Elvira

Don Giovanni: Hush, hush, for a crowd is gathering around us. Be a little more prudent, you'll make yourself ridiculous.

Donna Elvira: Don't hope it, o villain, I have lost my prudence, I want to show everyone your guilt and my condition, I want to show everyone!

- Act One, Scene 3 (page 34)

These lines emphasize Elvira's desperation. She will do whatever it takes to expose Don Giovanni, even if it means exposing herself. She is willing to break out of her prescribed social role - she has "lost her prudence" and will make herself "ridiculous." Isn't this a striking attitude in Seminar IV? Most of our readings have been about conforming to society. Remember Hobbes's unbreakable contract or Pride and Prejudice's rigid rules of conduct. Elvira is a rude awakening. There are still wild cards in human nature; Medea is still among us...