Hero

Name: In the Greek myth she is a priestess of Aphrodite who loses her virginity to her lover, Leander, who then goes on to drown in the Hellespont that runs between their two hometowns while swimming over to meet her. Hero throws herself in after him in her grief, committing suicide.
Definition: A name given (as in Homer) to men of superhuman strength, courage, or ability, favoured by the gods; at a later time regarded as intermediate between gods and men, and immortal.

Hero’s name is not the only aspect of her characterization that intrigued me: like Olivia from Twelfth Night, she is wooed indirectly. Claudio immediately recognizes that he “loves” her, but doesn’t address her. First he speaks to Benedick about her, who wants to know if he would “buy her” (1.1.145) which initiates a language of trade and exchange when speaking of her. He then agrees to let Don Pedro speak to her and then to Leonato before he ever even says a word to her himself. His pursuit of her is calculated: he is interested in her dowry (“Hath Leonato any son, my lord?”) and when Don Pedro goes off with Hero, it is an “open secret” as to what they will be speaking. Throughout the first act, everyone has been speaking of her marriage to Claudio without ever consulting her, illustrating that she has no privacy. Her marriage is a fact before she has even consented to it. She also doesn’t have much of a voice. In 2.1 her attendants have more lines than she does (8:5). When Antonio specifically addresses her at 2.1.42, it is Beatrice who answers. The same happens at 2.1.57 and 2.1.271. Finally, Hero’s seeming powerlessness is exemplified when Claudio says “I give away myself for you and dote upon the exchange.” Again she is referred to in a language of trade. While Claudio gives himself to her directly, she had to do so through the older men. Perhaps her treatment thus far points to the way she will be humiliated (which is a word that is related to mortification and debasement => objectification) later on in the play?

It is clear, then, that the other characters within the play objectify her. Not only do they use her as an object of pleasure in and of herself (as Claudio’s wife-to-be) but she serves as a tool with which to gain pleasure by using her name in the trick they play on Benedick and Beatrice (thereby attributing a consent to her which she never gave.) Hero is not present in 2.3, yet it is her name that is repeated by Claudio and Don Pedro when they say that Beatrice is in love with Benedick: in an act of ethos they are appealing to her credibility. Her truthfulness is so unquestioned that Benedick says “They have the truth of this from Hero.” He believes them because they say Hero told them of it. This is an appeal to authority, which, unlike ethos, is a rhetorical fallacy. This, I think, is why he seems so ridiculous to me at the close of the second act. In fact, when he says “There’s a double meaning in that,” he reminds me of Malvolio reading the letter that Sir Toby and Maria left for him. (Note that Benedick also says “I’ll be revenged.”) While Malvolio was filling in his own desires for things that were only suggested, Benedick is fabricating desires where none exist. He is delusional.

But does the play objectify Hero? Does she rebel against the constraints placed upon her by her society? Her lack of speech suggests that she doesn’t, but I would actually argue that she does. She doesn’t approach societal restrictions with the same brassy, sarcastic verbosity as Beatrice, but she does resist it. For example, when Don Pedro asks her if she’ll help him in deceiving Beatrice she answers, “I will do any modest office, my lord, to help my cousin to a good husband.” She does not say yes outright: she dodges the question and never explicitly puts herself at his disposal, as Leonato and Claudio do. It’s a passive resistance, but one nonetheless. She is also an agent of clarity amid a tangle of “open secrets.” In the first act it is she who explains Beatrice’s speech, and when she whispers to Claudio she is claiming a sense of privacy that she had hitherto been denied.

Speaking of Don Pedro, is he really very different from Don John? They both manipulate the people around them. They even use the same language: at 1.3.54 Don John wants to know if his companions will “assist” him in his deception, and at 2.1.321 Don Pedro asks for “assistance” with his own trickery.

Addendum: In class we compared Don Pedro to Don John. By way of extension, we could also compare Borrachio to Claudio. We know that Borrachio is helping D.John because of money; in the same way Claudio may be helping D. Pedro because Pedro helped him "get" Hero. Both are working within structures of trade/exchange, which is supported by the language used to describe Hero.