Preserving Women: Hospitality, Birth, and Healing in <i>The Winter’s Tale</i>

Abstract

Scholars have long expressed fascination with the apparent revivication of Hermione in The Winter's Tale and yet few have dwelled on the conditions that make her preservation possible. In this article, I argue that the depiction of Hermione in the final scene is part of a larger constellation of images in the play that are predicated on early modern understandings of women as preservers. In early modern England, women served as the preservers of belongings, health, food, and lineage. In The Winter’s Tale, Paulina, Hermione, Perdita, and other women participate in the tradition of preservation, and yet they are often met with resistance, disparagement, and threats. I argue that Shakespeare uses depictions of hospitality, childbearing, and nursing to encourage the audience to accept women’s natural proclivity for preservation and thus avoid the “diseased” thinking that proves harmful in the play.