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Inside Shakespeare’s mind - Titus Andronicus

Written in 1593-4 and set in Rome and its neighbourhood, Titus Andronicus is yet another melodrama of William Shakespeare of which we have seen of an Elizabethan play in its setting with a happy mix-up of costumes which the chief characters are attired in Roman clothing while the rest are Elizabethan costumes.

Another mistake, why Elizabethan clothing for the stage?

The plot of the play is so heinous that some may have been stunned by Shakespeare’s atrocious handling of more-than-a-murder epic where we see the gruesome thoughts that provoked an otherwise sober mind of Shakespeare whose works we have seen in a more constrain setting even with so many assassinations and homicide in many of his plays. Titus Andronicus jump-start then all and make even The Rape of Lucrece look amateurish.


Titus Andronicus bent on revenge

Why did he have to load the play with so many characters, all inter-woven unnecessarily? Too many sons to Titus Andronicus along with a daughter. Three sons to Tamora along with a ‘black’ son by Aaron.

As the play deepens, I find Shakespeare entangled in his own net towards the end where the whole scenario is in one mad frenzy.

Shakespeare need not have worked his play to this frenzy.

Already the murders, killings, rape, etc has had a bad patch in the plot like a Alfred Hitchchock movie, complicating one from the other.

The story could have been eery as Shakespeare decided and yet could have ended on a high-pitch note with less characters, clearer to the audience as well as to the readers. No doubt every one plays a part in the plot but not necessarily which makes the play to be acted rather than be read.

Today’s theatre goers would abhore such a mighty cast like in Antony and Cleopatra. A massive stage is desired for such a setting.

Various productions failed even at Stratford until in 1955 the combined gifts of director, Peter Brook and Lawrence Oliver saw a gleam of glitter on this very complexed play. During Restoration, a great actor as a alchemist could have attempted the role of Titus and in Ravenscroft’s version until the last frightful scene, there was no deviation from Shakespeare’s script. Many versions followed each so different to the other but in 1857 James Quin was applauded over and over again for his role as Aaron.

By 1923, Robert Atkins who was Old Vic’s Shakespeare text director, returned and commenced his own version with such expert players as Wilfred Walters, George Hayes, Ion Swingley and Florence Saunders. In 1953 a revival was mounted by the Marlowe Society at Cambridge and attempted to show how humanity and retribution balanced sadism. Later Stratford re-entered the professional repertory.

All these attempts reveal Shakespeare’s mishandling of characters, especially in such large numbers when he could have obtained the same suspense on a moderate and leave behind the rest for the imagination of those who wanted to mount the play.

After being caught in his own lair, he had to put pressure on the script as well as on directors who were planning to mount this play. No wonder, the versions went haywire.

Titus Andronicus has twice been part of a double bill, in 1960. It was paired off with The comedy of errors at the Old vice and was a total disaster.

Synopsis

This play was more than a roughly effective melodrama and at the moment in peril of being over-praised though once scorned.

So, the chopping goes on and on and if we were to know what was going on in Shakespeare’s mind, things could have worked out easier than being a complicated narrative of blue murder.

Bassianus and Saturninus who are the two sons of the late Roman Emperor attempt to succeed their father but Titus Andronicus succeeds because as a veteran general, he has triumphed in the capture of the Goths. He returns with the Queen Tamora and her three sons and her Moorish lover, Aaron.

Titus orders the execution of Tamora’s elder son, Alarbus as a sacrifice to appease the spirits of his own dead sons.

Titus refuses the crown urging the choice of the elder prince, Saturinus to whom he weds his daughter, Lavinia and Titus yields his Gothic prisnors.

But unknown to Titus, his daughter Lavinia who has pledged herself to Bassianus, runs off with him. An angry Saturninus with an idea to curb, influence Titus that he will marry Tamora. Determine to take revenge upon Titus, Tamora tells Saturninus to remain silent while she plans.

And here we go to a rush of events; Tamora’s sons, Demetrius and Chiron kill Bassianus during hunting in the forest.

Aaron manages to involve the sons of Titus in the murder of Bassianus and they are sentenced to death. In the meantime, Demetrius and Chiron rape Lavinia and after ravishing her, chops off her hands and cut her tongue. Another son of Titus, Lucius is also sentenced to death.

(Enter the Empress’s sons, Demetrius and Chiron with Lavinia, her hands cut off and her tongue cut off and brutally ravished)

Demetrius - So, now go tell, and if thy tongue can talk. Who ‘twas that cut thy tongue and ravished thee.

Chiron - Write down thy mind, bewray thy meaning so. And if thy stumps will let thee play the scribe.

D - See how can signs and tokens she can scrawl
C - Go home; call for sweet water, wash thy hands
D - She hath no tongue to call, nor hands to wash. So, lets leave her to her silent walk
C - And ‘twer my cause, I should go hang myself
D - If thou had hands to help thee knit the cord .....
Act. 11.Sc.iv

Titus is insane and requests Marcus to despath messages to the gods to redress his wrongs when another son, Lucius is banished but he raises an army for revenge. The mutilated Lavinia with the help of a staff in the sand, manipulates to accuse Demetrius and Chiron for her fate. Tamora manages to persuade Titus to recall Lucius.

Having promised to invite the Empress Tamora and her sons along with Saturninus, and Lucius, Titus who had seen the whole episode through, later kills Demetrius and Chiron and serve their flesh in a baked pie, at the banquet.

The end is yet another frenzy in which Lavinia, Tamora, Titus and Saturninus all die.

Lucius becomes the Emperor and after sentencing Aaron to be buried breast-deep and starved to death, he restores sanity.

..................................

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