When I was studying for the exam this weekend, I came across an interesting line from The Duchess of Malfi. It's from the section right after Ferdinand orders the duchess killed, and in it Bosola tells Ferdinand, "You have bloodily approved the ancient truth, / That kindred commonly do worse agree / Than remote strangers" (4.2.247-249). When I was reading it, I nodded my head, like, Yes! Totally! People who are related definitely have a hard time getting along with each other! Then I remembered the emphasis on comitatus from the Anglo-Saxon works and realized just how far we'd come from Anglo-Saxon literature.
In Beowulf, strong family ties were the greatest virtue. That's why Hrothgar made it so clear that he considered Beowulf a son: he knew that if he and Beowulf were kindred, Beowulf would do anything to keep his lands safe. Similarly, Unferth, who was a brother-killer, is scorned because killing family is an unforgivable sin in Anglo-Saxon culture. Loyalty to family was the backbone of culture.
That's why it's so interesting that this ideal gets turned on its head in The Duchess of Malfi. Most of the plot in the play is Ferdinand, the jealous brother, trying to figure out how to punish his sister and her husband for getting married. After he finds out that his sister has married beneath her, he is so incensed as to insist that they use "fire, / The smarting cupping glass for that's the mean / To purge infected blood, such blood as hers" (2.5.24-26). Because she is now infected from her unapproved union, this is the way that he suggests that they purge her. Instead of being concerned about his sister's well-being, Ferdinand immediately jumps to the conclusion that she must be killed. He is loyal to the purity of his family's blood, not to his kinship relationship with his sister. Because she has violated their standards, Ferdinand does not think that it is beyond his place to kill her.
And kill her he does, causing Bosola to note that he has confirmed an ancient truth: that some families just can't get along. (How many times have we heard something along these lines in our own lives? I'm guessing pretty often.) Violence between families has become a maxim, considered ancient and always-known (even though the opposite was practiced around 700-1000 CE). Culturally, literature has come so far away from Anglo-Saxon values that the idea of comitatus and astute family loyalty is no longer a part of the conversation.
While they don't acknowledge the ideal of family loyalty outright, however, perhaps it's still there. After Ferdinand kills the duchess, he is full of regret: he laments, "a good actor many times is cursed / For playing a villain's part, I hate thee for 't" (4.2.266-267). In the end, Ferdinand's preoccupation with money, instead of familial love for his sister, brings him a great deal of despair and self-loathing. He recognizes that what he has done is wrong, as he killed his "dearest friend" (4.2.257). So while literature norms have changed quite a bit from Anglo-Saxon times, allowing a culture where one can contemplate killing their kin, the stigma against this action has not disappeared. Which, as I'm sure we'd all agree, is probably a really good thing.
Anyway, I just thought it was interesting to consider how comitatus has, in many ways, disappeared from the literary scene. People in the early modern period don't expect to get along with their families. They kill their kin for money or fame or power, and while they may suffer the consequences, it's a pretty well-known literary trope (like how King Hamlet is killed by Claudius in Hamlet, for example). That doesn't mean that it's not still bad, the way people look at it now is very different, and it's interesting to be able to see this transition in English literature and culture.
No comments:
Post a Comment