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John Webster’s Duchess of Malfi: Noble in Birth and Life

In John Webster’s play The Duchess of Malfi, the Duchess shows an uncommon

strength of character and self-reliance, beginning with her decision to defy her brothers

and marry again, and culminating with her death. The Duchess displays a powerful

personal strength and a dominating will until the moment of her death at Bosola’s hands.

She displays her strength throughout her prolonged ordeal in a myriad of ways, beginning

by defying her brothers’ wishes for her not to remarry in the first place, and continuing

after her capture by Ferdinand, with her dignity throughout her torture and her death.

The Duchess demonstrates her unique determination by going against the

command of her brothers, the Cardinal and Ferdinand, that she never marry again. She

makes an immediate decision, knowing what she wants and what is right for her, and

ignoring what may be right for her brothers. This is the first indication of the powerful

will the Duchess displays throughout the play. Despite the intensity of the emotional and

political pressure her brothers subject her to, she is determined to achieve what she

desires most, marriage to Antonio: “If all my royal kindred/ Lay in my way unto this

marriage,/ I’d make them my low footsteps” (Webster 1441). She is determined to do

what she wants and face the consequences, whether it subverts the established order or

not —“So I through fights and threatenings will assay/ This dangerous venture (Webster

1441).” Her defiant insistence on following her own desires allows her to achieve what

she wants, Antonio. She shows a strength of will and character with her actions, because

to the reader, it seems that Ferdinand and the Cardinal have no real motive for their

request for the duchess not to marry. The Duchess insists on being acknowledged as the

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person and duchess she is, able to make decisions for herself and in her own best interest.

Her actions contrast with the prevailing ideas of how women should act in such a way

that Mary Beth Rose contends, “Her assertiveness in wooing Antonio has been

characterized as androgynous, an attempt to conjoin male and female modes (Rose 164).”

The Duchess’s actions as the play continues demonstrate the “radical potential of female

heroism in the process of cultural change (Rose 165).” Despite being looked down upon

as a lesser person as a woman and a widow, the Duchess purports herself with a dignity

that Ferdinand and the Cardinal, with their tyranny, can never accomplish. She refuses to

admit that her life is over due to her premature widowhood, and accept their idea that she

is supposed to remain alone for the rest of her life. She defies them, hoping they will

change, and hoping that things at her court will change for the better because of it.

No matter what happens to her, the Duchess believes in herself and the strength

she possesses—“I am armed ‘gainst misery” (Webster 1477). She knows the duties she

has as duchess, but even more importantly, she knows what she wants to accomplish in

her personal life, and she intends to let no one stand in her way. She proclaims to

Antonio, “This is flesh and blood, sir,;/'Tis ot the figure cut in alabaster/ Kneels at my

husband's tomb” (Webster 1444).

As Ferdinand tortures her, the Duchess again shows her uncommon inner

strength. Bosola presses her to admit she erred in disobeying her brothers, but she

refuses to succumb to this pressure. He tells Ferdinand that she displays “a behavior so

noble/ As gives a majesty to adversity” (Webster 1477). Lee Bliss writes of the Duchess,

“she refuses Bosola’s or her brothers’ right to judge or punish her. The Duchess does not

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simply defy Bosola. She challenges the assumptions on which he bases his taunts, forces

on him the dilemma of knowledge confounding knowledge” (Bliss 152). She explains to

him, “Man is most happy when one’s own actions/ Be arguments and examples of his

virtue” (Webster 1476), and she follows this creed in the play. It is this ability to fight for

what she believes in that helps Bosola, after her death, to realize that he has erred in

following her brothers’ orders, going against what is right or good in the process. She

asks him, “I prithee, who is greatest? Can you tell?” (Webster 1476), and he eventually

realizes that the person who allows their actions to carry out their beliefs is the “greatest.”

