초록 열기/닫기 버튼
Shakespeare’s first Roman tragedy, Titus Andronicus, is a play aboutthe ancient Rome, but also about the Elizabethan England. While deal-ing with Roman history and Roman characters, the play projectsonto/beneath the Roman backdrop a displaced and narcissistic image ofShakespeare’s England. For Shakespeare’s exploration of Rome hingeson the Eurocentric/Manichean dichotomy between Roman civilizationand non-Roman barbarism. Put simply, Rome stands for nobility andmasculinity whereas its opponents are connected with barbarity andfemininity. Of course, it is true that the play is not an eulogy of Romeand its masculine and jingoistic heroes. Yet it is equally true thatShakespeare’s critical stance towards the Roman heroes cannot be readoff as a renunciation of Rome itself or an elevation of Rome’s oppo-nents. Despite its immanent barbarity shared by all human civilizations,Rome is still an edifying model upon which the Elizabethan England asa nascent empire ought to turn its gaze.In this binary antithesis, racial difference serves a key referencewherein blackness, as opposed to whiteness, carries all sorts of negativeimages and pejorative associations. In the amidst of such ‘racial’ dramastand two ‘barbarians’; Tamora, the sexual Other and Aaron, the racialOther who must be cast out so that the Roman hero can restore his coun-
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race, empire, the Moor, Rome, masculinity, barbarity, blackness
