Author’s Note: This was an essay I wrote for my Introduction to British Literature course where I had to choose between several prompts to write about. I had fun analyzing the complexity of the Madonna Whore dichotomy.
The King James Version of the Bible (1611) informed Renaissance England’s belief system regarding a woman’s role in society—emphasizing chastity, virtue, and submission to the men in her life. As a result, her intrinsic value was deeply tied to her ability to uphold this feminine ideal, with her purity rendering her an object of status to the benefit of men. Her own virtue—or lack thereof—reflected on their honor.
Therefore, regulating a woman’s sexuality, limiting her autonomy, and punishing her were essential to ensuring that patriarchal order was maintained. Women were reduced to embodying only one of two opposing personas: the Madonna or the whore. These dichotomous roles can be traced back to the Biblical figures of Mary, the virgin mother of Jesus, and Eve, the perpetrator of original sin, respectively. Dramatic literature of the early 17th century often depicted the tragedy of an innocent woman’s death, whose only crime was moving from the virtuous Madonna to the sinful whore within the male mind. William Shakespeare’s Othello and John Webster’s The Duchess of Malfi both delineate the violent ramifications of male anxieties about female sexuality and autonomy through the unjust murder of women who are relentlessly dehumanized.
Desdemona and the Duchess are initially portrayed as symbols of female purity, yet the mere perception of their sexuality disrupts the rigid Madonna/Whore binary, leading to violent punishment by male figures seeking to reassert control and exposing the tragic consequences of patriarchal power over women.
At the beginning of each play, Desdemona and the Duchess are positioned as Madonnas within the binary and reduced to mere icons of purity with limited autonomy. Although this may seem more favorable, both women are stripped of their agency and treated as objects that uplift the status of men. The Madonna/Whore dichotomy exemplifies how a woman’s value is defined.
Grace Detwiler writes, “In no way is the male reaction to female sexual transgressiveness more succinctly embodied than in the Madonna/Whore binary, a theoretical framework used to assess the moral virtue of a woman based on her sexual status. The Madonna—the virgin—is pure, clean, whole, and idealized; her opposite, the whore, is demonized” (5).
Desdemona’s status as the divine Madonna enhances Othello’s own status as a Black man in Venetian society. The play’s villain, Iago, plants the seeds of jealousy in Othello’s mind, starting the process of a Madonna/Whore switch: “Good name in man and woman, dear my lord, / Is the immediate jewel of their souls” (Othello 3.3.155–156). Iago highlights the importance of reputation, or a “good name,” likening it to a precious and irreplaceable object. Desdemona’s stature as a virtuous woman is valuable to Othello’s reputation as a man. To him, she is a shining symbol of feminine ideals that bolsters his insecure ego as an outsider.
Similarly, the Duchess is compared to a treasured inanimate object. Her brothers, Ferdinand and the Cardinal, order her not to remarry despite being widowed to control her sexual status. In an act of defiance, she marries her steward Antonio and laments their attempts to limit her agency: “Why should only I, / Of all the other princes of the world, / Be cased up, like a holy relic?” (The Duchess of Malfi 3.2.137–139). Much like Desdemona, she is objectified as an icon rather than seen as an individual. As an upper-class woman, the Duchess is confined to her role as a “cased-up holy relic” and denied the freedoms her male counterparts are afforded.
The religious language also coincides with Biblical teachings that state women are meant to be the moral backbone of society and therefore must be infallible. To maintain her revered status as a Madonna, she must also be stripped of agency, strictly unable to step outside the ideal of feminine virtue she represents. Both women are valued merely as precious objects that adorn the men connected to them with prestige.
Once Desdemona suffers reputational damage and the Duchess asserts her sexual autonomy, they challenge the patriarchal order, activating a Madonna/Whore switch. In these dramas, both women are innocent of the crimes they are accused of, but due to male jealousy, the mere perception of Desdemona and the Duchess is enough to vilify them. If the Madonna is the pure symbol of feminine virtue, then the whore is the corrupted icon of sin. Because women are dehumanized, there is no room for the nuance or complexity that men are given when it comes to morality.
