklin steps out of his role to deliver the speech. Franklin’s relationship to the imprint is unclear. Has he, in fact, witnessed it such that he can testify to its existence? His use of the passive voice in the lines ‘‘And in the grass his body’s print was seen / Two years and more after the deed was done’’ (epilogue 12, 13) suggests that we cannot be sure that he has seen the imprint. We cannot say how or even if the imprint was staged in early modern performances of the play, nor can we be certain that it was visible to the audience. Arden’s corpse is missing from the image, and this absence stands in contrast to the play’s focus in the final scenes on bringing Arden’s corpse into visibility. All that we have is the bodily imprint, the impression, the trace. The imprint is an exterior without an inside; it is hollow. What makes it an imprint is the notion that it withholds something; therefore, it highlights the idea that there are potential limits to evidentiary representation and evidence may not always concern that which can be physically observed. Read alongside the play, the imprint’s spatial manifestation comments on the construction of evidence by inclusion and exclusion in forensic investigation. The wealth of criticism on Arden of Faversham attests to the fact that the play continues to fascinate audiences and readers. Arden’s complex enactment of a pre-trial investigation and the quality of material evidentiary detail it contains makes it a productive source for the study of categories of legal evidence presented in a literary mode. As the playwright’s inclusion of Franklin’s tale suggests, the movement from knowledge to judgment is not a neutral course of action. By dramatizing the notion that proof is a process, that evidence is generated via processes of narrative inclusion, exclusion, and combination, Arden makes a solid case for the fact that all evidence requires interpretation.

Notes I would like to thank the members of the 2006 SAA ‘‘Staging Justice’’ seminar for their helpful comments on an early draft of this paper. I am particularly grateful for the advice for revision I received from Holger Schott Syme and Lisa Klotz.

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1. See, for example, Subha Mukherji, Law and Representation in Early Modern Drama (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006); and Lorna Hutson, ‘‘Forensic Aspects of Renaissance Mimesis,’’ Representations 94 (2006): 80–109. Both of these excellent studies have informed my paper. 2. The genre of early modern domestic drama contains plays that enact crimes of witchcraft such as The Witch of Edmonton (Rowley, Dekker, and Ford). This paper does not propose to discuss the specific evidentiary practices and protocols operative in prosecutions of women for these offenses. Arden of Faversham provides an example of a play that dramatizes a non-witchcraft offense. 3. Ian Hacking, The Emergence of Probability (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975). According to Hacking, the notion that ‘‘the evidence of things is distinct from testimony, the evidence of witnesses and authorities’’ did not achieve prominence until the Royal Society’s publication of the Port Royal Logic in 1662 (ibid., 33). J. S. Cockburn notes the late development of the law of evidence in England: he states that even in the sixteenth century, ‘‘few recognizable rules of evidence were applied in criminal cases,’’ Crime in England: 1550–1800 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1977), 38. 4. Hacking, Emergence, 33. 5. I am indebted to the work of Alan Dessen for drawing my attention to issues of staging. 6. See Barbara Shapiro, ‘‘Classical Rhetoric and the English Law of Evidence,’’ in Rhetoric and Law in Early Modern Europe, ed. Victoria Kahn and Lorna Hutson (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001), 54–72. 7. See Mukherji, Law and Representation, and Hutson, ‘‘Forensic Aspects of Renaissance Mimesis.’’ 8. I rely here on Kathy Eden, Poetic and Legal Fiction in the Aristotelian Tradition (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1986), 10. 9. Mukherji, Law and Representation, 45–46. See also Eden, Poetic and Legal Fiction, 10–13. 10. Eden, Poetic and Legal Fiction, 16. Eden finds it unlikely that Athenians would not take advantage of the presentation of real evidence given its potentially effective ability to persuade (ibid.). 11. Mukherji, Law and Representation, 46. 12. Ibid. 13. Shapiro, ‘‘Classical Rhetoric,’’ 68. 14. Hutson, ‘‘Forensic Aspects of Renaissance Mimesis,’’ 92. Hutson defines narratio as follows: ‘‘In classical judicial oratory, a narratio was defined as a preliminary exposition, designed to be persuasive, of the facts in dispute’’ (ibid., 90). 15. Ibid., 92. 16. All references to Arden are to Arden of Faversham, ed. Martin White (New York: Norton, 1982). 17. Barbara Shapiro, A Culture of Fact (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2000), 11. 18. Jacques Derrida, Demeure: Fiction and Testimony, trans. Elizabeth Rottenberg (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2000), 32. 19. Ibid., 33. 20. Ibid., 41. 21. Ibid.

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22. Frances Dolan, Dangerous Familiars: Representations of Domestic Crime in England 1550–1700 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1994), 52–53. 23. John Langbein, Prosecuting Crime in the Renaissance (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1974), 83. 24. Lorna Hutson, ‘‘Rethinking the ‘Spectacle of the Scaffold’: Juridical Epistemologies and English Revenge Tragedy,’’ Representations 89 (2005): 31. 25. I rely here on Lorna Hutson’s reading of Quintilian in ‘‘Forensic Aspects of Renaissance Mimesis,’’ 94. 26. Catherine Richardson, Domestic Life and Domestic Tragedy in Early Modern England: the Material Life of the Household (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2006), 125. 27. The phrase is Joseph Pugliese’s. See ‘‘ ‘Super Visum Corporis’: Visuality, Race, Narrativity and the Body of Forensic Pathology,’’ Law and Literature 14.2 (2002): 367–96 at 368. 28. Peter Daly’s description of the corpse in tragedy of the period as ‘‘an emblem that instructs’’ can be found in Literature in the Light of the Emblem (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1979), 147. 29. Pugliese, ‘‘Super Visum Corporis,’’ 370. 30. Alice’s direction is confirmed by the stage direction that follows it: Then they lay the body in the countinghouse’’ (14.248 sd). 31. Pugliese, ‘‘Super Visum Corporis,’’ 370. 32. Alexander Leggatt, ‘‘Arden of Faversham,’’ Shakespeare Survey 36 (1983): 121–33 at 123. 33. Pugliese, ‘‘Super Visum Corporis,’’ 371. 34. Malcolm Gaskill, Crime and Mentalities in Early Modern England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 226. 35. Ibid. 36. The quoted phrase is Pugliese’s in ‘‘Super Visum Corporis,’’ 369. 37. Mukherji, Law and Representation, 116. 38. Gaskill, Crime and Mentalities, 229–31. 39. Catherine Richardson notes the significance of the stage business in this scene: ‘‘The stage image of servant and mistress scrubbing together signals a breakdown in domestic hierarchy.’’ See Richardson, Domestic Life, 124. 40. See Peter Lake’s discussion of the trope of the chain of sins in The Antichrist’s Lewd Hat (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2002), 47–53. 41. See the discussion of Alice’s sins in Lake, The Antichrist’s Lewd Hat, 49. 42. In Holinshed, Mosby’s hose and purse are stained with Arden’s blood, and the objects are referred to as ‘‘tokens.’’ See Holinshed’s account of Arden’s murder in App. II in Wine’s ed. of Arden, 104–12 at 111. 43. Holinshed, ibid. The Account of Thomas Ardern’s Murder from the Wardmote Book of Faversham is found in App. III in Wine’s ed. of Arden, 160–63 at 162. 44. As Barbara Shapiro points out, ‘‘jurors initially were expected to have personal knowledge of the facts of the case before them and only gradually became evaluators of evidence presented by others.’’ After the fifteenth century, English trial jurors largely ceased to be self-informing and came to base their decisions on the evidence of witnesses. Shapiro, ‘‘Classical Rhetoric,’’ 66. 45. T. B. Howell, ed., Cobbett’s Complete Collection of State Trials . . . From the Earliest Period to the Present Time, vol. 2 of 34 vols. (London: Bagshaw, 1809), 930–35 at 932.

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46. Ibid., 932–33. 47. Ibid., 932. 48. Lake, The Antichrist’s Lewd Hat, 21. 49. Dolan, Dangerous Familiars, 76. 50. Garrett Sullivan, Drama of Landscape: Land, Property, and Social relations on the Early Modern Stage (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998). 51. Ibid., 55–56.

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Shakespeare’s Bed-tricks: Finding Justice in Lies? Emily A. Detmer-Goebel

IN THE SECTION ON RAPE IN HIS HISTORY OF THE PLEAS OF THE CROWN, seventeenth-century legal jurist, Matthew Hale, sternly and repeatedly warns those who practice law to be particularly careful because false accusations of rape are so easily made.1 Today our culture often sees this anxiety about false accusations dramatized in our films and television programs such as Law and Order. Yet, early modern dramas rarely depict false accusations of rape, and stage rape victims are almost always believed by the men they tell. Given Hale’s repeated reference to the possibility of false accusations, it is in some ways surprising so few ‘‘false accusers’’ of rape appear in dramatic plots. What we do find are women characters who make false statements about sexual desire and sexual activity. Although all sorts of plays represent women as deceptive and coy, several bed-trick plays can be read as informed by and informing the same cultural anxiety about false accusation out of which Hale writes. In Shakespeare’s All’s Well that Ends Well (1603) and Measure for Measure (1604) and John Fletcher’s Queen of Corinth (1616), I argue that the action surrounding the stock dramatic device of a bed-trick supports and feeds into a rape culture by sustaining the cultural belief that women lie about sex. By ‘‘rape culture’’ I am not referring to a social environment where rape is necessarily accepted or approved; on the contrary, patriarchy goes to great lengths to place limits on sexual access to some women. A rape culture, instead, is one in which certain cultural beliefs make rape more likely to happen. A rape myth that is familiar to both the twenty-first century and early modern audiences is the cultural fantasy that women always lie about desire; in other words, it is believed (or thought generally true) that when women say ‘‘no’’ it is likely they mean ‘‘yes.’’ A woman’s alleged propensity to lie 118

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about her desire at the scene of sexual intimacy is matched by another myth that suggests, if she does consent, she will easily lie about it afterwards. For example, Linda Woodbridge locates the idea in Edward Gosynhyll’s sixteenth-century satire, The Schole House of Women (1560): while women are easily wooed because they are ‘‘frail,’’ it is likely that after she consents, she will then lie and say the man promised to marry.2 Just as men may fear being held accountable for sexual activity—which in early modern culture usually translates as marriage—they also fear women having judicial power over them. Here the comic endings of these plays depend on the reversal of the expected; in the world of the theater, the women’s lies bring about justice.

Bed-tricks: ‘‘That man should be at woman’s command, and yet no hurt done!’’ Bed-tricks are understood to be sexual situations where one person’s intended sex partner is substituted for another, without at least one person’s knowledge or consent. (In some cases, both people are tricked.) Also referred to as the ‘‘substitute bed-mate,’’ a bed-trick is played on a person who often has agreed to have sex under the cover of darkness and silence, but unbeknownst to him/her, the anticipated partner switches with someone else. Throughout the twentieth century, the bed-trick has bothered many commentators. On the one hand, many critics have found bed-tricks disturbing because they are considered either morally corrupt or simply unrealistic. On the other hand, bed-tricks are hard to take seriously; there is something inherently funny or titillating about the ‘‘problem’’ of the bedtrick, that is, consensual sex with an unknown partner. Marliss Desens argues in her book-length study of bed-tricks that no other ‘‘dramatic convention has generated so much critical uneasiness,’’ but few, she notes, consider the element of violence inherent in the bed-trick.3 While Desens sees the bed-trick as akin to rape based on the lack of informed consent, I argue that its connection to a rape culture can be seen in the bed-trick’s frequent theatricalization of women lying about sex. Most critical attention to the bed-trick centers on the sexual fraud that is performed in the bedroom, so to speak. However, bed-tricks are often accompanied by a subsequent fraud; in a quasi-legal set-

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ting, a ‘‘good’’ woman prospers by testifying about sexual intimacy that never happened. For instance, Shakespeare’s All’s Well that Ends Well (1603) and Measure for Measure (1604) both feature heroines (Diana and Isabella) who bear false witness against men with whom they claim to have been sexually intimate. While the dramatic moment when a woman tells a lie is brief, each play’s ‘‘happy’’ conclusion depends on it. The pious fraud is forgiven because the consequences of the woman’s lies appear to be fortunate and just. One possible reason for celebration is that both the intended sexual encounters were illicit; each bed-trick replaces an illicit partner with a legitimate one, thereby ‘‘making a marriage’’ instead of breaking one. The substitutions allow Helen in All’s Well and Isabel in Measure to use the bed-tricks as a way to rescue the male protagonists from sin. Shakespeare goes to great lengths to portray his male protagonists as in need of reform. Bertram is the spoiled, ‘‘unbridled’’ and ‘‘rude boy’’ ready to commit adultery; Angelo reveals his moral corruption by his attempted rape of the saintly Isabella. In contrast, while in the plays Helena and Isabella are repeatedly described as good and their coy defenses as virtuous, critical reception of them has been more mixed. In both plays, the women’s deceptions seem fortunate; but while the cultural rape fantasy of women’s feigning seems at first entertaining, I will argue that by the end of each play, it turns disturbing.

The Delight of Coy Defenses: or, ‘‘to lose it to her own liking’’ In All’s Well that Ends Well, Helena wins the right to marry Bertram by healing the king. But Bertram despises this forced marriage, and swears never to be her true husband until she can do the impossible, that is, get his ring and become pregnant with his child. Thus begins the folktale plot which culminates with a bed-trick and a trial scene where Helena reveals that she has fulfilled Bertram’s conditions. Critics’ estimation of Helena’s character has dominated most interpretations of All’s Well.4 Just as readers have mixed responses to her namesake, Helen of Troy,5 some defend and others condemn Helena’s ingenious strategies to achieve her task. The critical reception of Helena’s strategies depends on how one places her on the continuum of stereotypically deceptive women.6

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That Helena and Diana manipulate Bertram seems a given, but the question of whether a woman’s manipulation can ever be other than negative seems arguable. W. W. Lawrance argues that the folktale plot elements of the ‘‘clever wench’’ and the ‘‘fulfillment of tasks’’ suggest reading with a less rigid sense of morality or a need for realism.7 In other words, Helena’s coy, ingenious manipulations should not be judged as if she were a real woman. Those who find her actions troubling point to the play’s early evidence that she is manipulative. Her coy willingness to discuss virginity with Parolles is thought beyond the bounds of modesty. When Helena asks ‘‘How might one do, sir, to lose it to her own liking?’’ (1.1.151–52),8 it is taken as signaling her desire to control men as well as her own desires. After curing the king and winning the choice of husbands, Helena ‘‘seems’’ to consider several men before Bertram, which critics argue illustrates her feigning modesty. Despite the pious reasons for and outcome of the bed-trick, these critics suggest that Shakespeare includes these instances to prove that Helena is manipulative beyond some level of acceptability, which condemns her. On the other hand, some account for Helena’s manipulations by seeing them as healing; they highlight how Helena’s actions—here, positive manipulations—rescue Bertram, heterosexuality, and the institution of marriage. Janet Adelman, for example, suggests that Helena and Diana represent men’s desire for ‘‘splitting of the sexual object into the legitimate but abhorred Helena and the illegitimate but desired Diana.’’9 I offer another account of how the women’s manipulations entertain; my reading suggests that the actions of Helena and especially Diana exploit both the fear and pleasure of the fantasy of the deceptive woman. While I do not condemn or praise Helena’s deceptive means of winning Bertram, I do fall into the critical camp which finds the play’s representation of Helena, while ambiguous, more positive than negative. As Hodgdon argues, the play’s ‘‘affective center affirms Helena’s control and power as a counter to [patriarchal] conventions.’’10 But rather than concern myself here with what this suggests about my or Shakespeare’s morality or feminism, my reading strategy aims to consider the implications of the apparent affirmation of women’s power through deception. As several critics have argued, Helena’s agency and ability to get what she wants might be read as a model of feminized power. But what does it mean that its power is rooted in cunning deceptions

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like the bed-trick? Diana as well as Helena manipulates men by seeming to say or be one thing while knowing they mean another; in other words, they act coy. Depending on the context, the feminized strategy of acting ‘‘coy’’ can be represented as either positively or negatively manipulative. For example, it is appropriate for a modest woman to act coy, to leave unsaid her desire in order to dissuade a suitor from illicit sex. Yet this same coyness can also be registered as a license for men to overpower women’s resistance. Shakespeare utilizes this meaning of coyness elsewhere; as Julia says in Two Gentlemen of Verona, ‘‘maids, in modesty, say ‘no’ to that / Which they would have the profferer construe ’aye’ ’’ (1.2.55–56).11 Acting coy can be represented as a deceptive means to manipulate men; by withholding sex women can gain favors, trinkets, or a contract of marriage. Thus, acting coy empowers women with the ability to be simultaneously aggressive and submissive. In each of these instances, the charge of coyness assumes that the women indeed desire sexual intimacy, but they (deceptively) say ‘‘no’’ for other reasons, such as to retain the facade of modesty or to gain a marriage contract. Just as the double meanings of a woman’s ‘‘no’’ are at the root of being coy, so too is Helena’s talk of virginity shown to be sexually enticing. For instance, Shakespeare has Helena wish to know a ‘‘military policy how virgins might blow up men’’ (1.1.123–24). While she appears to be wishing for a means to safeguard her virginity, her same words can be read as wishing for a sexually aroused man. The play teases its audience with the idea that women are sexually vulnerable, while, at the same time, its main action reveals women as sexual manipulators. One might argue that Helena’s straightforward desire for Bertram is anything but coy, but Diana is Helena’s coy representative, her substitute. Hired by and on behalf of Helena, Diana enacts the coy defenses that allow Helena to regain Bertram. In doing so, the play indulges its audience in this fantasy of the deceptive woman who both ‘‘captures’’ and saves Bertram. Upon hearing about Helena’s situation, Diana agrees to help Helena entrap Bertram. Even though she intends to consent to Bertram, Diana coyly leads Bertram into the snare by resisting him further, pleading against the great loss of her honor. Diana plays her part perfectly, which Bertram later confirms when he blames Diana’s ‘‘restraint’’ for ‘‘madding’’ his ‘‘eagerness’’ (5.3.214). I think we are meant to enjoy Diana’s feigning yet familiar resistance as we

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witness her successfully gain the prized ring from his finger. Adding to the pleasure of the scene is that while we imagine Bertram’s thrill at winning Diana’s consent, the audience also recognizes that it is a lie.12 More commonly, ‘‘the lie’’ is that a good woman’s seemingly modest resistance is a necessary facade; she was saying ‘‘no’’ although she meant ‘‘yes’’ all along. Her resistance is erotic foreplay. In this scene, however, the same discourse takes place, but when Diana says ‘‘yes’’ the audience knows that she means ‘‘no.’’ The comic reversal adds another level to the fraudulent sexual games being played. If Diana had been characterized as a ‘‘whore’’ who often tricked and exploited soldiers, we would very likely respond very differently to her lie; here the audience enjoys her falseness at Bertram’s expense. Falsehoods and counterfeits are featured throughout All’s Well (especially through the character of Parolles) and in the final scene, lying or perjury is first brought to mind not by a woman but by Bertram. Bertram agrees to a second marriage, but when he offers the ring that Diana gave him, the King recognizes it as one he himself gave to Helena. Bertram confidently claims ‘‘The ring was never hers’’ (5.3.90), but then he lies about how he received it: he says he got the ring ‘‘from a casement thrown me, / Wrapp’d in paper which contain’d the name / Of her that threw it’’ (5.3.94–96). Since Helena swore to the king that ‘‘she would never put it from her finger’’ (110), the king fears Bertram ‘‘got it from her’’ through ‘‘rough enforcement’’ (5.3.108–9), perhaps even causing her reported death. Ironically, as Bertram is being removed by royal guards, he speaks his own truth: ‘‘If you shall prove / This ring was ever [Helena’s], you shall as easy / Prove that I husbanded her bed in Florence’’ (5.3.126–28). Soon after Bertram reenters, he is faced with the woman whose bed he thinks he did ‘‘husband,’’ only to deny it. In refusing her, he claims to have only ‘‘laughed’’ with Diana, but soon counters that she is a common camp prostitute (5.3.179,189). As both Cheryl Dudgeon and Lisa Klotz discuss in this volume, a woman’s sexual reputation determines if a court will find her testimony believable. Although Bertram thinks Diana is telling the truth about their sexual encounter, we know that, in fact, she lies. At the same time that we find humor in Diana’s falseness, the scene plays on the fact that even though the men do not believe her, they should. Thus

