DOM and PL critics condensed Flashcards
PL
Johnson Women
“Milton shows ‘contempt for females, as subordinate and inferior’ - Johnson
PL
Litt Desire
“all men fall victim to self-deception when they are tempted sufficiently” - Dorothy Litt
PL
Weston Flattery
Eve’s “passions, as a result of flattery, are ruling her reason” - Weston
PL
Fowler Love
Adam “becomes corrupt because he refuses to divorce Eve” - Fowler
PL
Tanimoto Inferior
“if Eve is created to be inferior to Adam, how can she help him? - Tanimoto
PL
Sanger Milton and feminism
“Milton does not show a hatred of women, but also does not show a willingness to elevate them.”
“This is merely sexism - nothing more, nothing less” - Sanger
PL
Gilbert Eve Satanic
“Milton’s Eve is Adam’s inferior and satanically inspired” - Gilbert (that Milton is a misogynist)
PL
Bennett Evil and Good
“Evil is the absence of pure good and the experience of evil are mutually exclusive” - Bennett
PL
Tillyard Fallen
“They are both virtually fallen before the official temptation has begun” - Tillyard
- Eve dreams of going to heaven and wants to comprehend Evil
- Adam is swayed by Eve’s beauty
DOM
Painter Duchess
views the Duchess as a “Lusty Widow”
DOM
Callaghan Victim/Protagonist
“the figure of the Duchess combines the roles of tragic protagonist and tragic victim”
DOM
Callaghan Autonomy
“widowed women potentically achieved auronomy from men upon the death of their husband”
DOM
Sloane Bosola
“(he) has both a propensity for good as well as evil”
DOM
Scott societal bounds
“the Duchess does not transgress Jacobean societal boundaries on widowhood, but transgresses only her brothers opinions on how she should conduct her private life”
DOM
Scott Ferdinand
“Ferdinand corrupt desire to control both the public and private life of the Duchess ultimately ends in death and madness”
DOM
Hamilton Pity
“Her suffering excite our sympathetic pity”
popularity of tragedies, conventions of a jacobean one
DOM
Lewes Nightmare
“The Duchess of Malfi is a nightmare not a tragedy”
critical of the play
DOM
Murray love
“not only is their love utilised to contrast it with the discord of the brothers but it is also mutual”
true love vs infactuation
PL
Diane McColley Temptress
‘[Milton] broke the stereotypical scapegoating of Eve as essentially a temptress and uniquely gave her responsible motives for her independent movements on the morning of the Fall.’
PL
Shelley Satan
‘Nothing can exceed the energy and magnificence of the character of Satan as expressed in Paradise Lost.’
‘Believes Satan is ‘the hero of Paradise Lost’
PL
Shelley Devil
‘Milton’s Devil as a moral being is as far superior to his God’
(Milton’s Satan is better than God, because Satan suffers hardship and God is secure in his power, as well as inflicting more suffering onto Satan. This infliction isn’t to make Satan repent, but just to torture.)
PL
T.S Eliot
‘Milton writes English like a dead language.’
PL
McEvoy Jealousy
‘Jealousy then motivates the fallen Eve’s desire to make Adam fall too’
PL
Beer heroism
Milton ‘demonstrates her [Eve’s] quiet heroism”’
PL
Empson God
‘The reason why the poem is so good is that it makes God so bad.’
PL
Johnson Women
‘Milton thought women made only for obedience’
DOM
Patrick Lee Religion
‘juxtaposed the classical idea of fickle gods and the necessity of revenge with a Christian understanding of salvation and God as the ultimate dispenser of justice.’
DOM
F.L.Lucas incest
in 1924
‘Ferdinand potentially in love with his sister.’
DOM
Whighams summary of Ferdinand
‘a threatened aristocrat, frightened by the contamination of his ascriptive social rank.’
DOM
Callaghan Eve and Duchess
‘repeating the historic transgression of eve.’
DOM
Whigham Tragedy
“The duchess is the first fully tragic figure in Renaissance drama”
DOM
Barbara Todd Widow
ALSO V GOOD
“the remarriage of any widow confronted every man with the threatening prospect of his own death and the entry of another in his place”
DOM
Bradbrook Bosola
“With all his many roles, Bosola is never permitted the luxury of being a self”
DOM
Jankowski Female rule
“the presence of Mary Tudor and Mary Stuart on British thrones served to point out to political theorists especially that no language existed for describing the nature of female rule.”
DOM
Emma Smith Bosola
“Bosola becomes a figure of class anxiety in The Duchess of Malfi” and represents “the play’s ultimate ambivalence in the story it tells”. Webster engages in an “evasion of moral judgement” - “The Duchess of Malfi gives us a kind of social autopsy into familial, religious and emotional corruption”, “the play’s inhumanity is its most compelling feature”
DOM
T.S. Elliot Skull
Webster “saw the skull beneath the skin”.
DOM
What did the RSC team describe as their focus?
Designer Naomi Dawson - one of an almost entirely female creative team - says in the programme that the intended focus is on “masculinity and madness”.
DOM
How did the 2018 RSC production display the Cardinal’s relationship to Julia?
He sexually assaults her.
DOM
How is Bosola’s ultimate guilt displayed in the 2018 RSC production?
He places a hankerchief over the dead Duchess’ face.
DOM
What was the set of the 2018 production?
Naomi Dawson’s stark set design is an indoor sports pitch, backed by scaffolding from which a testosterone-pumped ensemble of men leer, animal-like, from the darkness.
DOM
Christina Luckyj Revenge
‘The Duchess of Malfi inverts the usual structure of revenge tragedy…Webster arouses sympathy for the objects of revenge rather than the revenger”.
