William Shakespeare’s The Rape of Lucrece zooms in on the heavy issue of sexual assault through both internal and external lenses. As it nearly overflows with flowery diction and at times harrowing speech, some critics may be quick to accuse this poem of beautifying Lucrece’s trauma while simultaneously subduing her character. However, scrutinizing Shakespeare’s language unlocks our ability to ponder whether Lucrece is simply sidelined or if her suffering instills her with newfound strength. Shakespeare fosters a poetic environment in which both Lucrece and her attacker, Tarquin, are given equal rhetorical space to deliberate their respective inner turmoil. While Shakespeare’s curious decision to transpierce the mind of a rapist is problematic in essence, I intend to argue that Shakespeare ultimately spotlights Lucrece and her plight to both criticize Tarquin’s actions and confound patriarchal notions of female domesticity and sociopolitical subservience.
By delineating the importance of Lucrece’s belonging to Collatine, Shakespeare gives his poem the ability to disparage Tarquin’s assault and simultaneously uncover faults in the overarching system of patriarchy. In Sara Quay’s “Lucrece the Chaste,” Quay astutely examines the civil implications of sexual assault in the fundamentally patriarchal society of Rome. While most of her colleagues are inclined to discredit Shakespeare’s poem as inherently chauvinistic, Quay paves the way for further consideration by conjuring socially constructed notions of what it means to be ‘man’ or ‘woman’ and the act of rape itself. Alluding to scholar Catharine Mackinnon, she insists that Lucrece’s representation as an “object” by men keeps her held in “a position which is social, not biological” (4). Drawing from this perspective, one can shift feminist criticism from the focal point of a single author to the oppressive ideologies of a male-centric culture. Quay first begins her incendiary argument by calling into question how Lucrece’s portrayal all through the poem’s duration constructs her as a woman who is “able to be raped” (4). Furthermore, she elucidates that Tarquin’s motivations to defile Lucrece have little to do with Lucrece herself, but rather are rooted in a perpetuated myth that women’s bodies are “virginal and closed” and that these “characteristics of closure and wholeness” are therefore put on a pedestal only “to be violated” by men (6). This reading regarding Tarquin’s incentives and Lucrece’s objectification and helps explain Tarquin’s fixation on the idea of her sexual virtue early on in the poem:
And die, unhallowed thoughts, before you blot
With your uncleanness that which is divine.
Offer pure incense to so pure a shrine.
Let fair humanity abhor the deed
That spots and stains love’s modest snow-white weed (Shakespeare 192-196).
In this stanza, Shakespeare depicts Tarquin as an unholy antithesis to Lucrece’s celestial being. Tarquin is cognizant of the fact that he can upset the status quo by taking advantage of her and hence divesting her innocent identity. Even more significantly, though, it is extremely odd that Tarquin is speaking directly to his own thoughts here. This suggests that instead of taking ownership for his actions, he displaces his blame onto metaphysical realms, almost as if he is attempting to absolve himself from any actual wrongdoing in Lucrece’s assault because his thoughts have him under some sort of spell. In his mind, his thoughts alone will be at fault for ‘blotting’ Lucrece’s divinity. By the same token, personifying Tarquin’s thoughts as “unhallowed” and “unclean,” Shakespeare overtly passes judgment on his antagonist even before he commits the actual crime. Tarquin’s calling on society to condemn his intentions is a testament to a prevailing preoccupation with women’s chastity. Thus, it can be construed that Shakespeare is not only condemning Tarquin’s character, but also giving insight into social constructions of virginity.
Shakespeare’s construction of Lucrece also relies heavily on restrictive categories of gender represented in the poem. Lucrece, as Quay argues, is depicted as the prime example of woman, as she symbolizes what is “good, pure, and whole” (7). The men in the poem, on the other hand, “define [themselves] against” (7) these qualities. These rigid definitions are to be upheld by any means necessary, because “without them the system [patriarchy] fails” (7). Advancing this reading, these ideals can additionally be applied to the narrator’s description of Lucrece during her and Tarquin’s initial encounter:
This earthly saint adorèd by this devil
Little suspecteth the false worshipper:
For unstained thoughts do seldom dream on evil (Shakespeare 85-87).
