Women and Men in Aphra Behn's "The Rover"

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Women and Men in Aphra Behn's "The Rover" Act one of the rover opens with two scenes which indicate that men and women occupy very different spheres. Compare and contrast the men and women in Act 1 scene1 and Act 1 scene 2. Aphra Behn sets the first scene of her play within a chamber in order to introduce a domestic sphere, allowing the audience to gain direct information about the characters and their inner views and ideas as they are hidden from the outside world. Consequently Behn is able to communicate to the audience the difficulties of a patriarchal society, this is portrayed by Helena and Florinda’s behaviour towards their brother, Pedro, who although maintains status due to his gender and possesses power over his sisters, he is challenged and opposed by Helena, which becomes clear through her use of language in addition to her actions and behaviour in scene 2. We are instantly provided with the differences between men and women within society; where Pedro views the purpose of marriage to gain status and the importance of marrying a well known man, Florinda challenges his opinion as she is in love with Belvile and therefore desires to follow her heart and remain faithful to him, regardless of his background and place in society. Nevertheless, society empowers Pedro due to his gender therefore allowing him to maintain authority over his sisters, which is explicit by the force Florinda is exposed to, ensuring she is to marry Don Antonio, in which Pedro declares she ‘must do tomorrow’, evidently we recognise the control and authority a man embodies due to his place in society. The women in the play as demonstrated by Helena and Florinda are not only discontented with the decisions made for the... ... middle of paper ... ...idently she has trapped him as she states ‘if I understand my trade he’s mine’, thus although she is a prostitute she has power over him as he thirsts to make love to her. Similarly Angelica Bianca is said to be in town, she possesses a lot of power over all men due to her beauty, Frederick states ‘’tis pretty to see how much love men regard her’, however, whether or not this is to be referred to as power can be argued, as men exploit her to receive sexual satisfaction, nevertheless the fact that they pay for her can be interpreted that she does have power over them due to the idea that she is gaining money from them. Furthermore, throughout this scene we are enlightened that Helena has conducted a sexual act with Willmore, thereby emphasising that she possesses power as she has gone against her family and her society as she is to be transformed to a nun.

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