Early Modern Notions on Men and Masculinity
Taylor Murphy
Class of 2014

Although Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida was never “staled with the stage,” there have been many discrepancies, in recent years, about the masculinity of the men playing female characters.  According to the Oxford-English Dictionary, “effeminate” means “womanish, unmanly, gentle, tender, compassionate…voluptuous…devoted to women” or “to weaken, to corrupt, to cause to degenerate.”  So, defining a man as effeminate seems to be an insult to those men and to Shakespeare in early modern history.  Not only are the men who would have taken on female roles considered effeminate, the men who show their devotion to women can also be considered effeminate.
Gary Spear, author of Shakespeare‘s “Manly” Parts: Masculinity and Effeminacy in Troilus and Cressida says, “The play repeatedly challenges our notions of masculinity and draws attention to the effeminacy and emasculation of nearly every male figure (p 412).”  Many of the men in this play have very feminine scenes, whether that be in their speech or in the way they present themselves. In the beginning of the play, Troilus expresses that he does not want to go to war because he is “weaker than a woman‘s tear (Shakespeare, p 449).”  By saying this, he is saying that he is not even as strong as one of the softest things in the world.  Troilus is also considered emasculate because of how he portrays his love for Cressida.  However, this is contradicted later in the play by Cressida’s uncle, Pandarus. Another great example of effeminacy is found in Paris because he caters to Helen’s every whim. He does everything  Helen asks, and, if Helen asks him not to do something, he will not do it.
In the words of CoppTlia Kahn, “The Greeks and the Trojans fight over the possession of a woman because for each of them, masculinity depends on retaining exclusive sexual property in women.  Virility, honor, valor all are earned in defending one‘s right to that sort of property, and Shakespeare stresses evenly both the utter irrationality and the irreducible necessity of such a position.  The war is folly, but essential to the identity of either side (p 131).”  This statement seems to contradict the thought of effeminacy because it is saying that, although they are fighting for women, their masculinity depends on their possession of women.  So, it does not matter that they are fighting for women because it is over the ownership of women, not the idea of women.  At the end of the play, this mindset leads to the Greeks in the camp getting “ownership” over Cressida once again.  Forcing her to move from the Trojan camp, with her love, to the Greek camp.
In Act 1 Scene 2, Cressida suggests that masculinity and effeminacy exist as modalities of one another, rather then antitheses.  In other words, you need one to have the other. In the play, excessive masculinity is viewed as effeminacy or “womanish.”  For example, in Act 3 Scene 3, Ajax is considered “symbolically feminine” because he is so clearly overplaying his masculinity. Evidence of this is when Thersites says of Ajax’ speech, “[he] stalks up and down like a peacock, a stride and a stand; ruminates like an hostess that hath no arithmetic but her brain to set down her reckoning; bites his lip with politic regard (Spear, p 414).”  Although Ajax is attempting to play up his masculinity with his words, the way he presents himself makes him seem much more feminine than masculine.  This is the main scene where Cressida was really allowed to voice her opinion, and in it, she chose to make the comment about men being nothing without the qualities of a woman.
Throughout the play, there are many contradictory scenes concerning masculinity.  The best example is of how Troilus is portrayed in different scenes. When describing himself to Pandarus, Troilus says, “But I am weaker than a woman‘s tear,/Tamer than sleep, fonder than ignorance,/Less valiant than the virgin in the night,/And skilless as unpracticed infancy (Shakespeare, p 449).”  However, when Pandarus describes Troilus to Cressida, he says, “Brave Troilus, Prince of chivalry (Spear, 416).”  In order to make Troilus seem masculine enough for Cressida, Pandarus has to completely undermine what Troilus says about himself and portray him as, almost, a completely different person. In order to win Cressida over for Troilus, Pandarus finds it necessary to lead her on to think that Troilus is a brave soldier who will fight for what is right, instead of some cowardly womanish man who does not see any reason to go to war.  Pandarus also points out to Cressida his looks, not only his personality, as if to say that, if nothing else, she’ll always have his looks to be happy with. So, if his feminine personality takes over, at least he’s good looking enough.
Troilus and Cressida is a play based on the heterosexual relationships between headstrong women and men who would do anything for their women. Troilus, although he is in love with Cressida, lets her be traded back to the Greek camp because that is what is the ‘right’ thing to do. He stays behind her until he starts to believe that she is cheating on him with Diomedes. However, the only thing that is really going on is flirting on her part because she figures that she needs to put on a good face for the other Greeks at the camp, because they do not know about her marriage to Troilus. Another great love in Troilus and Cressida is that of Paris and Helen. Paris does everything, literally, for Helen.  Whatever Helen wants, Helen gets.  This is only a bad thing because this makes him more seemingly feminine than her because she, in a way, wears the pants in their relationship.
Troilus and Cressida portrays men as womanish and women as more manly, in some instances. Every main male character has at least one scene in which he is portrayed as emasculate. In this play, the women rarely had a voice, but when they were allowed to speak, they (Cressida, usually) made some comment on how men were not so manly without having the qualities of a woman, at least sometimes. Therefore, this entire play is based off of the balance between masculinity and femininity.

Works Cited

Kahn, CoppTlia. Man’s estate; masculine identity in shakespeare. (University of California Press. Berkeley/Los Angeles/London, 1981). pg 131.

Spear, Gary. Shakespeare’s “manly”  parts: masculinity and effeminacy in Troilus and Cressida. (Shakespeare Quarterly. 1993). pg 409-422.