Crossdressing in Shakespeare's Comedies: As You Like It and Twelfth Night

Crossdressing in Shakespeare's Comedies: As You Like It and Twelfth Night

Introduction

  • Crossdressing Definition: Wearing clothes associated with the opposite sex within a particular society. It's been used for various purposes throughout history, especially in theater.

  • Shakespearean Context: In Shakespeare's plays, crossdressing is a prevalent custom. Specifically in "As You Like It" and "Twelfth Night," the plays involve boy actors playing girls who then disguise themselves as boys.

  • Plot Overview:

    • As You Like It: Rosalind, banished by her uncle, disguises herself as a man named Ganymede and goes to the Forest of Arden.

    • Twelfth Night: Viola survives a shipwreck and disguises herself as a young page named Cesario to serve Duke Orsino.

  • Function: Crossdressing serves to advance the plot and convey deeper meanings in these comedies.

  • Elizabethan England: The plays were written in a patriarchal society where men controlled economic, political, and marital power. Women were considered inferior and were expected to be silent and beautiful, not intellectual. The era emphasized female subjection, limiting women's subjectivity.

  • Critical Perspectives on Crossdressing:

    • Edward Berry: Some critics, like Edward Berry, argue that the plays ultimately reinforce traditional patriarchal norms by ending with the heroines in the role of wives.

    • Catherine Belsey & Leigh Bullion: Other critics, like Catherine Belsey and Leigh Bullion, contend that crossdressing challenges patriarchal values by disrupting sexual differences and portraying homoerotic relationships.

    • Carol Thomas Neely: Neely views the concluding marriages as an accommodation where both men and women negotiate within the culture to achieve their desires.

    • Barbara Hodgdon: Considers the flexible sex-gender identities presented by boy actors playing women cross-dressing as men.

    • Phyllis Rackin: Examines gender in relation to the plot, suggesting that cross-dressing reproduces the unstable sex-gender system of Shakespeare's time.

    • Carol Thomas Neely: Highlights the different relationships of eroticism and gender that are played out through the cross-dressed heroines.

  • Paper's Focus: This paper explores how crossdressing relates to gender stereotypes and examines its role in circulating notions of masculinity and femininity within the two plays, thus blending culturally assigned gender roles through the disguised heroines.

From Passive Resignation to Subjective Freedom

  • Initial Suffering: Both Rosalind and Viola start as sufferers before assuming male disguises.

  • Rosalind's Situation: She is melancholic, missing her banished father and her former social standing. Despite Celia's affection, she feels like a prisoner in the palace, maintaining silence and patience, and resigning herself to being an object of submission.

  • Viola's Situation: Viola is alone and unprotected in a foreign country after surviving a shipwreck. She can't enter Olivia's service because Olivia has sworn off men.

  • Disguise as Self-Defense:

    • Rosalind: Before going to the Forest of Arden, Rosalind fears sexual assault and decides to dress as a man for safety: "what danger will it be to us,/Maids as we are, to travel forth so far?/Beauty provoketh thieves sooner than gold" (I.iii.114−116)(I.iii.114-116).

    • Viola: Viola knows she's in a precarious position as a woman in an unknown country and is more likely to find work as a man. Power resides in the hands of men, offering more opportunities and safety.

  • Shift in Roles: Crossdressing enables the heroines to shift roles and express their subjectivity.

  • Viola's Resourcefulness: Viola quickly gains Orsino's trust and is sent to woo Olivia, succeeding where Valentine failed. She transforms the situation by drawing Olivia out of her mourning.

  • Viola's Wit:

    • Refuses to reveal her origins to Olivia, claiming it's not part of her role: “I can say little more than I have studied, and/that question’s out of my part” (I.v.176−177)(I.v.176-177).

    • Retorts sharply when accused of rudeness: “The rudeness that hath appeared in me have I/learned from my entertainment” (I.v.214−215)(I.v.214-215).

    • Compliments Olivia's beauty: “Excellently done, if God did all” (I.v.235)(I.v.235).

    • Engages in witty repartee with Olivia, which Malvolio describes as speaking "shrewishly" (I.v.159)(I.v.159).

  • Viola's Courtship: As Cesario, Viola delivers a convincing courtship speech, expressing a determination to pursue love that contrasts with Orsino's behavior and societal expectations of women.

