Gender and Sexual Politics Potency in Twelfth Night and Richard 111 and King Lear - Essay Example

? Gender and Sexual Politics Potency in Twelfth Night, Richard 111 and King Lear and Date of Submission: Gender and Sexual Politics Potency in Twelfth Night, Richard 111 and King Lear Shakespeare is indeed a great playlist. His works are exemplary and despite them having an old time setting, their application streams to date. Twelfth Night, Richard 111 and King Lear are some of the plays which Shakespeare did to expose the societal ideologies of gender and sexual politics. As it shall be seen here below, gender had been intertwined with politics. Every evolution mattered a lot and the plays are full of betrayals and let downs. The betrayals and disappointments all revolve around gender and sexual politics. Shakespeare’s work in these three plays show that gender and sexuality had great influence in the political platform. Though power was vested on men, women had both direct and indirect control of all the happening. Twelfth Night Twelfth Night presents a number of weird gender relation complications. Generally the play basically revolves around the theme of love. The setting is of a festive atmosphere. As the play progresses, all the madness of love is revealed and its impact on the politics of the time are evident. Insanity accentuates the themes of love and politics whereby gender-crossing disguise is observed. The dress code at the end of the play sets a stage for fierce criticism. Viola dresses like Cesario and this brings in the element of gender identity. Gender roles are also of major concern in this play and they yield both comic and tragic moments. In Twelfth Night, Shakespeare presents the idea of gender identity in a most complex way. He capitalizes on the gender roles and sexual attractions to make the play capture every viewer’s attention. Two scenes are critical in this discussion; the Malvolio story and the already mentioned ending story of Viola’s dressing. The cross dressing earns Viola that heroine image taking into consideration the norms of the times of writing the play (Bulman, 2008: p. 241). Women were supposed or expected to remain women in all circumstances. This included even the dressing. Depart from feminine was abnormal and Viola’s dressing raises eyebrows. Sexual relations are definitely multi-layered (Shakespeare & Elam, 2008: p.165). There is an interesting complication of the love relationships between Viola, Olivia and Orsino. Through these three, there is a confusion of the gender roles. Sexual availability is depicted to be tied to crossing dressing. This goes along into influencing all the aspects of economic dependency. It is through economic demands which avails Viola to Orsino and Sebastian to Olivia for sex. Psychological anxiety which result from emotional intimacy has a lot of implications in the conduct of every stakeholder in the play. This implicates on the rest of whatever happens including a person’s normal activities. Homoerotic relationships open a new dimension on matters concerning gender. Normally, it is expected that a relationship be hetero-erotic. Homoerotic undermine sexuality which is build on the gender identity platform. This can be seen when Antonio is attracted to Sebastian while the two women are attracted to each other. In consideration to Elizabethan Culture, this is absurd and yet it’s very potent on every happening in the society depicted by the play. People react according to their emotions and what matters to them. Every decision is not independent and it is intertwined to the elements of gender which are emotional. The extent of the impacts of gender relations is featured in Malvolio in the play. The punishment he gets lacks an equivalent and brings the out the theme of dark side of the relationships. The oppression of what is right and perpetuation of what is generally selfish is observed. Identity and desire are the forces behind any happening. King Lear Focus lightly on the play King Lear, the play is basically political but the elements of betrayal are evident. The king is displeased with the conduct of the daughters whom instills in him the “other side” of a woman. In pushing for the political theme, other elements show up. In this play, politics is viewed to resonant with class. A king is always a leader everywhere. Both at national and home levels, he represents leadership in totality. Failure at any level is not permissible. This is primarily because the consequences there after are unbearable. In this play, it is seen that failure of good leadership at family level contributed to the fall of King Lear and deaths of his daughters. Women are the source of evil. This is evident because they are emasculating. Through the daughters of King Lear, it is observed that women are disloyal and very promiscuous. They are the kind of human beings who are not worthy of trust. King Lear was betrayed by his daughters and for this cause he began something like a campaign against not only his daughters but also all the women in general. King Lear loved all of his daughters but except Cordelia, all the others failed to love back. Nevertheless, Cordelia failed to agree to the demands of her father and she was not either spared from the wrath of her father Morality is of great importance to women. The behavior portrayed by Cordelia’s sisters is unacceptable. They paint a bad image of what really a woman ought to be. Pretence and confession of only with mouth that you do love somebody is the highest betrayal a man can get from a woman. In support of leadership, a woman ought to be morally upright. It is said that “behind every successful man, there is a woman behind it.” the two sisters of Cordelia were filled with greed and general irresponsibility. Wrong judgment is a big mess. It not only affects the person who made it but also those who are affiliated to the maker either directly or indirectly. Cordelia suffers expulsion from the kingdom because her father made a wrong judgment about her. Despite the love she had for her father, her father failed to see. The reason behind all this was that her love towards her father was immense that she could not talk about it. Unlike the other two girls who faked their love, Cordelia is presented as a very supportive girl. In any political setting, the success of the king depends much on the support he receives from the people around. The girl desired for the good of the father. The mistake she did