Virtuous Viragos: Female Heroism and Ethical Action in Shakespearean Drama

Abstract

Virtue, from the Latin vir for manly courage and strength, was the mark of male excellence in Renaissance culture. Embodying both physical and moral strength through the famous figure of Hercules, virtue took on other values of courtly gentility and political prudence as the medieval warrior society was gradually transformed into the modern state. In inverse proportion to the expansion of male virtue, the conception of the virago underwent a corresponding constriction and decline from a manlike, heroic woman to a scold. Encompassing both physical and moral excellence (OED 2a, 7), male virtue came to appropriate the heroic definition of virago, and female virtue, by Shakespeare’s time, became confined to chastity (OED 2c). Challenging the traditions of male virtue and female monstrosity in Renaissance drama, this essay examines the virtuous viragos populating the Shakespearean canon, who present themselves as better models of ethical action than men, with whom virtue is etymologically and historically associated. This study examines two nuanced conceptions of female heroism and ethical action centering on the erotic and politic Cleopatra and the chaste, self-affirming Desdemona as virtuous viragos. Moreover, the notion of heroism, traditionally associated with tragedy, translates to the less exalted but more prudentially successful ethical action of viragos in Shakespeare’s comedies such as The Taming of the Shrew. I argue that virtuous viragos attain their ethical stature against this male-inflected standard of tragic heroism even while calling for its dismantling and replacement with the more discerning framework of neo-Aristotelian virtue grounded on practical wisdom.