Mariana: The Woman the Plot Needs

Mariana was engaged to Angelo before the play began. He broke off the engagement when her dowry was lost at sea, claiming her reputation was damaged to cover a purely financial decision. She has been living alone at a moated grange (a house surrounded by a moat) for years, still in love with him. Her first scene, in Act 4 Scene 1, has a boy singing the mournful 'Take, O take those lips away' as she enters.

The Duke proposes that she substitute for Isabella in Angelo's bed. This is called the 'bed trick,' a device where a man sleeps with his own betrothed thinking he is with someone else. Mariana agrees. She is willing to sleep with the man who abandoned her in order to become his legal wife. This is presented in the play without irony, as a solution.

In Act 5 she reveals herself and argues for Angelo's life with extraordinary generosity: 'They say, best men are moulded out of faults.' She knows what he did and chooses him anyway. Whether this is love, pragmatism, or a form of resignation the play dresses as happiness is the most uncomfortable question in an uncomfortable play.