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the dramatic irony is that the men do believe her when she lies and disbelieve her when she tells the truth. In some ways, Diana’s testimony could be read as artful equivocation; he did promise to marry her, even though she never slept with him. She artfully answers Bertram’s disparagement of her character with a question: ‘‘Ask him upon his oath if he does think / He had not my virginity’’ (5.3.186–87). But she goes further. To ward off Bertram’s claim that she is simply a camp prostitute, Diana reveals her possession of Bertram’s ring as proof, to which his mother attests: ‘‘that ring’s a thousand proofs’’ (5.3.200). Then Diana testifies that the other ring, Helena’s ring from the king, was hers and baldly lies by saying, ‘‘And this was it I gave him, being abed’’ (5.3.230). Artfulness goes out the window (rather than the ring) and the noose tightens around Bertram’s neck. To verify Bertram’s first lie, the king asks, ‘‘The story then goes false you threw it him / Out of a casement?’’ (5.3.231–32) to which she answers, ‘‘I have spoken the truth’’ (5.3.232). Significantly, neither story is true! At the apex, after Parolles supplies further supporting evidence in support of Diana’s (female, thus always suspect) voice, Diana abruptly changes her story to say that she, in fact, did not give him the ring. Diana speaks the truth, but seems to lie. The king rapidly turns on Diana and her riddles; he says, ‘‘Take her away, I do not like her now. / To prison with her’’ (5.3.282–83). That the king couches his willingness to listen to her claims in his own affections, ‘‘his likes,’’ blatantly reveals the court’s arbitrary preferences. Just as Bertram attempted to dislodge her believability by calling her a whore, as soon as Diana begins to speak in riddles, the remaining men again try to silence her by characterizing her as a whore.13 Thus, Diana’s sexual status is linked not only to her inclination to speak the truth, but the willingness of the court to hear her. The play reveals this troubling, oppressive gendered judicial system that fails to believe women, especially because women’s testimony can so easily be discredited with the charge of ‘‘whore.’’ But I think this play asks us to laugh at this rather than worry over it. It ‘‘tickles’’ the viewers to see this familiar cultural tradition ‘‘harmlessly’’ enacted. Since the audience knows these good women really have the upper hand, we are given license to laugh at this turn of events, including Diana’s ‘‘strumpet’s boldness’’ and falseness. While I do not assume all spectators would consistently respond

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the same way, I am arguing that this is one of the available interpretations at the time of the play’s original production. As Laura Mulvey and other theorists have argued about mainstream film, I assume the implied viewer is male and the pleasures of the text play to men and women who are consciously and unconsciously invested in certain gender roles and the ideology of patriarchy.14 The comedic form often relies on reversals and subversions of such ideologies, and I am suggesting that part of the pleasure of this play comes from its confirmation of women as deceptive, which is at once affirming and anxiety-producing. I think the play at first ‘‘seduces’’ its viewers into cheering for the clever Helena, hoping she will accomplish her task, and only in the end does the play bring us to realize that her aggressiveness, manipulation, and falseness are left unchastened/unchastized. The jarring, swift ending and seemingly forced forgiveness and/or acceptance are somehow unsatisfying and this very lack of satisfaction demands further contemplation. As the viewer/ audience member turns back to contemplate, we realize that neither Helena nor Diana receives any ‘‘correction’’ for her part in the sexual fraud or false accusation. This (belated) recognition is unsettling or, as scholars have dubbed the play, a problem. In this way, Shakespeare performs a sort of bed-trick on his audience. Just as the illicit sex of the bed-trick provides pleasure for Bertram until he realizes the substitution, there is a similar pleasure in watching a woman lie and not be believed by the courts (especially when the defendant thinks the woman is telling the truth). Similarly, the audience yearns for and expects a kind of poetic justice for the lying cad, Bertram, but this earlier pleasure changes with the recognition that the good women who lie to ‘‘capture’’ men are in no way chastised. In this way, the play serves a rape culture in that it participates in the tradition that says that women’s words should not be believed in the courtroom or in the ‘‘bedroom.’’ Yet, the play ultimately questions any erotic pleasure that might be gained by such a myth. In other words, while the fantasy of the deceptive woman seems to license an understanding of coyness that calls for a man to overpower a woman sexually, and to discredit her in a courtroom, the fantasy cannot foreclose the fear of being manipulated by a woman.

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Making Accusations: ‘‘Who will believe thee, Isabel?’’ Whereas All’s Well delights us with coy defenses and false accusations, but ends with worrying about controlling unchastised women, Measure for Measure worries about false accusations as well as charges of false accusations. In the midst of all these accusations, the play jokes about (if not celebrates) men being forced to marry their ‘‘whores,’’ while at the same time, it questions which is worse, being executed for making a woman a whore or being forced to marry one. In Measure for Measure, the duke desires to rein in the people’s illicit sexual behavior, but fears they will accuse him of ‘‘tyranny’’ (1.3.36); therefore, he deputizes Angelo to enforce the edict against whoredom. As the new ‘‘voice of the law,’’ Angelo decides to make an example and punish the unchaste Claudio with a swift execution. When Isabella pleads for her brother’s life, however, Angelo proposes an exchange: her maidenhead for her brother’s life (2.4.162– 64). Isabella refuses and reveals the ‘‘abhorred’’ offer to her brother, Claudio, who wishes his sister were not so good, but rather more willing to save a brother’s life with what he argues nature would surely not count as sin (3.1.132–34). After Isabella accuses Claudio of every vice she can name,15 the duke appears in disguise as a pious friar and offers her a way out of their dilemma by virtue of a bed-trick. Similar to the attention to Helena, much of the criticism of Measure for Measure centers on the Duke’s role as manipulator as well as on Isabella’s moral dilemma over saving her chastity or her brother.16 For my purposes here, I want to put aside these issues to focus primarily on the intersection of false accusations with the punishment of men’s illicit sexual behavior. Lindsay Kaplan persuasively argues that the play dramatizes ‘‘the state’s own slanderous practices’’ as a critique of the state’s ‘‘use [and abuse] of theatrical power to expose and punish.’’17 But where Kaplan pursues slander’s connection to the theater, I am interested in how the primary slander against Angelo depends on a woman’s accusation about sexual activity that never happened. While the duke uses falseness to expose the falseness of Angelo, the main conduits of that falseness are women. Shakespeare adds such falseness when he incorporates the bedtrick and the character of Mariana to the ‘‘corrupt magistrate’’ plot. Of the scholars who study Shakespeare’s possible source materials,

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some suggest that the greatest impact of such changes is to preserve Isabella’s virtue.18 For me, the significance is the addition of women’s deception. In the sources, women are vulnerable and tricked, but they are not deceitful in any way. In Cinthio’s Hecatommithi and Whetstone’s Promos and Cassandra, the Isabella-like character does agree to sleep with the ‘‘corrupt magistrate.’’ When he reneges and kills her relative (brother/husband), the woman reveals it to a higher authority.19 Easily convinced of the magistrate’s guilt, the ruler orders a twofold sentence: first he restores the woman’s honor by forcing the man to marry her and then he condemns the man to death. When the newly married woman pleads to save her nowhusband, the ‘‘exemplary ruler’’ grants her request; thus, as Lever puts it, ‘‘mercy was combined with justice, and marriage instead of blood-retaliation made amends.’’20 In all of the sources, an emphasis on justice conflates the question of the corruptness of a magistrate with the question of how to punish sexually coercive/illicit sex (rape). Shakespeare, then, takes a plot about sexual coercion (where the ‘‘frail’’ woman gives in) and its punishment and he complicates it by adding women’s own acts of deception, albeit planned and sanctioned by the duke. Thus, Shakespeare adds another level to the question of justly punishing sexual misconduct; he adds the potential of false accusations. Although Claudio freely admits his guilt, the question of adequate punishment is displaced onto Angelo, who denies Isabella’s (false) accusation. Isabella responds to Angelo’s sexual threat by testifying to a sexual act that never happened to her. In other words, she uses the charge of coercive sex / rape to harm Angelo. While one might see Isabella’s participation in the bed-trick as a way to save her brother, it is also possible to read her motivation as grounded more in her desire to ‘‘discover’’ Angelo’s government to the duke; put another way, Isabella wants revenge for Angelo’s assault against her honor. After all, while the duke always mentions saving Claudio, Isabella had just, moments before, sworn to ‘‘pray a thousand prayers for [Claudio’s] death; [but] no word to save’’ him (3.1.145–56). But after explaining the bed-trick, Isabella answers, ‘‘The image of it gives me content already’’ (3.1.260). Many critics have judged Isabel harshly for her glee, but my point is to notice how Isabella’s desire for revenge lines up with stereotypical ‘‘false accusers.’’ While her ‘‘scorn’’ does not come from being seduced and abandoned, she still uses deception and a false accusation to

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punish a man. Thus, while the play takes as fact that men may sexually ‘‘abuse’’ or ‘‘misuse’’ women and deserve punishment, it also suggests that women might ‘‘revenge’’ crimes against them through false accusations. Throughout the play, false accusations of sexually illicit behavior are littered in and among legitimate accusations; the difference between the two becomes increasingly difficult to distinguish. For example, Claudio is ‘‘guilty’’ of the crime for which he is accused (i.e., making Juliet pregnant outside of lawful marriage), but we hear of several other false accusations of sexual sins. For instance, we learn that Angelo was betrothed to Mariana, but when her brother and her dowry were lost at sea, Angelo was able to break the engagement by falsely claiming that Mariana was unchaste, a claim he repeats in the fifth act. Lucio is an excellent source of sexual slander. He not only repeatedly slanders the duke to the duke’s (disguised) face, but also admits that when he got a woman pregnant, he lied about it in court because he did not want to be forced to marry a whore, even if he was the one who made her so (4.3.170–71). At the height of her outrage at Claudio, even Isabella slanders her own family by suggesting her own mother’s infidelity (‘‘my mother play’d my father fair’’ [3.1.140]). While the play underscores the potential danger of false accusations, this idea is held in tension with the power to call any accusation, valid or not, false. The risk involved in making an accusation comes into view at the height of the erotically-charged ‘‘indecent proposal’’ scene. Although Isabella lists with eloquence the many reasons her brother’s life might be spared, soon after Angelo makes his demand for her to ‘‘lay down the treasures of her body’’ (2.4.96), Isabella switches tactics. She fights back with a threat of her own: ‘‘I will proclaim thee, Angelo, look for’t. / Sign me a present pardon for my brother, / Or with an outstretch’d throat I’ll tell the world aloud / What man thou art’’ (2.4.150–53). Isabella produces a picture of herself making a self-righteous accusation, but Angelo’s response makes her ‘‘throat’’ seem particularly vulnerable. Angelo taunts her: Who will believe thee, Isabel? My place in the state Will so your accusation overweigh, That you shall stifle in your own report, And smell of calumny. (153, 156–58)

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It’s not just that Isabella won’t be believed; to make such an accusation will leave her vulnerable to charges of slandering a prince. Angelo’s image of her smelly, suffocated body also suggests that to make such an accusation will ruin her reputation, which for a woman is always her sexual reputation.21 While I argued that in All’s Well the habit of thought that women’s words will not be believed in a courtroom is a source of pleasure in the plot, here I would suggest it is meant to be read as troubling. At this point in the play, the audience is not amused by the routineness of disbelieving women; rather, Angelo’s self-satisfied reliance on such a belief is disturbing. The scene puts the audience in the position of wishing for Isabella’s rescue; therefore, we approve when the duke suggests the ‘‘substitute bedmate’’ of Mariana, Angelo’s abandoned fianceé, instead of Isabella. The bed-trick counters Angelo’s dishonest use of Mariana and his fraudulent use of his position to sexually coerce Isabella. The duke repeatedly confirms that this sexual fraud is virtuous and just. Like the title metaphor of the play, it is fitting that Angelo’s falseness will be trumped by further falseness. In this way, the audience is given permission to indulge in Isabella’s and Mariana’s revenge against the ‘‘corrupt magistrate’’ because it brings about a form of justice. One might argue that the presence of so many false accusations in the play dilutes Isabella’s falseness; however, Shakespeare calls our attention to it in several ways. In two short scenes just prior to the final trial scene, both Angelo and Isabella voice reservations about the upcoming public confrontation. In a repetition of a key idea, Angelo worries how Isabella might accuse him (‘‘How might she tongue me!’’) but he assures himself that the woman he now thinks is a ‘‘deflower’d maid’’ will remain silent because, to accuse him publicly will reveal her own shame (4.4.19–26). As if to echo Angelo, we hear Isabella worry about the truthfulness of her testimony. According to the duke’s advice, Isabella is to publicly accuse Angelo as if she had given into Angelo’s proposal. Highlighting that she is about to lie, Isabella says that she would rather ‘‘say the truth’’ than ‘‘[t]o speak so indirectly,’’ especially since it is Mariana’s ‘‘part’’ ‘‘to accuse him so’’ (4.6.1–4). Both of these scenes prepare the audience to watch who lies.22 Some critics suggest that Isabella’s lies are slight, or even justified. Roy Battenhouse, for instance, calls to mind examples in Christian ethics that allow a ‘‘pious fraud’’ if the ‘‘total goal . . . is God’s victory

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and man’s salvation.’’23 Melvin Seiden claims that even though she is not the virgin violated, the lie is ‘‘moral truth.’’24 But I think Shakespeare uses these earlier scenes to underscore the fact that Isabella speaks a falsehood when she says, ‘‘I did yield to him’’ (5.1.104). Not only does Isabella speak falsely, but she is also humiliated by doing so, which can be sensed in her opening remarks as she implies her own whoredom: ‘‘Justice, O royal Duke! Vail you regard upon a wrong’d—I would fain have said, a maid’’ (5.1.21–22). William Bowden points out that bed-tricks, and I would add the public revelations that follow, are often used to expose and humiliate ‘‘the unchaste one.’’25 This trial scene exposes and humiliates Isabella as well as Angelo. The audience might easily get caught up in the passion of Isabella’s seemingly true accusations, such as when she accuses Angelo of being ‘‘forsworn,’’ ‘‘a murderer,’’ ‘‘an adulterous thief, / An hypocrite, [and] a virgin-violator’’ (5.1.40–44). Yet the scene is just as dramatic when Isabella is undoubtedly proved a liar. Mariana testifies that Isabella lies with the crucial revelation that she herself slept with Angelo. As a witness for Angelo, the veiled Mariana explains that at the time ‘‘She that accuses him of fornication / In self-same manner doth accuse my husband . . . I’ll depose I had him in mine arms’’ (5.1.194, 197). Ironically, her testimony is not believed either.26 When both women’s ‘‘just’’ revelation of Angelo’s corruption falls flat, the audience is left in the state of wonderment. In other words, when the expected result of the woman’s deceptive yet virtuous ploys to reveal Angelo break down, it changes all the rules for our expectations. While some readers suggest that our anger and frustration increases at this moment, I want to suggest that the earlier anxiety about corrupt justice is displaced by the duke’s charade of being on Angelo’s side. When the duke as the duke arrives, he plays the role of the ‘‘credulous,’’ ‘‘gullible and corrupt judge.’’27 When he seems to support Angelo, as Seiden argues, he appears to be ‘‘a shameless, colluding crony’’ who is the ‘‘kind of judge who has been bribed to be deaf to the pleas of the weak, the innocent, especially of women in a world in which men make, enforce, judge, and corrupt the laws.’’28 Yet, where Seiden suggests the ‘‘mock trial’’ aggravates us because we get caught up in the ‘‘simulated perversion of justice,’’ I want to suggest

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that, instead, the audience can now enjoy seeing both Angelo and Isabella tricked.29 Through an elaborate ruse by the duke, both women are charged with being ‘‘suborn’d’’ to falsely accuse Angelo, and ironically, this is true. The audience’s enjoyment of the duke’s ability to expose the corrupt Angelo is built on women’s acts of deception; however, even these manipulations (i.e., the bed-trick and the false accusation) of Angelo are overshadowed by the dramatization of the women’s testimony not being believed. Yet, this aspect of the fantasy of the deceptive woman is played out much differently than in All’s Well. There the king believed Diana when she lied, only to disbelieve her when she spoke the truth; here, neither woman is believed from the start, as was predicted by the corrupt Angelo. Although we are in the know, Isabella is still unaware that ‘‘the duke’’ who charges her with making false accusations is the same man who planned all that has happened. Moreover, we know the duke’s accusations are true: Isabella has ‘‘been suborn’d against [Angelo’s] honour / In hateful practice’’ (5.1.109–10); and that ‘‘Someone hath set’’ [her] on (5.1.115). Although Isabella gives up and tries to leave, saying ’’thus wrong’d, hence, [I] unbelieved go‘‘ (5.1.122), just like Diana in All’s Well, Isabella is sent off to prison for her ’’scandalous breath‘‘ (5.1.125). This confrontation might not simply anger or frustrate us, as Seiden argues; it might also confirm that Isabella has been completely ’’suborn’d‘‘ as well as tricked by the friar/duke. When the duke, dressed once again as the Friar, is accused of ‘‘set[ting] these women on to slander Lord Angelo’’ (5.1.286), Lucio gets into the act and (falsely) confirms that he heard this same fellow slander the duke. Escalus orders his torture and finally the ‘‘real’’ duke is revealed when Lucio pulls off his hood. Angelo confesses all at the sight of the revealed duke. This ‘‘enjoyment’’ has an edge to it; it is not the delight of Diana’s riddles in All’s Well. Instead, the pleasure might come from the sense that Isabella is being chastised for her falseness. Just as we were amused by the irony of Isabella’s falseness tricking Angelo’s own false corruption, we are given license to enjoy it when Isabella’s falseness is chastised by not being believed in the court. Where earlier, Angelo’s slimy dealings (‘‘Who will believe thee, Isabel?’’) troubled us, by now we know that the duke holds all of the cards. The idea that Isabella is being chastized by the duke also explains the

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duke’s trick of not telling Isabella that her brother lives; this becomes the basis of the second half of the trial scene. Some read the duke’s deception as a test of Isabella’s humility, but I think it also indulges the audience’s desire to see her humiliated. Thus the deceptive woman not only fails to be believed in court, but when the outcome she wished for comes about anyway (Angelo is ‘‘discovered’’), she finds she is asked to plead for the man’s life. Certainly, the source of ‘‘entertainment’’ repeatedly shifts in this multi-layered and complex scene, but after Angelo confesses, the dramatic emphasis of the scene shifts from accusation to punishment. Angelo hopes for death, but instead is married to Mariana, and Isabella asks and receives a pardon (5.1.385). Critics generally agree that these acts of forgiveness are unsatisfying. Angelo speaks eloquently for death rather than marriage: ‘‘I crave death more willingly than mercy; / Tis my deserving, and I do entreat it’’ (5.1.474– 75). Lucio’s punishment of being forced to marry his whore is an ironic and telling parallel. Comically, Lucio thumbs his nose at the duke’s ‘‘forgiveness’’: ‘‘Marry a punk, my lord, is pressing to death, / Whipping and hanging’’ (5.1.520–21). While this comment is always sure to get a laugh in the theater, I believe this is the moment when Shakespeare tries another ‘‘bed-trick’’ on his audience. Although we were hoping that the ‘‘bad’’ Angelo would receive his just reward, learning that his life will be spared and that he is forced to marry is not satisfying. Even the possibility of Isabella’s marriage to the duke is marred by her humiliated status. Isabella has been stripped, rather than raped, of her purity; she not only had to go through with seeming to accept Angelo’s ‘‘wicked’’ proposal (she is shown the garden, twice), but must also publicly announce she is not a maid—only to reveal she lied in order to condemn Angelo. While Isabella’s act of mercy in pleading to save Angelo’s life seems the last test of her goodness, it once again highlights her role in the deceit. Her unanswered offer of marriage from the duke puts her in the position of the other offenders on stage; she seems faced with a forced marriage as punishment for the offense of slandering a prince. Although David Evett’s essay in this volume sees balanced justice in the marriages at the end of the play, I read them as more vexing. The one marriage we might really find as a source of joy (Claudio and Juliet’s) is not part of the play’s closure. Instead, we are given Lucio’s forced marriage which I suggest works too hard to

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make us laugh. These forced marriages ordered by the state check our pleasure in and desire for ‘‘justice.’’ While the play seems to indulge the cultural fantasy that all sexual transgression can be solved by marriage, it complicates it by utilizing women’s false testimony. In order to humiliate and chastise extramarital sexuality (Angelo’s instead of Claudio’s), the duke ‘‘suborn[s]’’ a woman to bear false witness. Although the audience has earlier been placed in the position of being pleased that falseness for falseness worked, a pall is cast over the pleasure once one realizes that what has happened is that the state (in the form of the duke) has forced men to marry women based on the false testimony of women. The closure of Measure for Measure depends on men being punished (by forced marriage) for sexual misconduct by the state, which takes us back to Justice Hale’s fears about false accusations.