was of not revealing it. The evil desires pushed the Cordelia’s sisters to do things which were extremely evil. The play depicts women as subordinate naturally and lesser than man and for them to get up high, they can only do that using their feminine endowment. Falling in love for material gain is not allowable at all. But for this two girls, they did not care and went ahead to do the unimaginable. To the contrary, Cordelia remained faithful and supportive to her father. Her father betrayed her love. Failing to consider her in the inheritance was a great let down. The relationship of King Lear with her daughters is an excellent example of the complications which show up in every society which is politically organized (Holland, 2002: p. 7). Worse enough, the effects trickles down to the family level. There can never be two faces of a single person. The roles will change but the person does not change. The King is a leader at national level but a father at family level. These roles need to be carried out in a very balanced way. The effect of either role will be felt automatically by the other. Additionally, the political success is much depended on the family stability and support. A mother is of major importance in any family setting. This aspect has been shown all along but peculiar, mothers are absent in the entire play. For the family of the king, the mother is missing. The rebellious nature of the king’s girls can to some extent be attributed to the gap left by the mother. This is because King Lear is already committed to the duty of leading the country and despite the love he has for his daughters, what the mother could offer to the daughters he cannot offer to them. There are duties which are naturally gender based and cannot be replaced no matter what. The kingship status did not influence have impact on taming the girls behave as expected. Traditional roles shape the behavior. The male and the female are traditionally assigned some roles which see into the success of the family. A successful family shows good leadership and such a husband automatically qualifies to be a leader of the society. A break from these roles yields multiples of problems and King Lear failed. It is the duty of the father to ensure the mother of children is available. The mother is missing in this setting. The King is handling all the roles of both the mother and the father. He cannot make it all and the results are evident. The girls rebelled. As mentioned earlier, there are two sides of a coin here. There is Cordelia and her sisters. Cordelia’s actions and speech was genuine and full of love though she did not express it directly. To the contrary, her sisters were malicious and anything they were doing was self-centered. Despite social status, all the girls were obligated by social norms to submit themselves to their father. It is true that Cordelia’s motive was good but it was not in accordance to the demands of a patriarchal authority. Many viewed her actions as having arrogance which was hidden in her naive. The elements of gender polarity in the times of the play are being evident. The masculine nature of a man does not permit some habits like crying. King Lear is very emotional. Because of this, he has a weakness that deprives him off aspects of manhood. He is emotionally weak. Generally, crying is a thing for women. A king crying or showing the potential to cry paints black the title of kingship. A king ought to be in control of his emotions which includes crying and anger. Soberness is mandatory for any king to make sound political decisions. A king should not be driven by emotions as is the case here the king makes decisions on grounds of emotions that have been impacted on him by the daughters. This effect forms the start of his fall as a king. Women are expected to be gentle. They are described as to have “milk of human kindness.” This equates their care and gentleness as that of a mother. The mother’s love is unconditional. The female sex plays an important role in building the toughness which is found in the males. Contrary to this, women in King Lear’s play are seen to be treacherous. Instead of accentuating the masculine nature of the men in the play, they are busy destroying it. The girls are not only turning against their father but also they are causing serious pains. The ability to govern the country becomes difficult. Despite the natural endowments, feminine are prone to change. This is achievable through change of habit which earn the woman male roles. Some of the new activities which might result to this change include adulterous and corrupt activities. Here it is presumed that these dirty acts are done only by men and when women engage in them then they have agreed to bear any repercussion that come with it and includes physical violence. Adultery has been used to show what a woman’s revenge is when wronged. Defiance from patriarchal organization either at national or family unit level, is the beginning of feminine rise. This led to the establishments of woman rights. This has effect in the political and social platforms whereby a society which was once dominated by male is gradually paving way for women. The freedom is though limited as the man is considered an intellectual authority over the women. Everybody lives for his purpose. Poking into the affairs of others is not encouraged. This results to the notion of men being equal to men. But this freedom sums up to greed, and vanity (Shakespeare & Petronella, 2011: p. 335). King Lear’s mistake was when he gave an ear to the daughters. This free interaction hardened the minds of the girls and was able for anything. Richard III In this play, the theme of political supremacy is on the lead. There is a lot of struggle for power. The expectations are betrayed and the unimaginable is seen to be taking course on every happening. Leadership is supposed to be embedded on trust and integrity but the play contradicts this. It is a great piece of literature by Shakespeare which in addition to the politics of the play’s time, gender and sexual politics are intertwined to yield to total confusion Richard is a ruler who lacks ethics of leadership. His greed of power is so intense that he can do anything to just ensure that he remains to be the leader. He is a Machiavel. Introduction of new order through Henry VII is a relief from the leadership of Richard and its unscrupulous nature. Richard’s fight to power is the basis for the play whereby he