The productivity of women's anger in Shakespeare's tragedies

Abstract

In Shakespeare's tragedies, women's anger is either presented as unreasonable and dangerous. Women's anger is also read as something else instead-such as madness or lamentation. Is it possible, however, to understand a woman's breaking point as a breaking point-as a feminist snap? In this thesis, I use Sara Ahmed's "Feminist Snap" as a framework to understand how women's anger is misrepresented and ignored. According to Ahmed, when women can no longer take the consistent dismissal of their emotions and identities, they snap. Ahmed acknowledges that the snap is a type of crisis, but she also argues that the snap can be triumphant and productive. I pinpoint the breaking points of Ophelia, Lady Macbeth, Tamora and Lavinia and how the feminist snap can be used to discuss their anger. Before delving into specific Shakespearean tragedies, I unpack the ways in which early modernists understood a woman's breaking point. Through early modern notions of bodies and emotions, I trace how the concept of a woman was viewed as transgressive and how the early modern patriarchy policed and regulated women. The cultural policing and regulation of women bleeds into literature; the patriarchal structures in Hamlet, Macbeth, and Titus Andronicus impede Ophelia, Lady Macbeth, Tamora, and Lavinia from expressing anger outright. In each play, the feminist snap becomes something different. In Hamlet, Ophelia's snap is her madness-she is momentarily free from patriarchal standards. In Macbeth, Lady Macbeth snaps for political power and to fuel her bloodlust. In Titus Andronicus, Tamora seeks revenge and the snap becomes tool for violence and Lavinia inherits the violence of Tamora's snap. In each Shakespearean tragedy, the women complicate notions of the feminist snap and while their anger is momentary, women's anger in these Shakespearean texts threaten patriarchal standards and challenge ideas of productivity.