DOM - ALL KEY QUOTES

Question 1

‘a prince’s court is like a common fountain…pure silver drops should flow’

Answer 1

untainted water = purity, prized
indication that a ruler’s morality influences the prosperity of their court.

Question 2

‘poison near the head, death & diseases spread’

Answer 2

AO1/2: Simile - positional language = destructive impact of a corrupt leader on a country
Foreshadows the destruction that is rife in italy under the jurisdiction of the cardinal and Ferdinand.

Question 3

‘plum trees that grow crooked over standing pools…rich, o’erladen’

Answer 3

ao1/2: Nature metaphor,
‘grow crooked’ = skewed moral compasses of the brothers, misshapen & deformed = this court is in an unnatural state.
‘standing pools’ - stagnation, lack of prosperity - immorality has defiled Italy
A03: veiled criticism of the sycophantic court of James I.

Question 4

‘[Widows] Livers are more spotted than Laban’s sheep’

Answer 4

AO1/2: religious allusion juxtaposes goodness and morality with the misogynistic stereotype of the ‘lusty widow’ who becomes corrupted by a desire for sex.
Imagery of decay - biological corruption = women biologically predisposed to have strong sexual appetites
AO3: position of women in the GCB
AO5: argument over the duchess remarrying ‘dynastic arg. concerned with dom’s body politic’ - JANKOWSKI

Question 5

In reference to widows remarrying: ‘such weddings…to be executed than celebrated’

Answer 5

AO1/2: Polysemic qualities of ‘executed’ - could mean like a secret plot to be completed , could be the harsh quelling (through execution) of the subversive female’s attempt to remarry for love.

Question 6

‘Why should only I be cased up like a holy relic’

Answer 6

imagery of confinement = social restraints for the female gender.
Casual misogyny of the era = objectification through ‘holy relic’ - trad. ideas abt the pure virginal female, through repressions her sexuality will become an ancient forgotten desire, much like a relic. WOMEN SHOULD CONTAIN DESIRE
‘only I’ - questioning female, she draws attention to the hypocrisy of this court ran by two obsessively lustful men, reinforces how she feels truly isolated in her misery

Question 7

‘women like that part which like the lamprey hath no bone in’t’

Answer 7

AO1/2: perverse sexual jibe at the DOM, Ferdinand essentially reduces the female body to a mere vessel for the penis - female dissection at the hands of the male
- The casual misogyny of this sexual simile indicates that women serve no other purpose than sexual gratification and reproduction.
- Ferd. metaphorically dismembers the Duchess as a punishment for her sexuality
A03: This is a reminder of her dynastic position - DOM’s only reason to remarry should be to produce an heir to the throne.

Question 8

I am Duchess of Malfi still.

Answer 8

AO1/2: expression of her utter defiance in the face of death. She is a rigid, stoic figure, accepting and embracing death but also reasserting her status

AO5: the Duchess ‘remains unquestionably feminist’

Question 9

‘This was my father’s poniard…I’d loath to see it rusty’

Answer 9

A01/2: generational passage of masculine authority.
- phallic imagery of ‘poniard’ reinforces male domination of the Duchess and her body politic & private + Violent potential of the dagger = male & the patriarchy’s propensity for violence to quell the subversive woman.
- Ferd’s intrusion into female spaces evolves into a desire to ‘physically intrude’ on the female body by plunging his literal and metaphorical ‘dagger’ into his own sister to prohibit her sexual relations.
AO5: unveiling his ‘dangerous mixture of desire and revulsion’ towards the female body as Ferdinand wishes to own his sister’s sexuality by any means necessary.
-The sexualisation of extreme, graphic violence towards the DOM is, from a feminist perspective, a manifestation of the patriarchal desire to supress female sexuality when it is not for a man’s own gratification.
AO3: To a Renaissance audience, exploration of female sexuality = foreign concept as sex was merely a means to procure heirs.
AO3: Authority in renaissance families passed down through MALE generations, male family members had ultimate authority over females.

