Titus Andronicus

This one was a barnstormer. Like Henry VI, Part 1, this is another play where I can totally see why it was popular in its day. Likewise, I can totally imagine it being performed live in front of a general audience.

With some Shakespeare plays it's hard to envision them being watched by an audience of normal Elizabethan folk. They seem so niche. Consequently, I've always been sympathetic to the idea that these plays were read more so than performed. After all, it was the age of the printing press. However, reading these plays, along with Thomas Kyd's The Spanish Tragedy, has really brought home to me how real live performance must have been back in those days.

I hate to get on my anti-intellectualism high horse again, but it really does seem that the scholars and experts often miss the gist of things. The plays they consider lesser often turn out to be the most fun -- and the fact that they were popular in their day only reassures me that, just as now, the plebs tend to have better judgement than the experts. It seems the scholarly class really only want things that appeal to their sense of elite-ness. They can't just enjoy things.

There's a bit in the play where Lavinia, the daughter of Titus, carries her father's severed hand in her mouth. At this point in the play she's also had both her own hands severed, and had her tongue cut out! (It's a pretty bloody play. I would describe it as an Elizabethan Reservoir Dogs type offering. These really were the popular movies of their time.)

Anyway, the academics don't really like this scene. They think it's silly and unnecessary that she carries the hand in her mouth. Having read this criticism before reading the play myself I was expecting the scene to be a bit sloppily written. However, it just made easy and perfect sense. It's a joke - that would've been funny for any watching audience.

Titus is already carrying one of his sons' heads in his remaining hand (again, it's gruesome), so he gives the job of carrying his lopped off hand to Lavinia - but as she has no hands herself, she has to use her mouth. So, it's just a bit of fun. You probably can't make a scene like this work if you take yourself too seriously though.

The play is actually quite humorous throughout - don't let the label 'tragedy' fool you. It's bloody, and the themes, if taken on face value, are quite serious, but it doesn't feel heavy. Entertaining is probably the best word to describe things. It was like watching a really good, action-packed movie.

Oh, and finally, the play is quite racist!

Obviously, I wouldn't describe it as racist. The context was very different when it was written. However, if modern rules are applied, as they often are by the censorship and cancellation crowd, then this would definitely fail the test. The character of Aaron - one of the bad guys - is a "blackamoor," and plenty of jokes are made in reference to his skin colour. The general theme being that black skin = black heart.

We've seen claims that The Merchant of Venice and other plays are "problematic". I think the only reason this one has escaped the beady eye of the inquisition is that it's so underappreciated and unknown. If people were forced to read it in school classrooms and universities, as they are the more popular Shakespeare plays, things might be different. Thankfully, they can't cancel what they can't see, and what they don't know won't hurt them. So maybe the scholars that deemed this play of lesser value have done us all a huge favour.