Much Ado About Nothing Comparative Essay

In the Shakespearean play “Much Ado About Nothing” (1623) and the regency novel “Emma” by Jane Austen (1815), both texts’ protagonists face oppression from the male characters and are pressured about the ideas of marriage. This is because, in these eras’ women were often only considered in the context of becoming wives or mothers. In Emma, Harriet refuses a proposal from a man she loves under Emma’s influence since she believes she could find a man of higher status, showing how a woman’s power came from the men to whom she was linked. As is the same in Much Ado About Nothing, with Leonato’s advice to Hero being “if the prince do solicit you in that kind, you know your answer” , even though Hero has expressed no previous interest in the Prince.

This links back to the suggestion that a woman’s honour has a significant impact on her family as we see via the advice given from Emma to Harriet to not settle for a farmer as it would lower her status which is shown when she tells her “Dear Harriet, I give myself joy of this. It would have grieved me to lose your acquaintance, which must have been the consequence of your marrying Mr Martin.” The use of the language “grieved” adds impact to this sentence as it describes feelings of a great loss and therefore shows how deeply upset Emma would be if she lost her friendship with Harriet. However, Emma still considers this a better alternative to remaining friends with the wife of a farmer. This shows that the class divide was so prominent in this time period that Harriet lowering her rank would result in a loss of their friendship and helps a modern reader potentially understand Emma’s certainty about the importance of marrying well. Austen’s choice to characterise Emma in this way is potentially a reflection on society at this time and also Austen’s treatment as a female author. Austen published many of her novels anonymously due to the sexism she faced, with her male peers telling her that her work was “far too clever to have been written by a woman” and suggesting she should settle down and marry instead. This expectation and oppression that was placed on

In Much Ado About Nothing, Beatrice is presented as a stubborn shrew-type character who is argumentative and is treated as unreasonable and strange by the other characters for not wanting to marry. Benedick, however, who shares all the same values as her, is not treated in this way and it is seen as perfectly acceptable for him that he should not want to marry, with him saying things such as “Is 't come to this? In faith, hath not the world one man but he will wear his cap with suspicion? Shall I never see a bachelor of threescore again? Go to, i' faith, an thou wilt needs thrust thy neck into a yoke, wear the print of it, and sigh away Sundays” , declaring the belief that marriage turns men into fools. This shows the blatant sexism present in the time period and further proves the point that women were seen as lesser and only an extension of a man. However, although these stereotypes of the time are presented, it can be argued that Shakespeare was fighting these stereotypes with the character of Beatrice as ultimately, Benedick loved her as she was his equal, despite all of his previous jabs at her expense, “I do love nothing in the world so well as you. Is that not strange?” It is said that in Much Ado, “the real block that needs to be overcome is the characters’ own resistance to commitment and their