Examines the lack of independence in female characters from Geoffrey Chaucer's "The Knight's Tale" and William Shakespeare's "The Tempest".
Written in 2004; 948 words; 2 sources; MLA; $ 33.95
Paper Summary:
One of the most striking aspects of the female protagonists in Shakespeare's "The Tempest" and Chaucer's "The Knight's Tale" is their apparent lack of agency, or force of independent will, in the face of male dominance and control. This paper shows that women, as such, do not seem to exist in these tales. In other words, unlike the men of these tales, women do not act as individual people or fully-formed characters, either in the contemporary sense or even in the sense that "character" or "psychology" may have existed in their creators? respective ages and places. Rather, women in these texts only serve to act as objects or placeholders. This paper explains how they simply live, textually speaking, to serve and to reinforce male notions of honor and power or act as objects of male transfers of power.
From the Paper:
"Miranda's only power is her ability to arise pity and wonder in others. When she expressed her opinion about stopping the tempest, her father dismisses her with the query: "my foot, my tutor"? In other words, he is amazed that something from his body can have its own volition, namely a daughter, who is something lower than himself, a body part that he stands upon like a foot that cannot teach him anything, morally speaking, and can only cement his physical connections to the earth through generating marital alliances. Prospero forces Miranda to go to sleep when he is distracted, again against her own will. (1.1.) Eventually, her alliance with Ferdinand allows her father to return home to his customary place?her function in society as Prospero's prop and "foot" has been fulfilled."
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