portia

• “giving myself a voluntary wound, here in the thigh”

  • manipulates Brutus into confiding in her
  • deninstrates strength - atypical Elizabethan woman, foil to Calpurnia
• “swallowed fire”


  suicide - symbolism of fire linking to sin as she attempts to atone for man’s sins yet fails
• “I grant I am a woman“


  iterative lexis - intertextual link to Elizabeth’s Tilbury Speech - distances self from femininity
• “how weak a thing the heart of woman is”


  distances herself from femininity to assert power & strength
• “well reputed, Cato’s daughter“


  Portia only gains power through men