If men perceive a woman to be a whore, whether it is based in reality or not, she is thought to be a threat to the Christian, male-dominated order. Detwiler states, “Women who fail to embody this ideal are ‘whores’: they are explicitly or symbolically immoral and dangerously concupiscent” (6). For Desdemona, her pure Madonna image is ruined by Iago’s manipulation of Othello’s insecurity, successfully turning her into a whore in his mind. In grieving this corruption, he says, “Her name, that was as fresh / As Dian’s visage, is now begrimed and black / As mine own face” (Othello 3.3.389-391). Othello likens Desdemona to the Roman goddess of chastity who has been “begrimed” like his own Black face.
Metaphors of blackness and impurity are used throughout the play to contrast with her whiteness and purity. Desdemona’s value as a jewel representing desirable, white, female purity is contaminated because of Iago’s suggestion of her alleged infidelity. For the Duchess, even though she has sex within the marriage bed, her brother Ferdinand immediately deems her a whore. His obsession with her sexuality reveals a latent incestuous desire to keep their noble bloodline pure, culminating in a jealous rage: “Damn her! That body of hers, / While that my blood ran pure in’t, was more worth / Than that which thou wouldst comfort, called a soul” (The Duchess of Malfi 4.1.121-123). The physical purity of the Duchess has been tainted by Antonio, with Ferdinand equating her worth to sharing his noble blood rather than her unique soul. His possessiveness over her body is reminiscent of a cuckolded husband, mirroring Othello’s jealous rage. Both women have been defiled in the eyes of possessive, jealous men who do not view women as complex human beings, but as objects.
When Desdemona and the Duchess have been deemed a “whore” in the male mind, violent punishment is used to restore order. Placed in the sinful category of the two personas, they are subject to vile mistreatment. Othello and Ferdinand act out of a misogynistic wrath born from male anxieties. Grace Detwiler discusses how men seek to rectify perceived sexual transgressions: “The Duchess and Desdemona are in fact innocent of the sexual ‘crimes’ they are accused of by their brother and husband, respectively. […] The only way for a whore to become a Madonna again, in the ethos of these plays, is for her to die violently” (4).
Brutality against women, in this context, is used to purify them once more in the male mind. Not only is the whore a threat to his masculinity, but it is an evil that must be purged. Othello, driven to insanity, becomes convinced his wife is unfaithful and resolves to kill her. In the climactic scene, he contemplates murder: “Yet she must die, else she’ll betray more men. / Put out the light, and then put out the light!” (Othello 5.2.6-7). Desdemona is considered an ongoing threat, not only to himself, but to all men. He must “put out the light” that is her life, therefore restoring male dominance. Her image has been fully corrupted, and the only way for her to become pure again is through death.
Ferdinand has a similar motivation for murdering his sister, which he believes will erase his family’s dishonor and reassert his power. Consumed by the same jealous beast as Othello, he orders the death of his sister and her children. When Bosola brings news of its success, he feels no remorse for killing her children, but he does, however, instantly regret her death. During the play’s final scene, he reflects on his actions as he lies dying: “Whether we fall by ambition, blood, or lust, / Like diamonds, we are cut with our own dust” (The Duchess of Malfi 5.5.73-74). The Duchess “falls” through “blood” when Ferdinand reclaims control over her body through violent punishment, and she is “cut with [her] own dust.” His fixation with her purity and his family’s honor destroys his sister and ultimately leads to his own downfall.
An identical fate also befalls Othello, whose violent punishment of Desdemona results in his death as well. Desdemona and the Duchess are viciously condemned at the hands of insecure men for being perceived as stepping out of their initial Madonna role into a whore.
Despite suffering from misogynistic violence due to shifts from Madonna to whore, Desdemona and the Duchess remain virtuous until their deaths, underscoring the injustice of their punishment. The Renaissance tragedy of Othello and The Duchess of Malfi stems from the innocence of both women, who are murdered because of male anxieties. Aurélie Griffin and Sophie Lemercier-Goddard illustrate how they embody the Madonna archetype even in death: “Desdemona and the Duchess meet their death in very different circumstances… the heroine’s tragic path is very similar…The [two] women forgive their murderers; they pray; they put on display patience and forbearance” (7).
