Introduction
In the Elizabethan era females were seen as lesser than men; an inequality. Women were seen as not being capable of acts such as murder that are villainous. They were often referred by their husband’s name, showing they were almost a belonging. The society was patriarchal, men dictated everything, women had to be subordinate and submissive or there would be ramifications. Carol Ann Duffy’s poems in the anthology “The World’s Wife” are contemporary, but set in an era when women were treated without equality.
In the plays and poems of Shakespeare and Carol Ann Duffy, the wives, the female villains all deviate from the given eras expectations. The women demonstrate a will, a drive for power, but they are ultimately reliant and dependent on a man to achieve it as they had to leverage their authority and power. Furthermore, women in the plays and poems of Shakespeare and Carol Ann Duffy differentiate themselves from the men by having a vocation and a will to succeed. By doing this Shakespeare and Carol Ann Duffy both challenged …show more content…
Both wives manage to influence and coerce their husbands to commit heinous deeds. Lady Macbeth pressures Macbeth to murder King Duncan by leveraging the fact he is a man and insulting his masculinity, not to mention using numerous manipulative methods. Queen Herod on the other hand, orders the death of innocent infants. They both commit these deeds due to two conceived prophecies. Both women surprise the reader by committing acts that don't fit female stereotypes or what women are expected to conform to at the given era. Both acts were malicious and savage to an extent, only capable of being done by wielding power over their very strong, powerful husbands. Moreover, both women do not actually commit the crimes themselves, but rather order their husbands to do what they cannot
In the Elizabethan era females were seen as lesser than men; an inequality. Women were seen as not being capable of acts such as murder that are villainous. They were often referred by their husband’s name, showing they were almost a belonging. The society was patriarchal, men dictated everything, women had to be subordinate and submissive or there would be ramifications. Carol Ann Duffy’s poems in the anthology “The World’s Wife” are contemporary, but set in an era when women were treated without equality.
In the plays and poems of Shakespeare and Carol Ann Duffy, the wives, the female villains all deviate from the given eras expectations. The women demonstrate a will, a drive for power, but they are ultimately reliant and dependent on a man to achieve it as they had to leverage their authority and power. Furthermore, women in the plays and poems of Shakespeare and Carol Ann Duffy differentiate themselves from the men by having a vocation and a will to succeed. By doing this Shakespeare and Carol Ann Duffy both challenged …show more content…
Both wives manage to influence and coerce their husbands to commit heinous deeds. Lady Macbeth pressures Macbeth to murder King Duncan by leveraging the fact he is a man and insulting his masculinity, not to mention using numerous manipulative methods. Queen Herod on the other hand, orders the death of innocent infants. They both commit these deeds due to two conceived prophecies. Both women surprise the reader by committing acts that don't fit female stereotypes or what women are expected to conform to at the given era. Both acts were malicious and savage to an extent, only capable of being done by wielding power over their very strong, powerful husbands. Moreover, both women do not actually commit the crimes themselves, but rather order their husbands to do what they cannot