Baillie’s Revolution

Baillie’s Revolution

De Montfort: by Joanna Baillie

The closet drama is type of play that is not meant to be acted out in front of an audience; instead it is intended to be studied in private, in order to be able to be adequately dissected. These works have the tendency to be those in which deeper life morals are weaved in by the author. In the play De Montfort by Joanna Baillie, the concept of gender roles is flipped and reversed into a revolutionary new concept of what it means to be a male or female. Discrepancies between character expectations and character realities are the main clue of the massacre of the gender binary that Baillie tends to follow in her early works.

In the Act I, the reader is introduced to De Montfort, a stereotypical man of unparalleled pride.  However, as the story goes on, and Baillie unveils other themes, it is clear that De Montfort is a deeply emotional character that has essentially held a grudge since childhood, and who shares a unique relationship with his sister that surpasses the familial level.  “For in my breast a raging passion burns, "To which thy soul no sympathy will own." A passion which hath made my nightly couch A place of torment; " and the light of day, With the gay intercourse of social man, "Feel like th'oppressive airless pestilence.” This quote from Act II depicts an extremely emotional player whom has no rationality, as men have the bias of being portrayed as.  De Montfort is also troubled by his inappropriate infatuation with his sister, Jane De Montfort. He deals with this in a stereotypical ‘female’ way—by insisting he’s fine and garnering his emotions inside. Eventually, all these unresolved emotions and unexpressed guilt result in his death.

Baillie hides Jane De Montfort’s true character for the majority of the play, due to De Montfort’s amongst the predicament that De Montfort is in. Jane is ruled not by emotion like De Montfort, or like would be typically expected from her, but instead by reason. It could also be argued that she is seducing him throughout the play. “Come to my closet; free from all intrusion,  I'll school thee there; and thou again shalt be My willing pupil, and my gen'rous friend; The noble Monfort I have lov'd so long, And must not, will not lose.” This creates an eroticism not amply seen in female characters during the Romantic period. De Montfort’s refusal to share his emotions with his sister results in her consoling by telling the story of their childhood "So sadly orphan'd, side by side we stood,/ Like young trees, whose boughs, in early strength,/ Screen the weak saplings of the rising grove,/ And brave the storm together" Jane vows to never hate him. While the male characters in this play expect Jane to be conventional, emotional, pretty, and passive, she refused the role simply by taking the initiative and confronting her brother. Even in her choice of outfit she is demure and wears simple dresses a if to not attract men. However, one point that was quite non-progressive and seemingly a dismissal of Jane De Montfort was Baillie’s choice to write Montfort as just that while Jane had to have her full name or as just Jane. This use of diction creates a gap and backwardness in a story with such forward thinking ideas.