  • Rosalind's Transformation: Rosalind takes the lead as Ganymede, acting as Celia's protector, and uses her disguise to test Orlando's love.

  • Rosalind's Wit: She mocks amatory conventions and chastises Phebe for mistreating her lover.

  • Transition: Rosalind undergoes a shift from passive resignation to assertive wit.

  • Performance of Intelligence: Crossdressing allows both heroines to perform their intelligence, creativity, and courage that are usually associated with men.

  • Beauvoir's Perspective: According to Simon de Beauvoir, women, if given the opportunity, can display the same exuberance, curiosity, initiative, and hardihood as boys.

  • Disruption of Norms: Shakespeare uses crossdressing to challenge the notion that women should be silent, chaste, and obedient, as dictated by Elizabethan texts.

Fluidity of Gender

  • Femininity Maintained: Despite adopting male attire, the heroines retain their femininity. They play on the contrast between their inner selves and outward appearances.

  • Rosalind's Tenderness: Rosalind possesses both tenderness and mirth. She shows her feminine side despite her disguise.

  • Rosalind's Assertion: Rosalind asserts that her male attire doesn't change her nature as a woman: “Good my complexion, dost thou think/though I am caparisoned like a man, I have a/doublet and hose in my disposition” (III.ii.198−200)(III.ii.198-200).

  • Stereotypes: Rosalind uses and puts into circulation stereotypical views of masculinity and femininity.

    • She uses stock satirical jibes about women's garrulity, joking that when she thinks, she must speak: “Do you not know I am a woman? When I think, I must speak” (III.ii.253−254)(III.ii.253-254).

    • She asserts that Phebe's love letter must be a man's invention: “I say she never did invent this letter./This is a man’s invention, and his hand” (IV.iii.31−32)(IV.iii.31-32).

    • She mocks stereotypical views of femininity by describing an effeminate woman.

  • Viola's Femininity: Viola is described as distinctly feminine even in her disguise.

  • Viola's Compassion: Viola gets caught in misery realizing how her disguise has entangled herself, Orsino, and Olivia in a love triangle: “My master loves her dearly,/And I, poor monster, fond as much on him,/And she, mistaken, seems to dote on me” (II.ii.33−35)(II.ii.33-35).

  • Viola's Reflections: She laments women's frailty and hopes time will resolve the problem: “How easy is it for the proper false/In women’s waxen hearts to set their forms!/Alas, our frailty is the cause, not we,/For such as we are made of, such we be” (II.ii.29−32)(II.ii.29-32).

  • Viola's Story: Viola hints at her love for Orsino by telling a story of a wordless woman who pines in thought. The story adheres to contemporary prescriptions of female conduct.

  • Fear of Dueling: When forced to duel, Viola's fear reveals her feminine interiority: “Pray God defend me! A little thing would make me tell them how much I lack of a man” (III.iv.314−316)(III.iv.314-316).

  • Others' Comments: Others comment on the fusion of gender attributes in Cesario.

  • Orsino's Observation: Orsino remarks on Viola's smooth lips and maiden-like voice: “Diana’s lip/Is not more smooth and rubious, thy small pipe/Is as the maiden’s organ, shrill and sound,/And all is semblative a woman’s part” (I.v.34−37)(I.v.34-37).

  • Malvolio's Description: Malvolio describes Viola as being "in standing water, between boy and man" (I.v.158)(I.v.158), highlighting the fluctuating status between genders.

  • Reemphasis at Conclusion: Fluidity of gender is reemphasized when Cesario is revealed to be Viola. The similarities between Viola and Sebastian make their different genders less significant.

  • Orsino's Acceptance: Orsino effortlessly transfers his favor from Cesario to Viola: “Cesario, come/For so you shall be while you are a man./But when in other habits you are seen,/Orsino’s mistress, and his fancy’s queen” (V.i.408−411)(V.i.408-411).

Conclusion

  • Significance: Crossdressing plays a significant role in characterization and theme in "As You Like It" and "Twelfth Night."

  • Qualities: Rosalind and Viola's movement between female and male traits conveys that they possess qualities of both.

  • Invalidation: Crossdressing puts gender-typed behaviors into play, distorts them, and invalidates the idea of fixed masculinity or femininity, showing indifference to or breaking Elizabethan gender conventions.