CONTEXT for THE DUCHESS OF MALFI and THE MERCHANT'S TALE

Malleus Maleficarum

• 1487 - after MT, before DoM

• argued women were morally weaker, sexually dangerous, more susceptible to corruption

• ironic because the Duchess is the least corrupt of her siblings

William Painter’s Palace of Pleasure

• Webster’s principal source

• Italian courtly environment reminiscent of Painter’s Palace of Pleasure

The Fall in Genesis

• Eve = temptation, deception, sexual threat, transgression

• January’s garden becomes a corrupted Eden - mirrors the Fall

• the Duchess challenges the postlapsarian patriarchal order through sexual autonomy

Webster’s The White Devil

• also centred on female sexuality, corruption, and patriarchal judgement

• he repeatedly presents women trapped by male systems

• critiques misogyny and exposes corruption

The Witch of Edmonton

• contemporary for DoM

• women who resist/fail to conform are demonised

Renaissance stages

• no women on stage - femininity becomes performative

• patriarchal ideals of womanhood are literally male-constructed

Jacobean patriarchy

• women were: legally dependent, economically restricted, socially subordinate

• January sees marriage as ownership and control - medieval views of wives as property

• marriage = an institution designed to secure male authority

Widows

• widows had unusual economic and social freedom

• Duchess is wealthy, sexually autonomous, politically powerful

• her remarriage threatens male control over inheritance and lineage

Medieval antifeminist discourse

• The Wife of Bath

• Chaucer obviously not antifeminist

• antifeminist satire - used for comic effect

Marriage as a patriarchal contract

• marriage was rarely romantic

• the Duchess’ secret marriage undermines patriarchal structures designed to control - politically threatening

• age, property, heirs, ownership

Court corruption and Machiavellian politics

• Italian courts were associated with: corruption, intrigue, moral decay

• Niccolo Machiavelli - “the end justifies the means”

• fears of ruthless political ambition

• the Cardinal and Ferdinand embody corrupt politics

• morality is secondary to power

Social hierarchy

• as the Duchess’ steward, Antonio is socially beneath her

• reminiscent of Lady Arbella Stuart who also married her steward

• marriage for erotic reasons, not dynastic

The Great Chain of Being

• believed that God put everything in a hierarchy

• God, monarch, nobles, men, etc

• January has relative status/power as a man and a knight

• the Duchess is in an anomalous position of female power

Sexuality

• female chastity was linked to legitimacy and male honour

• huge male anxiety about cuckoldry - humiliating!

• January’s obsession with May’s fidelity reflects fears of illegitimate heirs

• is Ferdinand’s obsession dynastic or erotic?

Hippocrates’ humoral theory

• excess passion = imbalance in bodily humours

• Ferdinand’s lycanthropia/madness can reflect excessive melancholy or choleric instability

• January’s lust despite old age could be viewed as irrational bodily excess

• uncontrolled passions disrupt both bodily and moral balance

Conduct literature

• aimed to shape behaviour for polite society

• women were expected to be: silent, obedient, chaste

• both May and the Duchess violate ideal femininity

Fabliau tradition

• fabliaux were: comic, sexual, cynical, based on deception/adultery

• senex amans

• supposed to be funny (and it is!)

• no likeable characters

Anti-Catholicism

• Jacobean England was deeply suspicious of Catholic Europe

• the Cardinal represents: corruption, hypocrisy, moral decay

• Webster exploits Protestant anxieties

Revenge tragedy

• often included: violence, madness, corruption, moral decay, death

• macabre

• genre was arguably created by The Spanish Tragedy - 16th century

Eve vs Virgin Mary binary

• pure/chaste Mary vs corrupt Eve

• the Duchess is difficult to categorise

• May aligns with antifeminist traditions (is she simply making the best of a bad situation?)

Fortune and instability

• fate and fortune constantly changed human status

• January’s confidence collapses rapidly

• power and status are proven to be fragile

Chivalric code

• medieval chivalry idealised men as: honourable, loyal, protective, morally disciplined

• January’s lust undermines his position as part of the nobility

• are there any noble male characters? (aside from Antonio)