Question 10

‘saucy & ambitious devil is dancing in that circle’

Question 11

‘Lay a naked sword between us..to keep us chaste’

Answer 11

ao1/2:
potential metaphor for the overwhelming potential of desire which can lead to ultimate destruction.
‘naked sword’ - highly threatening image, perhaps foreshadowing the future dangers that await ant. & the DOM

Question 12

Ferd: ‘toss her…root up her goodly forests…blast her…lay her general territory as waste’

Answer 12

Use of sexually explicit, violent and often intrusive verbs suggest a male entitlement to the possession and desecration of the female body.
AO5: from an eco-crit. perspective = Ferdinand’s desire to ultimately destroy the DOMs ecological territory is a metaphor for his desire to encroach onto her physical, human body.

Question 13

‘Whether I am doomed to live, or die, I can do both like a prince.’

Answer 13

AO1/2: simile equates the Duchess to the powerful masculine figure of a prince, displaying how she - as a subversive feminist figure - believes that she is of equal status and power as a male.
Utter stoicism in the face of death - she does not display the expected tendencies of a woman i.e. crying.
AO3: At the time there were no labels for the political female figure = political discourse of the renaissance era
AO5: ‘Duchess remains unquestionably feminist’

Question 14

[Ferdinand gives her a poniard]

Answer 14

AO1/AO2: Gifting quality of ‘gives’ - subversion of a healthy, caring sibling relationship as Ferdinand’s perverse desire for revenge has tainted this relationship.
- Phallic image of the poniard, given to the DOM to signal suicide = metaphor for how the DOM’s pursuit of desire & female sexuality will ultimately culminate in a gruesome death.
- Sinful nature of suicide - potentially Ferd. believes that suicide will bring less shame to the family than her ‘bastard’ children = highlights the demonisation of female sexuality within renaissance society.
AO3: Suicide in highly religious renaissance era was seen as a grave sin.

Question 15

‘Daphne…became a fruitless bay tree…pale empty reed….frozen into marble’

vs.

‘those which married…became flowers, precious stones or eminent stars’

Answer 15

AO1/2: Motif of lifelessness & loss juxtaposes the motif of bounty and reverence.

• ‘fruitless…pale empty…frozen’ = illustrates single life without passion or marriage to be unfulfilling and a death-like state
• ‘precious stones…eminent stars’ = married women lead lives of value = mouthpiece for Jacobean attitudes towards marriage
  AO3: Jacobeans placed high value on marriage as believed that marriage & procreation = main purpose of humanity.

Question 16

‘Enter Ferdinand, behind’
& Bosola’s ‘false key into her bedchamber’

Answer 16

AO1/2: The positional language employed is incredibly threatening, DOM left in a position of extreme vulnerability, perhaps implying the potential for sexual violation here, the lack of visibility increasing the sinister tone as it is symbolic of the invisible, ever-present threat of the patriarchy to female liberation.
This unsettling notion is furthered by the masculine conspiracy to gain entrance to the Duchess’ bedchamber, procuring the key to such from Bosola, a man of a lower class, thereby demonstrating the utter entitlement of the Renaissance patriarchy to the female body and sexuality.
- The phallic image of a ‘false key’ adds to the perverse tone of male conspiracy to dominate the female as these two men wish to access the Duchess’ bedchamber, a highly intimate location in which the only male that should enter should be her husband, potentially aiming to subdue her own sexuality with their sexual brutality.

Question 17

‘The spring bathes the tree’s root…the grateful tree rewards it with its shadow’

Answer 17

AO1/2: Natural imagery illustrates the natural quality of this union/relationship.
‘bathes’ & ‘rewards’ - sense of protection + care established, illustrates the true symbiosis of the DOM & Antonio’s relationship as they provide each other w/ sustenance + protection.
AO3: unusual considering that within Renaissance society a marriage between people of different classes was highly frowned upon
AO5: Jankowski - ‘challenges basic concept of the early modern marriage’.

Question 18

‘most unvalued jewel’…‘trophy of a man’ + ‘can this ambitious age…prefer a man merely for worth, without these shadows of wealth…’

Answer 18

AO1/2: Bosola voices the ignorance of Ren. society which overlooks peoples true character due to factors of class etc.
Ant. is depicted as a highly valuable man, someone to be prized.
- polysemic quality of ‘worth’ - Antonio despite being poor is wealthy in his morality and nobility of character.
‘shadows of wealth’ - intangibility of wealth shows how it is an unstable guarantee of someone’s true worth.
AO3/5: Bosola’s description of Ant. matches Aristotle’s view that a noble character is not guaranteed by a nobility of status.

