Fictions of gender in Byron's Don Juan

In Byron's Don Juan, the poet inverts the traditional interpretation of the Don Juan myth; one of the consequences of this refiguring is the exploration and exposure of the roots of the gender ideologies of his time. By empowering the women with whom the title character comes into contact in the poem, Byron places them in a superior position which, coupled with the creation of a passive Don Juan, establishes a pattern of female dominance/male submission that challenges previous conceptions of masculine and feminine behaviour. This female power, however, is not always depicted as positive or sustainable. Byron's strategy of female empowerment employs several tactics to show that definitions of masculine and feminine are often derived not from biological difference but from social and cultural expectations; as such, they are contextual and dynamic. My thesis will examine what these tactics are and how they are deployed in Don Juan through his romantic relationships with the major female characters.