Rebels in Marriage—A Case Study of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and The Duchess of Malfi

Based on the customs of making matches in the renaissance, this paper intends to demonstrate social restrictions imposed on women when choosing partners. Through textual analysis of Hermia’s escapement from an enforced marriage in A Midsummer Night’s Dream and the duchess’s clandestine marriage in The Duchess of Malfi, more detailed explanations would be given to elucidate how those restrictions were put on women, how women reacted to them, and finally what were the consequences of their reactions. The paper will conclude that both Shakespeare and Webster, by creating progressive women carried with them a rebellious consciousness, calculated to laud the courage of women characters while also to lambaste the suffocating patriarchal society.

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