Comparing Women In Titus Andronicus A Midsummer Night's Dream

Gender Roles in Titus Andronicus Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus is a play centered on the aftermath of the years’ long war between the Roman’s and the Goth’s. General Titus has come home victorious in the war with the Queen of the Goths, Tamora, and her sons as prisoners of war. Titus’s daughter Lavinia welcomes her father and what remains of her twenty-five brothers to praise their success. The characters of Lavinia and Tamora show two very different images of women. One is seen as the classical “good girl” feminine archetype while the other is willful and embodies more of a masculine gender role.

Hermia has been promised to Demetrius by her father; however she is unwilling to marry him as she is in love with Lysander. We are introduced to this theme when they visit Thesus, the figure of authority in the play, who makes it clear that women are not to have their own identity, but instead are

The biggest obstacle in this play occurs when the power of love is challenged by authority. The play starts with Theseus, duke of Athens, being eager to marry Hippolyta, who he wooed with his sword in combat. Although Theseus promises Hippolyta that he will wed her “with pomp, with triumph, with reveling,” true love between them is questionable. By starting the play with Theseus and Hippolyta, Shakespeare hints the audience of the authority involved in their marriage and leaves the audience wonder if they actually love each other. The focus is then shifted to the four lovers: Hermia, Lysander, Demetrius and Helena - by establishing the story of Hermia being forced by her father, Egeus, to marry Demetrius, when the person she actually wants to marry is Lysander. However, Egeus

Tamora and Lavinia, the two main female characters in Titus Andronicus, have to put up others underestimating them, but both women prove they are capable of taking matters into their own hands and get revenge on the people who have done them wrong. Though they were taken advantage of and hurt in many ways they both found a way to get revenge in the end.

An essential element to any Shakespearean tragedy is the idea of human suffering. In both Titus Andronicus and King Lear no one can deny that the characters in these plays do indeed suffer and at great lengths, but the question begs to be asked what is the source of this suffering? Keeping in mind that during the times in which William Shakespeare wrote death, adultery and fragrant sexuality where at an optimal level and as such single parent families frequently resulted. Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus and King Lear are indeed tales that show the follies of such single parent families and more precisely those families that lack a mothering figure. It is this lack of the female in the

Equity between men and women is a deeply rooted battle. As the modern culture shifts further from patriarchal rule, it is interesting to question why females remained the submissive sex for so many centuries. When examining the play Twelfth Night, it becomes apparent that Shakespeare considered such an issue and used the character Viola and her interaction with Orsino as a vessel for gender equality.

By telling Demetrius of the planned elopement between Lysander and Hermia, she mind get her man and help her friend in the process. On the other hand, we have the workmen who put the play together. Although they all have different professions, they know each other well and able to tell which character would fit them well. When it was being decided who plays who, there is a bit of argument between them.

Perhaps the theme that is most recurrent in William Shakespeare's plays is that of filial relationships, specifically the relationship between daughter and father. This particular dynamic has allowed Shakespeare to create complex female characters that come into conflict with their fathers over issues ranging from marriage to independence. At the same time, the dramatist exposes his audience to the struggles women face when attempting to assert themselves in a misogynistic world. Through the daughter-father dyads portrayed in The Taming of the Shrew and A Midsummer Night's Dream, Shakespeare highlights the effects that gender constraints have on female characters while simultaneously drawing attention to the sharp contrast between both relationships.

Theatre Under the Female Microscope Compare and contrast the depiction of female characters in Oedipus Rex, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and The Glass Menagerie. What does each author suggest about the role of women in his society based upon the way that women are written for the stage? The influence of female characters in the world of theatre is vast, and highly determined upon the thoughts of the author. The depiction of these versatile characters in Oedipus Rex, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and The Glass Menagerie, are nowhere near a sequestered concept, but instead, a mirrored theory for societal norms.

Shakespeare may be the most known playwright of all time, however, you may be surprised at how many unfair stereotypes this very famous writer incorporated into his plays. A Midsummer Night’s Dream is a comedy play written by William Shakespeare in the late 1500s that portrays events surrounding the marriage of Theseus, the Duke of Athens, to the extravagant Hippolyta, the former queen of the Amazons. Such events included Demetrius jilting Helena at the altar and falling in love with Helena’s rival instead, Hermia. However, Hermia is in love with Lysander, not a disdainful youth known as Demetrius. According to feminist theory, the theory that focuses on gender inequality. A Midsummer Night’s Dream would not be considered a feminist empowerment play because throughout the play Shakespeare portrays women as timid/easily frightened. He shows men having more power than women, and perpetuates the unfair stereotype that all women must act a certain way.

In the play the reader gets the truth that Hermia’s father wants her to marry Demetrius, and as a woman living in a patriarchal society, she must obey; at least that is what the reader is lead to believe. Hermia takes a stand for herself and becomes powerless in her love for Lysander. With no reasonable explanation, besides her love for Lysander, she defiantly denies her father’s attempt for an arranged marriage. Since their love for each other is so immense, they prepare for the underlying bad circumstances they are going to suffer from for not obeying the wishes of her father. Hermia’s love for Lysander means so much more to her than the property or social placeholder she would gain by marrying Demetrius. Hermia dedicates herself to Lysander, saying he is worthy of the ultimate consummation of her love. She must convince her father that Demetrius is disgraceful and immoral. At the end of the play, Hermia and Lysander are eloped, and unlike Katherine and Petruccio in TOS, they demonstrate their dedication for each other from the beginning, disregarding a few

One of the last Shakespearean works of Elizabethan England, A Midsummer Night’s Dream is laced with a progressive line of feminism, which is coupled with an air of sexual freedom that would have been very much in line with the views of the ageing monarch, and may have been written as a tribute to her rule. Although such a feat would be considered remarkably progressive at the time, Shakespeare's conservative plebeian audience still obligated him to include a more traditional ending.

Titus Andronicus is a play renowned for its bloodshed and human suffering. Shakespeare’s strategic use of diction, literary devices such as alliteration and rhyme heightens the dark ambiance. The dark and lifeless images which pervade Tamora’s monologue explores the breakdown of human goodness and familial relations and loyalty. Titus Andronicus demonstrates the dangerous force of vengeance. Furthermore, Shakespeare’s underscores the complexity of gender roles that can impede female liberties through enduring patriarchal societal values who elevates a prudent woman over the ‘wildly’ lustful woman susceptible to her sexual appetite.

Women have a specific role throughout the Elizabethan society and are known as inferior. In Shakespeare’s play, A Midsummer Nights Dream, women are told how to act by men, that reveals superiority towards men. This is portrayed by the characters-Hermia, Helena, and Titiana throughout the play. These characters were represented as powerless and blind because they fail to receive what they what and are told what to do countless amounts by the men in the play. Women's’ inferiority in the play makes it impossible for them to achieve true happiness attributable to the superiority the men in the play believe they have.

Shakespeare and the members of the Elizabethan era would be appalled at the freedoms women experience today.  The docility of Elizabethan women is almost a forgotten way of life. What we see throughout Shakespeare’s plays is an insight into the female character as perceived by Elizabethan culture.  Shakespeare’s female characters reflect the Elizabethan era’s image of women; they were to be virtuous and obedient and those that were not were portrayed as undesirable and even evil.