The Wykehamist
Briseis remains concerned that some act by her has“ cheapened” her in the eyes of Achilles, denoting that she sees herself as an object of( possibly decreasing) value in the eyes of the Greeks, rather than a person in her own right. Since she is, admittedly, a slave as well as Achilles’ companion, this is perhaps excused as a cheapening of human life with no regards to gender, rather than a de-valuing of female worth. Yet since she also feels that she must swear to Achilles that
‘ the Mycenaean king has shared No couch with me’( Briseis to Achilles)
it is clear that it is her sexual activity and loyalty( in addition to her beauty) which decides her estimation: a condition which isn’ t as obviously held for other male slaves. Briseis’ decidedly passive attitude towards love appears to rely on a male-centric reliance on Achilles’ choice and her own monogamy: she isn’ t expected to provide agency or any value in their relationship or other than her attractiveness.
The concept of the male gaze and a woman’ s beauty being the defining feature in a relationship is not a new one in Early Modern Drama, nor one which can be attributed solely to Ovid’ s influence. Shakespeare’ s depictions of a woman’ s appearance being the catalyst for the love felt by her pursuer, such as the Duke’ s opening description of his devotion to Olivia:
‘ O, when mine eyes did see Olivia first, Methought she purg’ d the air of pestilence; That instant was I turn’ d into a hart, And my desires, like fell and cruel hounds, E’ er since pursue me. How now? what news from her?’( I. i. 20-24)
cannot be said to provide the foundations of a love worth having— Orsino, of course, eventually falls for Viola, whom he has got to know on a more personal level without the ordinary constrictions of her gender, having realised that he cannot truly love Olivia simply due to her stationary beauty viewed from a distance. Moreover, by comparing the Duke to a‘ hart’ being chased by‘ cruel hounds’, Shakespeare alludes to one of Ovid’ s most famous myths, that of Diana and Acteon, which often acts as“ a caveat against debauchery of all kinds … and interprets the hounds as Actaeon’ s own devouring desires”( Deats, 1980). Shakespeare, through the Duke’ s description, compares Olivia to the beautiful, yet vengeful, Diana, implying that women, even in their passive state of simply existing, act as dangerous traps for men who can become ensnared even when they themselves( or their eyes) are the active instigators of such an entrapment.
Furthermore, in Shakespeare’ s The Merchant of Venice, when describing mythological women who they perceive to be embodiments of devotion and love, Lorenzo and Jessica choose three women, two of whom suffer premature deaths due to their love: Thisbe and Dido. This could read as suggesting that both Shakespeare and Ovid considered a willingness to die to be the ultimate proof of true love. Broadly, this is shown in many of Shakespeare’ s tragedies; Romeo and Juliet shares clear links with Pyramus and Thisbe, while the tragedy of the deaths of
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