Here, Shakespeare’s narrator pits Tarquin’s masculine, ‘devil’-ish wiles directly against Lucrece’s saintly femininity, accentuating the Roman patriarchy’s need for uncompromised distinctions between men and women. What’s more, he channels his contempt for Tarquin through his narrator. Noting that Lucrece ‘little suspecteth’ her attacker’s true intentions, the narrator reveals not only a sense of innocence on Lucrece’s behalf, but also more importantly highlights Tarquin as a brooding, malicious figure. The narrator’s labeling Tarquin as ‘evil’ minimizes his credibility and maximizes the audience’s disdain for his character.
Another technique Shakespeare employs is that he exemplifies Tarquin’s malevolent rhetoric to challenge the patriarchy’s commoditization of women. In Catherine Belsey’s article, “Tarquin Dispossessed,” Belsey delineates the duplicitous meanings of ‘possession’ throughout the poem. On one hand, ‘possession’ refers to the fact that Lucrece’s husband, Collatine, legally owns her and that Tarquin’s assault violates not only Lucrece’s well being, but also the law. On the other hand, Belsey applies the idea of ‘possession’ to Tarquin’s bewitched state of mind, as his actions ultimately contradict his inner conflict. Furthermore, she contends, Lucrece’s suicide at the end of the poem renders him “thus doubly dispossessed by a woman’s constancy” (Belsey 315). Belsey, weighing in with criticism from other feminist scholars, is outwardly contemptuous of Shakespeare’s portrayal of female commoditization and argues that the poem is rather overt in its “endorsement of woman as property” (317).
Taking Belsey’s claim a step further, we can examine the stanza in which Tarquin wrestles with whether or not to yield to his temptations and violate Lucrece:
Shameful it is – ay, if the fact be known,
Hateful it is. There is no hate in loving.
I’ll beg her love, but she is not her own (Shakespeare 239-241).
Though Belsey is quick to assume Shakespeare’s compliance with the sexist notion that women are simply men’s to acquire, this passage suggests that Shakespeare is actually scornful of this convention. Tarquin laments that his actions will be ‘shameful’ and ‘hateful’ if carried out, which exhibits his reservations and briefly lets show some semblance of a conscience within. However, this is confounded by the fact that he seems more fretful that the actions will be ‘known’ by the public, not whether his actions will have moral consequences. Tarquin’s initial motivation, as I have alluded to earlier, is fueled by Lucrece’s unscathed sexuality, as it is something he feels obliged to conquer. Moreover, his emphasizing that Lucrece is ‘not her own’ implies that he also intends to denigrate Collatine in the act’s illegality. If this is the case, then there is room to argue that Shakespeare discredits the idea marital ownership as just another way for Tarquin to assert his dominance over women and to overshadow his fellow male counterparts.
In regard to the poem’s handling of sexual violence, Shakespeare’s depiction of the rape’s political ramifications, I assert, also further aim to complicate Roman ideologies surrounding patriarchy by indirectly giving Lucrece an upper hand in the public sphere. In John Kunat’s “Rape and Republicanism in Shakespeare’s Lucrece,” Kunat puts forth the notion that Lucrece’s assault necessarily accentuates the relationship between gender and government. The inability of her male counterparts to protect her in her own home, Kunat continues, made it apparent that a system based solely on safeguarding relations within the realm of domesticity could no longer “adequately serve the needs of the expanding Roman state” (Kunat 3). Moreover, Kunat’s interpretation opens up a new arena for observation in regard to Lucrece’s position in the realm of both public and private spheres, even if her role in the latter is significantly restricted due to societal impositions regarding gender roles. As Lucrece bemoans her ignominy and contemplates taking her own life, for the first time she also – perhaps unknowingly – subtly positions herself into the public domain:
Yet die I will not till my Collatine
Have heard the cause of my untimely death,
That he may vow in that sad hour of mine
Revenge on him that made me stop my breath (Shakespeare 1177-1180).
In this excerpt, one can surmise that Lucrece deems it absolutely imperative for her husband to be made aware of the crime committed against her so that her anguish will not be in vain. The fact that she calls upon her husband to ‘revenge’ her grants her with an agency she had previously not been given access to. What’s more, Lucrece’s choice of the word ‘vow’ presents her plea for Collatine’s swift action as a kind of marital duty in regard to her honor. By making the event ascertainable to her spouse, a man of high acclaim, she can thus make it ascertainable to the community at large. While the text does not provide evidence that suggests that she knew her assault would spawn rather immediate political change into Rome as a republic, it can be argued that her eagerness to avenge herself and to blight Tarquin’s reputation as he did hers is a component of Shakespeare’s strategy to go against patriarchal conventions.
