Lila Shelley

English 4784

Prof K Cleland

November 21, 2019

Final Maids: Slasher Theory and Renaissance Revenge Tragedy

Slasher films and Renaissance revenge tragedies fill similar niches in the storytelling of their time, in both content and audience. Both of these genres fixate on blood, taboo, deception, death, and on secure, upper-class settings being torn apart in a violent spree (Gill 19–20; Willis 40). In audience, both had either mostly or entirely male viewers when first performed or shown in a theatre. And despite these audiences of men, both of these genres often feature heroines. These similarities, while somewhat superficial, reveal much about the aesthetic of these genres. Horror film theorist Carol J.

Clover describes horror as one of the two sensation or “body” genres, alongside pornography, and she argues that while pornography has to do with the act of sex, horror is about gender (Clover, “Her Body, Himself” 186). This perspective allows us to examine sensational work within the framework of gender and feminist theory.

Horror aims to create sensations in the audience, and it accomplishes this through externalizing societal anxieties, particularly through fixating on women, especially well-off or privileged women, in distress (Loh 325; Clover, Men, Women, and

Chain Saws 35). Violence against women, or the idea of a damsel in distress, features prominently in early modern revenges as it does in slasher horror films, particularly in

Titus Andronicus with the rape and mutilation of Lavinia. The audience identifies with the victim, and as they relate more to her, they feel her distress as their own, and how

1 much pain an audience feel as a part of viewing a sensational work, the better they regard that work, a phenomenon described as strong ambivalence (Strohl 203).

Clover coined the term for “Her Body” in order to discuss a component of the formula for the slasher genre, and she expanded on the importance of gender in horror further in her book Men, Women, and Chain Saws. The Final Girl story adds a hero arc to a character that would otherwise be a victim and thus restores or enhances their agency as women within the narrative. Given this context, I will use the lens of slasher films’ Final Girl theory in looking at the narratives of Aspatia of The Maid’s

Tragedy and Bel-imperia of The Spanish Tragedy, which both include victimized women who achieve their desired result in their story endings, to argue that these characters are Final Girls of the early modern revenge tragedy.

Final Girl theory, as the basis of this analysis, requires some explanation. The

Final Girl is the protagonist of the . She is the lone survivor at the end of the movie. Clover, when creating the term, introduces the concept as “abject terror personified. […] She alone looks death in the face; but she alone also finds the strength either to stay the killer long enough to be rescued … or to kill him herself” (Clover, “Her

Body” 203). The Final Girl is always a woman or teenaged girl, but in Clover’s terms, she is not feminine by the end of the narrative and has become both masculine and feminine. Femininity in horror is a performance and state of mind, one associated with victimhood and passivity as compared to the masculine performance of strength and activity (Wester 317; Clover, Chain Saws 22). Clover argues that the key to the Final

Girl’s survival is her willingness to cross from the performance of femininity to one of masculinity.

2 Additionally, the Final Girl’s femininity is not threatening to a masculine audience. She, at least in appearance, fits the conservative moral attitudes of how women should behave, and she is almost always a virgin in films from before the 1990s.

She remains fully clothed and does not do drugs or drink. In short, she starts the story more on the side of being the damsel who will fall into distress, and she is often contrasted with other women or teenaged girls displayed as promiscuous who are murdered early on (Clover, Chain Saws 34). The Final Girl discovers the bodies of her friends, and that trauma and knowledge of her own peril is what begins her transition out of moral norms of femininity into what Clover deems masculinity.

I will look at two examples of Final Girls, Laurie Strode from (1978) and Sidney Prescott from , to illustrate how this theory applies in both Ending

“A” and Ending “B” situations.

Clover notes that Laurie Strode codified the Final Girl tropes for other movies.

Her arc is one of victim as hero, or victim-hero, which combines the feminine aspects of her character with the masculine violence of the story. Before her friends are killed, she is already on alert. She has seen the killer, Michael Myers, watching her throughout thee neighborhood, and her watchful paranoia characterizes her as more careful and focused than her friends, who are characterized as carefree and sexually active without much more detail. All three of the young women who are murdered in the movie die while not fully clothed, and in each case, their carefree sexuality is presented as the reason they don’t notice Michael Myers ready to strike. In the case of Lynda, she is strangled by a phone cord while calling Laurie for help, and Laurie assumes, based on the moans

Lynda makes while gasping for air, that Lynda has called her during sex. It is only later

3 that she realizes what she bore witness to, as she finds her friends bodies. She is thus the only target in the film who is aware of her situation, and that is what triggers her to go from her feminine role to a survivor.

She flees, with Myers in pursuit, and through her smarts, she eludes him, running, hiding, and breaking through glass windows to escape him. It is only when cornered in a closet that she strikes back violently, with a clothing hanger, and then

Myers’ own knife. This violence is displayed as masculine, and the camera shifts to her perspective to illustrate as such. Laurie does not kill Michael Meyers, nor does she take him out. Dr. Loomis rushes to the rescue, shooting Myers until he crashes out the window to the ground below. This ending is what Clover describes as Ending “A” for

Final Girls, as Laurie did not take herself out of distress but held on long enough for a man to rescue her.

Sidney Prescott of the Scream (1996) film, however, fits the Ending “B” storyline, as she kills both of the slasher villains herself and does not need to be rescued. She survives, covered in blood, but she survives. In a departure from earlier slasher films, she is not the last person standing. Also, she has sex in the movie, with one of the killers, her boyfriend Billy Loomis. However, this is still painted as sinful in the story, and Billy

Loomis tells her that because they had sex, she has to die. Scream relies heavily on parody of slasher film moral rules, so this is not itself shocking. The first scene of the movie follows the murder of Casey Becker, who has invited her boyfriend over while her parents aren’t home. Billy Loomis also killed Sidney Prescott’s mother because her affair with his father led to his own mother leaving him, illustrating that the motivation for his murderous revenge originates in women’s sexuality.

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An interesting part of her character is how she begins the film much more aggressive and fitting Clover’s idea of masculine action than Laurie’s version of the Final

Girl. Before the film starts, her mother died violently, and so Sidney begins the story already coping with trauma. The death of her friend Casey also keeps her wary. The reporter keeps trying to get specific soundbites from her, and Sidney responds rudely each time rather than acquiescing. When she receives the first anonymous call from , she mocks him over the line, challenging him by opening her front door and daring him to attack her. This directly contrasts the death of

Casey, who upon receiving the threatening call, anxiously double checks locks and grows terrified and hunted. Sidney starts off already with a sense of her agency and power.

As the Ghostface incidents escalate, she suspects her boyfriend is responsible, and she reports him to the police. The police eventually clear him after another

Ghostface call comes in from Billy’s partner, Stu, and he and Sidney tentatively reconcile though she remains wary. When Officer Dewey is stabbed and drops his gun, Sidney takes it with her. He proves her suspicions right in the finale, where he and his friend

Stu Macher reveal that they were the Ghostface killers the whole time. Sidney waits for a moment of surprise when Gale Weathers bursts into the scene, and she takes control of the situation. She defends herself against Stu Macher by pushing a TV, that is playing the movie Halloween, on his head, and she shoots Billy Loomis in the head, making sure he’s dead.

The Final Girl narrative adds a heroic arc to slasher films which otherwise just depict as extended scenes of women as victims to violence. I believe there is a

5 misogynist aesthetic in how these films depict women. There is, broadly speaking, more screen-time in slasher films devoted to the suffering of female victims than there is to that of male victims, to the point where many male victims are killed offscreen (Clover,

Chain Saws 35). There is a sense of feminist empowerment in how these Final Girls, the

Laurie Strodes and the Sidney Prescotts, subvert the societal expectations that their femininity makes them victims by nature. They fight back, from punching and kicking to killing. They put the security of their own bodies above that of their attacker, and thus they become the hero of the story in conjunction with their victimhood.

Much like Laurie Strode in her story, Aspatia does not begin The Maid’s Tragedy particularly aggressive. She is the sweet fiancée of Amintor. When Melantius hears that

Amintor is getting married, he congratulates Aspatia upon seeing her. Aspatia takes the comment as an insult and rebukes him, though she is more stricken with grief at her own situation. Her “longing” for “marriage joys” (II.i.90-1) adds a dimension of her sexuality into the story. Her proper role as an early modern maiden would be for her to quietly accept that her betrothed is marrying another woman instead of her. Adding this anger to her character creates a more human reaction to such a betrayal, and it inspires her transition out of feminine conformity.

Amintor’s rejection of her by accepting the marriage with Evadne is what begins her break from the gender norms. As her grief turns to planning, she laments to her handmaidens, “This is the last time you shall look on me: / Ladies farewel; / […] /Write on my brow my fortune, let my bier / Be borne by virgins that shall sing by course /The truth of maids and perjuries of men” (II.i.99-107). Here, her desire for Amintor both sexually and romantically has been rejected, and she wishes for death. This establishes

6 her victimhood within the narrative, and Aspatia finds her agency in chasing her death.

This agency continues a few lines later, as she insists that Amintor give her a kiss goodbye, saying, “Ile trouble you no more, yet I will take / A parting kisse, and will not be denied” (II.i.115-116). It is a forward move for her to make, but her conformity to her societal expectations was not enough to keep Amintor faithful to her. Rather than remain demure and chaste, she demands a token of physical affection before leaving.

In Aspatia’s return, she has fully broken out of her gendered expectation by cross- dressing as her brother. She cannot challenge Amintor to a fight while in a feminine role, so she must cross into masculinity. She introduces herself as “ the brother to the wrong’d Aspatia” (V.iii.42), addressing her victimhood even as she takes agency in the narrative. She continues, speaking more aggressively with Amintor than she dared while in a feminine role, addressing “the baseness of the injuries” (V.iii.58) that Amintor dealt on her. When even this is not enough to get Amintor to agree to a fight, she tells him he is a deceitful and treacherous man, “to be kickt” (V.iii.95), and finally crossing into physicality by kicking him. She continues, mocking him “Thus to be kickt!” (V.iii.96), before, in an aside, incredulously wondering why Amintor is taking so long “in giving me my death?” (V.iii.97). Rather than wait around for her death, she demands that the man responsible for her situation end it.

While it results in her dying, this is a display of agency in her narrative, as her story ended exactly as she wanted it. She remarks, “I have got enough, /And my desire; / there's no place so fit for me to die as here” (V.iii.105-107). This alone is the ending she wanted, but when Amintor discovers her identity, he expresses his love for her, saying

“Alas! / all that I am's not worth a hair from thee” (V.iii.219-20). The two reconcile, and

7 she dies with all her desires achieved. Amintor kills himself shortly after, as does

Evadne.

The deaths of Evadne and Amintor are directly due to Aspatia’s, which establishes that this tragedy is hers, and that she is the character referenced by the singular “Maid” in the Maid’s Tragedy. I contend that this makes her the hero of the story, as the tragedy is what befalls Aspatia, despite her limited presence in the play. I compare this to an Ending “A” in Final Girl theory as she does not act with killing intent, and she ends up relying on a man to be fully masculine. While it is violence directed at herself, the agency she finds as the story progresses mirrors that of Laurie Strode.

Interpreting Aspatia as a Final Girl adds new ways of analyzing her cross- dressing in the final act. She cannot accomplish her goals while remaining within the feminine genderde roles, as Amintor would not fight her if he knew her identity. It is her willingness to cross into masculinity in both clothing and actions that forces the ending she wants. Adding the narrative of victim-hero to her story makes her a much more compelling character for me, as she is otherwise just the scorned lover who only briefly appears in the play before dying. Interpreting her actions as gender crossing also adds more agency to her narrative, which in turn makes her more important to the plot of the tragedy.

Bel-imperia of The Spanish Tragedy, on the other hand, starts her story already broken out of her feminine roles, similar to Sidney Prescott. The text establishes this deviance early, as Prince Balthazar explicitly describes both the reasons she should accept his love as well as how she rejects each rationale:

Yet might she love me for my valiancy; Ay, but that's slander'd by captivity.

8 Yet might she love me to content her sire: Ay, but her reason masters his desire. Yet might she love me as her brother's friend: Ay, but her hopes aim at some other end. Yet might she love me to uprear her state: Ay, but perhaps she hopes some nobler mate. Yet might she love me as her beauty's thrall: Ay, but I fear she cannot love at all. (II.i.19-28)

Before she witnesses the trauma of Horatio’s death, Bel-imperia already rejects the gendered roles expected of her. Even without a historic context of early modern society’s expectations of women, these are made clear for how they apply to Bel-imperia.