Question 19

‘A politician is the devil’s quilted anvil’

Answer 19

AO1/2: Machiavellian Metaphor - juxtaposing ideas of cushioning & soft with the labour and arduous craft that takes place on an anvil = Bosola’s desire to conceal immorality

Question 20

‘they are like foxes: when their heads are divided they carry fire in their tails…the country…goes to wrack for’t.’

Answer 20

AO1/2: Nature simile demonstrates that tempestuous, uncontrolled anger within a court can wreak destruction on a country.
‘heads are divided’ - potentially demonstrates the mental instability of both the Cardinal & Ferdinand as both are overly obsessed with revenge for the DOM’s tainting of their Aragonian blood. -The fragmentation of the mind perhaps foreshadows Ferdinand’s mental decline as a result of his obsessive desires & jealousy.
AO5: Miller: tragic flaw…‘inherent unwillingness to remain passive in the face of a challenge to his dignity’

Question 21

’ taken you off your melancholy perch…showed you game & let you fly at it…like a tame elephant’

Answer 21

AO1/AO2: Objectification and sexualisation of the female.
- motif of female entrapment: ‘perch,’ ‘let you fly’, ‘watched…like a tame elephant’ demonstrates how women are seen as tools for male sexual gratification rather than their own sexual liberation.
Cardinals assertion that he had ‘taken [her] off [her] melancholy perch’ and ‘let [her] fly’ = male as the key to female sexual liberation.
Grotesque animalisation of the woman through a falconry metaphor = women as tameable sexual beast & a trophy for men to ogle.
AO3/5: Burke - ‘dangerous mixture of desire and revulsion…inherent in a patriarchal society’s understanding of the female body’

Question 22

‘Our value can never be truly known till in the fishers basket we be shown…in the market my price may be the higher even when I am nearest to the cook, and fire’

Answer 22

AO1/2: fish parable/metaphor is a commentary on class and the value of nobility.
Criticism of society’s warped perception of what constitutes as ‘nobility’ as often those of a lower status who are sneered at are those with the most value in terms of nobility of character.
- ‘in the fishers basket’ - analogy for death - this is the Duchess’s recognition that her transgressive nature will not truly be appreciated by society until her untimely death - this is ultimately confirmed by Ferdinand’s breakdown upon witnessing her death.

Question 23

‘this world a tedious theatre,…I play a part in’t against my will’

Answer 23

AO1/2: Metatheatrical lang. ‘against my will’ - lack of personal autonomy
AO5: Through a feminist lens, the Duchess has no real control over her fate.
Jankowski - ref. to the body politic and body private

Question 24

‘my curse has a great way to go, plagues, that make lanes through largest families, consume them’

Answer 24

AO1/2: ‘my curse’ - plays into her labelling as a witch: ‘the witchcraft lies rank in her blood’. Perhaps this is a metaphor for the belief that femininity, within a renaissance society, is akin to a curse because it greatly restricts you.
‘Plagues…consume them’ - foreshadows the violent end that the brothers will face esp. Ferdinand who’s immorality and perverse desire s will act like a plague, consuming him entirely which will lead to the eventual breakdown of the family unit.

Question 25

‘my throat cut with diamonds…smothered with cassia or to be shot to death with pearls…’

Answer 25

AO1/2: items all have connotations of royalty & feminine beauty - the pairing of these with violence ultimately indicate that her feminine attributes and sexual liberation are the true cause of her violent end.
- She sees her own feminine, upper-class identity as more damaging than actual death.

Question 26

‘heavens gates are not so highly arched as princes palaces….[kneels].’

Answer 26

AO1/2: Structural/positional imagery - metaphor for the strict, superficial courtly system which sneers at those of lower social status. Recognition that heaven is a more moral ‘court’ as it imposes no class restrictions…
- The Duchess’ act of kneeling in the face of death is empowering as she carries herself with great humility - although she ‘lowers’ herself, she remains of a higher moral status than the male figures within the play.

