What Leads To Ferdinand Quotes Analysis

This concept of control and omnipotence is what leads to Ferdinand and the Cardinal seeking to control the Duchess, their Eve. According to the Daily Walk Bible (NIV), God only gives Adam one specific edict to follow. He tells Adam, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die” (Gen. 2.16-17). This command is then passed along from Adam to Eve after she is created. The crux of story happens when Eve encounters the snake in the garden. The snake convinces Eve to eat the fruit from the forbidden tree, and she then offers it to Adam who eats it. They become aware of of their nakedness and hide from God. When God finds out, he asks them who told them they were naked, and “The man said, ‘The woman you put here with me

- she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it” (Gen.3.12). According to the myth, God says to Eve “What is this you have done?” and the blame is sufficiently transferred from the man to the woman. In the myth, both woman and man is punished; however, Eve’s punishment, in addition to having painful childbirth, is to be ruled by her husband.
When examining the brother’s need to play God in their sister’s life, the complex becomes more apparent. For Ferdinand and the Cardinal, the Duchess becomes their Eve. She is their innocent, chaste sister that has free reign in her own Eden. She is free to conduct herself as she pleases, but her brothers give her one edict, like God gave Adam and Eve in the garden: Do not get married. To be specific, the brothers do not want her to marry any man that they have not hand chosen for her. Many critics have discussed the Duchess position as an unmarried woman. (INSERT CRITICS HERE) Any other man would be a forbidden tree for the Duchess. While the brother’s also specify that she should not be loose and have sex, they explicitly tell her not to get married because they cannot fully conceive of their sister having sex outside of marriage. However, soon after Ferdinand and the Cardinal leave, the Duchess meets with Antonio, and the Duchess offers him her wedding ring. This scene is very symbolic, because it is one of two scenes where the Duchess can be seen offering Antonio forbidden fruit. After Antonio gives his speech about the importance of having children, the Duchess responds:
Duchess: Fie, fie, what’s all this?
One of your eyes is bloodshot; use my ring to’t,
They say ‘tis very sovereign; ‘twas my wedding ring,
And I did vow never to part with it,
But to my second husband. (I.i.394-397)
By offering Antonio her ring, she explicitly states that she will only part with this ring to her second husband, and when Antonio accepts it, he accepts her proposal of marriage, and the metaphorical forbidden fruit just as Adam did in the creation tale.
Following this metaphorical offering, the Duchess later offers Antonio literal fruit. In act one, Ferdinand employs Bosola to be his intelligencer. In order to ensure that Bosola will perform the duties for him, Ferdinand arranges for Bosola to work as the provisorship of her horse, neatly ensuring that Bosola would feel indebted to him. Jones says that tatics like this stem from the fear of castrion. Jones explains that “the idea of castration always plays with our type a part of quite special importance, both in the form of castration-wishes against the father (authorities) and of fear of castration (talion) on the part of the younger generation. The later is more pronounced of the two, and naturally leads to a fear and jealous of younger rivals, this being in some cases remarkably intense” (261). According to the article, this characteristic leads to a seemingly contradictory trait which is their “desire to protect,” which entails “acting as a patron or guardian, and so on. All this, however, happens only under the strict condition that the person to be protected acknowledges his helpless position and appeals to them as the weak to the strong” (262). While these two may seem contradictory, it functions to help the afflicted male maintain the feeling that he is more powerful than those that he controls. The reader may not know whether or not Bosola is younger than Ferdinand, but Bosola is considered a great soldier. Also, Bosola is not awed by Ferdinand or the Cardinal, therefore not susceptible to bend Ferdinand’s authority without cause. Ferdinand therefore may feel as though his power has been castrated, and as a result he creates a situation where he acts as a patron to Bosola, and provides him with work, as long as he submits to his terms.
When Bosola realizes what Ferdinand has done, Bosola frequently refers o him as a devil, saying “take your devils, which hell calls angels. These cursed gifts would make/ You a corrupter, me an impudent traitor,/ And should I take these they’d take me to hell” (I.i.255-257). Stuck between ungrateful, and a traitor, Bosola takes the job. While working as Ferdinand’s intelligencer, he notices how the Duchess:
Is sick o’ days, she pukes, her stomach seethes,
The fins of her eyes look most teeming blue,
She wanes i’th’ cheek, and waxes fat i’th’ flank;
And, contrary to our Italian fashion,
Wears a loose-bodies gown; there’s somewhat in’t. (II.i.60-64).
Suspecting that the Duchess is pregnant, he devises a plan to offer her an apricot. This scene mimics that snake encouraging Eve to eat the forbidden fruit. After the Duchess tastes the fruit, Bosola tells her he wishes she would have pared the fruit because it was grown out of horse dung. No believing him, the Duchess replies that he is joking and says to Antonio, “ You shall judge; pray taste one” (II.i.133). However, Antonio rejects the fruit. While he doe accept the marriage that the Duchess offers him, the metaphorical fruit, he rejects the literal fruit, which leads Bosola to figure out that the Duchess is pregnant.
When Ferdinand learns that the Duchess has had a child, he does not know that she is also married, and he flies into a rage.

He immediately judges his sister to be a “notorious strumpet” (II.v.3). In Ferdinand’s mind, she has broken the edict of his garden, though her body and her land belong to her, and he says that he has “to purge infected blood, such blood as hers” (II.v.26). This is another instance of Ferdinand’s God complex. In relation to judging, Jones states that “it is a double one, consisting of an alternation of extreme tolerance and extreme intolerance. The question of which of the two is shown seems to depend on whether the infringement to be judge is of their own will or merely of that of other people. In the former case no punishment is too harsh for the offender...in the second case, on the other hand, they are always in favour of the greatest leniency and broad- minded tolerance” (260). Ferdinand believes that his sister has violated his direct authority, so he issues the harshest sentence that he can impose, death. Ferdinand decides to become a law within himself, and in his mind, he plays judge, jury, and

executioner.
Two years and two children later, Ferdinand finally decides to confront the Duchess. When he arrives to her court, the Duchess does not know that he knows that she has children, and she continues to pretend that she is not married. This mimics Adam and Eve hiding from God after they have eaten the fruit. They attempted to hide their sin, though God is all omniscient and omnipotent. By continuing to pretend to defer to her brother out of respect, the Duchess is unknowingly fueling Ferdinand’s delusion that he is a God, and unwittingly help him sink deeper into his madness. This scene comes to its climax when Ferdinand enters the Duchess’s bedroom and hears her telling Antonio, who has hidden himself as a joke, that her brothers may catch him in her room sleeping, and that “[he] shall get no more children till [her] / consent to be [his] gossips” (III.ii.67-68). When she turns and notices that Ferdinand is behind her with a poniard, she immediately recognizes her brother may have murderous intent, and she informs him that she will accept whatever the outcome is with dignity. Ferdinand replies “ Die then, quickly./ Virtue, where art thou hid? What hideous thing/ Is it that doth eclipse thee?” (III.ii.71-72). This line is reminiscent of God’s calling to Adam and Eve in the garden.
This deviation from the creation myth illustrates reveals the difference between Adam and Eve and the Duchess and Antonio. Adam and Eve disobeyed God, the higher power that created them. the Duchess disobeyed her brother, who is human. While God does wield absolute power, Ferdinand does not, yet he has attempted to perform this role in his sister’s life. While the patriarchal system does imbue him with some power as a duke, he is not all power because he is a human. In reality, the Duke does not have the power to control his sister’s will, nor the authority to pass down dictates.