Even though they have been fixed into the position of whore by this point, Desdemona and the Duchess exhibit Madonna traits such as purity, virtue, and moral integrity. The murder of these women is presented as martyrdom, highlighting the corruption of tyrannical patriarchy. After Othello has savagely killed her in an act of domestic violence spurred on by his jealousy, Desdemona absolves him of blame: “Nobody; I myself. Farewell. / Commend me to my kind lord” (Othello 5.2.125-126). She upholds the purity of Madonna through forgiveness and sacrifice, remaining loyal to him in spite of his abuse. Desdemona accepts her fate with dignity, sharply contrasting with Othello’s moral downfall. Male insecurity and jealousy are framed as dangerous to the male psyche, leading to dire consequences even for innocent women.
The Duchess embodies a Madonna with personal agency in her final hour, keeping the moral high ground as death awaits her: “I am the Duchess of Malfi still” (The Duchess of Malfi 4.2.134). Where Desdemona symbolizes a more obediently pure form of Madonna, the Duchess represents a maternal figure with integrity that resists the male-dominated order. She is a martyr in the face of a corrupted, patriarchal society that seeks to destroy her for transgressions she did not commit. Desdemona and the Duchess both exemplify the tragedy of women’s suffering at the hands of male figures reasserting control.
Although Othello and The Duchess of Malfi were written by men, these Renaissance dramas poignantly depict the ways in which women are objectified and violently punished in patriarchal society. Desdemona and the Duchess are cemented into the literary canon as tragic feminine martyrs. The male perpetrators of this misogynistic brutality, Othello and Ferdinand, demonstrate how male anxiety about female sexuality and autonomy leads to ruin on all fronts. Both men can be characterized as deeply insecure and possessive over female bodies, lashing out when their control is threatened.
By casting women as either the chaste ideal of Madonna or the sinful whore who must be quelled, they are thus denied the right to their individuality as complex human beings. In Desdemona, there is a fierce purity of spirit and lack of agency, whereas, with the Duchess, she actively challenges her oppressors to the end. Yet still, neither woman is fully realized as a character. In contrast to other, more restrictive representations of women, however, there are hints of a future with a progressive perspective on female autonomy.
Works Cited
Detwiler, Grace. “That death’s unnatural that kills for loving”: Violence & Gendered Power in English Renaissance Tragedies, The Duchess of Malfi, Othello, and The Tragedy of Mariam. University Honors Thesis, Colorado State University, 8 Dec. 2021. SSRN, https://ssrn.com/abstract=4705919. Accessed 5 Nov. 2024.
Griffin, Aurélie, and Sophie Lemercier-Goddard. “’Talk You of Killing?’: Rhetorical Construction of Tragic Femininity in William Shakespeare’s Othello, Elizabeth Cary’s The Tragedy of Mariam, and John Webster’s The Duchess of Malfi.” Actes des congrès de la Société Française Shakespeare, vol. 41, 2023, Société Française Shakespeare, https://journals.openedition.org/shakespeare/8084. Accessed 5 Nov. 2024.
Shakespeare, William. Othello. MIT Shakespeare, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, shakespeare.mit.edu/othello/full.html. Accessed 5 Nov. 2024.
The Holy Bible, King James Version, Titus 2:3-5. Bible Gateway, www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Titus+2%3A3-5. Accessed 11 Nov. 2024.
Webster, John. The Duchess of Malfi. Project Gutenberg, 1997, www.gutenberg.org/files/2232/2232-h/2232-h.htm. Accessed 5 Nov. 2024.
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In my novel in progress the characters get up a burlesque performance of Othello. In their comic version of the tragedy Desdemona is a lusty sophisticated woman who is the true agent of the action, undermining Iago's schemes behind his back. In this madcap rewrite I try to highlight problems with the story like the power imbalances and imposed sexual roles you discuss. It was great fun to rewrite the Bard. Also it was a nightmare!
I haven’t read the Duchess of Malfi now It’s on top of my list. Love your analysis and I agree with A.S. Matze sounds like a TED talk is in your near future 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻🌸