SOURCE: Weinberg, Alan M. “Religion and Patriarchy in Shelley's The Cenci.” Unisa English Studies 28, no. 1 (April 1990): 5-13.

In the following essay, Weinberg assesses the role of religion as it relates to the characters and themes in The Cenci.

In writing The Cenci, Shelley was scrupulous in his attention to historical detail. The reason for this is explained in a comment he made in his ‘Dedication’ of the play to Leigh Hunt. Speaking of the poems he had already published, Shelley says they are ‘dreams of what ought to be, or may be’. By contrast,

[t]he drama which I now present to you is a sad reality. I lay aside the presumptuous attitude of an instructor, and am content to paint, with such colours as my own heart furnishes, that which has been.

(Reiman and Powers 1977: 237)

Shelley was committing himself to ‘actuality’: he wanted the sad facts of...