Bed-tricks and Rape-tricks: The Queen of Corinth Another less familiar bed-trick play, Fletcher’s The Queen of Corinth (1616), crystallizes for me the connection between bed-tricks, false accusations, and a rape culture.30 In a dramatized trial scene for rape, we witness two ‘‘good’’ women each claim that they were raped by the queen’s son, Theanor. Like many seventeenth-century rape plays, the world of the play takes place during a time when the punishment for rape could be either marriage or death.31 After a clerk reads what the audience would consider an obsolete law of rape which stipulates a rape victim’s ‘‘choyce’’ of punishments, one woman, Beliza, calls for his death, while another, Merione, wants to exercise her privilege of marrying the rapist. Here is a familiar legal dilemma that those who had studied the law would recognize; what to do if one man raped two different women in the same night?32 Prosecuting rape with the usual legal remedy of marriage or execution becomes an educational ‘‘problem’’ when faced with two different claimants, a version of which also takes place in Measure for Measure, as Karen Bamford discusses.33 While the legal dilemma of the play centers on how to satisfy both claimants, the plot of Corinth is complicated by the fact that one of the victims lies. Although Theanor intended to rape two different women, he has been the ‘‘victim’’ of a bed-trick. Beliza, who calls for his death, was never raped. Instead Merione, who was raped by

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Theanor, switches places with Beliza when she finds out that he intends to rape a second time. Merione agrees to be disguised and ‘‘againe (but willingly)[be] surpriz’d’’ (5.4.208) as a means to catch and then prosecute Theanor for his act of rape. Before the bed-trick and the final rape trial, the play calls our attention to the dangerous potential of believing rape victims’ accusations of rape. Merione spots her own ring, which was stolen during the rape, on the hand of Euphanes. Although Merione sincerely believes Euphanes is her ‘‘foul Ravisher’’ (3.2.132), we, in the audience, know it’s a false accusation; he’s innocent. Theanor, the real rapist, had planted the ring in hopes of incriminating Euphanes, who is a particular favorite of the queen. When Merione’s brother and his followers learn of her accusation, a war almost begins before the innocent man can prove he is not the rapist. Realizing their error, the would-be revengers say they are ‘‘utterly lost, and sham’d’’; they honorably kneel to receive their punishment of death for rebellion and for falsely accusing a man with rape (4.3.114, 125). Instead, the virtuous Euphanes pardons their ‘‘rash love’’ (4.3.127) and suggests that the ring will hold a clue to finding the real rapist. In this way, the play builds on the problem of prosecuting rape amid false accusations; it highlights how being too quick to believe a woman might lead to rash and false judgments. Merione’s male relatives ‘‘shamefully’’ turn to rebellion in order to prosecute their own brand of vigilante justice because they fear that the queen’s favorite is untouchable. When it is revealed that the true rapist is the queen’s own son, however, she severely denounces her son for the crime that ‘‘murders all that’s chaste, or good in woman’’ (5.2.86). The queen makes a lengthy speech explaining that she will not consider a pardon because she must ‘‘Teach others to be honest: all will shun to tempt her Lawes, that would not spare her Son’’ (5.2.123–24). The queen sternly condemns the rapist to die since he ‘‘cannot marry both, but for both dying, Both have their full revenge’’ (5.2.158–59). Theanor confesses and, on his knees, asks first to marry Merione in order to restore her honor, and then suffer execution for Beliza. Once Theanor’s guilt is proven by his own words (as opposed to the words of a woman), Euphanes reveals the bed-trick; he explains that Theanor raped only one woman, twice. Now the remorseful rapist can marry Merione, ‘‘erasing’’ the rape altogether. The rejuvenation of the contrite rapist and the

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soiled woman provides the grounds for celebration and the play ends with three marriages. The bed-trick distracts the audience’s attention away from the first rape and we are meant to forgive the illicit nature of the intended rape/sex. Just as a rape can be transformed into just pre-marital sex by marriage, Beliza’s false accusation against Theanor becomes a pre-wedding mask, an entertainment: ‘‘And these two Ladies in their feign’d contentions, / To your delight, have serv’d as Maskers / To their owne Nuptialls’’ (5.4.220–22, emphasis added). I find it interesting that both women are called liars. Merione does not lie; she was raped and she does want to marry her rapist. By linking the two women, the play glosses over the rape, and at the same time, makes all women (‘‘harmless’’?) liars. Unlike All’s Well and Measure for Measure, where we are allowed to enjoy Diana’s riddles and Isabella’s coy defense, here we are duped along with the rapist and the judge. Similar to our reactions to Angelo’s entrapment, we watch Theanor get caught and justly receive his punishment, only to learn it was a trick. A ‘‘good’’ woman falsely and convincingly accuses a man of rape whose execution is ordered. Rather than enjoy the deceptions, we are also taken in by the false testimony, which I argue is more disturbing and confirming. While the revelation of the bed-trick miraculously fixes things, this courtroom scene sustains the culture’s anxiety over false accusations of rape. While Theanor and Merione’s marriage is featured as joyful and allows for the legal rescue of his guilt and her chastity, first he was condemned to die based on the false accusation of a woman. The play performs a bed-trick on its audience; in this case, the new knowledge changes our reactions to the punishment of rape. Unlike Measure for Measure, here is not the worry that the state will force one to marry a ‘‘whore’’ of one’s own making. In The Queen of Corinth, the worry centers on the death sentence for rape and fantasizes about a time when marriage was a legal remedy. While the happy ending calls for us to forgive the women’s ‘‘feign’d contentions’’ and the rape, we—along with the queen—were convinced that Theanor was a guilty rapist deserving death; now we can no longer be sure. Not only did Merione mis-identify her rapist earlier in the play, here the rapist cannot be sure exactly whom he raped. In this way, the play puts into doubt anyone’s testimony regarding rape. While Justice Hale, whom I discussed at the beginning the essay,

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explicitly worries about malicious false accusations, here the play questions all testimony regarding rape. If the victims and perpetrators can be mistaken, the play seems to ask, how can judge and jury ever execute a man for such a crime? While All’s Well and Measure for Measure may worry about men being forced into marriage on the basis of a false accusation, The Queen of Corinth suggests that even this is a fantasy of an obsolete solution. The darker fear is that men will be killed on a false accusation, which almost happened to Theanor and, earlier in the play, to Euphanes. While the play explores both solutions, and suggests that the obsolete law is by far the less alarming of the two, what we seem to be left with is Hale’s myth of the deceptive woman in order to stave off possible false judgments. After all, from either the stern law or a revengeful relative, swift justice is all the more frightening when a false accusation of rape might mean the death of an innocent man. Rape might ‘‘murder’’ chastity, but, the play suggests, false or even mistaken accusations might murder men.

Notes 1. Matthew Hale, Historia Placitorum Coronae: The History of the Pleas of the Crown (London: Professional Books Ltd., 1971), 1:635. 2. Linda Woodbridge, Women and the English Renaissance (Urbana: University of Chicago Press, 1986), 26. 3. Marliss Desens, The Bed-Trick in English Renaissance Drama: Explorations in Gender, Sexuality, and Power (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1994), 11. Desens provides persuasive evidence of how our understanding of the bed-trick has been narrowed by certain reading practices. She faults prior criticism of the bed-trick because it has relied almost exclusively on Shakespeare’s two plays (All’s Well and Measure) and has read the bed-trick from a male perspective, that is attending to male desires and fears. My reading is necessarily narrow in just these ways; however, I am not making claims about all bed-tricks. I analyze the strategies by which these particular plays attend to male desires and fears, and connect these to other representations of male desires and fears. See also William Bowden,‘‘The Bed-Trick, 1603–1642: Its Mechanics, Ethics, and Effects,’’ Shakespeare Studies 5 (1969): 112–23. 4. For the most extreme and negative reception, see Evans who argues that Helena’s ‘‘veil of ambiguity’’ masks her exploitive manipulation that is so ‘‘unheroinely’’ that it at times ‘‘borders on witchery.’’ Bertrand Evans, Shakespeare’s Comedies (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1960), 154, 166. 5. On Helena’s connection with Helen of Troy see Barbara Hodgdon, ‘‘The Making of Virgins and Mothers: Sexual Signs, Substitute Scenes, and Doubled Presences in All’s Well That Ends Well,’’ Philological Quarterly 66 (1987): 48, 66; and Carol

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Thomas Neely, Broken Nuptials in Shakespeare’s Plays (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1993), 73. 6. For the most part, critics who defend Helena dismiss her deceptions and highlight their good ends. See Neely, who argues that Helena ‘‘transcends the corrupted and stereotyped views held by the male characters’’ (60). Like Lawrence, Neely points to All’s Well’s folktale origins to show that traditionally women are often seen as even more ‘‘manipulative and ingenious than Helen, whose stratagem presents itself to her accidentally,’’ which seems a rather coy defense of a woman’s manipulation (78). See also Cohen who argues that the piousness of the bedtrick ‘‘strips away stock responses to the women who design the deception’’ because its aims are virtuous, in Eileen Cohen, ‘‘ ‘Virtue is Bold’: The Bed-Trick and Characterization in All’s Well That Ends Well and Measure for Measure,’’ Philological Quarterly 65 (1986): 171. 7. W. W. Lawrence, Shakespeare’s Problem Comedies (New York: Macmillan, 1931), 33. 8. Quotations from Shakespeare’s plays are from The Complete Works of Shakespeare, ed. David Bevington (New York: Longman, 1997), 4th edition. 9. Janet Adelman, ‘‘Bed Tricks: On Marriage as the End of Comedy in All’s Well That Ends Well and Measure for Measure,’’ Shakespeare’s Personality, ed. Norman Holland, Sidney Homan, and Bernard J. Paris, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989), 154. See also Neely, who argues that ‘‘the husband’s flight and the tasks imposed express the husband’s fear of female sexuality and marital responsibility along with the contradictory desires for illegitimate satisfaction and the achievement of family continuity through an heir’’ (78). 10. Hodgdon, 58. 11. See also the line in Richard III: ‘‘Play the maid’s part—still answer nay, and take it’’ (3.7.51). 12. In contrast, in Measure for Measure, Isabella’s scenes of resistance are understood as genuine and Isabella’s consent is only reported. 13. See also Katherine Finin-Farber on the female promiscuous body, and the charge of being a ‘‘whore’’ in legal proceedings as dramatized in The White Devil in ‘‘Framing (the) Woman: The White Devil and the Deployment of Law.’’ Renaissance Drama N.S. 25 (1994): 219–47. See also Laura Gowing, Domestic Danger: Women, Words, and Sex in Early Modern London, (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996). 14. See, among others, Laura Mulvey, ‘‘Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,’’ Visual and Other Pleasures (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989), 14–26; and ‘‘After-thoughts on ‘Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema’ Inspired by King Vidor’s Duel in the Sun,’’ Feminist Film Theory: A Reader (New York: New York University Press, 1999), 122–30. 15. Critics have judged Isabella’s reaction harshly, noting that she not only justly calls Claudio a coward, but slanders her own mother and father. While some critics argue that this ‘‘over-reaction’’ by Isabella allows the audience to see her as treasuring her chastity too much, I think we can see Shakespeare developing our sense of Isabella’s ability to make a false accusation when prompted out of ‘‘scorn’’ and anger. 16. For example, Adelman finds in Measure a response to the fears released in All’s Well by redoing the bed-trick so that it is ‘‘under the management of a powerful

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and asexual man, in whose hands women are merely cooperative pawns . . . That is, the play takes the power back from the hands of the woman and consolidates it in the duke’’ (174). On the duke as coercive, for instance, see Neely, 94. 17. Lindsay M. Kaplan, ‘‘Slander for Slander in Measure for Measure.’’ Renaissance Drama n.s. 21 (1990): 24, 47. 18. W. W. Lawrence, 91. 19. For a detailed examination of the sources, see N. W. Bawcutt, ‘‘Introduction.’’ Measure for Measure. The Oxford Shakespeare. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1991),12–24; and Lawrence, 84–94. 20. J. W. Lever, ed., Measure for Measure, The Arden Shakespeare (London: Routledge, 1966), xxxix. 21. The whole justification of needing to use the bed-trick is premised on the idea that a true revelation of Angelo’s deeds will not be believed. While Angelo spouts this belief to silence and possibly humiliate Isabella, and to motivate her to sleep with him, the duke uses it to motivate her to deceive Angelo. 22. Yet, while Angelo’s lies are presented as corrupt, Shakespeare highlights the women’s deceptions without ‘‘demonizing’’ them in order to ‘‘enjoy’’ them more as coy than as wicked. Cf. Katherine Finan’s essay in this volume that examines Portia’s use of ambiguous language as a form of agency. 23. Roy W. Battenhouse Shakespearean Tragedy: Its Art & Its Christian Premises. (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1969), 148. Diana’s and Isabella’s falseness could also be read as part of another tradition; one which sanctions or allows women’s falseness as a defense of their chastity, which Brundage asserts was thought to be a lesser sin. According to early Christian doctrine, women were ‘‘morally justified in using deceptive stratagems to forestall sexual attackers. Faced with an assault upon her virtue, an unmarried woman could rightfully pretend that she was married . . . : the lie was only a minor sin. A woman who promised to pay a would-be attacker in order to persuade him to desist had no obligation to keep her promise, and if the assailant tried to enforce the promise, the law would not require her to pay’’ (James Brundage, Law, Sex, and Christian Society in Medieval Europe. [Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1987], 397). 24. Melvin Seiden, Measure for Measure: Casuiatry and Artistry (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1990), 121. 25. William Bowden, ‘‘The Bed-Trick, 1603–1642: Its Mechanics, Ethics, and Effects.’’ Shakespeare Studies 5 (1969): 116. 26. Angelo seems to discredit both women by ‘‘explaining’’ their motives for making false accusations. He says that Isabella is bitter because he executed her brother (5.1.38), and Mariana is trying to claim him as a husband because he broke off an earlier engagement due to her ‘‘disvalu’d’’ reputation (220). Although Angelo believes that Isabella is speaking the truth and Mariana speaks false, we in the audience know it is the other way around. Isabella may seem to speak the truth, but she is patently false. 27. Seiden, 118. 28. Ibid., 119, 123. 29. Ibid., 121. 30. For all quotations of The Queen of Corinth, see Robert Kean Turner, ed., The Dramatic Works in the Beaumont and Fletcher Canon, vol. 8, Fredson Bowers, General

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Editor, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982). Although I refer to the authorship of Corinth as Fletcher, Turner argues that the authorship was shared by Fletcher, Field, and Massinger. 31. For an overview of the plays which feature the fantasy (and the old law) of marrying the rapist, see Suzanne Gossett, ‘‘ ‘Best Men are Molded out of Faults’: Marrying the Rapist in Jacobean Drama.’’ English Literary Renaissance 14 (1984): 305–27. 32. For more on the history of this rhetorical exercise, see Turner, ‘‘Introduction,’’ Queen of Corinth, 5. 33. See Karen Bamford’s thoughtful exploration of the play, its relation to Measure for Measure, and her coining of the term ‘‘rape trick’’ (Sexual Violence on the Jacobean Stage, [New York: St. Martins, 2000], 143).