Prince Balthazar describes how Bel-imperia should love him to please her brother and father, or else for his bravery and noble status. Earlier, in Act I, she mocks his self- proclaimed valiancy, as she describes his military experience as “what was't else but murd'rous cowardice, / So many to'oppress one valiant knight, / Without respect of honour in the fight?” (I.iii.73-5). She has sworn revenge on Prince Balthazar, saying that he will “reap long repentance for'his murd'rous deed” (I.iii.72) in killing Andrea.

In her article “Painting Women,” which examines depictions of femininity in

Jacobean tragedies, Laurie Finke, discusses how the objectification of the female body in

Renaissance revenge tragedies results either from or in the audience perceiving women as either sexual threats or potential sexual threats. She describes how Gloriana’s skull in

Revenger’s Tragedy combines two ideas of femininity, which are “woman as ideal” and

“woman as death’s head,” and how it is “masculine perceptions of woman that transform her into extreme projections of man’s own fears of mortality” (Finke 357).

Anxieties about the sexual threat of women are thus eased by women suffering for that sexuality. Bel-imperia suffers throughout this work for her sexuality, as she presents a sexual threat. Balthazar is aware she does not requite his love, and he laments “My

9 feature is not to content her sight; / My words are rude and work her no delight” (II.i.

15-16). He pursues her regardless, and she resents him more for this. She is desirable, but instead of using her desirability to accept Balthazar’s courtship as her brother and father wish for her to do, she pursues her own wants and feelings.

Just as Sidney Prescott eschews the chaste expectations, Bel-imperia easily finds a lover in Horatio. However, Balthazar and Lorenzo punish her for this by murdering

Horatio in front of her, and then stealing her away. Lorenzo deals with her rejection of gendered expectations by confining her into them, against her will. This backfires on

Lorenzo, as she rejects the feminine expectations further and commits to a bloody revenge. Her prior plan to avenge Andrea’s death at Balthazar’s hands was bloodless, as it is her love with Horatio. She plots that “second love shall further my revenge” (I.iii.

67), and her relationship with Horatio illustrates to Balthazar that while she is willing to love again after Andrea’s death, she is not going to be in love with him. This enrages him, and so he murders Horatio as well. When she laments a lack of planning from

Hieronimo, she also rages against her forced victimhood, saying “Accursed brother, unkind murderer, / Why bends thou thus thy mind to martyr me?” (III.ix.5-6).

Describing herself as a martyr, she recognizes the victim status into which she has been forced.

Despite being confined, she does not remain a damsel in need of rescue, and she takes active part in avenging Horatio’s murder. Since Bel-imperia cannot act herself, she writes Hieronimo. She writes Hieronimo in her own blood, informing and commanding him, “Me hath my hapless brother hid from thee: /Revenge thyself on Balthazar and him, /For these were they that murdered thy son. / Hieronimo, revenge Horatio's death,

10 / And better fare than Bel-imperia doth’” (III.ii.27-31). In actively ordering violence against her brother who has ordered her into conformity as well as the prince pursuing her romantically, she breaks further from the gender roles pressed onto her and into the more masculine identity presented by Clover. Additionally, she is ordering an older man to follow her commands, another action not acceptably feminine.

Throughout the tragedy, Hieronimo wavers on his revenge plot, and it is Bel- imperia’s agency and masculine aggression that moves the story forward. After her first letter does not result in his action for vengeance, she reprimands him, saying,

“Hieronimo, for shame, Hieronimo” (IV.i.14). Her monologue here reflects a deep disgust in his inaction, describing him as a “monstrous father” (IV.i.18), before promising:

For here I swear in sight of heaven and earth, Shouldst thou neglect the love thou shouldst retain And give it over and devise no more, Myself should send their hateful souls to hell, That wrought his downfall with extremest death (IV.i.25-29)

This completely reverses the Ending “A” of Final Girl narratives, as Bel-imperia now takes over the masculine role from the man who would otherwise be her rescuer. In her view, Hieronimo has failed her. She must take action herself and kill Balthazar and

Lorenzo. Her agency and activity despite being physically removed from the action add heroism into her victimhood, making her, too, the victim-hero that Final Girls must become in order to achieve their goal.

