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Aemilia Lanyer’s poem, Eve’s Apology in Defense of Women, offers a subversive defense of womyn. The defense that Lanyer offers is complete because it penetrates the idea that Man is all knowing simply because he is the chosen vessel through which God chooses to speak. Lanyer’s poem when interpreted in relation to John Milton’s Paradise Lost equated Adam, God, Eve, and Satan. If God already knew that Eve would fall why would he speak to Eve through Adam? If Adam is God speaking to mankind and if Adam has control over Eve and is supposed to guide her to what is right, God directed mankind straight into sin. Satan did not send Eve into the trap, God did, God who fights nothing because he is so powerful. Lanyer’s poem states that “But surely Adam cannot be excused: Her fault, though great, yet he was to blame” (33-34).Adam was the one speaking directly to God, who deemed man morally and intellectually stronger than womyn and all other creatures on earth. The gifts taken by the morally and intellectually weaker creature (womyn) on earth are in fact the very things that make the greatness that is mankind. Knowledge, creativity, and passion are the very essence of mankind. Eve, the disobedient, ignorant, beautiful creature made from Adam ate the apple first, receiving the gifts destined to make mankind great.

In Book four of John Milton’s Paradise Lost Satan’s image is weakened by sneaking in to the Garden of Eden as opposed to spreading his wings and showing his power to God. The Satan subversively undercuts the power of God just as Aemilia Lanyer subversively undercuts the power of man over womyn. If man is truly the head of womyn then Eve would not have eaten the Apple. There really is no fall of Man if it was predestined by God. Eve did not commit a sin the entire charade of mankind is merely entertainment for God. Mankind greeted his full potential when Eve bit into the Apple and received knowledge. God gave man free-will but the only way that free-will can be fully exercised is if a wide range of experience and knowledge are its closest companions. Humans even realize this fact of humanity and restrict themselves using the legal system.

In Book 3, Canto 6 Stanzas 11-25 of Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene Diana and Venus are characterized in very different ways. Venus and Diana are twins therefore they are mirrored, if one possess a trait then the other must possess the opposite trait. This follows the theme of doubles that is found throughout Spenser’s The Faerie Queene. Venus possesses typically feminine traits and the opposing Diana possesses typically masculine traits. Venus is described as faire, gentle, and seeking. Her quest to find Cupid, her child, is a noble mother’s duty. The words used to describe Diana and her actions are haunts, scorne, and wanton. Diana is portrayed as unforgiving and unsympathetic to her own sister’s grief-stricken plea to find her son. Diana states “Faire sister, ill beseemes it to upbraid A doleful heart with so disdainfull pride; The like that mine, may be your paine another tide” (lines 187-9). Venus is characterized in a very positive way that evokes human emotions of lust and sympathy. Diana is portrayed as a harsh character that appears out of the wilderness in a beastly manner. The opposing images created serve to characterize what each goddess represents. Venus is the God of marital love, she is emotional, beautiful, and sexual, Venus is what women are expected to be in marriage. Diana is the goddess of virginity and of unmarried women. She is characterized as harsh, impassionate, and unloving. Women who have not been in love or physically expressed love are epitomized by Diana’s demeanor. Diana is self-serving which directly opposes Venus who is the goddess of marriage which is never self-serving. They are both mothers, Venus is the mother of marital chastity. Belphoebe represents the kind of love only found between two married people, intimacy magnified because it is shared, without holds between two people within the confines of marriage.

    In Elizabeth Cary’s, The Tragedy of Mariam, Act IV ends with a condemnation of Mariam as she has just walked to her death without a mention of Herod’s radical behavior. The chorus condemns Mariam because she was inactive through out the play. She did not stand up for her family as Herod’s animalistic rage drove him to murder numerous people. Mariam did not use her position of power to initiate change in the kingdom; to expel the power hungry family that occupied the throne. Throughout the story Salome and Herod enacted their will upon whomever they wished and killed at least four people for their personal gain yet the chorus does not criticize them as they do Mariam.

            Mariam did not act on allegiance to her family or to her husband, this only leaves one option of who she was acting for, herself. Line 31 states “Had Mariam scorned to leave a due unpaid, she would to Herod then have paid her love. (Cary 627)” Mariam is a very selfish character, who held her love and opinions to herself, away from the world and especially her husband. Mariam is a selfish character who let her beauty speak for her instead of speaking for herself. Mariam’s beauty is the only aspect of her that Herod really saw when he looked at her. Women were not supposed to disobey their husbands but Mariam did not directly disobey her husband but she did not surrender herself to him. Mariam knows what he did to her family and resents and fears him due to his temper and need for power and control. Mariam kept her true self away from Herod, driving him to kill her. Mariam was the only conquest that Herod truly lost and at his own hand, therefore he suffered the most in the end.

