"Bettering" the Generic Domain of The Winter's Tale
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 12357706 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Barbara L Estrin (corresponding author) |
| Year | 2008 |
| Volume | 20 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 283-313 |
| Publication date | 2008-07-01 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Exemplaria (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1041-2573 • E-ISSN: 1753-3074 |
| Publisher | Routledge (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1179/175330708x334547 |
| OpenAlex | W2015433566 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 17 |
Following Luce Irigaray's concept of "mutual engenderment" and the advocacy of "recognition" as a "petition for the future" in Judith Butler's Precarious Life, I offer a reading of the lost-child myth that generically structures Shakespeare's Winter's Tale. Because they mutually engender themselves to situate the present as an unrealized past that then defines the future of generational space, Florizel and Perdita preempt the status quo ante concomitant to Hermione's triumph. In suggesting that her language reiterates patriarchal values without changing them, I argue that for Hermione, as for Leontes, Perdita exists only as the compound "issue," both the dénouement of her parents' story and the destiny of her father's court, outcomes reflecting a belief in the "old tale[s]" (5.2.28, 5.2.62) that are part of the construct Florizel and Perdita challenge as they bypass the dynastic imperative to generic foundling stories and that Shakespeare himself undercuts when he renders Hermione more like Leontes than critics have hitherto acknowledged. The young lovers' achievement in act 4—an expansion of the realm of sexual love to include a nurturing function that connects sexual difference and language—renders the fourth-act discoveries more important than the fifth-act recoveries
Aesthetics · Art · Destiny (ISS module · Linguistics · Literature · Mythology · Political science · Reading (process · Realm · Sociology · Status quo · Engineering · History · Irish and British Studies · Law · Philosophy · Psychology
| Highly cited | No |
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