Woman and gender in renaissance tragedy : a study of King Lear, Othello, The Duchess of Malfi, and The Wite Devil

Part 1 The centrality of gender: feminism and tragedy - argument by antithesis, argument by analogy, the family, the family and the Church, cosmos; foregrounding gender and tragedy; feminism - genre and power. Part 2 Woman, tragedy and transgression: tragedy - the Renaissance concept of tragedy, transcendence versus transgression, woman and the tragic paradigm, decentring the tragic hero; the construction of woman through absence, silence and utterance; feminine endings or dead centres. Part 3 Gender differentiation in tragedy: the patriarchal imperative; exorcism and exile; misogyny and the misogynistic voice; ambition and lechery - desire and the malcontent; a monstrous desire; in praise of woman; masculinity and power - impuissance, potency.