Adding to the topic of sexual politics, in his article “Rome’s Disgrace,” Peter Smith insists that many feminist scholars fail to understand Shakespeare’s underlying intentions for not focusing heavily on the portrayal of Lucrece’s assault but rather on the significance of Tarquin’s ability to commit it. Making the case that if scholars only theorize sexual assault as an “accepted albeit abnormal part of sexual behavior,” then the social structures that enable its existence are left “dangerously unquestioned” and thus insufficiently analyzed in Lucrece’s narrative (Smith 18). Furthermore, he puts forth that this reading “constitutes an empowering” interpretation for a “feminist agenda” (Smith 18.) Smith’s persuasive argument is once again reminiscent of the measure to which Lucrece’s agency is able to escape the confines of the private realm. To facilitate Smith’s understanding of Lucrece’s participation in the political upheaval that soon follows her suicide, it might be beneficial to zero in on the poem’s final lines:
When they had sworn to this advised doom,
They did conclude to bear dead Lucrece thence,
To show her bleeding body thorough Rome,
And so to publish Tarquin’s foul offense,
Which, being done with speedy diligence,
The Romans plausibly did give consent
To Tarquin’s everlasting banishment (Shakespeare 1849-1855).
Underscoring the word ‘sworn’ in this passage, there is room to deduce that Shakespeare grants Lucrece’s political influence as more than merely within the strict confines of her and Collatine’s home, which was heretofore all she had known. The fact that Lucrece made these men swear to ‘publish’ Tarquin’s actions stretches this influence not only beyond domestic life, but also from beyond the grave, awarding her a kind of omnipresence in Rome’s political sphere. The men who parade Lucrece’s ‘bleeding body’ through the streets of Rome are championed with a round of applause, signifying the Romans’ encompassing agreement to revolutionize how their city is to be governed, as well as their intolerance for such a crime against Collatine’s wife. Shakespeare highlights Tarquin’s punishment to stress the political good that has been generated by his brutality. Likewise, as Lucrece comes to personify the need for a reordering of Rome, the exiled Tarquin thus stands for the oppressive pillars that kept the old order firmly rooted. The ease in which said pillars could be shaken or taken out entirely sheds light on the shortcomings and the social permeability of the patriarchy.
Concerning Shakespeare’s representation of Lucrece’s overwhelming grief, I maintain that he employs her rhetoric to further admonish the ideal of women’s expected passivity. Throughout Carolyn Williams’ article, “Silence, Like a Lucrece Knife,” Williams employs a reading that conjures ideas about studying sexual assault from a modern point of view. She argues that there are “three distinct views of rape” (102). The first provides insight into the age-old fallacy that “all women want to be raped” (102). The second calls attention to “male desire” and how “sexually repressive communities” are often regarded as responsible for this violence (102). The last view is that men who commit sexual assault ultimately strive at “humiliating women” (103). Drawing from texts such as Ovid’s Ars Amatoria, Williams delineates how ancient outlooks regarding rape may inform Shakespeare and other major authors’ portrayals of it. Williams, however, also provides a counterargument to my claim, putting forth that Shakespeare does Lucrece a grave injustice by sidestepping the poem’s “central moral complexities” (94). What’s more, she argues, Shakespeare’s “vision seems to falter” (93) in that Lucrece’s body is completely reduced to being a “middle term in a transaction between men” (94), and she applies this notion to Lucrece’s union with Collatine. Williams is correct in her evaluation that the men in the poem utilize her body as a means for political gain and that Lucrece and Collatine’s relationship adheres to fixed cultural norms of Rome. This can be applied to the stanza in which Lucrece laments the consequences of Tarquin’s actions:
Let my good name, that senseless reputation,
For Collatine’s dear love be kept unspotted.
If that be made a theme for disputation,
The branches of another root are rotted,
And undeserved reproach to him allotted (Shakespeare 820-824).