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‘‘What Is Yours Is Mine’’: Sexual and Social Complementarity in the Trial Scenes of Measure for Measure David Evett

THAT MEASURE FOR MEASURE TAKES ACCOUNT OF JUSTICE CAN HARDLY BE gainsaid; the word itself occurs in the play twenty-five times, more often than in any other, and by my count, the final scene alone contains at least one hundred juridical terms. There are, indeed, several trial scenes, with now Angelo, now Escalus, now the Duke as judge, and almost all of the other significant characters at one time or another as plaintiff or defendant. There is extensive scholarship on the legal issues of the play, including a number of articles published in journals devoted to law rather than literature. Many critics treat the play as a de´bat between justice, understood as the strict application of codified legal principles, and equity, as the effort of judges informed by human wisdom, experience, and learning to settle disputes according to principles of conscience, fairness, and justness. The opposition is sometimes treated in terms of the differences between civil law, based on English common law, and canon law, based on Roman law (see Chamberlain),1 or, more broadly, between the various common law courts and the courts of Chancery and Star Chamber, representing ‘‘a system of Christian justice distinct from the secular framework of common law.’’2 That religious matters are active in the play is signified, of course, by the title, with its echo of St. Matthew’s gospel (7:2), by Isabella’s status as a conventual novice, and by the monastic clothing which she, the disguised duke, and Friar Peter/Thomas all wear, and which Darrell Gless calls the play’s most striking visual effect.3 These topics cross and recross in an institution, marriage, that conspicuously bestrides the juridical, moral, and social realms, and the fullest possible understanding of the play must accommodate the fullest possible intercalation of marriage with the other active concerns. 140

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‘‘WHAT IS YOURS IS MINE’’

The title of the play powerfully signals a conceptual and rhetorical structure that infuses the language and action of the play, the quality of balance (‘‘dialogic’’ is Louise Schleiner’s term).4 The definitive icon for this structure is also the definitive attribute of the figure of personified Justice, her scales, repeatedly invoked in the play by the name of one of its judges, Escalus—a personage who can himself be said to balance the narrow insistence on codified justice of his colleague, Angelo, with the disposition toward equity that extensively if not uniformly animates the Duke.5 The play is rich in what Marc Shell calls ‘‘taliation.’’6 ‘‘The plot of Measure for Measure is informed by a series of exchanges, or proposed exchanges, in which things are taken for each other. These exchanges constitute a developmental series that motivates the play from beginning to end, a series that plays out the figurative basis of all transaction— commercial, sexual, and linguistic.’’7 Thus, according to Angelo, either Claudio’s head or Isabella’s maidenhead must pay for Juliet’s maidenhead, while, according to the Duke, Mariana’s can be substituted for Isabella’s; and Ragozine’s head substitutes for Isabella’s maidenhead, or for Barnardine’s or Claudio’s actual head. Disguise, Shell says, images exchange: ‘‘one human being passes for another by seeming to be another.’’8 Barnardine, the murderer, is sentenced to give his life to balance the life he took. For Angelo, to marry Mariana was to marry her dowry; when the money sank with her brother’s ship, so did she. Isabella’s going into the convent balances Claudio’s going into prison; Angelo’s disguise of his libidinous desires behind the disguise of the icy rationalist matches the Duke’s as friar. For the original spectators of the play, ‘‘balancing choice after choice forced them to weigh the microcosm of Measure for Measure against their own.’’9 As Shell observes, however, the imbalance between the power of the state and the power of the individual short-circuits taliation: if Angelo, on the authority of the Duke, takes Claudio’s life, Claudio’s friends cannot legally retaliate by taking Angelo’s.10 A similar imbalance appears when the state destroys the bawdy houses in the city suburbs and with them the livelihoods of the sex workers they employ (although it may appear that a kind of grey-market justice is restored when, according to Pompey, what sounds like civic corruption allows a ‘‘wise burgher’’ to buy up the houses in the city, presumably with intent to reopen them when the heat is off [1.2.76–84]). Nor is it evident to common sense (one of the compo-

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nents of equity) that Claudio’s single life is a just counterweight to thousands of licentious acts for which he had no responsibility. It is hard to see, furthermore, why he rather than his friend Lucio should have been selected as the scapegoat. In terms of the image of the scales, all the weight is in one pan. When we pile on the quasiofficial hugger-mugger of the bed-trick and the head-trick, plus the Duke’s apparent cruelty in inviting Isabella and Mariana to accuse Angelo, plus setting Angelo as judge of his own case (the Duke himself calls this unjust [5.1.294]), then rejecting the accusation, plus the even greater cruelty of telling Isabella that her brother has died despite her efforts to save him, plus the public rebuke of the conscientious and faithful Provost, plus perhaps even the punishing of Lucio for slanders that in public, at least, do not amount to much (the truly offensive ones having no audience on stage but the Duke himself, albeit in his disguise as friar)—adding all this up, it may appear that the state as a whole, not just the individual defendants, is radically out of balance—that is, on trial. On the critical stage, that trial in recent decades has taken place under the skeptical, anti-idealist rubrics of postmodern materialism. The charges are the inherent inequalities of early modern political and social hierarchy, including the patriarchal subordination of women, and that hierarchy’s insidious exploitation of the era’s religious and moral ideas to further its own material interests by helping it retain a disproportionate and largely unearned share of power and wealth. As Paula Blank puts it, ‘‘All law in Vienna is exposed as ‘private’ law, the privilege of the ruler. . . . And in such a world, the difference between law and equity ultimately is abolished: call it ‘law’ or call it ‘equity,’ justice in Measure for Measure, from beginning to end, is the sovereign’s discretion.’’11 Andrew Barnaby and Joan Wry connect the play to King James I’s initiation, early in his reign, of the project that would produce the translation of the Bible that commonly bears his name. Barnaby and Wry see this (at least on James’s own part) as a political rather than spiritual enterprise. They argue that these motives are refracted in the play through the actions of the Duke, developed here as a politician ‘‘who uses (or abuses) religious rhetoric as a political weapon, a weapon through which he manages finally to ‘ratify’ his waning royal authority by imposing fraudulent claims to the divine authority—claims deriving in part from biblical texts—upon the body politic.’’12 The Duke, in his own figure but especially in his disguise as the monastic puppet-mas-

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ter Friar Lodowick, manipulates things so as ‘‘to enhance his own reputation as a wise and virtuous ruler, one who in good Machiavellian terms should be feared and loved simultaneously.’’13 His devious self-interest effectively ambiguates all the actions at the end of the play, and particularly the four marriages, one accomplished and three in the immediate offing, which he has either ratified (Claudio and Juliet), required (Angelo and Mariana, Lucio and the whore Kate Keepdown), or proffered (himself and Isabella). If they are merely means to shore up his control of Vienna, they are fundamentally secular, not sacramental, and he is, as Lucio affirms and Paula Blank seconds, a ‘‘very superficial, ignorant, unweighing fellow’’ (3.1.379).14 Blank’s skeptical position is echoed by Emily A. DetmerGoebel in her essay on the bed-trick in the present volume.15 It is possible to restore the sacramental quality to these unions, however, even Lucio’s—to restore the play’s balance, at least in its own historical frame of reference.16 Margo Todd argues persuasively that through the sixteenth and into the seventeenth century, English social commentators more and more presented the household—not our own often fragmentary nuclear families, but the more typical early modern gathering of parents, their children, often other blood relations of various ages, and one or several or many servants—rather than the cloister or the palace, as the seedbed and training ground for social order.17 From across the theological spectrum, they called on Aristotle, Vives, and Erasmus to buttress their claims. Thus William Perkins: the household, he says, is ‘‘the Seminarie of all other societies.’’18 The authorizing concept was the analogy between the state and the family whose fullest expression is Sir Robert Filmer’s Patriarcha.19 At the center of the definitive household was a married couple. Debora Shuger, whose investigations into the interactions among religious thought, social institutions, and literary production in early modern England have much enriched our understanding of the period, has related the negotiations between equity and justice to the institution of marriage. Marriage is the mean between the macrocosm of the state or institution and the microcosm of the individual, and the household its outcome. In this perspective, ‘‘the fundamental contrast throughout is between remaining within the interwoven bonds—of duty, honor, power, use, affection, and the like—that define the family, and, conversely, withdrawing from these bonds to act on one’s own volition, as a free agent.’’20 Shuger’s language con-

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nects marriage to the issues discussed in the present volume by Catherine E. Thomas in her consideration of tyranny in The Winter’s Tale. Leontes abuses his public power to satisfy private (and fundamentally sexual) passion. The relationships distorted or destroyed by his actions are familial, but they have public effects, for marriage is the institution that preeminently modulates the public implication of private passions, both sexual and economic, by restraining the energies of sexual desire within the socially approved unit of the married couple, and by ordering those of acquisitiveness by governing the transmission of possessions through the means of familial legitimation. (Note that the two elements intersect in the case of bastardy.) The household is thus an essential feature of virtually all societies. But there are no households in Measure for Measure. Almost uniquely among Shakespeare’s plays, it inscribes no images of conventional domesticity—no married couples, no parent-child relationships, not even the kind of single masters-plus-servants households we get in Twelfth Night and Timon of Athens. (There is an unconventional grouping that in its way makes the point, the brothel-keeper, Mistress Overdone, and her factotum, Pompey.) Its one familial pair, brother and sister, Claudio and Isabella, live apart from one another, and spend most of the play morally as well as physically separated. Its one mutually linked couple is unmarried, forcibly separated early in the play, to the point where Juliet is sent off to bear the pain of childbirth at exactly the same time as Claudio is to undergo the pain of judicial murder (another balancing act). All the other characters are, as far as the text tells us, single; none of them has a servant, a Tranio or Nerissa, with whom to share their concerns. We know that the endings of Shakespeare’s comedies typically restore broken families as well as make new ones, and that the devastation of families by war and murder is the most pervasive theme of both the tragedies and the histories. In Measure for Measure, we are told at the beginning that the social fabric has unraveled, to the point where the leader can only flee into hiding in a way so disorderly that his deputy wonders if he is insane: ‘‘His actions show much like to madness’’ (4.4.2–3). (The line might well describe the actions of unbridled passion.) This comedy, therefore, has the task of producing households from scratch, from atoms and monads and other elementary social particles. Indeed, the particles whiz and bang with an almost Brownian unpredictability and only slowly begin to agglomerate. At the beginning, such sexual activity as there

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is is illicit, and there is not much. The brothels have been closed. Two of the three socially superior women, both marriageable adults, are locked into a sterile passivity, Isabella in her convent, Mariana in her grange. Juliet is pregnant, but without a husband to provide for and defend the child, while the ‘‘friends’’ who have apparently been an impediment to the marriage (1.2.127–30) are nowhere to be seen when her troubles come upon her. The men are seemingly intent only on satisfying their desires, and none aims at marriage. Angelo begins in icy chastity, and he and Lucio explicitly seek to satisfy their sexual urges only outside wedlock. Some modern critics have toyed with the idea that Lucio’s accusing the Duke of having sowed a field full of wild oats may be true;21 nothing in his actions or language in the play supports this, however, and his choice of disguise suggests a natural inclination to chastity. Even Claudio is not set on marriage enough to follow the lead of Lucentio in Taming of the Shrew, Edward Plantagenet in 3 Henry VI, Romeo, and Fenton in Merry Wives—that is, hire a priest and marry the girl without the family’s approval. Yet the play struggles to bring the women out of passivity into action, the men into a willingness if not an eagerness to choose a mate. For only when the sexual nuclei of a set of households have been produced can the comedy close. As indicated, the crucial formation is marriage.22 In this play, this means marriage not just in terms of Angelic justice, and not just as a religious sacrament, but as a human relationship that produces children and their education, from which come the citizens the community needs to survive socially (primarily the work of Eve), and the nexus of labor, from which come the goods and services the community needs to survive physically (primarily the work of Adam). Without the four couples constructed, however equivocally, at the end of the play, this version of Vienna is phenomenologically doomed, as the Verona of Romeo and Juliet, the Britain of King Lear, and the Rome of Coriolanus are doomed because with no young marrieds to keep them going, they are locked into moribund stasis, sexual and economic. In this play, the drive toward marriage is powered by the agency of the women. Marliss C. Desens’s claims that ‘‘the only power this society ascribes to women is a negative one that provokes men to respond sexually to them’’; the position is developed further by Detmer-Goebel.23 Yet on various fronts, and in more ways than Desens and Detmer-Goebel concede, the actions of women finally make the

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difference in Measure for Measure. At the beginning of act 5 Isabella has already tried to save the lives and thus the marriage of Claudio and Juliet; if she does not initially succeed in persuading Angelo to relent (or, indeed, Claudio to sacrifice himself for her chastity), her actions push both Angelo and the Duke into actions they had not planned, which when they backfire move both men into new positions for reasons that sexual desire by itself cannot explain: they need to be considered in the context of marriage as a social institution. By participating in the bed-trick she helps to set up the marriage between Angelo and Mariana. When the Duke is, as Stephanie Chamberlain says, ‘‘defrocked’’ (in fact, the phrase is tendentious, for nothing in the text suggests that he doffs either his friar’s robe or the authority it represents after Lucio pulls down his hood),24 he passes justice on Angelo in the way Angelo himself has persistently invoked and applied, by the strict application of legal codes. Angelo is to be forced to marry Mariana, so as to make good his broken pledge to her, then to be executed, so as to punish him for his projected rape of Isabella, his violated oath to spare Claudio, and his use of his judicial authority for his own selfish ends (exactly the kind of tyranny analyzed by Thomas): yet more talionic balance. The resolute insistence of the two women on something like equity rather than talionic justice, however, resists this kind of commodification, and leads to an ending that carries seeds of hope for a revived Vienna. We can see this when we see that for awhile, at least, the Duke endorses an essentially commercial view of marriage as a form of property exchange (like Angelo’s) when he tells Mariana that he will give her the executed Angelo’s possessions ‘‘To buy you a better husband’’ (5.1.417). Mariana will have none of it. ‘‘O, my dear lord, / I crave no other, nor no better man’’ (5.1.417–18). (Note that she, too, is, indeed, enacting her private passion in a public way—a way, however, unlike Angelo’s, that promises future prosperity for the commonweal.) The Duke at first holds fast, founding his rigor on the principle of taliation: ‘‘An Angelo for Claudio, death for death’’; ‘‘He dies for Claudio’s death’’ (5.1.401, 434). In response, at Mariana’s urging, Isabella adds her intercession; significantly, her decision follows Mariana’s claim that ‘‘best men are moulded out of faults’’ (5.1.431). The language, including the pun on mold as earth, recalls that the Prayer Book marriage service grounded the institution in the union of Adam and Eve, as a response to original sin.25 The moment is verbally and visually power-

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ful—the two women, both victims of Angelo’s greed, lust, and fear, mocked by him and apparently by the Duke just a few minutes earlier, on their knees, in a gesture that recalls Isabella’s vocation, and her earlier offer to Angelo to recompense mercy to Claudio with ‘‘true prayers’’ (2.2.154). Initially the Duke seems to remain adamant—so much so that he performs one more act in the strict justice line, demanding the Provost’s resignation when that officer admits to having allowed a ‘‘private message’’ rather than an ‘‘official warrant’’ to control the execution of Claudio (5.1.451–52; the language echoes Thomas’s terms). Then, two things happen, one right after another. The first is a second admission by Angelo—the first having been provoked by the unmasking of the Duke—of his guilt. This time, however, to confession he adds contrition, and the promise of penitence—one way to construe his acceptance of marriage to Mariana—though he continues still in his strictly legal way: I am sorry that such sorrow I procure, And so deep sticks it in my penitent heart That I crave death more willingly than mercy. ’Tis my deserving, and I do entreat it. (5.1.468–70)

The moment invokes an important provision of Christian as contrasted with secular justice, the desire not only to enact the society’s rejection of the wicked deed but to bring the doer to reject it, too.26 Shuger explores in detail the particular emphasis on repentance in early modern English thought and practice, in the early reign of James I, and in this play. The moment animates the spiritual as well as the social components of marriage: it is as though Angelo’s penitence signals the return of the Holy Spirit to the city. ‘‘What makes a society Christian is not just that its people are mostly Christians, nor that Christianity is the state religion, but that grace and peace and eternal righteousness . . . are at work in its midst, taming the powers of evil.’’27 The second thing is the entrance of Claudio (‘‘muffled,’’ in the Norton stage direction and most productions) and the pregnant Juliet—the prototypical married couple (though they are not yet accepted as married); think of them as representations of Adam and Eve having just stepped through the fiery gate from the Garden into

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the world at large, with Claudio/Adam not, perhaps, condemned to ordinary agricultural toil, but certainly to a world far less certain than the one he thought he was master of, and Juliet, certainly, with her generic labor about to start.28 The first appearance before the Duke of this promise of a revitalized Vienna uncorks a jeroboam of mercy and grace. Within five lines, he has pardoned Barnardine—an act of pure grace, for the murderer has done nothing to deserve it, except for doing nothing. Ten lines later Claudio has been pardoned, too, and five lines after that, Angelo, granting Mariana’s plea, with the effect of adding a second married couple to the newly repeopled city. Among these pardons is a rather backhanded proposal of marriage to Isabella—‘‘Give me your hand and say you will be mine. / He is my brother, too’’ (5.1.486–87)—which she might be forgiven for not hearing or not responding to, in the first flush of her happiness at the restoration of her beloved brother. Next, though it takes longer, he appoints the marriage of Lucio to his ‘‘punk,’’ sentencing him to be hanged thereafter in the process, and then remitting the sentence. All these are to be marriages in human fact, not just law, asserting the power of the state to produce equity. Note that two of the marriages are practically fecund; Kate Keepdown’s child is a year and a quarter old, Juliet will give birth at any moment. Finally, Vincentio reiterates his marriage proposal to Isabella, in language that gives a last, plangent statement of the theme of balance, and adds a fourth to the list of potential urban copulatives. Here the equity is not so clear—compensation for the public rejection and the agonizing deception?—but the marriage clearly answers motives different from the prudential concerns that intellectually and historically dominated the matchmaking of and for early modern rulers. There are ambiguities.29 Lucio remains unpenitent, and it is hard to suppose that his marriage to Kate Keepdown is victualed for the long voyage. Readers and spectators can, and do, find the Duke’s Protean changefulness disturbing. The text offers no clear index to the real state of Angelo’s feelings toward his marriage, nor to Isabella’s: we are not told explicitly whether she says ‘‘Yes’’ or ‘‘No, thanks’’ to the Duke’s offer. On the stage, some of these problems can be—indeed, must be—resolved in the playing. On the page, they remain as questions. I think the questions heuristic, however, like the questions that remain at the end of Hamlet or King Lear. Here, Shakespeare says, are alternative visions of a city and its gover-

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nors. Which would you rather inhabit? What might be done to make one vision, or the other, come to pass? And how? A possible answer appears in my own final point: Dear Isabel, I have a motion much imports your good, Whereto, if you’ll a willing ear incline, What’s mine is yours, and what is yours is mine. (5.1.527–30)

More is meant, here, I think, than that if Isabella says, ‘‘Yes,’’ the marriage portion that would otherwise presumably have gone to the convent will instead become part of the joint economic resources of the new couple. At the core of Christian marriage is the ancient proposition that when they wed, a man and a woman reverse the process by which woman was physically divided from man, and become one flesh (Gen. 2:24, quoted in Mark 10:7–8 and Eph. 5:31; the passage from Eph. is quoted in full in the homily printed at the end of the marriage service in the Prayer Book of 1559, which many of the play’s original spectators and readers had heard). In the Renaissance, the idea gets philosophically enriched by one of the most influential of the Platonic dialogues, the Symposium, in the old story recounted by Aristophanes of how Zeus, disturbed by the threatening energy and competence of humans as originally created, split them in two, vertically, so that always thereafter each individual has longed to be reunited with its other half, hence the compulsive search for a mate, in soul as well as body, that drives most men and women (189d-191d). Whether Shakespeare knew the dialogue directly is debatable, but it was widely quoted and adapted. In any case, one way to view the marriages in Measure for Measure is in terms of psychological and social complementarity, each of the women bringing to the match not only physical completion, but also social and psychological qualities that are markedly absent from the man, and vice versa. Against Claudio’s impulsivity and wide swings of mood, Juliet balances patience and a readiness to take things as they come. In her interview with the disguised Duke she insists on the full mutuality of the act that made her pregnant, and invokes in an intriguingly tough-minded way the golden rule: ‘‘Love you the man that wronged you?’’ ‘‘ Yes, as I love the woman that wronged him’’ (2.3.26–27). The parallelism invokes talionic balance; but this

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is a gift, not a punishment. Mariana offers self-sacrificial patience and fidelity to a man who discarded her impatiently and abandoned even her memory for Isabella. We never see Kate Keepdown and know nothing about her mental attributes (though the name implies somebody like Doll Tearsheet). We can suppose (or at least hope), however, that the ballast of a family might help stabilize Lucio’s radical irresponsibility. As for the Duke, from the beginning he is marked by a tendency to observe rather than to act—his motto might be ‘‘I like to watch,’’ like Peter Sellers in Being There, though without that character’s ironically effectual wise passivity—and when he acts, to act through other people (Isabella and Mariana in the bed-trick, the Provost in the head-trick, Angelo and Escalus in judicial circumstances at both beginning and end of the play) rather than in his own ducal persona. In general he treats life as a game or experiment rather than something deadly serious; thus his response to the crisis that initiates the play is essentially theatrical, involving centrally his own disguise, but also all the plotting, in a dramatic sense, that leads to the final moments. In this light, the ‘‘what is yours’’ of the Duke’s antepenultimate line includes Isabella’s passion, conviction, and energy, and her refusal to be anything other than what she is. In the same way, he brings coolness, judicious reflection, the ability to take the large view, and particularly to do the kind of role-playing to which Gil Richard Musolf gives an important judicial function.30 The combination exemplifies another kind of socially and personally valuable balance. And it is the means by which occurs the decisive set of judgments that ensure that the city is not only purged, but rectified, by the penitence and reformation of its corrupt leaders. That includes the Duke himself, to whom the two women have demonstrated qualities of fidelity, courage, forgiveness, and love that he himself expresses and enacts in the final lines of the play. That done, the process of revivification, centered on marriage, can begin in earnest. It means, moreover, in contradiction of the materialist skepticism of so many modern critics, that a trial that ends in a proposal of marriage offers—at least for the moment—to redeem and restore humanity at large to its original wholeness.

