Key Quote
“"If I can cross him any way, I bless myself every way"”
Don John · Act 1, Scene 3
Focus: “bless”
Don John equates causing harm with receiving blessings — inverting religious and moral language to define his identity entirely through opposition and destruction.
Technique 1 — INVERTED RELIGIOUS LANGUAGE
Don John inverts the meaning of 'bless' — a word associated with divine favour and goodness — by connecting it to malicious intent ('cross him'). This semantic inversion (reversing the meaning of a word) positions Don John as a figure of deliberate moral transgression (crossing moral boundaries). The word 'cross' itself carries both meanings: to thwart someone AND the Christian cross, creating a blasphemous (irreverent towards God) subtext.
The conditional structure ('If... I bless') presents villainy as a transactional exchange: harming others is Don John's form of self-care. Shakespeare creates a character whose emotional economy is entirely parasitic (feeding off others) — he experiences pleasure only through others' pain.
Key Words
RAD — STAGNATE
This statement confirms Don John's complete stagnation: he has no positive goals, no desire for growth or happiness independent of his brother. His only source of satisfaction is schadenfreude (pleasure derived from others' misfortune). Shakespeare presents a character trapped in a cycle of reactive negativity, unable to transcend (rise above) his resentment.
Key Words
Technique 2 — VICE FIGURE / MORALITY PLAY TRADITION
Don John draws on the Vice figure from medieval morality plays — a theatrical tradition in which a personification of evil directly addresses the audience and celebrates wrongdoing. The Vice's defining characteristic was gleeful (joyfully malicious) honesty about his own wickedness, exactly as Don John demonstrates here. Shakespeare updates this theatrical convention for the Elizabethan stage.
However, unlike the Vice — who was typically witty and entertaining — Don John is notably humourless. Shakespeare denies him the charm of his theatrical predecessors, making him a flatter, more realistic figure of petty malice. This is deliberate: the play argues that real villainy is not glamorous but banal (dull, unimaginative).
Key Words
Context (AO3)
LOYALTY & BETRAYAL
Don John's desire to 'cross' Don Pedro violates the most fundamental bond of the play's society — fraternal loyalty (loyalty between brothers). His willingness to destroy this bond for personal satisfaction positions him as the antithesis of the play's celebration of companionship and trust. Shakespeare uses Don John to test the limits of loyalty in Messina.
VILLAINY & MOTIVATION
Shakespeare provides Don John with remarkably thin motivation — he is resentful, bored, recently defeated in rebellion. This opacity (lack of transparency) is significant: Shakespeare suggests that evil does not require elaborate justification. Sometimes cruelty is simply the product of malcontent temperament and social exclusion, making it more terrifyingly ordinary.
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WOW — THE BANALITY OF EVIL (Hannah Arendt)
Hannah Arendt's concept of the banality of evil — developed from observing the Eichmann trial — argues that the most dangerous evil is not dramatic or demonic but ordinary and thoughtless. Don John embodies this: his villainy requires no sophisticated philosophy, no grand plan, no compelling ideology. He destroys simply because he can, because his position enables it, and because the system (the honour code, the credulity of men like Claudio) does the destructive work for him. Shakespeare anticipates Arendt by showing that evil's most effective form is not the spectacular villain but the petty operator who exploits existing structural weaknesses.
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