In this stanza, Lucrece is practically inconsolable – understandably so – after Tarquin assaults her. Tarquin has not only taken her chastity by force, but also has disrupted her entire way of life as she has come to know it. Whereas many scholars contend that Lucrece’s inner shame is simply a byproduct of perpetuated misogynistic discourse, I argue that Lucrece’s rhetoric in this passage is another one of Shakespeare’s attempts to make her sound more honorable. Her using the word ‘branches’ compares her relationship to a tree, whose ‘root’ depends on the wellness of its entirety. This language suggests Lucrece seems mindful of the fact that she is viewed as an extension of her husband. Despite undergoing immense, even insurmountable anguish, Shakespeare’s Lucrece nevertheless displays a sense of selflessness and tenderness, in that she worries less about her ‘good name’ than that of her partner’s. Shakespeare garners the audience’s sympathy for Lucrece’s suffering, no doubt, but also – more importantly – summons the question as to why his protagonist is so quick to deflect this suffering in favor of her husband. Lucrece’s lionhearted speech, therefore, invokes flaws in the hyper-masculine ideals of Shakespeare’s Rome, in that female victims of rape often internalize ‘reproach’ only as a means to protect their spouses. Additionally, Lucrece once again blurs the lines between public and private by stating she is fully aware that the consequences of her assault will most likely be up for ‘disputation’ amongst Roman society, and that this event goes far beyond her relationship to her husband.
In line with Lucrece’s illustrated responsibility to Collatine and his reputation, I argue that Shakespeare bestows upon Lucrece a medium through which she can express her justifiably inexpressible emotions. In Roman Shakespeare: Warriors, Wounds and Women, Coppélia Kahn offers a counter-reading to mine of Lucrece, in which the protagonist is given a rather clichéd “voice of a victim” (38). This voice, she insists, is rather muted and rooted purely in “patriarchal ideology” (Kahn 38) that cannot be separated from the origins of Tarquin’s act. Kahn corroborates her argument by additionally pointing to the passage where Lucrece alludes to Ovid’s Philomela, claiming that she likens herself not to the “weaving woman” facet of her character, but rather with the one that is “metamorphosed into the nightingale” (39). It is this identification, she argues, that reduces Lucrece to a figure of “concealment” (Kahn 39), one that is obliged to cower in internalized contempt. Moreover, Kahn continues, critics of Lucrece are misguided when they contend that Lucrece’s voice is “of its own”; Lucrece, in Kahn’s eyes, is therefore a woman who cannot help but to “affirm her inscription into patriarchy” (41). Given Kahn’s interpretation that the men in the poem eclipse Lucrece’s agency and thus silence her voice, there is room to argue that Lucrece’s reflection on the Trojan War painting is a means through which she can subtly stand up to patriarchal ideologies:
[I’ll] rail on Pyrrhus that hath done him wrong,
And with my tears quench Troy that burns so long,
And with my knife scratch out the angry eyes
Of all the Greeks that are thine enemies (Shakespeare 1466-1470).
In this passage, one can infer that Shakespeare allows Lucrece a certain rhetorical brawn that before could not be verbally exercised. This historical painting becomes a visual parallel to her struggle, and for the first time we see Lucrece using language in a way that intensifies her authority. For one, she personifies her ‘tears’ as having the power to ‘quench’ the flames of Troy, which both validates her emotional plight and suggests that she is – on some level – conscious of her agency. Shakespeare intimates that if physical manifestations of Lucrece’s sorrow can have influence over past events, then the verbal clarification of her assault can influence the future state of affairs. Shakespeare also thrusts Lucrece’s rage to the forefront as she aims to use her knife to inflict harm upon the ‘angry eyes’ that permeate the painting. Here, she projects her violent exasperation onto this inanimate object, which momentarily suspends her feelings of guilt as she equates Tarquin to the ‘enemies’ of Rome.
Shakespeare’s The Rape of Lucrece grants both a rapist and a victim of rape equal rhetorical capacity to flesh out their respective qualms in order to point out patriarchal deficits. He depicts Tarquin as a power-hungry force to be reckoned with, a ruthless vessel through which the patriarchy can be scrutinized and hence structurally invalidated. Shakespeare’s illustration of the heroine Lucrece, contrastingly, underlines her trauma and requests the audience to recognize her political agency within the claustrophobic field of Roman heterosexism. By underscoring constructed concepts of chastity, preconceived notions about Roman men and women, and Tarquin’s incentives for assaulting Lucrece, one can steer the already prevalent scholarly discussion into a new lane that challenges not only the abhorrent act of rape itself, but also the repressive pillars that keep gender-specific power dynamics in place.