He realizes that her values were important enough to her to not only believe in but to

follow through and stand up for, and he admires this quality in her and realizes how

wrong he was to believe in the false pretenses under which he was following Ferdinand’s

orders. According to Travis Bogard, “Webster... surrounds her last moments with all the

horrors of hell. The purpose is to see if a force of pure, motiveless evil can shake her

fundamental integrity” (Bogard 67). Gunnar Boklund agrees that by “depriving the

Duchess first of her elevated social position, then of her liberty and the amenities of life

and now finally of her hope, Webster has methodically taken away all the exterior

supports on which she may conceivably have relied to fortify her endurance. From now

on she is all alone in a closed room, with nothing outside herself to aid her” (Boklund

113). The Duchess of Malfi proclaims, “Necessity makes me suffer constantly” (Webster

1482), but despite this, she does not give in to baser desires, such as hate or revenge, at

least outwardly. As they are being bombarded by a cacophony of noises, she goes so far

as to tell Cariola, “Nothing but noise and folly/ Can keep me in my right wits, whereas

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reason/ And silence make me stark mad” (Webster 1481). Even after she believes

Ferdinand has destroyed everything she loves, her husband and her children, she retains

her dignity, knowing her actions were right.

Finally, the Duchess accepts death with serenity and bears her unfortunate fate

with an inherent nobility. She proclaims, “I am Duchess of Malfi still” (Webster 1484),

and this reaffirmation of her position, even when faced with death, is the culmination of

the strength and resolve the Duchess has developed over time. Rather than choosing to

suffer and accept death, she reasserts her title as rightful ruler of Amalfi, demonstrating

how Ferdinand can kill her, but he can never change who she is, or what she has done.

She accepts herself and is unrepentant of her actions. Rather than accepting defeat, she

turns her death into a victory of her will over her tormentors. She is serene in the face of

death, not calmly accepting her fate but defiantly protesting, telling Bosola she is not

afraid of death. According to Lee Bliss, “In her final composure she transforms former

curses into forgiveness of her executioners, her wish for general chaos into concern for

Cariola and for her children. In the face of death she transcends self-absorption and

despair” (Bliss 155).

The Duchess, instead of pleading for her life, tells Cariola to take care of her

children—“I pray thee, look thou giv’st my little boy/ Some syrup for his cold, and let the

girl/ Say her prayers ere she sleep” (Webster 1485). Indeed, the Duchess’ unselfish pleas

for her children contrast with the desperate pleas of Cariola, who, when faced with death,

begs for mercy, reducing herself to a level below that of her captors. Faced with death,

the Duchess retains her innate integrity. In stark contrast, the Duchess defies her

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tormentors to try to kill her—“Pull, and pull strongly, for your able strength/ Must pull

down heaven upon me” (Webster 1486). Earlier, the Duchess had told Ferdinand, “know,

whether I am doomed to live or die,/ I can do both like a prince” (Webster 1464), and

when faced with her actual death, she shows that she can keep her sense of dignity even

under the most difficult of circumstances. Indeed, killed for a cause she believes in, with

her death the Duchess almost ascends to the level of a martyr, continuing to identify

herself and her family openly, with no shame or guilt. She clarifies why she defied her

brothers and married Antonio in the first place—if she is willing to die for her actions,

she certainly must believe that she did the right thing. She still identifies herself, at her

death, with the values she ascribed to in life. With the proclamation “I am Duchess of

Malfi still,” the Duchess of Malfi reclaims her identity, the identity she still holds even

after all her secrets have been revealed. With the suffering she has now endured as the

Duchess of Malfi, she has been able to achieve the peak of her strength, and she can stand

with dignity and a truly heroic stature, knowing that she never gave in to her brothers

with the weakness that was expected of her. In this moment, “she assumes… a posture of

true humility that denies the arrogance of ‘princes’ palaces’” (Bliss 155).

She is never called by name, but the Duchess of Webster’s Duchess of Malfi

nevertheless shows a resilience and strength of character unmatched by anyone else in the

play. Her courage, even when faced with death, is remarkable, and sets her apart from her

brothers, who have no values or reasons for what they do to her. The Duchess held fast to

her beliefs, and acted on them, and in the end she stood by them even under great

pressure. Her beliefs are reinforced with the integrity of her actions, and when she

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proclaims, “I am Duchess of Malfi still” (Webster 1484), she proves that she is not only

noble in birth, but noble in character—and that is a true accomplishment.