Troilus and Cressida and The Book of Duchess - Essay Example

Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida and Chaucer’s The Book of Duchess Q: Compare and contrast the presentation of women in Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida and Chaucer’s The Book of Duchess. The story of Troilus and Cressida by William Shakespeare made use of the Greek tragedy Helen of Troy as its background while Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Book of Duchess is believed to be an elegy of the death of Blanche Lancaster, wife of Chaucer’s patron John Gaunt (Schibanoff 2006 p 66). Both stories revolved around the love of a man for a woman with both ending tragically for the main male protagonists. However, while both stories dwell on love, the stories’ presentations of women as the objects of affection not only varies differently but are on the opposing side of the scale. While Shakespeare presented his women as unfaithful and loose, Chaucer chose to show women as long-suffering, faithful and virtuous. Troilus and Cressida is set during the mythological war between the Greeks and the Trojans precipitated by a Trojan prince’s act of stealing the wife of a Greek king. The woman named Helen eloped with Paris, son of King Priam of Troy, and left her husband King Menelaus. Menelaus, together with the fierce Greek commanders and the greatest Greek warrior Achilles attacked Troy to vindicate the king’s honor and wrest the lovely Helen back. King Priam and his sons Hector, Paris and Troilus relentlessly defended Troy and a war lasting for more than a decade subsequently raged. Amidst this turbulent background, Troilus, Priam’s youngest son fell in love with Cressida, the daughter of a Trojan priest named Calchas. Troilus sought Cressida’s affection through her uncle Patroclus who, acting as a pimp more than a kinsman, set up a meeting between the two. On the initial meeting, Troilus proposed his love and Cressida although coyly at first, readily gave in. The swift development was marked by of faithfulness and Cressida, declared that “From false to false, among maids in love, Upbraid my falsehood! when they’ve said ‘as false As air, as water, wind, or sandy earth, As fox to lamb, as wolf to heifers’s calf, Pard to the hind, or stepdame to her son,” “Yea” let them say say, to stick the heart of falsehood, ‘As false as Cressid.” They ended up in bed together. Soon after, Cressida’s words were put to a test when her father Calchas defected to the Greeks who had camped outside Troy and suggested that a valuable Trojan prisoner be set off with his daughter Cressida. Since the Trojan prisoner was a valuable officer, the set off was readily agreed to by King Priam and his sons to the dismay of Troilus who was not able to stop the deal. Before she left, Cressida and Troilus pledged once more their undying love to one another. A few days later, Troilus witnessed Cressida’s falsity and vacuity. With the help of Ulysses, a Greek commander, Troilus sneaked into Chalcas’ tent where Cressida was held and there saw how she flirted with Diomedes, a Greek general, and was promising her body to him later that night. The women in Chaucer’s The Book of Duchess on the other hand, were not made of the same fabric as the women in Shakespeare’s play. The love stories in the Book of Duchess is told by a narrator, an old man suffering from insomnia. The first love story came in the form of a book story read by the narrator as he was trying to lull himself to sleep. This was that of Alcyone, a queen, whose husband, the king, perished in a natural disaster as he was sailing with his men in the sea. The queen was so distraught that she cried day and night. She prayed to Juno, the goddess, to let her know what happened to her husband in exchange for her own life as the sacrifice. Juno granted her wish and in a dream the king’s spirit informed her what actually happened to him and how he drowned into the bottom of the sea. The second love story is that of the Knight and his White Lady, a story which came to the narrator in the form of a dream. The narrator found the Knight bewailing his fate while an animal hunting was going on. It turned out that that the Knight felt that he was cheated by Fortune in a chess game and stole his Queen. Puzzled as to how a chess game could have affected the Knight that he was virtually begging for his life to be taken away, the narrator pressed him to explain to him the meaning of his story. It seemed that the Knight fell in love with the most beautiful and virtuous maiden in the world, a love which ended tragically. He described her beauty as “the someres sonne bright Is fairer, clere, and hath more light Than any planete, is in heven, The mone or the sterres seven For all the world so had she” (Chaucer 2004 p 24). She however, did not have only beauty but most of all goodness and kindness “Surmounted hem alle of beaute, of manner and of comlinesse, Of stature and well set gladnesse, Of goodlihede so wel beseye” (Chaucer 2004 p 24). In addition, the Knight only won the maiden’s love when he was able to prove his sincerity to her, a process which took time. She proved to be a very faithful lover until her very death. The two plays therefore mirrored women of contrasting qualities and characters. While Cressida and Helen in Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida were unfaithful, Helen to her husband Menelaus and Cressida to Troilus, and did not take much convincing to hop into bed with their lovers, the women in Chaucer’s The Book of Duchess were long-suffering and virtuous and were ready to die for their loved ones. Alcyone was truly in grief of the loss of her husband and was more than willing to offer her life to Juno if only to know what really happened to her husband while the White Lady was not a woman of great beauty but was kind and good. Moreover, unlike Cressida, she was faithful and careful in giving her affection to a man. She only accepted the Knight’s love only after she was convinced of the latter’s sincerity. References Chaucer, Geoffrey 2004, ‘The Book of the Duchess And Other Poems,’ Kessinger Publishing. Schibanoff, Susan 2006, ‘Chaucers Queer Poetics: Rereading the Dream Trio,’ University of Toronto Press. Shakespeare, William 2001, ‘Troilus and Cressida,’ Classic Books Company. Read More