The Role of Virtue in Shakespeare's World

After our class discussion Tuesday, I found myself thinking about the role of virtue (virginity) in Shakespeare’s world at the time. After being asked the question of if we would sleep with someone in exchange for our sibling’s life being saved, I knew that most of us were secretely thinking, “Well, YEAH.” Most of us would do whatever it took. As immoral as it might seem, it is not enough of a hardship to prevent (most) of us from saving the life of someone we love dearly. However, it occurs to me that we are looking at the situation from a twenty-first century’s viewpoint. As I pointed out in class, Isabella was a novice nun. To have sex before marriage would be to prevent her from taking her vows and living the life that she wanted and had been envisioning for herself. Although I cannot understand the desire to be a nun, I can certainly sympathize with a woman who had one plan for the rest of her life and was suddenly faced with a situation that would prevent her from achieving all that she wanted in the world. Isabella’s situation is different from most women, in that having premarital sex would not just make her feel guilty, it would completely change the rest of her life. To ask Isabella to save Claudio’s life in this way also entails her giving up her life, in a sense.

Even with the knowledge that premarital sex could lead a person to be sentenced to death, I found myself still a little shocked at the way it impacts the lives of the characters. Isabella aside, Angelo’s entire plan for Claudio is overthrown by the fact that he has engaged in premarital sex as well. To punish Claudio would be to make Angelo a hypocrite or to make him susceptible to the same punishment that he issued to Claudio, aka death. Angelo even acknowledges that he will have to let Claudio go, and does so without a fight. I also found it noteworthy that after it is agreed upon that Claudio will not be sentenced to death for premarital sex, the standard is set that the punishment for the crime will be to have to marry the person who you impregnated. Angelo is sentenced to marry Mariana by the Duke, after he confesses his crime. The Duke also sentences Lucio to marry the woman he supposedly impregnanted. The fact that the next most horrible punishment next to death is to have to marry the woman is very comical, and I wonder if Shakespeare’s audience at the time would have been amused by this parallel and seen how silly it is to judge a person for premarital sex, or if they would not have even made the connection.