Sunday, September 22, 2013
Judith
I believe the major dramatic question for Judith is, "Will Judith become the type of person she wishes to kill?" And i believe the answer to this is yes. She wants to kill this man but we must wonder, will killing him make her the killing machine she hates most. I believe the reason she begins speaking indignatly and crude towards the servant is because the power of killing Holofrenes made her into a monster like him. We can derive this from the script by looking at the language that Judith uses. Throughout the play we can see Judith's language shifting from more propper to cursing, but we see it greatest and more foul through the difference before and after she kills him. Towards the end of the script Judith says ,"Well, it has to end at some time, love! But it's smell, in the after hours... Magnificence. (She laughs, with a shudder.)" (Barker 67). I think this shows the audience how twisted she is after killing a man she could love. She at first regretted it but then is consumed by the power she feels and leaves a different women.
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Interesting take on the MDQ of this play. I'll admit it was definitely a challenging play for me to break down. Although, I am not certain if it's the question I would choose. We see her struggling throughout the text to murder a man she "loves". I didn't pick up the vibe, from the text, that she was concerned with what the killing would do to the person she is. More so, what doing it or not doing it would mean for Israel, which the servant enforces. But who knows? It's still an interesting choice to focus on because Judith did instantly change ( like Bruce Banner into the Hulk.)
ReplyDeleteI think it’s interesting how you draw attention to the characters’ language. If we interpret profanity as an expression of the characters’ monstrous nature, it opens up some interesting possibilities. Something I noticed is that, while Holofernes uses individual curse words, he never lapses into the rough, sleazy style of speech that Judith and the servant occasionally use. Could this mean that Holofernes may not be as evil as Judith and the Servant believe? Has Judith actually become worse than Holofernes? Or could this mean that Holofernes is so comfortable with his monstrous nature that he has learned to maintain his composure?
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