Kyd's traumatic passage to the underworld - The Spanish tragedy and early modern crises
Symptoms of a cultural trauma are present everywhere in early modern English drama. This paper sets out to explore the complex and ambiguous relationship between a theatre of bloody spectacles and an underlying, fundamental cultural trauma of the post-Reformation religious transformations within the...
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| További közreműködők: | |
| Dokumentumtípus: | Könyv része |
| Megjelent: |
JATEPress
Szeged
2020
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| Sorozat: | Acta Universitatis Szegediensis de Attila József nominatae : papers in english and american studies
25 Papers in English and American studies : Tomus XXV. - Distinguished Szeged student papers 2020 25 |
| Kulcsszavak: | Angol irodalom története - 16. sz., Műelemzés - dráma - angol - 16. sz. |
| Tárgyszavak: | |
| Online Access: | http://acta.bibl.u-szeged.hu/86798 |
| Tartalmi kivonat: | Symptoms of a cultural trauma are present everywhere in early modern English drama. This paper sets out to explore the complex and ambiguous relationship between a theatre of bloody spectacles and an underlying, fundamental cultural trauma of the post-Reformation religious transformations within the context of an oppressive, paranoid and terrorizing state apparatus. The age of Elizabeth saw an upsurge in the practice of torture and public execution, due to the nervousness of the authorities fearing a Catholic coup. To show how this trauma registers itself in literary writings in general, various histories will be discussed such as Machiavelli’s The Prince and John Foxe’s Book of Martyrs. Furthermore, it will be maintained, that the gory spectacles of the early modern stage are not simply a catering for the voyeuristic demands of the audiences but, in a paradox way, they also reflect true and thoroughgoing cultural trauma. In the last analysis, Thomas Kyd’s The Spanish Tragedy, one of the most popular and most published plays in the era, will be examined for signs of this cultural trauma, while always keeping in mind that ultimately its author also became victim of state violence. The protagonist in his tragedy will be considered as a voice from the wound which is personal (a wound in the psyche of the individual) and communal (a wound on the body of the contemporary religious society) at the same time – he is a mentally unbalanced father who cannot work himself through the violent death of his son. The investigation of Hieronimo’s mourning based on Sigmund Freud’s analytical procedure promises to yield valuable insights into the traumatic universe of the play. Finally, it will be shown how the multiple layers of witnessing and the intrinsic ambiguities of theatrical mimesis deprive the audience of the comfortable possibility of meaning-making and closure in the last scene of the tragedy: the final outbreak of violence happens in the total absence of coherent meaning, which fact also allows for the final conclusion of this paper. |
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| Terjedelem/Fizikai jellemzők: | 61-87 |
| ISBN: | 978-963-315-428-1 |
| ISSN: | 0230-2780 |