interacts with his adversaries who help move the theme of gender and sexuality forward. He is interested in the wickedness which will earn him the kingship. Richard’s attitude towards women is one of major concern in the entire. He holds low esteem and in fact treats them as inferior. The women in this play surrender both integrity and strength to him. Temporary he feels as a hero but the same women are the strongholds of his downfall. The gender influence in leadership is evident. Political is seen to be wholly depended on the will of the sexes involved. When women crave for power like Elizabeth Woodville, the ground is set for good or worse. Nevertheless, Richard, over time, had developed skills on how to manipulate anybody who aimed at the same thing he was aiming. In this play, Elizabeth represents an image of what a woman can become when pushed to the wall. She turns out to be cunning and betraying. Her personality is strong and despite her being strong minded, she is also self-determined to achieve anything which comes her way. Richard finds a tough woman to deal and hence intensifies his struggle for power. The relationship which erupts between them is of violent hatred. Marriages are used to strengthen political relationships. Elizabeth’s act of giving her daughter to Richmond is a clear political move. It is made to sadden Richard. It is a political fight and poor will for the Richard’s undertakings. This step helped Richmond ascend to power. Leadership is thus very tightly influenced by gender. A woman may be weak physically but very strong in the influence. Remember that it is the neck which supports the head and not the other way round. Despising the feminine in leadership is a direct guarantee of failure of such a leadership. Elizabeth is a testimony of how far leadership which sidelines a woman can go. Women strengthen leadership. Richmond’s success is only attributable to the cooperation he received from the young Elizabeth (Bloom & Marson, 2010: p. 261). The bonding is strengthened by the aspect of marriage. Marriage is a lifetime commitment and those this implies that the support is also lifetime. Generations down in line will experience the impact of this arrangement which began by a plan to bring down the Richard in favor of Richmond. Anne’s-Richard’s relationship is of another major focus in this play. It blends two conflicting aspects found in relationships in a perfect way. Love and hatred coexist in this relationship. The betrayal she receives from Richard makes her loss everything making her recall of her angel-husband. The sadistic nature of Richard toward Anne shows how the male sex can become of when given the chance. Women should not be influenced by the power men posse there outside. In so doing, the women might fall victims of the kind Anne went through Richard. Despite all this, the love which Anne has for Richard is abundant that she refuses to kill him even when given the chance she says “Arise dissembler; though I wish thy death I will not be thy executioner” (Shakespeare, 1904:p. 188). This shows how support the women are to men that despite the prevailing circumstances, they never fail to love what they have made a choice of. This determination gives them appeal to everybody and strength to overcome any storm in their lives. Evil men like Richard take the opportunity to fulfill their self motives. In this case, Richard needed Anne on helping him ascend to power only and nothing more as he is quoted saying”….I’ll have her, but I will not keep her long…” (Shakespeare, 1904: p. 234). To achieve this he became hypocritical. Richard turning to Anne to help her get to the throne is evidence that in this society, for one to be a leader, a woman was to be involved. Though women are not in the leadership positions, they are the only catalysts used into getting to power. In other words, they are king makers. This relationship also presents complexities of how men can be. They are go getters of what they want and this includes manipulating of those who even belong to the enemies. In addition, they want their experience to be felt by others. This is seen through the way Richard wants Anne to feel the desert of love in him and instead of loving, he becomes a sadist to Anne. Richard III is a play which depicts the life of a modern woman where love and violence is the order of the day. men, upon failing in their gender roles, turn their anger to women and end up loving themselves alone. If they had a chance to do everything by themselves, women would be an endangered species. Thanks to the course nature which makes men rely to women in every aspect of their success. Biblically, a woman is described as a helper and nothing man will ever achieve without the help of a man. This is a fact which men like Richard will need to admit. Fear of shame and public scandal has enslaved many women. This has rendered them powerless and fallen prey of cunning men. Nevertheless, their words are powerful and all stereotypes associated with feminine nature fulfilled in nearly all the women in this play. They force their way up and define the political set up of the play from start to end. They are instrumental in inducing the emotional reality in the political platform. In all the plays of Shakespeare, which includes the discussed three, love, gender and politics of their time are the major themes. Political heroes and stability is defined by women. Love is seen to be the instrument which is used to link politics and gender. Political success is intertwined in the will of a woman and men need women to succeed in their political career. The support ought to start right away at family level to the national level. A society which despises women and undermines their potential is bound to fail terribly. These plays represent a good literally work of Shakespeare which finds application even in the modern times. List of References Bloom, H., & Marson, J. (2010). Richard III. New York, NY, Bloom's Literary Criticism Bulman, J. C. (2008). Shakespeare re-dressed: cross-gender casting in contemporary performance. Madison [NJ], Fairleigh Dickinson University Press Holland, P. (2002). King Lear and its afterlife. Cambridge [u.a.], Cambridge Univ. Press. P7 Shakespeare, W. (1904). ... King Richard III. London, Dent Shakespeare, W., & Elam, K. (2008). Twelfth night, or, What you will. London, Arden Shakespeare Shakespeare, W., & Petronella, V. (2011). King Lear. Independence, Ky, Heinle & Heinle. Read More