My revision notes for the comparative drama essay of the A level course, comparing the Duchess of Malfi and Streetcar Named Desire. These notes helped me get 55/60 in my final essay and a high A* overall. The first part of the document contains general points of analysis between the two plays , inc...
- Play was initially performed without sexual and political and sexual moments – e.g. some
critics think that Delio and Antonio moments – silver fountain – was only added to 1623
version – politically would imply Webster was too worried about doing it the first time.
- Repeated motif of women being strangled – silenced; evokes a Witch Trial.
- Julia is “the duchess on high speed played for laughs” – Jem Bloomfield
- JB - “a play in search of a motive” - none of Ferdinand’s motives make sense; Bosola;
Duchess deciding to take Antonio as a husband.
- Audience is made complicit in how women/ women’s bodies are treated – Bosola tells us in
asides apricot scene vs Stan saying what he will do to Blanche.
3.4.
- Loreto – representation for the audience at the time of a potentially corrupt religious site –
3.4. is set here.
- What function do the pilgrims serve? - choric feature: “the cardinal Bears himself much too
cruel.” -- exposing religious hypocrisy of the Cardinal. Do also show that society judges the
marriage = “who would have thought So great a lady would have match'd herself Unto so
mean a person.” Microcosm of what has happened so far in the play. Pilgrims = non-
powerful religious people and therefore non-corrupt – voice of the audience? Or not to be
trusted because they are at the shrine at Loretto – not properly religious? Voice of people
outside the court. Also reveal that the Pope has taken Malfi from the Duchess – religious
corruption at the top. Duchess and Antonio banished – Mary and Joseph vs Adam and Eve –
virtuous vs sinful. Religion, politics, corruption, power, performance and illusion – dumb
show is a performance, a play within a play.
- Links to Streetcar – Stanley “banishing” Blanche, Stan sees Blanche as corrupt religion -
“Ticket! Back to Laurel! On the Greyhound! Tuesday!” Image of Ant and Duchess holding
their baby – similar to Stan and Stella at the end – pure or corrupt? Adam and Eve vs Mary
and Joseph; ultimate nuclear family ideal ‘safe’ or corrupt family life – Adler sees this as
“unholy family” SND? Cardinal violently takes ring off Duchess’ fingers – violence of men
towards female possessions (e.g. paper lantern), stripping women of their rights, their
symbolic strength and presence, rejection of character (Stanley in Scene 2 with the
Napoleonic Code and jewels etc.)
- New Orleans as a pilgrimage for Blanche/ safe haven/ Stella for star?
General points of comparison
Malfi Streetcar
Why did - Criticising corruption in the court; - Responding to treatment of
they write protesting against a sexist society. women, change of values –
it? (conc) - Critiquing Jacobean hypocrisy critique of old way of life as
around female sexuality well as new American dream
- -- source text = Palace of - Williams: one major theme of
Pleasure; however, in DOM my work is the “destructive
Bosola repents and is conflicted power of society on a
and in Palace of Pleasure the two sensitive, non – conformist
, brothers die of natural causes. individual”
- Webster fascinated by the far-
reaching consequences of actions.
- Genre = tragedy; Aristotelian
notion that tragic events are both
surprising and yet follow cause- -- tragic inevitability of B’s downfall
and-effect.
- Satirise the court of James I –
promoted ‘favourites,’ autocratic
attitude towards parliament; his
cousin Arabella Stewart had
married without permission –
both locked up in the tower.
- Meditation on the human
condition – obsession with
“death” (T.S. Eliot)
Key formal - Duchess is titular character; - Blanche not the titular
differences leaves in Act 5 but returns as echo character. But she defines
in Act 5. when the play begins and
- “grand guignol” (excessive bloody ends, unlike the Duchess.
melodrama) of the ending is a - Sets the play in a real location
pastiche of the beginning. - Expressionist aspects –
- Not a “real” Malfi but an idea – lighting, “jungle” voices;
satire of what Italy is like. shadows; the Varsouviana,
- Setting is deliberately other music.
transferrable – set in Italy but - Time: after Scene 7 the time
probably about English court. gets closer together and then
- Time is deliberately disrupted; Scene 11 in the aftermath
deemphasises linear narrative and - Time passing through
idea of causation; time constantly pregnancy – are we leading up
jumping around- echo means past to rape or pregnancy
and present are mixed up. - Past and present mixed up
with Varsouviana and young
man played by same actor as
Alan.
Production - Written to be performed in - Almeida 2023: staged as just
s candlelit Jacobean theatre – one room – no separate
heightens idea of corruption, bathroom or division of the
sneakiness. stage (no divisions/ portieres;
- SW playhouse 2024: softens no furniture) and B walked
Ferdinand; genuine, affectionate around the stage when she
relationship w Duchess at the was in the “bathroom” - like a
beginning. Cries when Duchess boxing ring, physically
tells him she has defied him to competing for power, no
marry Ant. privacy, exposed constantly.
- In the 1940s and 1950s Bosola - Varsouviana is played by a
became the hero/ moral centre of band on stage one member of
the play; Act 5 only makes sense if which becomes the doctor at
you see Bosola as the centre the end – adds to sense of
- Performed at Globe and tragic inevitability and
Blackfriars – torture/ dead hand madness surrounding her
, scene: at Globe we are in position constantly, always present.
of torturer (we know what's - 2014 Young Vic production –
happening, but the Duchess set is a skeleton of an
doesn't) whereas at Blackfriars we apartment which is designed
are in position of Duchess (can’t on a revolving stage;
see anything). movement starts when B takes
- SWPH production 2014 shows her first sip of alcohol; starts
Duchess and Antonio singing at the real action and becomes a
the beginning of the scene (3.2.), merry-go-round that none of
literally in matrimonial harmony – them can get off.
D “I prithee, when were we so - In both rape scene is alluded
merry?” to – in Young Vic Stan rifles
- SWPH 2014 B a tomb-maker is through her dress then scene
dressed completely in black, freezes; in Almeida Blanche is
cannot be seen in the dark. alone as the rain pours down
- Almeida 2019: the three on her.
murdered women do not
disappear but loom on the stage,
thereby giving them power after
their death.
- 1971 RSC production of DOM Judi
Dench as the Duchess and her
husband Michael Williams as
Ferdinand – casting highlighted
the sexual, incestuous
relationship between them.
Women- - Duchess’ financial power as a - Stan’s repeated references to
both show widow – Ferdinand hopes to have Napoleonic code by which
men gained an “infinite mass of what belongs to Stella also
seeking to treasure” if she was to die – belongs to him.
control although unclear if this is true
women motive?
financially;
inheritance
Deceit - Duchess and Antonio’s - Blanche concealing her age
clandestine marriage, which is and past to maintain her
also outside the authority of the reputation and southern belle
Church. (per verba de presenti) identity.
- Ferdinand: dead man’s hand and - “I want to deceive him enough
wax works. to make him want me”
- Secrets as corrupt and poisoning: - Self-deceit: by the end roles
Cardinal describes secret “like a have reversed as Stella admits
lingering poison” she may have allowed herself
- Ferdinand’s letter = equivocation, to be deceived in order to
form of deceit. continue her life w Stan.
- Women as deceptive: “unequal - Offstage announcement that
nature...” another poker game (“seven-
card stud”) is about to
commence ends the play with
a symbol of the deception and
bluffing that has taken place in
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