Brutal and savage… This is the Roman world as portrayed by Shakespeare in Titus
Andronicus. Shakespeare has taken the Roman
Empire as the backdrop for a number of his other plays such as Julius Caesar, Anthony and Cleopatra, Coriolanus; but nowhere does the brutality stand out in such stark contrast as in this his first play (if one excludes his earlier historical works). No doubt, there is the possibility of redemption – but, more often than not, its instrument is vengeance. On reading this play, it comes as no surprise to the lay student of history that the Roman Empire – howsoever great it may have been – was doomed to meet a bloody end. It is difficult to say if this was the impression that the
playwright wished to convey to the reader; but brutality is the predominant theme that comes across.
In Shakespeare’s defense, it may be said that the era in which he was writing was a brutal period, and the violence would not have seemed out of place to his audience. However, physical maiming of the principal characters (such as cutting off their hands) is not something that would easily be accepted by a more modern – and enlightened – audience. Especially if the victims were female…
Another criticism of the play is that the characters lack sufficient depth. Tamora – the Queen of the Goths – has no redeeming feature to her, even unlike the much vilified Lady Macbeth. Shakespeare’s greatness as a playwright lies is in the (moral) ambiguity of his characters; that are finely balanced between good and evil. More often than not, they are the victims of circumstances, rather than of their innate natures. However, the villains in this play: Tamora and Aaron (the Moor) lack any redeeming quality. So much so, that they are even abandoned by those very Goths – their countrymen - whose cause they claim to be upholding!
This is Shakespeare’s first play; being his first play, it is an important subject of study for students of his work. True, many of the themes that appear in Titus
Andronicus are repeated in his later plays, but their treatment is very different. One fact, however, stands out without dispute: Shakespeare’s early tragedies have very little comedy in them, and his early comedies have very little tragedy in them. However, as the playwright has matured and become more accomplished as a writer, in his later plays he appears to have fused the two forms – comedy and tragedy – together; so that it became increasingly difficult to classify his later plays into one category or the other.
Briefly, this is the tale of the noble Andronicus clan – led by Titus Andronicus and his brother Marcus Andronicus - that has returned in triumph from its military campaign against the Goths. But, in doing so, they earn the undying hatred of Tamora (the Queen of the Goths); who swears vengeance upon the entire family. The opportunity presents itself to her when Saturninus, the Roman Emperor who owes his position to none other than Titus Andronicus, takes Tamora for his wife.