Representations of Women in Theatre History from Ancient Greece through the Restoration
I just finished taking a really interesting theatre history course this semester. In preparation for the final class, we were asked to pick a topic of interest from the breadth of material covered in the course and review our notes for an in-class discussion. Throughout the semester, we had touched upon the role of women in theatre, on the stage, and as playwrights. Unfortunately, for the most part this was always an extra side note, never anything we explored in-depth. That is, until we reached the Restoration period of the 18th century (the first time a woman’s body was seen on stage). Instead, the class was structured around the various transitions in modes of thinking and knowledge production. “Identity is constituted ‘not outside but within representation’ and invites us to see film ‘not as a second-order mirror held up to reflect what already exists, but as that form of representation which is able to constitute us as new kinds of subjects and thereby enable us to discover who we are’� (hooks 213). Although hooks is speaking specifically about film, I think these ideas about representation apply to the theatre as well. All semester I thought there were these huge shifts throughout history that altered all aspects of representation. After reviewing my notes, I began to realize some interesting “side-notes� I had never pieced together before.
Since I am interested in the representations of women in theatre, I decided to go through the plays we read and make an outline detailing these representations. Here are some of the thoughts I gathered and some interesting connections I am in the process of working through.
I will first deal with the two translations of Medea we read, the first by Euripides and the second by Seneca. In Euripedes’ Medea he presents the act of being socialized into a silent woman. What constraints exist that govern our way of thinking and our ability to speak and be heard? The first time Medea speaks, she is offstage. In order to have a voice, she must be represented through a form of decapitation, therefore her body and her voice are not allowed to coexist. In Seneca’s Medea, a tension exists between being an Athenian or a barbarian. The process of othering becomes the tool to silence Medea and the chorus represents the beginnings of this dichotomy through their juxtaposed representation. This later develops into an angel/whore dichotomy which continues to be perpetuated. One must become a silent woman of Corinth and attempt to internalize the practices of society—therefore, a woman must accept her creation under a male gaze. Both playwrights rely on various constructions of madness to create a sense of displaced and silenced femininity. “Woman then stands in patriarchal culture as a signifier for the male other, bound by a symbolic order in which man can live out his fantasies and obsessions through linguistic command by imposing on them the silent image of woman still tied to her place as bearer, not maker, of meaning� (Mulvey 35).
In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Ophelia is represented through very similar constructions of madness. It is her refusal to exist in a world which is not her own which leads to her death, suggesting that a woman with knowledge, awareness, and agency is a woman who can not live. This constructed madness is used to juxtapose the concept of the irrational, emotional woman with the stabilizing force that is man. Ironically, it is men, and the male gaze that orders this particular universe and is ultimately responsible for Ophelia’s death.
In The Duchess of Malfi, the only character without a name is the Duchess. She exists only in reference to her function in yet another male-ordered universe. In McCabe’s article “Woman Is Not Born But Becomes A Woman�, she discusses Simone de Beauvoir’s theory that “patriarchal culture is somehow responsible for generating and circulating self-confirming parameters that institute gender hierarchies and sexual inequalities. The female emerges as condemned to her subordinate role, ‘defined exclusively in her relation to man’� (McCabe 4). The Duchess attempts to break out of the stagnant state of her repressive society and marry against her brother’s wishes—thus creating a world constructed through a feminine gaze (arguably a heterotopia). It is this choice that leads to her death, once again silencing a woman through the removal of agency and punishing those who do not conform to the accepted realities.
In various Restoration plays, such as The Country Wife and The Lucky Chance, a woman’s body becomes sexed through male anxiety about the implications of having a woman on stage, and through the layering of various gazes. “Men do not simply look; their gaze carries with it the power of action and of possession that is lacking in the female gaze� (Kaplan 121). These plays make it very clear that since everything is defined through commerce, a woman’s worth is defined by her virginity since that is what makes her “sellable.� This continues to perpetuate an angel/whore dichotomy.
This is just a rough outline of the representations of women in a few of the plays we read. What is interesting about this collection of information is that it spans from the problematic origins of theatre in Greece, all the way through the Restoration in 18th century England. This wide range of time is highlighted by various shifts in modes of knowledge production, and representational practices, although, when I look at this outline, I don’t see those shifts in the representations of women. How can an entire society be said to have shifted modes of thought from similitude to resemblance, to the French Neo-classical ideal, etc if an entire group of people is excluded from that shift? Do these transitions really exist if despite them the theatre continues to reify accepted forms of representation of women on the stage? Why is it that these shifts explain everything except the role of women in individual societies? It is almost as if the act of organizing history based on these changing modes of thought masks the stagnant representations of women and keeps us from questioning what it means to indeed shift our processes of thought. “‘Representation of the world…is the work of men’ which depicts it ‘from their own point of view’ and is confused ‘with absolute truth’� (McCabe 4).
Disclaimer: I know these are very disjointed thoughts, but I just started researching this yesterday so this is just the beginning.