Analysis of the Common Theme of Physical Violence - Essay Example

28 July 2008 An Analysis of the Common Theme of Physical Violence in "A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies" and "Titus Andronicus" The theme of violence and cruelty dominate in both "A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies" and "Titus Andronicus". The similarity between both works is that they represent a tragedy genre marked by man's relation to evil. Violations of physical and psychological reality may be the very means by which tragedy is rendered profound and moving, for by distorting reality to support the order and design he imposes upon the materials of life, the dramatist gives meaning to what in real life may be a haphazard and insignificant event. Thesis The main similarity between these works is that they portray violence and cruelty committed by men against men, thus they depict different historical epochs and different motifs of the main characters. Shakespeare depicts the Roman Empire and the envy between Titus and Tamora, the queen of the Goths. "A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies" depicts colonization and Europeanization of the American Indians by Spaniards. Euroamerican settlement of the West accelerated, the government abandoned gradualism in favor of comprehensive programs for assimilation. The savage, noble or ignoble, was judged capable of civilization. Those who embraced it would be welcomed into mainstream society. Those who balked would nevertheless be compelled to behave. In a short time, no more than a generation, the old ways would die out. The savage would disappear with the passing of the frontier. Instead of a geographical expression, the West became, in the imaginations of Americans stranded in the cities and towns, a wild region inhabited by even wilder humans, some white and brown, but most red. Casas depicts: "Guacanagari himself died up in the mountains, broken and destitute, after he had fled to escape the massacres and the cruelty inflicted by the Spaniards, and all the other local leaders who owed allegiance to Guacanagar perished " (20). The kind of historical criticism which has laid itself most open to attack has based its conclusions on limited data and unwarranted assumptions; thus it has been essentially unhistorical. Shakespeare He shapes the character of Aaron as an independent force of evil, rather than as a mere agent of the queen. He introduces the parallel with Ovid's tale of Philomela, and he adds the final triumph of justice and order with the return of Lucius to Rome, in spite of the inconsistency which this involves, for there is no reason for a Goth army to serve Lucius against their own queen. Shakespeare also makes of Marcus a virtual chorus to comment upon the action as the play unfolds. His most important innovation is in his conception of the principal characters and their relations to one another. Titus Andronicus is a commanding figure. He is a great and initially virtuous man, the first of Shakespeare's heroic figures whose very virtues are the source of their sins. In many ways he is a forerunner of Coriolanus. Titus embodies all the ancient Roman virtues: 'A nobler man, a braver warrior, / Lives not this day within the city walls' (I.i.25-26). He has given his life and his sons unselfishly in the cause of his country. He might now be emperor, but he respects hereditary right and chooses Satuminus instead. He is stern and he is proud, the master of his family, the last of the ancient Romans. In contrast to heroes themes presented by Shakespeare, A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies creates a negative image of the Spanish colonizers and cruelties committed by them against peaceful population. In their thoughts about the West and its original populations, Spanish colonizers variously imagined an Indian to be a noble savage, a rapacious killer, a reservation idler, the vanishing American, or a war-bonneted equestrian raider of the plains. The last image proved to be the most persuasive and, given Indian portrayals in motion pictures and television series during this century, the most persistent. Many people who dreamed about the West and longed after excitement and diversion from mundaneness had few places to look except to the printed page--until, that is, the appearance of Wild West shows. Casas states: "it is beyond human capacity to compile an accurate log of the murder, cruelty, false imprisonment and other crimes they committed. He sent fifty men on horseback who proceeded to annihilate" (37). It is possible to say that Shakespeare does not complicates Las Casas viewpoint but marks extreme violence and envy used to gain power and authority over other people. In Titus Andronicus , the main character is a superman, but being human he must, like all men, face the forces of evil in the world. In his encounter with evil Titus fails. He rejects the way of redemption which is offered him in the choral commentary of his brother, Marcus, and he moves towards inevitable damnation. By the life journey of his hero, Shakespeare explores in imaginative terms the universal way of damnation, for Titus becomes a prototype of erring humanity. In this early tragedy Shakespeare already is trying to shape his tragic hero as a symbol of mankind, and in the description of his fall to pose not so much the problem of an individual as that of humanity at large. This intellectual range, alien to the work of his contemporaries, he is to achieve in the great tragedies of his maturity. The similarity between Shakespeare and Las Casa is that Although Shakespeare makes his audience acutely aware of the hero's blindness, he causes them also to hope to the very end that he will learn the way of redemption before it is too late. So as not entirely to alienate his audience from Titus, while he depicts the moral degeneration which will lead to the final crime against nature, Shakespeare uses the pathos of Lavinia and the navet of Titus' grandchild. In the source Titus kills the emperor, but Shakespeare spares his hero the additional taint of regicide. The kissing of the dead body of Titus is another such attempt to win sympathy for him, crude as it may be, for the audience is invited to participate emotionally in the sorrow of his death. In Titus Andronicus the forces of good and evil are neatly arranged against one another. Of all the evil characters, Aaron is not only the most fully developed but also the manipulator of the evil action, the specific author of Titus' misfortunes. He may be regarded as a symbol of evil itself. He is black, the traditional colour of the devil (and more specifically of lechery), and like the devil he can never know remorse or penance. Ten thousand worse than ever yet I did Would I perform, if I might have my will: If one good deed in all my life I did, I do repent it from my very soul.(V.iii. 186-9) Las Casa portrays that in the attempt to maintain their rule the Spanish were contending with two parties whose interests were one: the foreigners and the colonists. They became violently against everyone who did not follow their rules and principles, and demand freedom and landownership. Shakespeare tries also to place the fall of Titus within a larger framework in which evil too is destroyed, so that the audience, while lamenting the damnation of one soul, may have a renewed awareness of the perfection of God's order and of the operation of justice in the world. Marcus points out the path which Titus might have taken, and Lucius brings about a reconciliation when the forces both of good and evil lie dead upon the stage and the world is ready for rebirth. In the portrait of the degeneration and damnation of a noble figure because of weaknesses which spring from those very traits in him which the audience admires, and in the reconciliation which comes from the destruction of evil in spite of his fall, we have a formula for tragedy which postulates the reality of evil, man's free moral choice in spite of it, and divine justice in a harmonious moral order. In sum, both works portray that the population demanded that a captive enemy be sacrificed to appease the souls of those who have died in battle. Shakespeare and Las Casas depict that cruelty and oppression, violence and hostility were the main tools which helped the Spaniards and Titus to gain power and authority. Works Cited 1. Cases, L. A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies Penguin Classics; 1st ed edition, 1999. 2. Shakespeare, W. Titus Andronicus. Oxford University Press, USA; New edition, 2002. Tamora, knowing that Titus in his distraction has been calling on Revenge for aid, disguises herself and her sons and undertakes the part of the supernatural being in order to tempt him into betraying himself. The figure of Revenge seems to have here ultimate associations with Virgil's Sibyl; it is certain that only the practices of medieval poets including Sackville in the Induction can be regarded as foundational to this scene. Read More