Hermione is defending herself. She has been accused of sleeping around with other men in King Leontes absence. Hermione insists that Leontes jealousy will be his undoing and though there are women who are unfaithful to their husbands, she is not among them more so now that Leontes raped her. Hermione is asking that Leontes stops using his suspicions of her infidelity to solicit mistresses. The persona says it is wrong for the King to use something that is untrue in the first place as an excuse to be unfaithful and to punish her. She says all that evil will catch up with him eventually (Silverbush Plotkin, 2002).
Hermione uses the word play to indicate that she pretends to be okay while she is not. The other meaning of the same word play refers to the King Leontes in-discretionary behavior and the last meaning is asking Hermiones son not to worry despite being in exile since all is well.
According to (Silverbush Plotkin, 2002) the poem creates an image of a woman who has self pride despite being disgraced by being raped and accused of sleeping around with other men. Leontes is a possessive man and this is a society where sexual immorality is rampant. Men have intercourse with their friends wives and married women also are unfaithful to their husbands. The word sluiced means snatching or a man taking anothers wife and bedding her. The word brings about the effect of speed whereby one is ready to take a chance as the window of opportunity is very limited husbands absence period is not certain - and it creates the image of misbehaving. Also, women are aggressive and go after men and though Hermione says she is changing tact, she is unlike what Leontes thinks of her. Hermione says she is tired of the mistreatment and will do something about it. The words used create several images and develop the gist of the poem.
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