Question 27

‘Come violent death…to make me sleep’

Answer 27

AO1/2: Imperatives suggest a determination and stoic acceptance of her fate.
Juxtaposition between violent death and the peaceful tranquillity of sleep.

Question 28

‘Cover her face. Mine eyes dazzle. She died young.’

Answer 28

AO1/2: Suggests extreme regret or remorse, merely reinforced by the stative, halting sentences which give a shocked tone/quality.
AO4: Link to Stella and her denial and regret of her betray of siblinghood. Whilst Stella’s betrayal of her sister is due to marital lust, Ferdinand’s stems from his perverted desire for revenge.

Question 29

‘Mine? Was I her judge? Did any ceremonial form of law doom her…complete jury…’

Answer 29

AO1/2: feverish onslaught of rhetorical questions - Ferdinand’s utter mental instability as he attempts to relieve himself of culpability for the DOM’s death.
SF of legal justice - this is Ferdinand’s utter corruption (mentally and morally) as he cunningly attempts to avoid blame through the argument that no legal system was used, forgetting the fact that as a duke/nobleman his word is essentially law.

AO5: J. Bate ‘Elizabethan theatre as a court of law.’

Question 30

‘pair of hearts are hollow graves, rotten and rotting others’

Answer 30

AO1/2: ‘hollow graves’ - lack of emotional depth, their hearts are solely focused on death as a means of revenge.
‘rotten and rotting others’ - links back to Antonio’s speech about the corrupting influence of a poor leader on the rest of a court.
- ‘rotten’ - moral corruption as a decaying of the soul and ones moral compass

Question 31

‘Your vengeance, like two chained bullets , goes arm in arm’

Answer 31

AO1/2:
Highly ironic as these bullets could be said to be foreshadowing of how the Aragonian brothers’ desire for revenge

Question 32

‘Said he was a wolf…only difference was, a wolfs skin was hairy on the outside, his on the inside.’

Answer 32

AO1/2: Transformative power of desire = has mutated Ferdinand into this primal beast. Ferdinand’s true immorality is realised and given a physical shape, demonstrating the overwhelming nature of perverse desire.
- Wolf = bestial, uncontrollable passions.
- Interior rather than exterior transformation = represents Ferdinand’s struggle to conceal his perversions from society.

AO3: link to physiognomy - this is an internal expression of the corrupt nature at Ferd’s very core.
AO4: Link to Stanley and how male violence & sexual perversions are portrayed through animalisation, suggesting that there is a dangerous underlying potential of men to commit perverted sexual atrocities against transgressive females to dominate them.
AO5: JW Lever ‘results from the murder of his humanity and reduces to the level of a predatory beast’.

Question 33

[Enter Julia, pointing a pistol at him]

Answer 33

AO4 - link to Blanche and the bottle top & the Duchess and the poniard.
AO1/2: Interestingly these female characters are often paired with phallic images that have the potential for violence/trigger their end fate.
- Webster & Williams commentary on the fetishisation and sexualisation of violence and female defence?
- poniard as a representation of…?
- Bottle top as a symbol of Blanche’s deterioration under the influence of alcoholism?
- Pistol as…?

Question 34

‘wind my tongue about his heart like a skein of silk’

Answer 34

AO1/2: ‘silk’ conjures image of weaving, domestic, womanly acts is subverted through deceit.
sibilance of ‘skein…silk’ - serpentine imagery, reflects the true duplicity of this woman - links to the snake tempting A & E in the garden of Eden.

Question 35

‘lingering consumption’ - about Julia

Answer 35

AO1/2: putrid image of illness, an addiction.
‘lingering’ - festering, a pest.

Question 36

“Whether we fall by ambition, blood or lust, Like diamonds we are cut with our own dust.”

Answer 36

• Ambition is Bosola, Blood is Cardinal and Lust is Ferdinand. All culpable for DOMs death.
  ‘we are cut with our own dust’ - taking ownership of actions, suggests that ones own transgressions will haunt oneself, inflicting wounds.