Beatrice In Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing

Make Curtsy

William Shakespeare’s comedy, Much Ado About Nothing, contains one of the strongest female literary characters Elizabethan era. The sharp tongued, quick witted Beatrice is one of the most beloved characters in all of Shakespeare. She is especially admired by the women of this generation and often hailed as the “first feminist” for boldy refusing to fall prey to male subjugation. Despite her extraordinary independence, Beatrice is not immune from the implications and limitations of being a woman in the Elizabethan era. In fact, Beatrice faces many of the same obstacles that hinder the progress of women today. Shakespeare’s characterization of Beatrice was progressive for its time, however the societal construct of the “ideal woman”,

Yet, between the lines emerges the positively brilliant, quick witted Beatrice: the Elizabethan Feminist. She resorts to a rhetoric of puns and speech dominated by scorn because she knows her words will only be heard if they are amusing to those around her. The intelligence of characters in Much Ado About Nothing, is reflected in their language. Beatrice is brilliant in the respect that she knows her voice will only be heard if she speaks in satire. She resorts to sarcasm over silence, and humor over hegemony. Though Beatrice is notably bold and strong willed, even she understands her limitations in

This resistance is crucial to the development of Beatrice's character because the “economics of marriage was not the only pressure on children to marry where their parents directed. Sixteenth-century children, and girls in particular, were very much brought up to obey, and to believe that it was their duty to their parents… to marry the person chosen for them (Sim). After seeing her cousin be married off, Beatrice implors Hero that while it is her “duty to make curtsy and say, 'Father, as it please you” she should also “make another curtsy, and say, 'Father, as it please me.' (Shakespeare 2.1.50-56). Beatrice was not willing to love just because her father wanted her too. She knew that breaking the silence was the key to ending the