Measure for Measure: The Duke's Surveillance

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In Measure for Measure, the Duke’s unexplained need to more strictly enforce the law and provide more intimate surveillance is the main cause of tension within the play. Without the Duke’s departure, Claudio wouldn’t have been sentenced to death, Isabella wouldn’t have had to defend her virtue, Angelo would not have been tempted or tricked into marriage, and in the end the Duke wouldn’t have any mess to clean up, regardless of how big the mess was. Shakespeare uses Juliet’s attitude and behavior towards the friar’s [Duke] questioning to prove that extra surveillance is unnecessary.
In the beginning the Duke’s action to pose as a friar and provide extra surveillance of the law in Vienna may seem necessary with streets full of unemployed soldiers and diseased prostitutes running a muck. The main reason the Duke takes to the streets is because he is afraid that people are no longer in love with the law, but fear only the consequences of breaking the law, and therefore are succumbing to their innate sexual desires and attempting to hide their sins against the state. The Duke tells Juliet “lest you do repent/ as that the sin hath brought you to this shame/which sorrow is always toward ourselves, not heaven” (2.3.31-32), worrying that she is only repenting due to the shame it has evidentially brought upon her, claiming that such an act would show “we do not spare heaven as we love it, / but as we stand in fear” (2.3.35-36). The Duke claims here that her repentance is out of fear of judgment and humanity does not strive to be virtuous because they love the holy doctrine, but because they are afraid of the eternal consequences. Here the Duke talks of “spare” (cite here) as illegality against heaven, and “fear” (cite here) as the consequen...

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...eve that Juliet would suddenly change her tone from honesty to sarcasm. In this context, “because” is more likely as she genuinely seems to understand her illegality and willingly accepts the consequences it entails. Her response to the problem the Duke is so worried about in this scene; particularly that Juliet only conducts herself according to the law out of her fear for it, or possibly doesn’t follow it at all, is actually nonexistent and therefore makes his surveillance unnecessary. In turn, if his surveillance is unnecessary, then the tension that his leave of absence from ruling caused could have ultimately been avoided if the Duke had come up with other means to survey his people.

Works Cited

Shakespeare, William, and S. Nagarajan. Measure for Measure: With New and Updated Critical Essays and a Revised Bibliography. New York: Signet Classic, 1998. Print.

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