In her last actions, Bel-imperia finishes her cross into masculinity. Rather than follow the script written by Hieronimo, she decides to kill Balthazar how she wants.

First, she lists the reasons why she is seeking revenge, and then she stabs him before

11 herself (IV.iv.59-67). This is the ending she wanted, rather than the one Hieronimo planned. She moves out of the feminine roles in her identity in order to have more agency in her vengeance, and she uses the relative power of her masculinity to force her to be on equal grounds for her revenge.

Bel-imperia as Final Girl, then, begins her journey with a strong attitude of assurance, and as she is forced into peril, she transitions into a violent, masculine mindset to achieve her goals. The expectations upon her due to her feminine role in society, as they are explicated by Balthazar, do not allow her to freely pursue her revenge in a heroic arc. She is made a victim by the circumstances of the plot, but in following a

Final Girl-like transition into masculinity, she becomes the victim-hero.

Slasher horror films and Renaissance revenge tragedies share many commonalities. I find it is interesting to take the criticism and theory that has been written about slasher films in the last few decades, and then apply this narrative formula to those early works of the Renaissance period. I think these genres fill the same niche in audience interest. They are both sensational genres, and that sensation is often achieved through acts of violence against women for the audience’s enjoyment. The Final Girl theory, in particular, offers a chance to re-examine women’s roles in early modern revenge tragedies. The Final Girl is, as feminine, made a victim, and it is through appropriating masculine aspects that she gains a heroic arc. The Final Girl is both victim and hero. While there are misogynistic elements in that, it does create a more compelling story for her than that of just victim.

Laurie Strode and Sidney Prescott do not survive by luck but rather through conscious choices and agency on their end, often through violent acts that are

12 characterized as masculine. They are the heroes of their movies, and they become such through their refusal to remain a victim and adapt however they need. Likewise, Aspatia and Bel-imperia find heroic arcs despite their victimhood, especially with this framework of the Final Girl applied. Aspatia no longer is a mostly irrelevant character in the tragedy but rather a driving character in its climactic action. Bel-imperia finds a powerful narrative of heroism from while confined, and in killing Balthazar and herself, she concludes her story on her terms, rather than on the terms of those that wish they controlled her.

13 Works Cited

Carpenter, John. Halloween. Compass International Pictures, 1978.

Clover, Carol J. “Her Body, Himself: Gender in the Slasher Film.” Representations, no.

20, 1987, pp. 187–228. JSTOR, doi:10.2307/2928507.

---. Men, Women, and Chain Saws: Gender in the Modern Horror Film. Princeton

University Press, 2015.

Craven, Wes. Scream. , 1996.

Finke, Laurie A. “Painting Women: Images of Femininity in Jacobean Tragedy.” Theatre

Journal, vol. 36, no. 3, 1984, pp. 357–70. JSTOR, JSTOR, doi:10.2307/3206952.

Gill, Pat. “The Monstrous Years: Teens, Slasher Films, and the Family.” Journal of Film

and Video, vol. 54, no. 4, 2002, pp. 16–30.

Loh, Maria H. “Introduction: Early Modern Horror.” Oxford Art Journal, vol. 34, no. 3,

2011, pp. 321–33. JSTOR.

Strohl, Matthew. “Horror and Hedonic Ambivalence.” The Journal of Aesthetics and Art

Criticism, vol. 70, no. 2, 2012, pp. 203–12. JSTOR.

Wester, Maisha. “Torture Porn and Uneasy Feminisms: Re-Thinking (Wo)Men in Eli

Roth’s Hostel Films.” The Dread of Difference: Gender and the Horror Film

Edited by Barry Keith Grant, edited by Barry Keith Grant, 2nd ed., University of

Texas Press, 2015.

Willis, Deborah. “‘The Gnawing Vulture’: Revenge, Trauma Theory, and ‘Titus

Andronicus.’” Shakespeare Quarterly, vol. 53, no. 1, 2002, pp. 21–52. JSTOR.

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