Women and Insanity in English Renaissance Drama

The following article presents how in the sixteenth century England, thanks to the increased awarness of the problems with mental disorders, the stories of madness entered the world of Renaissance drama and appeared in the works of numerous writers. As early modern culture and literature made attempts to understand female melancholy or insanity, particular focus is given to the characters of Ophelia in Shakespeare’s Hamlet and the Duchess in John Webster’s The Duchess of Malfi. The thorough analysis of the texts shows that contrary to the then common belief that all women’s illness and irrationality derived from the womb, those were, too a great degree, social constraints which affected women and pushed them into insanity. Oppressive, male dominant and chaotic socjety either pushed women into a state of complete madness, which subsequently results in death or it is the madness, confusion and chaos around them that was the cause of their death.