The Herbal Bed explores the conflict and discrepancy between human desires and the social conventions and expectations, which endeavor to repress them. Peter Whelan utilizes this universal conflict by developing a string of moral dilemmas that prevail within and among the characters to explore the conflict between ones own desires and the expectations of the restricted Jacobean society. Moral dilemmas are utilized to endeavor the individual human desires and passions and what society believes to be morally correct. Weare confronted with a main moral dilemma that splits the audience between societies views and modern perspectives of Susanna. Our consideration of the main thematic concerns of truth, love and duty are vested in Susanna as she is the dominant character in the play and through her knowledge and her actions, she is able to reconcile truth in love, passion and desire.
The Jacobean setting and context of The Herbal Bed creates an amplified backdrop of conflict and illness. Illness is ever present to remind us of the fragility of life but also promotes a conscious reflection upon the necessary salvation and vitality of the soul, irrespective of religious beliefs, as you may not have control over death but you do have control of your soul. This sense of internal conflict experienced by the characters only acts to demonstrate the larger dilemmas at play, namely Susanna’s key dilemma which is whether to conform to the social and moral expectations of Jacobean society and being true to herself as an individual. The society of the time is shifting into puritan beliefs and the oppressive nature of this society is very much what has caused the moral dilemmas in most of the characters. In the play Susanna has to conform to what society expects of her as a women and she has come to terms and struck harmony with that, as she can be the individual that she is and put on a front to conform of what society expects of her. The moral dilemmas faced by the characters are evidence of a more general conflict between what society condones as right and true and what is in fact right and true for the individual, by setting the play in such a contextually fraught setting the struggle between this dilemma is amplified.
In the play, the complexity of Susanna lies in the appeal of her feminist ideology and the post-modern appropriation of her characterization, Whelan makes her the character that appeals to us the most as a 21st century audience. To do this he uses contextually specific moral dilemmas of other characters to underpin and support Susanna’s key moral dilemma of conformity and duty versus individuality. In Act 1, scene 1, Rafe’s dilemma was irrelevant to us but nonetheless the presence of that moral dilemma gives us the power to reflect on the meaningful ones, “Bowing’s what you do isn’t it? Doesn’t mean anything”. Susanna’s perceptive and insightful observations, complex nature and resolve make her a post-modern female protagonist. Whelan has taken the independent nature of Shakespeare’s dominant female characters, such as Beatrice and Juliet, to compose Susanna. “We all were surprised of the man and medicine and the poet’s daughter”, this acknowledges the structuring and composition of Susanna from her father’s plays. The beauty of Shakespeare’s language often comes through in Susanna’s revelation, “love’s alchemy”. To her, love and truth are tied up in belief that they have the power to transform, nurture and inspire an individual. Images of love having the power to “change us” reflects the change of Susanna as she succumbs to desire, passion and joy of the human spirit; components that are missing from her life with John.
Whelan uses intertextuality to allude to other plays, such as the court scene from The Crucible and the garden, which displays the original sin from Adam and Eve, giving in to temptation. The herbal bed is symbolic of Susanna herself as it is walled in and disguised from society, it is domesticated but yet Susanna is free-spirited. The garden connotes Susanna’s moral and spiritual composure as the garden is able to exist in balance and so is she. It has the power to be curative as well as poisonous, it can be polished and wielded whilst being wild and it has the power to transform from day to night. During the day it is symbolic of the characteristics, which define her relationship with John and the boundaries of society, but at night it is symbolic of everything that releases her. Susanna recognizes the power of the garden as she tells Rafe that he is “in my garden. My husband’s by day and mine by night”. The audience is able to understand that the garden changes as does Susanna at night, “her hair let down” whilst preparing a cure for her father. The stage directions suggest that “she looks every inch the alchemist” and has changed into a role which is condemned for women by the church. The dramatic concept of the medicine and herb garden emphasize the range of moral and social truths addressed by Susanna, Rafe and John by symbolizing the varying worlds of thought between the main characters.
As I said earlier – I wonder if this analysis of the garden is better suited earlier on.
The moral dilemmas experienced in the play can be recognized in an audience of the 21st century. Susanna’s central dilemma of conformity and duty versus her true self is the key problem she faces during the play. She experiences constant internal conflict between what the church and society expect her to be as a woman and her untamed nature and true self, “you danced like the spirit of the year”. Susanna also encounters a struggle between the truth and being true to herself as she chooses between staying faithful to her husband and her own desire and happiness, being true to what she loves. She is able to choose what is right as she insists on a God very different to most people in the society, a God of love and forgiveness. The calmness she has inside herself combined with the clarity of insight allows her to achieve this. Both Rafe and John’s moral dilemmas underpin Susanna’s key central dilemma. Rafe must choose between honesty before God, the law, society and his wife and protecting himself, Susanna and John. John’s main dilemma in the play revolves around the honest use of power and abusing the power to protect his wife, Rafe and himself.
The herbal bed explores the conflict between what society expects of us and our inner devices by using minor moral dilemmas from characters such as Rafe and John, to underpin Susanna’s key moral dilemma of conformity versus individuality. Whelan utilizes the themes of truth, love and duty to be ever-present throughout the play in the moral dilemmas experienced by the characters, especially Susanna. Whelan uses motifs such as the herb garden as a reminder of the diversity of the meanings that can be found in their use on a moral and spiritual level and allow an audience to relate with the dilemma’s to create a definition for the nature of love, truth and duty.