Cecilia Guevara

Isabella: Because authority, though it err like others/ Hath yet a kind of medicine in itself/ […] Go to your bosom; knock there and ask your heart what it doth know/ That’s like my brothers fault. If it confesses a natural guiltiness such as his/Let it not sound a thought upon your tongue/ Against my brother’s life.

II.II. 139-146

This passage points to the body imagery and language that runs throughout the play and demonstrates how Isabella uses this language in attempt to persuade Angelo to spare Claudio’s life. The fact that authority has the capacity to “err” demonstrates that authority (and punishment) is linked to human frailty and justice is dependent upon the person holds authority and distributes justice. However this bleak interpretation of the subjectivity of justice is countered when Isabella claims that justice has a “medicine in itself.” Isabella identifies the homeopathic capacity of justice and hopes that the same “human” element of justice (and the ruler) will serve to save her brother’s life. Isabella appeals to Angelo’s humanity and asks him to recall a time when he made a “human” mistake.

Sadly, Isabella’s use of pathos in the attempt to save her brother backfires because (as we’ve mentioned in class) Angelo does not appear to be human. Thus, he does not confess any “natural guiltiness” and refuses to free Claudio. However, we later discover that this superhuman quality of Angelo is merely a political tactic. Angelo is, in fact, human. Yet what moves Angelo is not affect, but sexual desire. Isabella appeals to Angelo’s baser human qualities and must satisfy Angelo’s baser desires in order to save Claudio.