            Herod is not criticized throughout the tragedy because everyone is afraid of him. Herod only deals in terms of violence. The public and the people surrounding Herod would have been too scared of him to dare scorn him, he kills two men to gain control of a kingdom and his wife to gain control over her. This plot point is reminiscent of Robert Browning’s poem The Last Duchess. The kings can only control their queens fully in death. In The Tragedy of Miriam Elizabeth Cary wrote the characters in a way that their actions would define the plot instead of the plot defining the characters actions.

In Shakespearean and Italian sonnets love is being articulated in a refined, artistic way. Through these sonnets the English language was molded into an artistic form. The subject matter is love, but a new kind of love. This expression of love is different from courtly love. The subject matter and the language are new to the British Isles along with the form of the writing. The love that is the subject matter of the sonnets is not the traditional, courtly love but a more realistic and human love. Sonnets, as unfamiliar as they were as a literary form exemplified the progression of humanity.

Imagery, rhyme schemes, and structure are developed and exemplified in sonnets. Sonnets are the artistic representation of human society developing, setting these writers apart from the society existed 1000 years before when Beowulf was being told in the mead hall. The luxurious language used in the English language and to the British Isles.

Gender roles are also being challenged in the subject matter of sonnets. Men, the authors of the love sonnets, are feminized by desiring beings that they do not have and are often unattainable.

The concept of love outside of courtly boundaries is the subject of sonnets. The love found in sonnets is uncontrollable, unpreventable and closely related to the love of God. As societies and organized systems of living and communicating developed these people’s ideas about love developed. Sonnets exemplify the evolution of mankind from uncivilized creatures. Sonnets exemplify the creation of society and culture. The idea of love for another human creature is being concretely demonstrated in sonnets.

The Wife of Bath is a woman who understands relationships. After five marriages she has learned that balance of power is the most important element in a successful relationship. The Wife of Bath exposes the overt power that men have over women in material ways and even more basically in the options that they are offered compared to women of the day. The Wife of Bath exposes the sick tradition of women only serving men’s sexual needs and never fulfilling their own. Chaucer’s hidden agenda is hypothesized to be breaking down the barriers that exist in the hierarchy of society; with the Wife of Bath Chaucer seems to also be challenging gender barriers.

The Wife of Bath asserts that women have power in their relationships but admits that she did not use the power that she possessed. Once the Wife of Bath exerted her power with her fifth husband they had a happy, equal marriage after she put him in his place. Despite her understanding of relationships the Wife of Bath manipulates men by lying to them, taking allies, and using sex as control. In her prologue the Wife of Bath brags of the power she has had over her husbands to subvert their power and get her way. The WIfe of Bath also blows apart the meek and mild stereotype when she openly admits to being a lusty woman and having sexual desires. Women are traditionally only sexual if men make them sexual- fairy tales are a prime example.

The Wife of Bath is a dynamic character who is well traveled and had had a wide range of experiences in her life. This description is rarely used to describe a female character. She is intelligent and even portrayed by Chaucer as being more intellectually able than the male characters in the story. The Wife of Bath’s prologue is extremely long to indicate that her life and experiences are more substantial and offer more to the reader than the other, male, characters’. The prologue also offers more analytical leverage as the tale is being told.

Grendel’s Dam is the first madwoman of English Literature. Grendel’s Dam does not fit into the role that women in the Germanic war-like society were expected to fill. Women were portrayed as submissive, martyr-like creatures that lived to serve others; namely their sons and husbands. Women’s lives were filled with sacrifice and they had no control over their own lives or the lives of their children. Their daughters were used as human bargaining chips and their sons as fighting machines whose lives were often lost in vain. Wealhteow, Freawary, and Queen Modthryth are considered life- givers as they pass around beverages and give birth while Grendel’s Dam is considered a life- taker as she sheds blood while seeking revenge for her son’s murder. Grendel’s Dam breaks the mould cast for women and not only takes control over her own life and her child’s but breaks tradition by not agreeing with decisions made and actions taken by men.

Beowulf and Grendel’s Dam possess many similar qualities. They are both strong, independent characters that want to protect their families, in one case a tribe and in the other a child. The main difference between these characters is gender. This new role of protector taken on by a female character suggests that by not being obedient Grendel’s Dam is not in God’s glory while Beowulf fulfills his duty as protector placing him in God’s glory which is no coincidence considering a Christian scribe is the ultimate narrator of this legendary tale.

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