Notes 1. Stephanie Chamberlain, ‘‘Defrocking Ecclesiastical Authority: Measure for Measure and the Struggle for Matrimonial Reform in Early Modern England,’’ Ben Jonson Journal 7 (2000): 115–28.

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2. Debora Kuller Shuger, Political Theologies in Shakespeare’s England: the Sacred and the State in Measure for Measure (Basingstoke and New York: Palgrave, 2001), 89. 3. Darryl J. Gless, Measure for Measure, the Law, and the Convent (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1979), 64. 4. Louise Schleiner, ‘‘Providential Improvisation in Measure for Measure,’’ PMLA 97 (1982): 227–36. 5. Personified and hence feminized Justitia is not explicitly named or otherwise invoked in the text of MM. I think it not accidental, however, that of the twenty-six uses of the word justice in the play, fully half come within a few lines of terms that call up female sexuality and especially maternity: pregnant 1.1.11, 2.1.23; baby-nurse, 1.3.29–30; woman-child-she-her-her-her, 2.1.151–57; daughter-husband-sow-reap 4.1.67–72; maid 5.1.20–27 (six uses of justice; the stage-picture is centered on two kneeling women); her-her-she-virgin-violator 5.1.34–41; women 5.1.231–33 (another kneeling woman). Shakespeare is cited throughout from The Norton Shakespeare, edited by Stephen Greenblatt et al. (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1997). 6. Marc Shell, The End of Kinship: ‘‘Measure for Measure,’’ Incest, and the Ideal of Universal Siblinghood (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995 [first pub. 1988]), 97. 7. Ibid., 119. 8. Ibid., 122. 9. Carolyn Harper,‘‘’Twixt Will and Will Not’’: The Dilemma of Measure for Measure (Niwot, CO: University Press of Colorado, 1998), 8. 10. Shell, 130. 11. Paula Blank, Shakespeare and the Mismeasure of Renaissance Man (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 2006), 184. 12. Andrew Barnaby and Joan Wry, ‘‘Authorized Versions: Measure for Measure and the Politics of Biblical Translation,’’ Renaissance Quarterly 51 (1998): 1225–54. 13. Ibid., 1242. 14. Blank, 186. 15. Emily A. Detmer-Goebel, ‘‘Shakespeare’s Bed-tricks: Finding Justice in Lies?’’ 16. Brian Gibbons has useful remarks on early modern marriage as balancing religious and material, ethical and social values (35). See Brian Gibbons, ed., Measure for Measure (updated edition, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 36. 17. Margo Todd, ‘‘Humanists, Puritans, and the Spiritualized Household,’’ Church History 49 (1980): 18–34. 18. Perkins, Workes 3.698 (1618), quoted in Todd, 22–23. 19. 1680, composed c. 1632. 20. Shuger, 27. 21. Shell, 152–53. 22. See Gil Richard Musolf, ‘‘Role-Taking and Restorative Justice: Social Practices of Solidarity and Community in Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure.’’ Contemporary Justice Review 5 (2002): 227, though he shares the suspicion of Barnaby and Way. 23. Marliss C. Desens, The Bed-trick in English Renaissance Drama: Explorations in

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Gender, Sexuality, and Power (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1994), 82. Detmer-Goebel focuses particularly on the cultural expectation that women lie about sex in court, an expectation confirmed, she says, by Isabella’s actual testimony at the beginning of 5.1 ([10–11]). 24. Chamberlain, 116. 25. ‘‘instytuted of God in Paradise, in the time of manes innocencie . . . ordeined for a remedy agaynste sinne.’’ Booke of Common Prayer (1559), ‘‘The Fourme of Solempnizacion of Matrimonye,’’ para. 1. http://justus.anglican.org/resources/bcp/ 1559/Marriage_1559.htm. 26. Angelo’s turn is oddly anticipated by that of Pompey, who has left his illegal employment as brothelkeeper for a no more admirable but legal employment as executioner’s assistant. 27. Shuger, 47. 28. I sidestep here the extensive scholarly discussion of the relationship in this play and in early modern English society generally between handfast marriage and the more formal kind; it is noteworthy that for all its importance in getting Claudio sentenced to begin with, the Duke pays the question no notice here at the end. 29. Detmer-Goebel explores many of them. 30. Musolf, 212–13.

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Striking a Deal: Portia’s Trial Strategy in Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice Andrew Majeske The Legal Context of the Trial

THE ANALYSIS PRESENTED IN THIS PAPER IS BASED ON THE ASSUMPTION that Portia is acting in the trial more as an advocate than as an impartial judge—certainly as an advocate for Antonio, but more importantly as an advocate for herself, protecting her own interests. Moreover, it assumes that an indispensable element of any good advocate’s trial preparation, whether in early modern England or in contemporary times, is to formulate in advance a strategy for achieving a favorable outcome. Similarly, it is assumed that strategy is an indispensable component of commercial negotiations, and that commercial strategies include taking into account, among other things, the law or laws that might apply to the transaction. One of the hurdles to uncovering Portia’s strategy for the trial is identifying the legal context of the case. For the past forty years many critics have pursued a theory that the trial scene reflected the increasing tensions in England in the 1590s between the common law courts and the equity jurisdiction of the Chancery court.1 At first glance this analogy seems worthwhile since Portia’s strict interpretation of the bond appears to echo the critique of law as overly ‘‘strict’’—a strictness that the operation of equity, which was more flexible, was supposed to remedy. However, as B. J. and Mary Sokol have observed, such an interpretation seems misguided in a number of respects.2 Among the many problems this interpretation faces are that there is no equitable resolution to the strict interpretation of the bond put forth by Portia, and the glaring fact that Shakespeare appears little concerned with the concept of equity, either in this or any other of his plays.3 As will be discussed below, the duke and Portia both allude somewhat mysteriously to mercy rather than equity. 153

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In the legal sphere mercy does not address a solution to the problem of the bond; rather it relates almost exclusively to the apparently irrelevant functions of the pardon power of the executive, a power usually relating to the reduction or remission of punishment after conviction in criminal matters.4 B. J. Sokol initiated a more promising line of inquiry when he suggested that the play should be viewed in light of the lex mercatoria— the law merchant, the international law of trade in early modern Europe, applicable to commercial dealings in both England and Venice at the time the play was written.5 A key component of the law merchant was the requirement of bona fides—of good faith. What precisely this good faith consisted of is in dispute,6 but it is clear that it derives in part from the exceptio doli of Roman law,7 and in a case where it was determined that ‘‘an inequity or injustice would flow from the action’’ were it allowed to succeed, the judge had the ‘‘equitable discretion to decide the case before him in accordance with what appeared [to him] to be fair and reasonable.’’8 Among the remedies available to the judge, in the event of a lack of good faith under the law merchant, was the power to rescind a contract—in this case the bond. If rescission was applied, the parties would be returned to their pre-contract positions—the bond would be void and Shylock would simply have received back his principal. Surprisingly, determining the legal context for the trial does not provide much assistance in unraveling Portia’s trial strategy. What it does accomplish is highlight one way she could have handled the trial and achieved what appears to be a legally and morally satisfactory result, if she had been playing the role of an impartial judge. The question remains, why does she not pursue the resolution offered by the law merchant, instead electing to rely upon an obscure and long unenforced Venetian criminal statute, and in so doing resolve the trial by what many have considered ‘‘the most morally troubling means.’’9 To determine what Portia’s strategy was in choosing to resolve the case in this fashion, we need to take into account broader contexts affecting the trial.

Mercy and the Trial’s (A)Moral Component I address morality in this section both because of the moral flavor of the two appeals to mercy that begin the trial scene, and the

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(a)morality of the marketplace that is visible in Portia’s conduct (as Balthazar)—a conduct that disregards both the Jewish and the Christian moral schemas and replaces them with what could somewhat anachronistically be described as a capitalistic scheme in which the right or moral result is that which maximizes wealth for oneself or, by extension, one’s friends. Focusing on this moral sphere helps to illuminate key elements of Portia’s trial strategy.

The Prelude to the Trial: The Duke’s Mercy and the Summoning of Belario The duke’s appeal to mercy at the outset of the trial scene seems out of place since it is so evidently irrelevant to the case. It could only become legally relevant if the trial takes on a completely different and unexpected aspect—at least unexpected by everyone present except for the duke and Portia. Shylock would need to be convicted of criminal conduct and sentenced—presumably to death—and be seeking the duke’s pardon, for mercy to be relevant to the case. But on the surface there is no reason to expect that the trial involves anything other than the enforcement of the bond, a kind of contract. Even given the early modern period’s more relaxed distinction between civil and criminal matters, the issue of mercy (and pardon) would scarcely arise in this case in its initial formulation. Mercy is not obviously relevant in a case such as this under the common law, the Chancery’s equity jurisdiction, or the law merchant. Moreover, as the Duke apparently knows well, an extra-legal appeal to mercy would fail to resonate with Shylock’s Old Testament morality. From both the legal and the moral perspective, the duke’s appeal to mercy appears problematic. Another thing that is clear about the duke’s odd appeal to mercy is that it is not made in an official judicial capacity—the duke has recused himself from deciding the case, presumably in order to maintain the appearance of an impartial legal tribunal for the commercial interests observing the trial.10 He has referred the case for decision instead to one of the four civil law doctors at the university in nearby Padua.11 How and why the duke happens to choose the university at Padua, rather than, for instance, the university at Bologna, the preeminent center for civil law and other legal studies, merits consideration. Also meriting consideration is why the duke

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selected Belario from among the four civil law scholars at the university. The university at Padua, founded in the early thirteenth century by scholars who broke off from the university at Bologna, had by the end of the fourteenth century expanded to such an extent that it divided in effect into two colleges, the universitas lunistarum—which housed canon law, civil law, and theology, and the universitas aristarum—which taught astronomy, dialectic, philosophy, medicine, and rhetoric. While the university was a center for legal study, it was clearly inferior to Bologna, where the initial revival of the study of Roman law had occurred.12 More importantly for present purposes, after 1405, the university at Padua (as well as Padua itself ) had come under the direct control of Venice.13 Consequently, if the Duke of Venice revealed to Belario directly or indirectly the outcome he desired in the case, it would have behooved Belario and the university to accommodate his wishes, if at all possible.14 The duke’s selection of Belario deserves scrutiny as well. Initially we should note that Belario’s attendance at the trial is mandatory— the duke’s missive is an order, not a request, a clear reflection of the subordinate relationship of the university to Venice. But there is no obvious indication that the duke has had any prior dealings with Belario, or that he knows him other than by report, recommendation, or reputation. It certainly seems more than coincidental that the duke happens to have requested Portia’s relative as the replacement judge; as in the casket picking scene, the relevant choice seems to be pre-arranged.15 With respect to the issue of pre-arrangement, the duke’s letter to Belario also deserves our attention. Certainly the letter describes what is at issue in the case and identifies the parties. There are indications that the letter does considerably more than this, though. Portia, after all, initially identifies the parties by role, that is, as merchant and Jew, respectively, information that must have been contained in the letter; it is a reasonable inference given the duke’s attitude towards the case and his power over the university at Padua that he has also made clear in the letter what his views of the case are and how he would like the case decided. Moreover, in light of the duke’s unexpected appeal to mercy, we must seriously consider whether the duke’s letter also discusses a strategy for achieving the desired outcome. Is it possible that the duke alerts Belario to the existence of the long forgotten Venetian

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criminal statute rather than Belario uncovering it in Padua? It certainly seems more likely that someone in Venice would have access to the records where such a local criminal statute would be stored and the expertise to locate it. There is no indication that the ailing Belario, a civil law scholar, has an opportunity to visit Venice to perform research to uncover this purely local criminal statute. It is unlikely that such local criminal statutes would be housed in Padua. The duke, we have cause to think, must have been exerting every effort to find a way out of this predicament with his counselors in Venice, the very persons most likely to know about or discover the statute.16 In line with these considerations, it should be noted that the duke’s appeal to mercy suggests that the outcome preferred by the duke is complex—that is, in addition to saving Antonio and preserving Venice’s reputation for justice in the commercial world, he wants Shylock literally to be at his mercy—that is, to be under his absolute discretionary power at the end of the trial. After all, there would be no need to consult Belario to achieve the straightforward outcome of saving Antonio and preserving Venice’s reputation; the duke, pursuant to the law merchant, could have rescinded the bond himself and accomplished these results. There would be no need for an elaborate trial in such a case. A seemingly impartial judge like Belario is necessary only if the illusion of a fair trial needs to be created. Such an illusion is necessary, for instance, if an antiquated and forgotten criminal statute is used to resolve the case rather than the obvious commercial law solution. Certainly the enforcement of such obscure criminal statutes to defeat commercial claims would be of concern to merchants, who, above all, value predictability in legal matters; predictability allows them to measure risk. Great care must be taken to prepare the commercial audience for an outcome which might, if handled badly, be disastrous for Venice’s international commercial reputation. Portia’s subsequent, and seemingly independent raising of the issue of mercy, when viewed from this angle, takes on the appearance of a coordinated effort related directly to the duke’s earlier odd appeal to mercy—an appeal made prior to Portia’s arrival on the scene.17 The key to the strategy behind this coordinated effort is to bias the largely Christian audience against Shylock by causing him to act as though he earnestly intends to take Antonio’s life. Portia must construct a situation in which Shylock calculates that acting in

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a seemingly bloodthirsty way will increase offers made by Bassanio and perhaps others to relinquish the bond.

The Opening of the Trial: Mercy and The Merchant of Venice Portia’s appeal to mercy to open the trial is even more problematic than the duke’s since mercy is extrinsic to Portia’s function as a judge—she does not possess the duke’s power of pardon. Yet, as her opening gambit, I suggest that it must be pre-planned and pertain in a critical way to her overall trial strategy. Portia’s appeal to mercy, as well as the duke’s, is designed to prod Shylock into acting—that is, appearing, especially for Bassanio’s benefit, to be merciless. Such an explanation makes these otherwise unaccountable appeals to mercy comprehensible. Assuming that the duke and Portia both know prior to the trial that the desired outcome is for Shylock to be found guilty of violating an obscure criminal statute, then there would be no need for the trial, or at least not the sort of trial that takes place, provided all elements needed for establishing Shylock’s violation of the statute already existed. There is, I propose, a missing element. This element is intent—a clear and persuasive manifestation on Shylock’s part that he intends to kill Antonio.18 Prior to the trial, Shylock could claim that his actions with respect to Antonio and the bond were all in ‘‘merry sport’’ as he had asserted when the bond’s terms were being negotiated.19 Shylock’s proof that he was acting in merry sport would become manifest when he ultimately agreed to satisfy the bond in exchange for a princely sum paid by Bassanio. The more serious Shylock appears to be enforcing the strict terms of the bond, presumably the higher the amount Bassanio would offer. Shylock’s acceptance of a huge sum would prove him merely pursuing the merry sport of business. His return on his ‘‘investment’’ would dwarf even that of Antonio after his ships come in, and apparently, at considerably less risk. Shylock’s negotiating strategy, if successful, would have elevated him above the company of his fellow usurers—or rather he would have elevated usury to the level of a merchant art. Shylock would have proven himself to be the merchant of Venice.20

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Striking a Deal Shylock, of course, fails to achieve his objective—rather than becoming the merchant of Venice, Portia engineers his financial ruin. In so doing, she manipulates the situation to her financial advantage—she, rather than Shylock, proves to be the premier merchant negotiator and strategist. In this section, I will endeavor to show some key elements of how she accomplishes this. In order to appreciate Portia’s trial strategy from an economic perspective, it is necessary, in my view, to examine how the course of the trial can be viewed as a business negotiation. Portia, to state the obvious, is not the disinterested judge that she, the duke, and Belario present her to be. Not only does she favor one of the parties, she has a distinct and extremely large financial stake in the outcome. Earlier, at the end of the casket-opening scene in Belmont, she told Bassanio, in relation to Bassanio’s desire to free Antionio from Shylock’s bond: Pay him six thousand, and deface the bond; Double six thousand, and then treble that, Before a friend of this description Shall lose a hair through Bassanio’s fault. (3.2.296–98)

Portia begins by doubling the amount of the bond, and then immediately increasing Bassanio’s negotiating authority at least to 36,000 ducats, with the clear implication it could go even higher.21 Clearly, Portia is countering the exorbitant ‘‘demand’’ of 60,000 ducats that Shylock has indirectly communicated through Jessica.22 When I was with him I have heard him swear To Tubal and to Chus, his countrymen, That he would rather have Antonio’s flesh Than twenty times the value of the sum That he did owe him (3.3.282–86)

It is important to keep in mind, as we assess Portia’s actions leading up to and at the trial that even Bassanio’s return of Shylock’s principal, the 3,000 ducats, the likely outcome under the law merchant,

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would be a financial loss as calculated by Portia, since it would be paid from the funds she brings to her marriage to Bassanio. Shylock’s state of knowledge as he approaches the trial is significant. He is aware that Antonio’s ships are missing, and that Antonio’s expected profit of 27,000 ducats, less his capital investment, is now in serious doubt. Shylock certainly knows why Bassanio sought the 3,000 ducat loan, and that Bassanio has accomplished his aim of marrying a wealthy heiress. Presumably, Shylock also is aware that Bassanio knows his pronouncement that even 60,000 ducats would be insufficient to deter him from his purpose of enforcing the strict terms of the bond. The actual negotiations commence upon Shylock’s arrival at court, when the duke makes the laughable request to Shylock to release the bond for less than 3,000 ducats (4.1.25–26). We later learn that Shylock has previously been tendered, by Bassanio almost certainly, the precise amount of the bond—an offer which Shylock is not bound to accept since the bond is past due, and which he has refused (4.1.42–43, 80–81).23 Still prior to commencement of the trial, and immediately after Antonio begs Bassanio not to make any further offers to Shylock, Bassanio offers 6,000 ducats, double the amount of the bond (4.1.84). Frequently, such an amount, double the principle, was the penalty stipulated in bonds not paid on time.24 Shylock’s response is revealing: If every ducat in six thousand ducats Were in six parts, and every part a ducat, I would not draw them. I would have my bond. (4.1.85–87)

Typically, this response is interpreted to mean that Shylock intends to exact his pound of flesh regardless of the amount of money that is offered to save Antonio’s life. However, his response totals 36,000 ducats, hardly a random amount. I suggest that Shylock, as a shrewd businessman, is alerting Bassanio that he is aware of the amount that Portia has authorized him to offer. Bassanio, as a not very shrewd businessman, may initially fail to pick up on this hint, or at least appreciate its significance.25 Shylock’s response simultaneously indicates to Bassanio the general parameters of where a settlement can be reached. Most importantly, it signals to Bassanio that Shylock would settle for considerably less than 60,000 ducats, the initial amount he mentioned prior to the trial.

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In a sophisticated business negotiation, particularly one that is the subject of litigation, almost all of the critical dealings typically occur on the eve of, or more likely, at trial.26 The negotiators frequently continue to stick closely to their opening positions which invariably are unreasonable, until the last possible instant. Only then do significant compromises occur, and an agreement gets reached somewhere between an extremely low offer on the one hand, and an extremely high demand on the other, assuming relatively equal bargaining power and knowledge (to the extent these can be considered distinct). The case of Shylock versus Antonio appears to follow this pattern closely; any apparent differences can be accounted for by virtue of the complexity of the negotiation—Shylock does not know the judge is effectively a party to the negotiation initially. Shylock’s own knowledge of Bassanio’s negotiating limits is for a time to his advantage in the more straightforward negotiation between he and Bassanio, before Portia intervenes. More than balancing this is Portia’s knowledge of the existence and relevance of the criminal statute. However, the negotiating power of the sides may be nearly in balance when we consider that Portia needs Shylock to manifest his criminal intent, and, unexpectedly, she must contend with Bassanio’s negotiating ineptitude. When Bassanio fails to react in a commercially appropriate manner by substantially increasing his offer, and significantly, after the duke’s final appeal for mercy,27 Shylock prompts Bassanio by dramatically whetting his knife (4.1.121). Shylock’s actions have the desired effect—the next opportunity Bassanio has to increase his offer, he does so in dramatic fashion—from 6,000 ducats all the way to 30,000 ducats, an increase that approaches Shylock’s new ‘‘demand’’ of more than 36,000 ducats.28 Absent the ‘‘inside’’ information Shylock has revealed himself to possess, his knowledge of Bassanio’s negotiating limit, it is difficult tactically to comprehend, even given Shylock’s knife-whetting, why Bassanio would have so radically increased his offer at this point. Bassanio has finally realized that Shylock knows the extent of his negotiating authority.29 The ‘‘deal’’ has almost been reached—a middle ground of between 30,000 and 36,000 ducats has been identified, probably nearer the latter figure. Portia, who has not been privy to the prior course of negotiations, is presumably surprised by Bassanio’s seemingly reckless increase in

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offer. Certainly she quickly intervenes, probably to prevent Shylock from quickly accepting Bassanio’s offer, which would be paid from the wealth Portia brought to her marriage with Bassanio. Her apparent legal strategy, causing Shylock to act in a way that fulfills the intent requirement associated with a criminal statute, is now in extreme jeopardy. Shylock’s acceptance of 30,000 ducats, or a counteroffer of between 30,000 and 36,000 ducats, which Bassanio would almost inevitably accept, would prove in open court that Shylock lacked the necessary intent to be prosecuted under the criminal statute—that the ‘‘merry sport’’ he played was simply business. More importantly, Portia and Bassanio would be significantly poorer, and her husband’s enemy would be much more wealthy and powerful. Also, the legal case would be settled, and Portia would not even have the opportunity to achieve her ‘‘worst case’’ scenario—limiting her losses to 3,000 ducats by applying the remedy of rescission pursuant to the law merchant. A veritable financial disaster was immanent. Bassanio immediately causes additional problems for Portia following his 30,000 ducat offer, by asking her to ‘‘wrest’’ the law to her ‘‘authority’’ (4.1.220). This extra-legal appeal will raise awareness among the trial observers, particularly those representing commercial interests, of the possibility that the ‘‘fix’’ is in. Any decision the court makes that defeats Shylock’s bond will now be scrutinized with extra care. As a practical matter, even if Portia had planned to pursue the law merchant solution, this untimely and misguided request by Bassanio may have made such a solution untenable. Even if she had been inclined otherwise, Portia now becomes compelled to pursue the solution offered by the criminal statute; her options have been radically narrowed. Portia initiates a brilliant strategic move that avoids the result of Bassanio and Shylock quickly reaching a deal. She, to everyone’s surprise—including Shylock’s, strengthens Shylock’s bargaining position. Portia proceeds as if she is going to allow Shylock to enforce the strict terms of the bond. Shylock, who must have known of the risk that a law merchant solution might be imposed, and that he would in such a case only receive back his principal, suddenly is in a position to leverage a settlement of 36,000 ducats or even more. Would the duke or other prominent Venetians add to the amount offered by Bassanio? Shylock certainly has reason to believe they might, given that many of them have informally tried to intervene in the case:

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Twenty Merchants, The Duke himself, and the magnificoes Of greater port have all persuaded with him, But none can drive him from the envious plea Of forfeiture, of justice, and his bond. (3.3.277–81)

Seemingly, Bassanio would even tender Portia’s estate at Belmont, presumably a prize worth considerably more than 36,000 ducats. ‘‘I would lose all, ay, sacrifice them all / Here to this devil, to deliver you’’ (4.1.281–82). Shylock has great incentive to press his unexpectedly invigorated bargaining position to the utmost. Portia has created the impression that he has nothing to lose by doing so. Her general strategy appears to involve playing to Shylock’s greed in order to make him act more recklessly than he might otherwise. Her weak point is Bassanio—she must keep Shylock in the expectation that he can get more than Bassanio is offering. She must prevent Bassanio from making an offer Shylock would accept. Shylock quickly digests these new developments, and praises Portia as a second ‘‘Daniel.’’ Portia, however, just as quickly reacts and complicates the situation by unilaterally, and without any authority to do so, reducing Bassanio’s previous offer from 30,000 to 9,000 ducats: ‘‘Shylock, there’s thrice thy money offered thee’’ (4.1.222). Shylock is more uncertain now—this second ‘‘Daniel’’ is acting in a very disturbing manner.30 Portia keeps Shylock (and Bassanio) off balance, by immediately reassuring Shylock of the strength of his legal claim. But, inexplicably, she combines her reassurance with a renewed appeal for Shylock to be merciful—or rather, she commands him to be merciful, reiterating her previous injunction. The command to be merciful is followed immediately by an additional order, this time to accept in settlement 9,000 ducats, combined with a request that Shylock bid her to tear up the bond. ‘‘Be merciful. / Take thrice thy money; bid me tear the bond’’ (4.1.228–29). Shylock, at this point, appears to be quite confused, and more than a little exasperated. The judge has indicated the strength of his legal claim in accordance with a judge’s proper role. But the judge is also interfering in the business negotiation, which from Shylock’s point of view is literally none of ‘‘his’’ business. The judge’s continued appeals to mercy also seem extra-judicial. Shylock faces a delicate situation—he needs to make clear to the judge that ‘‘she’’

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should not interfere in the negotiations, but he needs to do so in a way that does not alienate her. After all, tens of thousands of ducats are at stake. Shylock’s confusion is understandable. Portia’s repeated demands for mercy are particularly troubling—these are of a different order than the duke’s pretrial appeals to mercy, which the duke indicated were justified (1) by pity Shylock should feel for Antonio’s losses, and (2) by Shylock’s self-interest in being able later to appeal to the duke for mercy. Portia’s subsequent demands for mercy during the trial, in contrast, resemble Old Testament commandments. As Shylock soon finds out, their violation will be punished severely, in harsh Old Testament form.31 Shylock, of course, fails to notice these distinctions in his greed-induced recklessness. Not without reason, and as the duke and Portia expect, Shylock disregards all appeals to mercy as irrelevant to the legal dispute. Shylock, however, is somewhat more suspicious now, and backs off of his earlier assessment of Portia as a second ‘‘Daniel.’’ He suggests more cautiously now that ‘‘It doth appear you are a worthy judge’’ (4.1.231). Then he tries to redirect Portia’s attention to what he quite reasonably considers to be the legally relevant point, and away from both the issue of mercy and interfering in the business negotiations. He is basically reminding her what a judge’s job is. You know the law. Your exposition Hath been most sound. I charge you by the law, Whereof you are a well-deserving pillar, Proceed to judgment. (4.1.232–35)

Portia briefly resumes the role of an apparently neutral judge and the trial/negotiation proceeds; Shylock’s greed again overpowers his ability to accurately estimate the true risk involved—he is blind to the signals of his peril. Instead of settling for Bassanio’s pending 30,000 ducat offer, Shylock can—with apparent safety, given the judge seems to be on his side, at least on what he considers to be the relevant point—attempt to garner even more than the 36,000 ducats Bassanio clearly has the authority to offer. He reprises his immensely successful earlier tactic of seeming ready to harm Antonio. Any reservations Shylock might still have, are swept aside when he hears Bassanio say:

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Antonio, I am married to a wife Which is as dear to me as life itself; But life itself, my wife, and all the world Are not with me esteemed above thy life. I would lose all, ay, sacrifice them all Here to this devil, to deliver you. (4.1.277–82)

Bassanio inflames Shylock’s greed—the 36,000 ducat threshold can be breached, the stakes are much higher now, even Portia’s estate at Belmont.32 Bassanio has again nearly undermined Portia’s strategy, but fortunately for Portia, Bassanio has not yet made a specific offer to Shylock—his speech is directed toward Antonio. Portia by this point can sense Shylock’s ravenous greed and his strategy. Portia has only to prevent Bassanio from making another offer, and Shylock will eventually reveal ‘‘intent’’ in a way that will be very difficult for him to disprove. Unfortunately, Portia will need to intervene and prevent Shylock from exhibiting crystal clear intent—she cannot adequately control Bassanio—he will attempt to strike a deal at the first opportunity. The only way to prevent Bassanio from making further offers, Portia has by now discovered, is to prevent him from talking. Portia’s peril lies between her awarding of judgment to Shylock and when she springs the first of the tricks she is holding up her sleeve—the flesh but no blood gambit. With Shylock effectively advancing toward Antonio, knife in hand, Portia must expect that Bassanio will do whatever he can at this point to settle if he is given any opportunity. Portia makes sure than no opportunity presents itself—she, without pause, halts Shylock by pointing out the failure of the bond to mention blood. Shylock immediately realizes his peril, though not yet its full extent, and accepts the pending but unauthorized 9,000 ducats that this bewildering judge had proposed. If nothing else, this quick change of heart on Shylock’s part is indicative that his prior oath ‘‘to have the due and forfeit of his bond’’ (4.1.37), was part of a negotiating ploy. Before Portia can prevent it, the ever agreeable and clueless Bassanio, still playing the game with someone else’s money, agrees to pay the 9,000 ducats—after all, from his perspective, he has just saved at least 21,000 ducats, and probably a great deal more. Again Portia quickly intervenes, though, as with the previous inter-

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vention, her actions exceed her authority. Just as she had no authority to reduce Bassanio’s outstanding offer from 30,000 to 9,000 ducats, so here she has no clear authority to prevent Bassanio from striking a deal with Shylock that settles the litigation. Portia realizes she needs to be more direct—she addresses Bassanio directly for the first time; she tells him to be quiet. Legally, she has entered a grey area—in typical commercial litigation, settlement would occur before a judgment is awarded. Settlement post-judgment is in all likelihood unprecedented. While nothing appears to legally constrain the parties to settle on terms other than the awarded judgment, Shylock does not appear to have the confidence to challenge this point. Portia’s bluff works; she creates the illusion that the rendering of judgment limits Shylock’s options to enforcing the terms of the bond—he can no longer settle the case in ‘‘merry sport.’’ As long as no one realizes or points out that she is acting beyond her authority here, it will appear to all present that Shylock possessed the necessary criminal intent—otherwise he would have settled the case prior to judgment. Shylock, still unaware of the second of the tricks Portia has in reserve—the criminal statute, retreats to what he must consider the worst case position, effectively rescinding the contract and receiving back his principal: ‘‘Give me my principal, and let me go’’ (4.1.331). Shylock is sufficiently confident that his ‘‘fallback’’ position will prevail that he presents this to Portia as a demand. But when his demand fails to move Portia, Shylock changes tactics and instead seems to appeal to the trial audience, the commercial elements of which will surely supply ample pressure to compel the court to agree to such an outcome; this is the ‘‘jury’’ to which Shylock reiterates his request for his principal, in the form of a question: ‘‘Shall I not have barely my principal?’’ (4.1.337) The seeming reasonableness of this request compels Portia to introduce the criminal statute that will defeat even Shylock’s ‘‘worst case’’ outcome, and reassure the commercial elements of the trial’s audience that the outcome for Shylock is just. Presuming that Shylock had adequately shown his criminal intent, Shylock’s fate will not constitute a problematic precedent from a commercial standpoint. Merchants will consider this to be a risk that can be assessed and avoided. The balance of the trial scene now becomes a foregone conclusion rather than a negotiation. What becomes clear, upon reflection, is that Portia has succeeded in

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reducing her potential losses from probably considerably more than the 30,000 ducats Bassanio explicitly offered, to zero. Moreover, she has reduced the wealth of her husband’s enemy to zero, increased the wealth of her husband’s friends, and placed her husband’s enemy’s very life in jeopardy. Portia has succeeded in proving herself superior to ‘‘these bragging jacks;’’ her superior negotiating skill has established her as the merchant of Venice (3.5.77).33

Afterword A theory of human nature made famous by Machiavelli, elaborated upon by Hobbes, and made palatable by Locke, characterizes human beings as being at root fearful, greedy, and radically self-interested. Neoclassical economics, utilizing this theory, constructed the concept of homo economicus, or economic man. John Stuart Mill effectively defined economic man, though his definition precedes somewhat the actual coining of the term: ‘‘[man is] a being who invariably does that by which he may obtain the greatest amount of necessaries, conveniences, and luxuries, with the smallest quantity of labour and physical self-denial with which they can be obtained.’’34 It is certainly unclear whether Machiavelli intended his general description of how men can be expected to act to apply equally to women.35 It is also unclear whether the general characteristics of economic man accurately describe or encompass the behavior of women generally—many feminist scholars are certainly skeptical on this point.36 For instance, Wanda Wiegers observes that ‘‘women have been assumed and expected to be all that ‘economic man’ is not—emotional, vulnerable, passive, empathetic, caring, and nurturant.’’37 As with so many of Shakespeare’s plays, the Merchant of Venice clearly anticipates many issues faced by contemporary society. The play certainly seems to presage the coincidence of law and economics, almost two centuries prior to the observations that are considered to be foundational to the law and economics movement.38 The play even foreshadows some of the problems with the concurrence of these disciplines that have since become apparent. In Portia’s character and actions, the play forefronts issues of gender in relation both to law and economics. However, while more than tacitly

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acknowledging inequities favoring men, the play simultaneously points out a potential power advantage that women, or at least some women, may possess with respect to men. Portia can beat Shylock at his own game because she can predict with a considerable degree of certainty how he will act—that is, his actions conform generally to how homo economicus would act.39 Portia, perhaps because she is not constrained to act this way in the same way Shylock is, has fewer limitations and can thus defeat him. It is beyond the scope of this essay to address whether ‘‘essential’’ differences in fact exist between men and women, or what precisely those differences might be.40 It is sufficient to notice here that Machiavelli seems to believe such differences exist, and that much of contemporary law and economics in turn relies, directly or indirectly, upon Machiavelli. Shakespeare, in his plays, also seems to recognize fundamental differences, though he often deals with the issues arising from these differences in more hopeful ways than does Machiavelli.41 A critical difference upon which both Machiavelli and Shakespeare could perhaps agree is that women possess a certain flexibility in matters with respect to which men tend to be considerably more rigid.42 This difference is reflected in the early modern era’s stereotypical association of women with equity and men with law.43 Portia’s flexibility fits this pattern well. Her actions resemble equity in that she manipulates and even circumvents the law to her advantage, effectively encircling Shylock, defeating his negotiating strategy at every turn. Ironically, her flexibility permits her to manipulate the law in such a way as to make it appear even more rigid than it already is.44 While both law and economics in the West, as well as their merged form, may ultimately depend upon the male-based views of Machiavelli and his successors, Shakespeare, in the character of Portia, may be pointing toward a resolution of this imbalance. Only a balanced perspective, one which accounts for both genders, including their differences, one which incorporates the flexibility exhibited by Portia and her actions, especially in the trial scene, can counter the rigidity of the new (a)moral order based on commerce, and the laws that support this world. Such a perspective, one that looks toward gender balance and greater flexibility, is in dire need. Today, at least in Anglo-American jurisprudence, the prevailing views respecting justice are rigid and male-centered: there is either no such thing as

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justice, justice is the same thing as wealth or wealth maximization, or justice is simply whatever the law happens to be from time to time.45 Among the things that are missing is a normative element deriving from a sense of nurturing and a desire to promote the common good.46 Portia, however, is an incomplete realization of someone who can counter the existing imbalance. There is something radically deficient or problematic in her character.47 She avoids more therapeutic resolutions to the trial seemingly to achieve total victory—to utterly crush Shylock—hardly a furtherance of any nurturing sense or common good. Portia, at some level, has become at least partially invested in Machiavellian values. We must look forward to Paulina, in The Winter’s Tale, or even more compellingly, to Rosalind, in As You Like It, for the full realization of a character who represents a vision of the possibility of someone capable of righting this imbalance.

Notes 1. B. J. and Mary Sokol discuss most of the prominent articles in which this theory is advanced at pages 417–28 of their article ‘‘Shakespeare and the English Equity Jurisdiction: The Merchant of Venice and the two texts of King Lear,’’ The Review of English Studies 50 (1999): 417–39. 2. B. J. and Mary Sokol, 417–28. See also page 64 of B. J. Sokol’s article entitled ‘‘The Merchant of Venice and the Law Merchant,’’ which appeared in Renaissance Studies 6 (1992): 60–67. 3. Shakespeare did not employ the term ‘‘equity’’ in The Merchant of Venice, or in the other play that many critics analyze in terms of equity, Measure for Measure. In fact, Shakespeare only used the term a handful of times in discreet instances, scattered among several plays. The decline of equity as a concept of much theoretical importance may be one explanation for its near absence from the Shakespearean corpus. I have discussed at some length the evolution of equity in England in the sixteenth century in chapter one of Equity in English Renaissance Literature: Thomas More and Edmund Spenser (London: Routledge Press, 2006). 4. Alice Benston’s observations on this score are useful: Mercy, then, seems to be the only way out of a choice between the two wrong actions. Either the state abrogates its obligations or Shylock’s ‘‘cruel contract’’ must be enforced. Because of this formulation, many readers conclude that the saving of Antonio represents the triumph of mercy over justice. Portia’s beautiful speech on the ‘‘quality of mercy’’ easily leads one to see her as the personification of that virtue. Hence the confusion when she shows no mercy toward Shylock. As long as we fail to see that Portia does not represent mercy, this confusion will remain. We must observe that it is justice—law—not mercy that prevails under Portia’s directions at the trial. This is not to say that the nature and value of mercy are of no thematic importance. On the contrary, because Portia does not argue that it be-

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come a state policy displacing the law, mercy is all the more protected as the higher virtue. Mercy must not function until after adjudication is made and justice is dispensed (173–74). ‘‘Portia, the Law, and the Tripartite Structure of The Merchant of Venice,’’ in The Merchant of Venice: Critical Essays, ed. Thomas Wheeler (New York: Garland, 1991), 163–94.

After judgment is rendered, judges in many American jurisdictions sometimes can draw upon mercy when considering elements relating to sentencing. There is no indication that the Venetian criminal statute allows the judge this discretion, though. 5. Sokol (1992), 63. 6. Sokol (1992), 66. The scope of the good faith requirement may be even broader than Sokol suggests. 7. Literally, it involves ‘‘duress’’—but its scope includes bad faith conduct by the plaintiff. 8. Reinhard Zimmerman and Simon Whittaker, eds. Good Faith in European Contract Law (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 16. 9. Sokol (1992), 67. 10. Certainly, it seems that the duke possessed the power to decide commercial disputes. The risk of the duke deciding in Antonio’s favor, the outcome the duke takes pains to publicize is the one he desires, is that other merchants will worry that their own bonds and contracts will not be enforced, and Venice’s trade will suffer greatly in consequence. 11. R. J. Mitchell, ‘‘English Students at Padua, 1460–75,’’ Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 4th Ser., 19 (1936): 102. 12. Jonathan Woolfson. Padua and the Tudors: English Students in Italy, 1485–1603 (Tornonto: University of Toronto Press, 1998), 10. 13. Ibid., 4. 14. Ibid.,15, 41. 15. Critics have long observed that the casket-picking scenes, particularly Bassanio’s, appear to be fixed so that the result conforms to Portia’s wishes. See for example Barbara Tovey, ‘‘The Golden Casket: An Interpretation of The Merchant of Venice,’’ in Shakespeare as a Political Thinker, ed. John Alvis and Thomas G. West (Durham: Carolina Academic Press, 1981), 217–19. I suggest that we cannot rule out, and have considerable reason to suspect, that the ‘‘fix is in’’ with respect to Shylock’s lawsuit as well. Has Portia perhaps sent a message to the duke suggesting that he request Belario’s services? Or more likely, has Portia, in league with Belario, alerted the duke of Belario’s availability to consult in difficult cases? It is difficult to account for Portia’s confidence that the duke would consult Belario unless she ensured this result in advance. Portia certainly seems very adept at advancing her interests through correspondence—both her own, and that of others. 16. Consider especially Salerio’s report to Bassanio in Belmont at 3.2.269–81. 17. Shakespeare introduces the theme of mercy to the story—it is not present in his sources. Joan Ozark Holmer, The Merchant of Venice: Choice, Hazard and Consequence (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1995), 199; Joan Ozark Holmer, ‘‘The Education of the Merchant of Venice,’’ Studies in English Literature, 1500–1900 25 (1985), 310. 18. See, for instance, Regula XV from Francis Bacon’s Maxims of the Law. ‘‘In

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criminalibus sufficit generalis malita intentionis cum facto paris gradus. All crimes have their conception in a corrupt intent’’; Siebter Band, ed., The Works of Francis Bacon, (Stuttgard-Bad Cannstatt: Friedrich Frommann Verlag Gunther Holzboog 1963), 365. See also Regula VII: ‘‘Excusat aut extenuate delictum in capitalibus, quod non operator idem in civilibus. In capital causes, in favorem vitae, the law will not punish in so high a degree, except the malice of the will and intention do appear;’’ Ibid. at 347. 19. At best the evidence that Shylock is seeking ‘‘the life’’ of a Venetian citizen is conflicting. The prime witness who could attest that Shylock meant to kill Antonio is Jessica; but her credibility is suspect because of her theft from her father. 20. A greater return at much reduced risk, it should be pointed out—even if the contract is rescinded, Shylock would receive back his principal. Holmer (1985), 312. 21. It is interesting that the sequence begins with doubling, and then, effectively with squaring the doubled figure. The timing of Portia’s authorization is intriguing. It occurs before she and Bassanio are actually married—that is, while her wealth is still exclusively her own. It also is the first response to Jessica’s revelation about the 60,000 ducat figure. 22. In Shylock’s presence, Antonio had told Bassanio that ‘‘Within these two months—that’s a month before / This bond expires—I do expect return / Of thrice three times the value of this bond’’ (1.3.149–51). It is intriguing to consider how Jessica could know that Shylock had said this—some critics have suggested possible collusion between the two. 23. Under terms standard at the time, Shylock would get 6,000 ducats. Herbert Berry, ‘‘Shylock, Robert Miles, and Events at the Theatre,’’ Shakespeare Quarterly 44 (1993): 183–84. 24. Berry (1993) at 184. This helps perhaps to explain Bassanio’s choice of an initial amount to offer. It also may help to explain Shylock’s overall scheme. If Shylock is legally limited to double the principal, his decision to craft this unique bond can be viewed as a creative way to breach the effective 6,000 ducat cap, and recover an amount equal to what Antonio’s friends are willing to sacrifice to save his life. 25. The source of Shylock’s knowledge could be the loose-lipped Gratiano, or possibly even Jessica, if we credit the theory that Jessica may be in league with her father in some fashion. 26. During my dozen years of legal practice—which encompassed commercial matters, both friendly and litigious—this was typically how things worked out when litigation was involved. 27. The duke’s final appeal to mercy takes on a threatening aspect—he signals to Shylock that he should not expect to receive mercy from him, having shown none toward Antonio (4.1.87). 28. In virtually all of the business negotiations I have participated in, certainly all of the sophisticated negotiations, it is the amount mentioned that is significant and communicates a position. Ancillary statements like ‘‘in excess of ’’ mean little in such situations. 29. It is not surprising that Bassanio is so slow on the uptake here—consider how long it takes for him to catch on to the hints Portia has fed to him in the casketpicking scene respecting which casket to choose. 30. Shylock’s oath can be discounted as a negotiating tactic—why should we be-

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lieve this oath any more than the previous one he violated respecting not eating with gentiles? 31. Consider the wide-ranging consequences of Shylock’s breaking of his oath not to dine with gentiles. Allan Bloom, Shakespeare’s Politics (Chicago: Basic Books Inc., 1964), 21. 32. Where, it should be remembered, Shylock’s daughter has been left in charge in Portia’s absence. 33. Just as Shylock tried to raise lending at interest to a merchant art, so Portia appears to be raising law, or at least being a judge, to one as well. 34. John Stuart Mill. Essays on Some Unsettled Questions of Political Economy (Essay V), 2nd ed. (London: Longmans, 1874). 35. Consider the prologue to Machiavelli’s Mandragola, in which Machiavelli, apparently addressing the women in the play’s audience, wishes that they would be tricked in the same way the heroine gets tricked. It becomes clear in the play that women need to be tricked because they cannot be relied upon to act as men would act—see act 3, scene 3, and the speech of Frate Timoteo that opens act 3, scene 4. The message of the play appears to be that women need to be tricked to act the way men do, or barring that, forced to act that way. Consider in this regard Ligurio’s penultimate speech in act 4, scene 2. Machiavelli, Mandragola, ed. and trans. Mera J. Flaumenhaft (Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press, Inc., 1981). 36. See generally Gillian K. Hadfield, ‘‘Feminism, Fairness, and Welfare: An Invitation to Feminist Law and Economics,’’ Annual Review of Law and Social Sciences (2005) 1:285–306; Wanda Wiegers, ‘‘Economic Analysis of Law and ‘Private ordering’: A Feminist Critique,’’ University of Toronto Law Journal 42 (1992): 170–206. 37. Wiegers, 170; see generally Feminism Confronts Homo Economicus: Gender, Law, and Society, ed. Martha Albertson Fineman and Terence Dougherty (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005). 38. Adam Smith notes, ‘‘It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own self interest.’’ Wealth of Nations, 1.2.2. 39. Shylock’s actions in the play appear to be almost a paradigmatic example of how homo economicus would act. On the other hand, as we have seen, Portia has considerable difficulty predicting how her less capable husband will act. 40. See Anne Campbell, A Mind of Her Own: The Evolutionary Psychology of Women, (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002). See also ‘‘The Mystery of Gender,’’ Newsweek, (May 21, 2007): 50–57; David France, ‘‘The Science of Gaydar,’’ New York Magazine, June 25, 2007, http:www.nymag.com. 41. Contrast, for example, Lucretia in Mandragola, with Rosalind from As You Like It. 42. For some possible repercussions of this difference, consider how Plato describes a healthy political order in terms of the ‘‘woof ’’ and the ‘‘warp’’ of fabric. Laws 734e–735a. 43. See generally, Andrew Majeske, Equity in English Renaissance Literature: Thomas More and Edmund Spenser (New York: Routledge Press, 2006), ch. 4. 44. Portia’s utilization of male disguise, far from undermining her power—a common view—instead increases it by enhancing her flexibility.

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45. Robin West, ‘‘Toward Humanistic Theories of Legal Justice,’’ Cardozo Studies in Law and Literature 10:2 (1998): 147–50. 46. Ibid. 47. George Anastplo, On Trial: From Adam & Eve to O. J. Simpson (New York: Lexington Books, 2004), 231–32.

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Contributors Cristina Leo´ n Alfar is an associate professor in the Department of English at Hunter College, CUNY. She is the author of Fantasies of Female Evil: The Dynamics of Gender and Power in Shakespearean Tragedy (University of Delaware Press, 2003). She has a new article on Elizabeth Carey’s The Tragedy of Mariam forthcoming in Early Modern Women: An Interdisciplinary Journal, volume 3, 2008. Her new book project, He Said, She Said: Shakespeare and Narratives of Marital Betrayal in Early Modern England, comes out of her work on The Winter’s Tale and examines men’s and women’s conflicting narratives about marital betrayal in the period and in Shakespeare’s cuckoldry plays. Carol Blessing is a professor of Literature and chair of the Department of Literature, Journalism, and Modern Languages at Point Loma Nazarene University in San Diego. Her article ‘‘The Duchess of Malfi: Integrity and Intrigue’’ was commissioned by the Shakespeare Theatre of Washington, D.C., for its 2001–2002 season magazine. Her most recent publications include a co-written chapter, ‘‘Speaking Out: Feminist Theology and Women’s Proclamation in the Wesleyan Tradition’’ in Being Feminist, Being Christian (2006), and an essay ‘‘Elizabeth I as Deborah the Judge: Exceptional Women of Power’’ in Goddesses and Queens (2008). Emily Detmer-Goebel is an associate professor of English at Northern Kentucky University, where she teaches courses on Shakespeare, Renaissance drama, early modern women writers, and composition. Her work appears in various journals including Shakespeare Quarterly, Shakespeare Studies, and Women Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal. She received her doctorate from Miami University. Cheryl Dudgeon is a PhD student in English at the University of Western Ontario where she is writing a thesis entitled Literary Legal Narrative: The Construction of Trial Scenes in Early Modern English 184

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Drama. Prior to beginning her doctoral work, she practiced international human rights law with non-governmental organizations. She also holds an LLB and an LLM in international law. David Evett is a professor of English emeritus at Cleveland State University. His first book, Literature and the Visual Arts in Tudor England, won the British Council Prize in the Humanities. His second, Discourses of Service in Shakespeare’s England, was recently published. He now lives and works in Boston, where he serves as Scholar in Residence for the Actors’ Shakespeare Project theater company. Kathryn Finin is an assistant professor of English at SUNYOneonta where she specializes in Renaissance drama including Shakespeare and literary/critical theory. Her work has been published in various journals including Renaissance Drama and the Renaissance Forum. She received her doctorate from Binghamton University. Andrew Majeske is an associate professor in the English Department at John Jay College of Criminal Justice (CUNY), where he teaches courses in literature and law. His book, Equity in English Renaissance Literature: Thomas More and Edmund Spenser, was published in 2006. Andrew is on the editorial board of the journal Law and Literature, and is a past chair of the MLA’s Law and Literature Discussion Group. Before pursuing his PhD, he practiced law for eleven years in Chicago and Pittsburgh. Catherine Thomas is an assistant professor of English and director of British Studies at the College of Charleston. She has published articles on gender, sex, and violence in Shakespeare and Milton and teaches courses on early British literature and writing and popular culture. She currently is working on a book project which examines political and literary representations of poisoning in early modern England.

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Index Adam and Eve, 145–147. See also under Measure for Measure Adams, Thomas, 88; ‘‘The White Devil’’ sermon, 88 Adelman, Janet, 63 n. 3, 121, 137 n. 6 adultery, 46–47, 51–54, 56, 59 agency, 20, 22; female, 46–47, 50, 53, 59, 62; legal, 138 n. 22 Alfar, Cristina Leon, 23, 74 All’s Well That Ends Well (Shakespeare), 24, 118, 120, 123, 126, 129–31, 135– 36, 136 n. 3, 137 nn. 6 and 16; Antonio, 23; Bertram, 24, 120–25; Diana, 120–22, 124–25, 131, 135; Helena, 120–26, 136 nn. 4, 5, and 6, 138 n. 23; King, 123 – 24, 131; Parolles, 121, 123–24; Royal Guards, 123 Angelo: and codified justice, 141; and contrition, 147; and penitence, 147; as judge, 141–42, 150. See also under Merchant of Venice Antony and Cleopatra (Shakespeare), 84; Antony, 84; Cleopatra, 84 Appius and Virginius (Webster), 84; Virginia, 84 Arden of Faversham (anonymous), 24, 88, 98, 100, 101, 105–6, 108, 110–14, 115 n. 42; Alice Arden, 98, 104, 106–11; Arden of Faversham, 104–9, 111, 113–14, 116 n. 42; Blackwell, 107; Black Will, 110–11; Bradshaw, 109–10; Franklin, 102–11, 114; Greene, 105, 107, 111; Mayor of Faversham, 105, 109–10; Michael, 107–9, 110; Mosby, 98, 108–10, 116 n. 42; Shakebag, 107, 110 Aristophanes, 149 Aristotle, 100, 143; Poetics, 100; Rhetoric, 100

authorship, 20 Bacon, Francis, 11 Bakhtin, Mikhail, 84 balance, 24 Bamford, Karen, 135, 139 n. 33 Barnaby, Andrew, 142 Baron, Jane B., 25 n. 6 Basilikon Doron (James I), 68 Battenhouse, Roy, 129 bed-trick, 24, 118–22, 125–26, 129–30, 132–35, 136 n. 3, 137 nn. 6 and 16, 138 n. 21, 143, 146. See also under Measure for Measure Benston, Alice, 169 n. 4 Berry, Ralph, 84 betrayal, marital, 46–47, 54, 57, 59 biases, procedural, 37, 44 n. 28 Bible, 142 Blank, Paula, 142–43 Blazon of Iealouvsie (Varchi), 67 Blessing, Carol, 24 blind justice, 18 blindfold, 18–19, 25 n. 2. See also under Justice, Lady blood, 98–99, 102, 106–9, 112 bodily imprint, 98, 101, 110, 114 Boesche, Roger, 67 Boleyn, Anne, 51, 63 n. 11 Bologna, University of, 155–56 Book of Common Prayer, 146, 149 Bothwell, James. See Hepburn, James, Earl of Bothwell Bourne, Anthony, 53–54 Bourne, Elizabeth, 48–50, 53, 56, 59, 62 Bowden, William, 130, 136 n. 3 Brandt, Sebastian, 13; Das Narrenschiff, 13

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Breitenberg, Mark, 63 n. 10 Breugel, Pieter, 13–14 Britain, 145 Brundage, James, 138 n. 23 Buchanan, George, 82; De Maria Scotorum Regina, 82; Detection of the Actions of Mary, Queen of Scots, 82 Buck, A. R., 22 burial, 23 Bushnell, Rebecca, 75 Butler, Judith, 23, 48–50, 53, 56, 59, 62 Caesar, Julius, 53, 64 n. 17 Camden, William, 91; Historie of the life and death of Mary Stuart Queene of Scotland, 91 Canon law. See law, Canon Capp, Bernard, 23 Catholicism, 81 Chamberlain, Stephanie, 140, 146 Chancery court. See court, Chancery Chancery, 153 Christianity, 147 Chronicles, (Holinshed), 98 Cinthio, Giraldi, 127; Hecatommithi, 127 Cioni, Maria, 53 Circe, 81 civil law. See law, civil class, 22–23 Clouet, Francois, 86–87; ‘‘Le Deuil Blanc’’ portrait, 86–88 Clytemnestra, 82 Cohen, Eileen, 137 n. 6 Cohen, Stephen, 39 Coke, Sir Edward, 40 complementarity, 140 contrition. See under Angelo Conway, Sir John, 54 Coriolanus (Shakespeare), 145 corpse, 106–9, 113–14 Council, Privy, 53–55, 64 nn. 17 and 18 Countess of Essex, 111 Court of Requests. See under court court: Chancery, 30, 53–54, 64 n. 17 and 18; 84; Ecclesiastical, 53; Equity, 53; of Requests, 22, 34 coverture, 21, 34

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Coy Charlesworth, Jacqueline, 18 coy defenses. See deception Crawford, Patricia, 21 crime, 20 criticism, literary, 20 cruentation 107–8 culture, dominant, 21 Cunningham, Karen, 51–52, Cust, Lionel, 86 Darnley, Lord. See Stuart, Henry, Lord Darnley Das Narrenschiff (Brandt), 13 Deborah (Biblical), 81 deception, 118–23, 125–27, 129–36, 137 n. 6 Dekker, Thomas, 83; Double PP, 83; Westward Ho, 83; Whore of Babylon, 83 Derrida, Jacques, 104 Desens, Marliss, 119, 136, 145 desire, 75; sexual, 141, 146 Detmer-Goebel, Emily, 24, 143, 145, 152 nn. 23 and 29 Devil’s Lawcase, (Webster) 24, 84, 93, 95; Contarino, 93; Leonora, 84, 93; Romelio, 93 dialogic, 141 Dolan, Frances, 104, 113 Double PP (Dekker), 83 dowry, 141, 149. See also Measure for Measure drama; Elizabethan, 82, 95; Jacobean, 82–83, 95; Renaissance, 84 Duchess of Malfi (Webster), 24, 89, 91, 93, 95; Antonio, 91–93; Bosola, 92; Duchess of Malfi, 84–85, 91–93, 95; Duke of Malfi, 85; Ferdinand, 91–92, 95; Julia, 92 Dudgeon, Cheryl, 24, 88–89, 123 Duke of Guise (Webster), 83 Duke Vincentio: and dowry, 141, 149; as friar, 141–43, 146, 149; as judge, 140; as politician, 142; marriage proposal to Isabella, 148; and sexuality, 145, 148; and theatricality, 150. See also under Measure for Measure Du¨rer, Albrecht, 13

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INDEX

Dusinberre, Juliet, 20 duty, 143 Ecclesiastical court. See court, Ecclesiastical Eden, Kathy, 112 Eggert, Katherine, 63–64 n. 11 Elizabeth I (queen), 55 England, 32–33, 36, 42, 80, 98; and jury system 85; and law, 84; London, 95; and people, 94–95; Protestant, 80; and Renaissance drama, 20–21; and throne, 94 Enterline, Lynn, 47–48 Equity court. See court, Equity equity, 14, 17, 24, 39, 140, 142, 148, 153, 168; and justice, 143 Erasmus, 143 Erickson, Amy Louise, 17, 21, 53 Escalus: as judge, 140–41, 150. See also under Measure for Measure ethics, 129 ethnicity, 18 Evans, Bertrand, 136 n. 4 Eve, 20, 145. See also Adam and Eve Evett, David, 132 evidence, 98–99, 101–3, 110, 113–14; documentary, 112; evidentiary categories, 99, 111, 114; evidentiary clues, 110; evidentiary law, 98; evidentiary representation, 114; and impression, 114; material objects of, 110, 114; real, 98, 106, 109–13; testimonial, 98– 99, 103; trace, 107 exchange: as basic principle in Measure for Measure, 141 false witness or accusation. See deception Faerie Queene (Spenser), 80; Duessa, 80, 83 family, 20; broken, 150 Felman, Shoshana, 35 female body, 36, 40 feme sole, 34 femininity, 35, 42, 44 n. 26, 66, 75 feminism, 19, 23; and feminist studies,

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20; and literary criticism, 19–21; and literary critics, 2 Ferguson, Margaret, 22 film, 124 Filmer, Sir Robert, 143, 151; Patriarchia, or the Natural Power of Kings, 143 Filmers, Dame Anne, 22 Finan, Kathryn, 23, 138 n. 22 Fletcher, John 118, 133; Queen of Corinth, 118, 133 Floyd-Wilson, Mary, 69 Forman, Simon, 111 Foucault, Michel, 89, 105 Francois II (king), 86 fraud, pious, 121, 129 Friar Lodowick. See Duke Vincentio Garden of Eden, 147 Gaskill, Malcolm, 108 gender, 19–20, 22–23, 28, 35–36, 40, 44 n. 26 Georgias, (Plato), 66 Gless, Darrell, 140 Goldberg, Dena, 84 Goodcole, Henry, 101, 112–13 Gosynhyll, Edward, 119; Schole House of Women, 119 Gowing, Laura, 22–23, 53, 55, 58–59, 65 n. 32 Granville-Baker, Harley, 27 Greenblatt, Stephen, 80 Greene, Gayle, 20, 89, 92 Grotius, Hugo, 11 Gunby, David, 88 Hacking, Ian, 99 Hale, Matthew, 118, 133, 135–36; History of the Pleas of the Crown, 118 Hamlet (Shakespeare), 82, 148 head: as medium of exchange, 141 head-trick. See Measure for Measure Heaven’s Speedie Hue and Cry sent After Lust and Murther (Goodcole), 101, 112; Elizabeth Evans, alias Canberry Bess, 112–13; Thomas Shearwood, alias Countrey-Tom, 112–13 Hecatommithi (Cinthio), 127

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INDEX

Heilbrun, Carolyn, 19 Helen of Troy, 120, 136 n. 5, 137 n. 6 Hendricks, Margo, 44 n. 26 Henri II (king of France), 86 Henry IV (Shakespeare), 145; Doll Tearsheet, 150; Edward Plantegenet, 145 Henry VIII (king of England), 51–52, 55, 63 n. 41; and marital disputes, 51; and treason acts, 51, 55 Hepburn, James, Earl of Bothwell, 86, 88 hierarchy. See Measure for Measure Hill, L. M., 54–55, 64 nn. 17 and 18 Historie of the life and death of Mary Stuart Queene of Scotland (Camden), 91 Hobbes, Thomas, 11, 167 Hoby, Lady Margaret, 22 Hodgdon, Barbara, 121, 135 n. 4 Holinshed, Raphael, 83, 98, 110; Chronicles, 83 Holy Spirit, 147 homo economicus, 167 Hopkins, Lisa, 80, 83 household: as basic social unit, 143–44 Howard, Katherine, 51, 63 n. 11 Hoy, Cyrus, 83 Hull, Suzanne, 81 Hutson, Lorna, 84–85, 99–101, 105 Hyde, Sir Laurence, 111 identity, 20 indeterminacy, 30, 35 infanticide, 22 Ingram, Martin, 53 Instruction of a Christen Woman (Vives), 51 investigation: pre-trial 105, 111, 114 Isabella: 140, 145, 147; and Duke’s proposal, 149; as novice. See also under Measure for Measure Israel, 81 James I (king), 68, 80–81, 83, 85, 90, 93–95, 142, 147; and Gunpowder Plot, 94; Basilikon Doron 68; True Law of Free Monarchies, 94 Jay, Martin, 25 n. 2

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jealousy, 66–67 Jed, Stephanie, H., 44 n. 28 Jessica. See Merchant of Venice Jezebel, 81 Jones, Ann Rosalind, 44 n. 25 judgment, 66, 76–77, 104–6, 110, 114 judicial narratio, 101 Juliet. See Measure for Measure jury, 100, 110 justice: and equity, 143; Angelic, 145; Christian, 140, 147; codified, 141; personified, 141; scales of, 142; secular, 147 Justice, Lady, 11–14, 17, 19, 22–23, 27, 32–33, 36–37, 40, 55–56, 59–61, 66, 68, 70–73, 76–78, 118, 127, 129–30, 133, 136, 140, 147, 157, 168–69; blindfolded, 18–19, 25 n. 2; clearsighted, 25 n. 2 Justitia, 151 n. 5 Kaplan, Lindsay, 63–64 n. 11, 126 King Henry VII (Shakespeare), 64 n. 11 King Lear (Shakespeare), 82–83; Goneril, 83; King Lear, 145, 148; Regan, 83 Klotz, Lisa, 85, 123 Knox, John, 81, 92; The First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous Regiment of Women, 81 Krepps, Barbara, 64 n. 11 Lacan, Jacques, 47 Lake, Peter, 109, 112 Langbein, John, 105 language, 20, 28–32, 38–39, 41 law, 24, 26 n. 10, 27–28, 32–33, 36–37, 39–40, 42 n. 2 , 43 nn. 16 and 19; 44 n. 40; canon, 34, 140; civil, 140; English common, 30, 140; and language, lex mercatoria, 154–55, 157, 159, 162; and literature, 19, 23, 26 n. 10; and literature movement, 26 n. 10, 28; and patriarchy, 28; private, 142; problems of, 26 n. 10; Roman, 142; rule of, 18 Lawes Resolution of Womens Rights (T. E.), 20

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Lawrence, W. W., 121 Lenz, Carolyn Ruth Swift, 20 Legatt, Alexander, 107 Lewis, Jayne Elizabeth, 80 lex mercatoria. See under law lie. See deception literary criticism. See criticism, literary Locke, John, 167 Lucas, F. L., 86, 94 Lucio: marriage to Kate Keepdown, 143, 148. See also under Measure for Measure Machiavelli, Nıćolo, 11, 13, 15–17, 25 n. 4, 93, 143, 167, 169; Discourses, 15; Mandragola, 15; The Prince, 15 MacLean, Ian, 43 n. 19 maidenhead: as medium of exchange, 141 Majeske, Andrew, 24, 26 n. 10, 153 Marcus, Leah, 80 marital betrayal. See betrayal, marital marriage portion. See dowry marriage, 20, 143–46, 148–50, 151 n. 16; and children, 145; as commercial transaction, 146; handfast, 152 n. 28; as link among competing institutions, 143; as property exchange, 146 Mary, Queen of Scots. See Stuart, Mary masculinist power. See power, masculinist masculinity, 35, 40, 66 Matthew, Gospel of, 141 Mazzola, Elizabeth, 82 McGrail, Mary Ann, 67, 70, 78 McMullen, John 43 n. 16 Measure for Measure (Shakespeare), 24, 118, 120, 126, 133, 135–36, 136 n. 3, 137 n. 12, 15, and 16, 139 n. 33, 141– 42, 146–47, 149, 151 n. 5; and Adam and Eve, 147; Angelo, 120, 126–33, 135, 138 nn. 21 and 22, 138 n. 26, 140, 142–43, 145–46, 148, 150, 152 n. 26; Barnardine, 141, 148; and bed-trick, 142, 150; Claudio, 126–28, 132 p 33, 137 n. 15, 141–49, 152 n. 28; and dowry, 141; Duke Vincentio, 126,

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128–33, 140–42, 145–48, 150, 152 n. 28; Duke Vincentio as Friar, 131; Duke Vincentio as Judge, 130; Escalus, 140, 150; and guilt, 147; and head-trick, 142, 150; Isabella, 120, 126–32, 135, 137 nn. 12, 138 nn. 21, 23, and 26, 140–46, 148–50, 152 n. 23; Juliet, 128, 132, 141, 143, 144–47, 149; Kate Keepdown, 143, 148, 150; Leontes, 23–24; Lucio, 128, 132, 142– 43, 145–46, 148, 150; Mariana, 24, 126, 128–30, 132, 138 n. 26, 141–48, 150; marriage in, 149–50; Mistress Overdone, 144; Pompey, 141, 143, 152 n. 26; Provost, 142, 147, 150; sexuality in, 140, 144; trial in, 142, 150 Medea, 82 Mendelson, Sara, 21 Merchant of Venice (Shakespeare), 23–24, 27, 30, 32, 34, 39, 42, 42 n. 2, 64 n. 28; Antonio, 27, 31–33, 36, 38–39, 153, 157–61, 164–65; Balthazar, 35; Bassanio, 30–31, 33, 37–38, 40–42, 44 n. 42, 64 n. 28, 158–67; Belario, 37, 155– 57, 159; Belmont, 30, 33, 40; Duke, 33, 37; Gratiano, 40, 64 n. 28; Jessica, 32, 159; Lorenzo, 36; Morocco, 29– 30, 40; Nerissa, 28, 30, 35, 40, 42; Portia, 23, 27–42, 42 n. 3, 44 nn. 40 and 42, 45 n. 42, 64 n. 28, 153–69; Shylock, 24, 27, 32–33, 36–40, 154–55, 157–66, 168 mercy, 153–58, 161, 163–64 Merry Wives of Windsor (Shakespeare), 145; Fenton, 145; Romeo, 145 Mill, John Stuart, 167 misogyny, 20 motherhood, 20, 23 Much Ado about Nothing (Shakespeare): 55, 61; Beatrice, 55–56; Hero, 55 Mukherji, Subha, 34, 42 n. 2, 44 n. 40, 72, 76–77, 84, 90, 99–100, 108 Mulvey, Laura, 125 murder, 98, 101, 106–9, 112–13 Musolf, Gil Richard, 150 narrative, 46, 48–50, 58–59, 62, 65 n. 32, 99, 101–3, 105, 107, 109–10, 112, 114;

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confessional, 110; evidentiary, 105; providential, 107–9 ; testimonial, 108 Neely, Carol Thomas, 20, 63 n. 2, 137 n. 5, 137 n. 9 Newman, Karen, 42 n. 3 Othello (Shakespeare), 55, 61, 64 n. 24, 79 n. 19; Cassio, 79 n. 19; Desdemona, 55, 79 n. 19; Emilia, 55–56, 79 n. 19; Iago, 79 n. 19; Othello, 79 n. 19 Overbury, Sir Thomas, 111. See ‘‘Trial of Anne Turner, Widow, at the King’sbench, for the Murder of Sir Thomas Overbury’’ Ovid, 47 Padua, University of, 155–56 Painter, William, 85; Palace of Pleasure, 85 Palace of Pleasure (Painter), 85 pardon, 154–55, 158 Parker, Patricia, 34, 44 n. 26 passions, 24, 67, 70–71, 73–75, 77–78 Paster, Gail Stern, 69 Patriarchia, or the Natural Power of Kings (Filmer, Sir Robert), 51, 143 patriarchy, 20–21, 23, 28, 30, 38, 124–25 Paul, Saint, 81 Paulina. See Winter’s Tale penitence, 147, 150; and marriage 147, 150 Percy, Thomas, 94 Perkins, William, 143 Peterborough Cathedral, 94 Phillips, James Emerson, 80–88 pious fraud. See fraud, pious Plato, 17, 67, 143; Georgias, 66; Republic, 17; and split lovers, 149; Symposium, 149 Poetics (Aristotle), 100 poison, 68, 70 Pompey. See Measure for Measure Portia. See Merchant of Venice power, 143; individual, 141; masculinist, 23, 46, 62–63; performative, 48, 50, 62; of state, 141

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Prayer Book. See Book of Common Prayer pre-trial investigation. See investigation, pre-trial Privy Council. See Council, Privy procedural biases. See biases, procedural Promos and Cassandra (Whetstone), 127 proof, 100, 106 property, 20 Protestantism, 55 Provost. See Measure for Measure Pygmalion myth, 47 Queen of Corinth (Fletcher), 118, 133, 135–36; Beliza, 133–35; Clerk, 133; Euphanes, 134, 136; Merione, 133–35; Queen, 133–34; Theanor, 133–36 Quintilian, 106 race, 20 Rackin, Phyllis, 21 rape, 118–19, 127–28, 132–33, 135–36; culture of, 118, 125, 133; myth of, 118, 125; stage, 118 Reformation, 11, 13 religion, 20 Renaissance, the, 11–14, 17, 21, 84, 89, 149; and drama, 101, 105; and feminist critics, 20; and jurors, 99; and literary studies, 19–20; monarchy in, 58; theories of, 62; women in, 62 repentance. See penitence Resnik, Judith, 19 Reynolds, Edward (bishop), 78 Rhetoric (Aristotle), 100 rhetoric, 100, 106; as political weapon, 142 Richard III (king), 82 Richardson, Catherine, 106, 111 riddles, 29–30 Rizzio, David, 91–93 Rome, 145 Romeo and Juliet (Shakespeare), 145 Rowe, Katherine, 69 rule of law. See under law

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sacramental unions. See unions, sacramental scales of Justice. See under Justice Scarry, Elaine, 30 Schleiner, Louise, 141 Seiden, Melvin, 130 sexual reputation, 123–24, 128–29, 135 sexuality, 20; women’s, 151 n. 5, 152 n. 23. See also under Measure for Measure Shakespeare studies, 23 Shakespeare, William, 20, 22, 24, 50, 52, 55, 56, 66, 74, 82, 84, 118, 120–22, 125–27, 129–30, 136, 138 n. 22, 144, 148–49, 153, 167 Shakespeare, William (Works of ): All’s Well that Ends Well, 118, 120; Antony and Cleopatra, 84; Coriolanus, 145; Hamlet, 82, 148; Henry IV, 145; King Henry VII, 64 n. 11; King Lear, 82–83; Measure for Measure, 118, 120; Merchant of Venice, 23–24, 27, 30, 32, 34, 39, 42, 42 n. 2, 64 n. 28; Merry Wives of Windsor, 145; Much Ado about Nothing, 55, 61; Othello, 55, 61, 64 n. 24, 79 n. 19; Richard II, 82; Richard III, 82; Romeo and Juliet, 145; Taming of the Shrew, 145; Timon of Athens, 144; Twelfth Night, 83; Two Gentlemen of Verona, 82, 122; Winter’s Tale, 23–24, 46– 48, 50, 52, 55, 61–62, 63 n. 11, 65 n. 24, 66–68, 70, 75, 77, 78, 144 Shapiro, Barbara, 103 Sharpe, J.A., 43 n. 16 Shell, Marc, 141 Ship of Fools. See Das Narrenschiff Short declaration of the ende of Traytors, and false conspirators against the state, Wherein are also breefely toughed, sundry offences of the S. Queene, committed against the crowne of this land, (anonymous), 82 Shuger, Debora, 143, 147 Shylock. See Merchant of Venice signs, 100, 103 slander, 22, 126, 128–29, 131–32 Smart, Carol, 27, 32, 44 n. 28 Sokol, B. J., 63 n. 11, 153–54

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Sokol, Mary, 63 n. 11, 153, 167 speech, injurious, 50 Spenser, Edmund, 80, 83; The Faerie Queene, 80 stage properties, 99, 107 Stanton, Domna, 26 n. 9 state: and power, 148 Stretton, Tim, 20, 22, 34, 53, 64 n. 17 Stuart, Henry, Lord Darnley, 86, 91–92 Stuart, Mary (queen), 24, 80–83, 85–86, 88, 91–95; and ‘‘daughter of debate,’’ 81; and ‘‘Deuil Blanc’’ portrait, 86–88; and execution of, 85, 95; Marian allusions in drama, 81, 87; Marian analogues, 83; Marian images, 80 subjectivity, 20 subordination of women. See women, subordination of subversion, 27, 40, 42 Sullivan, Garrett, 113 Symposium (Plato), 149 taliation, 141, 146 Taming of the Shrew (Shakespeare), 145; Licentio, 145 Thomas, Catherine, 24, 52, 144, 147 Timon of Athens (Shakespeare), 144 Todd, Margo, 143 tokens, 103, 116 n. 42 Traub, Valerie, 56, 65 n. 26 treason, 51–52, 56, 58, 61–62, 63 n. 11 Treatise of the Passions and Faculties of the Soule of Man (Reynolds, Edward), 78 trial, 100. See also under Measure for Measure ‘‘Trial of Anne Turner, Widow, at the King’s-bench, for the Murder of Sir Thomas Overbury’’ (anonymous) 101, 111 Trussler, Simon, 88 Tudor, Mary (queen), 81 Turner, Ann, 111. See also ‘‘Trial of Anne Turner, Widow, at the King’s-bench, for the Murder of Sir Thomas Overbury’’ Twelfth Night (Shakespeare), 83, 144; Olivia, 83; Viola, 83

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Two Gentlemen of Verona (Shakespeare) 63 n. 10, 122; Julia, 122 Tyburn, 111 tyranny, 66–68, 71–78 tyrant, 67–68, 70, 72, 74–77 unions, 24; sacramental, 145 Varchi, Benedetto, 67; Blazon of Iealouvsie, 67 Verona, 145 Vienna, 143, 145–46, 148 violence, 20, 23 Vischer, Peter, 25 n. 2 Vives, Juan Luis, 51, 143; Instruction of a Christen Woman, 51 Waage, Federick, 88; White Devil Discover’d, 88 Walker, Garthine, 22–23, 32; Walsingham, Sir Francis, 64 n. 17 Ward, Ian, 26 n. 10 Wardmote Book of Faversham (anonymous), 110 weapon, 98, 112–113 Webster, John, 24, 25 n. 9, 83–86, 88, 91–95; Appius and Virginius, 84; Devil’s Lawcase, 84, 93, 95; Duchess of Malfi, 89, 91, 93, 95; Duke of Guise, 83; White Devil, 84–86, 89, 91 Westminster Abbey, 94 Westward Ho. See Dekker, Thomas Whetstone, George, 127; Promos and Cassandra, 127 White Devil (Webster), 24, 84–86, 89, 91, 110; Brachiano, 86, 88; Camillo, 86, 88; Cardinal Monticelso, 88–90, 92;

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Duke Francisco, 88; Flamineo, 85, 88, 90; Gasparo, 90; Lodovico, 90; Vittoria, 84–86, 88–92, 110; Zanche, 90 Whore of Babylon. See Dekker, Thomas whore. See sexual reputation Wiegers, Wanda, 167 Windsor Castle, 86 Winstanley, Lilian, 80, 82 Winter’s Tale (Shakespeare), 23–24, 46– 48, 50, 52, 55, 61–61, 63 n. 11, 65 n. 24, 66–68, 70, 75, 77, 78, 144; Antigonus, 52, 57, 71–72; Apollo, 52, 61; Camillo, 60, 70–71; Ferdinand, 77; Hermione, 23, 46–52, 55–62, 64 n. 11, 65 n. 24, 66, 68, 70–74, 76–77; Leontes, 46–52, 55–62, 64 nn. 2, 3, and 23, 66–68, 70–71, 74–77, 78 n. 19; Mamillius, 66, 70; Oracle, 73–75; Paulina, 23–24, 46–52, 55–58, 60–62, 63 n. 3, 65 n. 24; Perdita, 66, 70–72, 74–76; Polixenes, 46, 51–52, 57, 60, 66, 68, 70, 74 women, 25 n. 4, 62, 131; and agency, 21–23; as inferior, 21; and justice, 23–24; and law, 20–21, 24; as legal agents; 21; and power, 18, 24–25; as sexual manipulators, 118–19, 121–22, 125, 133; and subjection, 21; subordination of, 142; as whores, 132; as witnesses, 124, 130, 133–35 Woodbridge, Linda, 81, 119 work, 20 Wright, Nancy, 22 Wry, Joan, 142 Zeus, 149

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