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The Duchess of Malfi
First, we should think about the definition of a "revenge tragedy." The term was first used by the American Shakespeare scholar Ashley H. Thorndike (1871–1933) in a 1902 article "The Relations of...
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The Duchess of Malfi
An important example of the intersection between the personal and the political occurs at the conclusion of the play. Antonio, the Cardinal, the Duke and Bosola lie in "this great ruin," with...
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The Duchess of Malfi
The nature of power in men like Cardinal and Ferdinand is physical, coercive, and assertive with all the manifest derivatives of control, manipulation, pressure, and authority. In The Duchess of...
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Literature
Psychologists studying the tragedy/comedy connection say that without a bit of horror or tragedy, comedy rarely exists. However, there must be some distance in time, space or personal reality for a...
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The Duchess of Malfi
John Webster's The Duchess of Malfi and William Shakespeare's Othello both are considered revenge tragedies. This genre, influenced by the Roman playwright Seneca, was extremely common in the...
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Hamlet
When we speak of identity politics, such as gender politics, we're referring to a means by which marginalized groups voice their feelings of oppression ("Identity Politics"). We're also referring...
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Volpone
This is an awesome question to pit the stock characters of Volpone against the characters in The Duchess of Malfi. The female characters to be admired are Celia and the Duchess, while the ones we...
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The Duchess of Malfi
In The Duchess of Malfi, the audience has no misconceptions about Bosola, the malcontent, released from prison despite his part in a vicious murder. Bosola is not happy with his status in life and...
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Othello
In the 16th century treatise on women, The good and the badde, or Descriptions of the vvorthies, and vnworthies of this age, Nicholas Breton classifies five types of women: The Unquiet Woman The...
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The Duchess of Malfi
Act Four in The Duchess of Malfi is full of captivity-themed language and imagery. In Scene 1 we are told that, "She seems to welcome the end of misery more than shun it." Her treatment in the...
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The Duchess of Malfi
The Duchess stands out in this play as a contrast to practically all the other characters. She is the only true strong, independent personality. She remains true to her own ideals and dies with her...
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The Duchess of Malfi
The main character, the Duchess, is shown to contravene gender roles in this play. She is shown to be a strong and wilful woman who acts independently of societal and familial expectations. Women...
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The Duchess of Malfi
In a purely literal sense Bosola's role is that of the hired assassin. More fundamentally, he represents the repentant sinner by the end of the play; he moves from performing cold-blooded acts of...
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The Duchess of Malfi
The significance of this story lies in what has just happened to the Duchess. She has just been arrested by Bosola in disguise and is going to be taken to her palace by guards. The story she tells...
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The Duchess of Malfi
Some might argue that Webster is creating a dichotomy with the two women as the Duchess is noble, keeps her feelings to herself, and plays the roles that a woman should by being proper and...
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The Duchess of Malfi
enotes' "sex and social mobility" in the Duchess of Malfi - that's pretty much sex and power. It includes critics in it like Fredric Jameson on these themes. :)...
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The Duchess of Malfi
The revenge tragedy is a genre that was common in Elizabethan and Jacobean England. It was modelled primarily on Seneca's tragedies, especially the Medea. The earliest work of the genre is usually...
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The Duchess of Malfi
The wooing scene of John Webster’s play The Duchess of Malfi (Act 1, scene 3) is written in blank verse, as can be seen by consulting, for instance, the edition of the play in the Norton...
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The Duchess of Malfi
John Webster’s play The Duchess of Malfi is historically significant for a number of different reasons, including the following: It exemplifies the emergence of Webster as an important successor...
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The Duchess of Malfi
During the English Renaissance, Italy was often imagined and presented as a place of moral and even spiritual corruption, and certainly this is true in John Webster’s play The Duchess of Malfi....
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The Duchess of Malfi
Many important themes found in John Webster's play The Duchess of Malfi are evident or implied right from the very beginning of the work. Delio's opening speech, for instance, alludes to the...
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The Duchess of Malfi
Mad men are a part of John websert's play duchess of malfi in second scene of fourth act. man men were sent in duchess's room by Ferdinand to irritate the duchess n hence making her mad. it was a...
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The Duchess of Malfi
The Duchess is absolutely not mad. There is no evidence for this. However, Ferdinand does attempt to drive her mad by torturing her in different ways. Firstly, he gives her a dead man's hand,...
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The Duchess of Malfi
Because the Dutchess of Malfi was so powerful in nature she was often feared by many of her peers and considered by some to be dangerous and not real. One example of her ability to provoke...
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The Duchess of Malfi
Critically speaking, The Duchess of Malfi is considered to be a Jacobean era (1603-1625) revenge play, or revenge tragedy. In writing The Duchess of Malfi, Webster borrowed elements form other...
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The Duchess of Malfi
In the play 'The Duchess of malfi' by Joh Webster, the author touches upon many themes including reality v unreality, identity, appearances, deception and insanity. The Duchess is subjected to a...
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The Duchess of Malfi
The Duchess of Malfi is generally regarded as one of the last of the great revenge tragedies. Your reference to it as a comedy of humours is perhaps a little offbeat. However, to begin, you need to...
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The Duchess of Malfi
The wooing scene between The Duchess and Antonio displays the difference in social class between the pair as The Duchess is forced to Woo Antonio instead of the typical man woos woman scenario....
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The Duchess of Malfi
Yes, the "Duchess of Malfi" has been made into a movie. On the 10th of October 1972, the movie version of John Webster's play "The Duchess of Malfi" directed by the famous U.K. director James Mac...
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The Duchess of Malfi
Well Webster mostly presents Bosola as a malcontent through his criticisms of the world and of humanity. "Man stands amazed to see his deformity in any other creature but himself;" He basically...
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The Duchess of Malfi
The Duchess is an independent and defiant woman who has a strong personality and I think was urged on to remarry by her brothers threats and warnings not to remarry. I believe that she wanted to...
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The Duchess of Malfi
I dont think he is a real villain. I think his malancholy is a result of his neglect. He has never been rewarded for the deeds he's done for the brothers so he lives thinking that if he does bad...
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The Duchess of Malfi
This Renaissance play paints the aristocracy is a mostly negative light. The brothers of the Duchess are jealous, hypocritical and vindicative. The Cardinal, supposedly a man of God, not only has...
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The Duchess of Malfi
Perhaps one could make a connection between Ferdinand's 'madness' when he discovers she has married and had children and his tormenting her with 'madmen'?
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The Duchess of Malfi
Bosola has the Duchess eat the apricots to confirm his suspicions that she is pregnant. Her pregnancy is confirmed when she throws up and goes into labor. It's suggested that they should say the...