Written 1582 – 1597 by Thomas Kyd, The Spanish Tragedy is the first play of
the genre of revenge tragedy. It is the long lasting success of The Spanish Tragedy that helped revenge
tragedy to be considered a separate branch of the plays on blood revenge.
Considering the elements of a revenge tragedy, the play undoubtedly contains
all the major components of the type.
The
setting is the Italian peninsula where people are considered more revengeful
and individualism still flourished despite the encroachment of law. The
storyline deals with murder and betrayal. Though Andrea dies in battle, he
considers that he has been killed dishonourably by Balthazar, the Prince of
Portugal. This is the reason the queen of the Underworld promises death to his
enemies. Yet, according to critics in front of the English Audience Andrea’s
claim would not hold water. Therefore, Kyd turns to Bel-Imperia, someone who is
genuinely affected by Andrea’s death. Elizabethan women and the heroin of the
French novellas the play is partly based on have female characters with a
reputation for being vindictive. She decides to use Andrea’s friend Horatio as
her cat’s-paw but end up falling for him. It is the death of Horatio that
allows a more acceptable revenge theme and a more logical avenger to emerge.
The
play revolves around four revenge plots
1. Don Andrea’s revenge against
Balthazar and Don Castile
2. Bel-Imperia’s revenge against Balthazar
and Lorenzo for the murder of Andrea and Horatio
3. Balthazar and Lorenzo’s revenge
against Horatio
4. Hieronimo’s revenge against
Balthazar and Lorenzo
Out of the four revenge plots, the fourth is
the most central to the plot.
The
play displays excessive passions – hate, jealousy and love. Hieronimo and
Isabella are both inordinately proud of their son Horatio and loved him beyond
measure. This is why they are unable to bear his loss and have been driven to
madness upon his gruesome death. Bel-Imperia is a creature driven by her
passions. She has indulged in two sexual relationships that are considered
socially incorrect. Both Lorenzo and Balthazar hate Horatio over his
relationship with the Princess. Excessive passions come to their gruesome conclusion
in the play-with-in-the-play.
The
Spanish Tragedy also contains a lot of sensational elements. Out of them the
most spectacular are the ghost of Andrea and the personified Fury that form the
macabre chorus of the play. Cruel torture is another sensational element. In
the opening scene, Andréa’s ghost following the tradition of Tantalus’ ghost in
Theystes of Seneca pains a horrifying verbal picture of the torture practiced
in the Underworld. In the court of Portugal people i.e. Alexandrino and Villepo,
are routinely tortured or threatened of torture. Bloody violence is another
element of a revenge tragedy that is found in the play. Out of the ten people
that die during the play, eight die on stage. This includes two hangings, one
performed on the stage in the full view of the audience. This is s very marked
de-tour from the tradition as murder is usually kept off stage. But the murders
on the stage are not glorifies and their impact especially that of Horatio’s,
is essential to the plot. The play also gives details of violence off stage –
the old man’s son is murdered. Isabella kills herself. In the last scene
violence reach an unprecedented height and all the major characters perish.
Lorenzo is the sinister Machiavellian in the play. His pride has been
hurt by Horatio on two counts. It is Horatio that captures Balthazar and later
he his is caught making love to Bel-Imperia. Lorenzo hopes to forge a royal
alliance between his family and that of Balthazar and Horatio forms an obstacle
to his dream. Lorenzo plots with Pedringano who owed him a favour and catch
Horation in the act. Though Balthazar was there, it is Lorenzo that actually
relished killing Horatio, and therefore, the real killer. He imprisons
Bel-Imperia to prevent her form seeking justice and gets rid of his accomplices
Serberine and Pedringano. Lorenzo’s Machiavellian tendency is most prominent in
the way he got rid of Pedringano. He allows his accomplice to believe that he
would not be hanged until the very last moment with the ruse of the
pardon-in-the-box. Lorenzo also is instrumental in preventing Hieronimo from
approaching the king. He also tries to get the king to remove Hieronimo from
the post of the Sheriff Marshall so that his own power would increase in the
absence of his enemy. In the end Lorenzo proves to be too clever for his own
good. It is his murder spree that draws Hieronimo’s attention towards Lorenzo,
not Bel-Imperia’s letter.
Kyd
uses motifs like bloody handkerchiefs, bodies, nooses, poniards, etc. as means of
connecting with the audience. Hieronimo carries a constant reminder of his
son’s senseless death in the form of a handkerchief dipped in his blood. He
keeps Horatio’s body without burying is so he could display it in a plea for
justice. The body is displayed in the last act to the king. Bel-Imperia’s
letter in blood is another popular motif in revenge plays (Tis Pitty She’s a Whore).
There are many speeches that can be labels as ‘rhetoric of the
horrible’. In the prologue, Andrea asking Persephone to grant him the right to
avenge his own death says:
Then will I rent and teare them,
thus, and thus
Shlvering their limes in peeces with
my teeth.
Hieronimo’s ‘Vindicta mihi’ speech and the call
for revenge fall under this category:
Behooves thee then, Hieronimo, to be
reveng’d
The plot is laid of dire revenge:
On then, Hireonimo, peruse revenge,
For nothing wants but acting of
revenge (4.III 26-30)
The above also could be taken as onomastic
rhetoric in which the characters play on their names – a common feature of
revenge tragedy. in this play it is
Hieronimo that uses this technique very frequently.
The
play concentrates on a single ‘hero’ in Hieronimo and the action to a single
main theme – revenge vs. justice. There is unity of action except in the
‘Portuguese Scene’.
Like
all the revenge plays, The Spanish Tragedy also has a period of disguise. In
the case of Hieronimo, it is not his identity that is disguised but the mind.
He pretends to harbour no ill feelings towards Lorenzo to his father and even
embrace him when asked to by Don Castile. Bel-Imperia pretend to accept the
marriage but seen railing at Hieronimo for not doing anything about Horatio’s
death. Both Lorenzo and Balthazar too disguise their emotions. Lorenzo tries to
put off everybody off the scent of his bloody activities by appearing jovial
and helpful.
The
avenger, Hieronimo becomes mad due to the loss of his son. Madness is a common
theme in revenge tragedies. Ferdinand in The Duchess of Malfi too had gone mad
and started acting like a maddened wolf. Both The Duchess of Malfi and The
Malcontent make use of Craziness, the first in the main plot and the second in
the subplots. Madness interested the Elizabethan audience and the playwright
indulged them. In the case of Hieronimo’s revenge attempt, madness is necessary
and convincing. Madness helps him to escape Lorenzo’s mechanizations and gather
information. But, ultimately it is his broken mind that prevented him from
approaching the king and demanding justice. This necessitates him to seek human
justice that resulted in his own death.
The
play-with-in-the-play is where Hieronimo takes revenge from his enemies. This
too is a common feature of revenge plays. The
Duchess of Malfi is a prime example for such a plot – the play ends in the
complete annihilation of the dramatic personae including the avenger himself.
Considering the above facts, is quite obvious that The Spanish Tragedy
is indeed a seminal work in the history of the revenge tragedy – in fact it is
considered ‘the great property room of the Elizabethan and Jacobean theatre’.
Lastly, like all the revenge plays, Kyd has used The Spanish Tragedy to project
his concerns over repressive religious traditions, political corruption, and
social malaises of his time.
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