The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 17.0185 Thursday, 16 March 2006
[1] From: Edmund Taft <
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Date: Wednesday, 15 Mar 2006 11:36:12 -0500
Subj: Measure for Measure and a Puzzle
[2] From: Larry Weiss <
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Date: Wednesday, 15 Mar 2006 12:59:53 -0500
Subj: Re: SHK 17.0181 Measure for Measure and a Puzzle
[3] From: Kristen McDermott <
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Date: Wednesday, 15 Mar 2006 14:18:57 -0500
Subj: RE: SHK 17.0181 Measure for Measure and a Puzzle
[1]-----------------------------------------------------------------
From: Edmund Taft <
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Date: Wednesday, 15 Mar 2006 11:36:12 -0500
Subject: Measure for Measure and a Puzzle
Abigail Quart insightfully observes that "Claudio is the GOOD guy. He
should NOT be in jail. He should be with Juliet preparing a home for
their child. He has made a small human error in anticipating his
wedding. Any law that would have him die for that is WRONG. It's not a
moral dilemma. It's not a "problem." It's WRONG."
Yes. But the real issue here and throughout MfM is the general lack of
regard for children in Vienna. The play is based on a dialectic of
absence and presence: witness the Duke who for years was present but
lax, and now seems absent but is really present. In 3.1, the absent (but
really present) term is exactly as Abigail Quart puts it: the unborn
child and its needs. It needs a mother and father, and that is why
Claudio is right to want to live (though he does NOT give the right
reason), and why Isabella is dead wrong to shout at her brother, "Die!
Perish!" (146). Much the same is true in 2.3, where the disguised Duke
risks a miscarriage by telling Juliet that not only will Claudio die,
but so will she (presumably after giving birth), leaving a child with no
parents! - and leaving Juliet visibly shaken on stage, but with a pillow
under her gown that the audience can see - a visible reminder of the
child whose needs the Duke cares nothing about!
In fact, the Duke hates children (see the opening of 4.1 in which
Mariana, who knows the Duke well, quickly sends away the boy! - I wonder
who's the father of this boy?). In the end, it is lack of concern for
children that makes the ending of MfM so problematic, not the marriages
themselves. Can you imagine Lucio or Angelo or the Duke being a good,
decent father?
Ed Taft
[2]-------------------------------------------------------------
From: Larry Weiss <
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Date: Wednesday, 15 Mar 2006 12:59:53 -0500
Subject: 17.0181 Measure for Measure and a Puzzle
Comment: Re: SHK 17.0181 Measure for Measure and a Puzzle
Abigail Quart is right on when she says:
>I know this is how Measure is being taught. I hate it. It's so
politically
>correct, so aware of delicate sensibilities and it is such a pile of
pasture
>pastry.
>
>Claudio was not "demanding" that his sister be raped. He was asking
>that she prostitute herself. He was asking that she trade the use of her
>body for a brief time for his entire life.
Feminization and political correctness have trivialized the notion of
rape the point where many regard seduction as its moral equivalent.
A woman who prefers not to copulate but does so anyway in the
expectation of obtaining a benefit for herself or someone else (such as
her brother) is a prostitute, not a rape victim. And, at worst, Claudio
was something like a pimp, not a rape facilitator.
[3]-------------------------------------------------------------
From: Kristen McDermott <
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Date: Wednesday, 15 Mar 2006 14:18:57 -0500
Subject: 17.0181 Measure for Measure and a Puzzle
Comment: RE: SHK 17.0181 Measure for Measure and a Puzzle
Abigail Quart writes:
>"If you have a brother and he is condemned to death, but you can save him
>by screwing the jailer, do YOU refuse? One way the brother you love is
>alive, the other he is dead. Yeah, you'll have to live with the memory.
>But you'll both be alive. What's your choice?"
Yes, but what about the possibility that screwing the jailer WON'T save
your brother, as indeed it doesn't (but for the intervention of fate in
the form of a dead prisoner)? Isabella knows that Angelo is a "perilous
mouth," a liar. She would have to be awfully credulous to assume that
Angelo wouldn't (as he does) order Claudio killed anyway. She's testing
Claudio, not asking his blessing, when she presents the
dilemma-that-is-not to him. Her purpose is to "fit his mind for death,"
not to save him. And when he fails the test, she's ready to kill him
herself: "Mercy to thee would prove itself a bawd./'Tis best that thou
diest quickly." Doubtless many women made -- with varying degrees of
regret -- the "choice" Quart mentions, but there is no choice in
Isabella's case. Although she's not happy about it, she knows exactly
what her course of action is.
Kris McDermott
Central Michigan University
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