Monday, April 4, 2022

Women of Will by Tina Packer

Women of Will – following the feminine in Shakespeare’s plays

By Tina Packer

What a book! I haven’t enjoyed a Shakespeare analysis this much since Jan Kott and Stephen Greenblatt’s various masterpieces.

In approximate chronological order of when the plays were written Packer shows how the women characters, though few, are pivotal in carrying the play, taking power, usurping power, revealing the inequality of society.

For example, Shakespeare attributed soul to Juliet and Beatrice in a time when the existence of women’s souls was still denied. In Troilus and Cressida he reveals that in this relationship Troilus has power, Cressida none, and the glories of war is hypocrisy and the gap between men’s ideals and their actions is vast.

Packer often touches upon the same analyses that I’ve done in mine. She too sees Katherina as a crushed victim of vicious sexism in The Taming of the Shrew. In the history plays she analyses the importance of Queen Margaret and ends thus: ‘Through writing Margaret, Shakespeare was living moment by moment with a woman, her natural abilities, her loves, her ferocity, her innocence.’ (p.32).

We don’t see eye to eye on his relationship with his wife Anne Hathaway. She neglects to comment on the fact that he returned to Stratford repeatedly throughout his London years and retired there even before his play writing was finished.

Nevertheless, this is a brilliant book and I recommend it warmly to all Shakespeareans.

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