We are entrenched in Giovanni's reasons for loving Annabella from the outset of 'Tis Pity, but we get little of what draws Annabella to her brother's arms. We know that she calls him a "blessed shape" and celestial creature" in I.ii and that she yields to him easily in the same scene, saying What thou has urged / My captive heart had long ago resolved" so I do not think we doubt her love, but it is never truly expressed. What could make this chaste woman commit so vile a sexual crime? As a pregnant woman, she must bear the mark of their mutual sin and pay consequences more dear in being forced to marry a man she does not love and being in death by her lover's hand. Her womanhood seems to mark her as more sexually deviant than her partner in the very same crime given her punishments. Is it merely her womanhood (or possibly even her girlhood), and by proxy her susceptibility to temptation, that accounts for her harder "fall"? Or can we somehow ascribe Annabella's lack of description of her feelings as her ultimate downfall because she contrasts so greatly with the verbose and logical Giovanni?
The thwarting of the virginity test in The Changeling has larger implications than a mere test of sexual constancy, and I think perhaps it is a subversive act that calls attention to some of the play's male characters' anxieties about the maintenance and protection of wifely and physical property. Alsemero, having gained entrance into Vermandero's physical castle, is perhaps anxious that someone has gained entrance into the play's other fortress - the body of Beatrice-Joanna - and must therefore ensure its safety. What does it say, then, that Beatrice-Joanna beats this test and dupes Alsemero into believing her virginity? Is this a comment on virginity - and therefore the female body - as unreliable? Does her triumph over the "chemistry set" subvert Alsemero's place in the patriarchal system in some way? Or perhaps alter her place within that system?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment