By William Shakespeare | Directed by David Quicksall All original material copyright © Seattle Shakespeare Company 2016 WELCOME Dear Educators, Titus Andronicus is Shakespeare's bloodiest play. There is no getting around the blood, gore, and violence in a story about the cycle of violence! This winter, we're embracing that violence in the more familiar and campy style of grindhouse cinema — disreputable films being shown at a cut-rate price. Titus Andronicus was one of Shakespeare's earlier plays, and likely his first tragedy. It has more similarities to the revenge plays that were popular before Shakespeare than to his later tragedies, though there are hints of his future characters present in this play. The character of Titus is reminiscent of King Lear. Tamora could be a proto Lady Macbeth. Aaron is like vicious Iago. Lavinia reminds us of other much-abused daughters to come, particularly Ophelia, Desdemona, and Cordelia. As you watch this play, the killing and maiming are the most obvious features. However, it can also be a fascinating study in Shakespeare's early career, and an easy entry point for those who have never seen Shakespeare. It's got nonstop action and a wicked cycle of revenge, but it also contains some of Shakespeare's most beautiful language, particularly as spoken by Marcus Andronicus. Have your students on the lookout for Shakespeare's genius poetry, tucked in among some of his most gratuitous bloody moments. Best, Michelle Burce Education Director www.seattleshakespeare.org/education 206-733-8228 ext. 251 or [email protected] PRODUCTION SPONSORS CONTENTS Plot Synopsis . 1 Characters . 2 Dates and Sources . 2 Tit for Tat / Chaos Characters . 3 A look at where our instinct for revenge comes from and how systems for maintaining fairness can go wrong. Themes in Titus Andronicus . 4 An examination of major themes in the play. In and Out of Taste . 4 A history of the changing popularity of Titus Andronicus. Placing the Production . 5–6 Take a look inside the director’s inspiration and thoughts for the production. Reflection and Discussion Questions . 7 Students consider themes in pre-show reflection questions, and think about the production in post-show discussion questions. ACTIVITIES Decision Alley . 7 Students explore motives behind character choices for crucial moments in the play. Titus Talk Show. 8–9 Students take on the perspective of characters by participating in a talk show. SYNOPSISé In the latter days of the Roman Empire, the emperor has died. His two sons, Saturninus and Bassianus, are fighting over who will be the heir. Marcus Adronicus arrives with news that his brother and famed Roman general, Titus Andronicus, has been elected emperor by the people. Titus has been fighting a ten year campaign against the Goths and returns to Rome victorious. He bears prisoners: Queen Tamora of the Goths, her three sons, and Aaron the Moor. In revenge for twenty-one of his own sons who died in battle, Titus decides to sacrifice Tamora's first born son, Alarbus. Tamora pleads with Titus to spare him, but Titus kills Alarbus anyway and Tamora vows revenge against Titus and his family. Titus refuses the offer of the throne and supports Saturninus’s claim as emperor. Saturninus is quickly elected and informs Titus that his first act will be to marry Lavinia, Titus’s daughter. Titus agrees, even though Lavinia is already betrothed to Bassianus. Bassianus refuses to give her up and the couple Aaron protecting his son from Chiron and Demetrius in Act 4, Scene 2; engraved escapes with the help of Titus’s sons. In rage Titus kills his own by J. Hogg, 1799. son, Mutius. Saturninus denounces the Andronicus family and surprises all by offering his hand in marriage to Tamora. She Meanwhile in Rome, Titus’s behavior suggests that he has swiftly begins to put her plans for revenge in action, first by gone insane. Tamora, Chiron, and Demetrius visit Titus's house, advising Satruninus to pardon Bassianus and the Adronicus disguised as the spirits of Revenge, Murder, and Rape. Tamora, family, which he does after much persuasion. in her Revenge guise, says she will grant Titus revenge on his enemies if he convinces Lucius to postpone the attack on Aaron now comes forward to help Tamora, his secret lover, get Rome. Titus agrees and says he will have a reconciliatory feast her revenge. During a royal hunt, Aaron manipulates events for Lucius, Saturninus, and Tamora. Tamora and her sons are to draw Bassianus and Lavinia away from the hunting party. about to leave, when Titus insists that “Rape” and “Murder” stay Tamora’s sons, Chiron and Demetrius, kill Bassianus and throw with him. After Tamora leaves, Titus cuts Chiron and Demetrius's his body into a pit. They drag Lavinia away, rape her, then cut throats and drains their blood into a bowl held by Lavinia. Titus off her hands and cut out her tongue to prevent her from later then reveals his plan to grind the bodies up and serve them to incriminating them. Aaron frames Titus’s sons Martius and their mother in a pie. Quintus for Bassianus’s murder. Saturninus arrests them both and sentences them to death. The feast day comes. While they eat, Titus asks Saturninus if a father should kill his daughter if she has been raped. When Marcus finds Lavinia and takes to her to her father. Titus, reeling Saturnius says he should, Titus kills Lavinia. Saturninus calls for from the accusations towards his sons, is overcome with grief. Chiron and Demetrius, and Titus reveals that they have been Lucius, his eldest, arrives with news that he has been banished baked into the pie Tamora has been eating. In the flurry of from Rome for trying to rescue his brothers. Aaron arrives and violence that follows, Titus kills Tamora, Saturninus kills Titus, says that Saturninus will spare Martius and Quintus if either Titus, and Lucius kills Saturninus. Lucius is proclaimed Emporer. He Marcus, or Lucius will cut off one of their hands and send it to orders that Saturninus be given a proper funeral, Tamora’s body Saturninus. Titus has Aaron help cut off his hand and sends it to be thrown outside the city to be eaten by wild animals, and Saturninus. However, in return, Titus is delivered the heads of his Aaron to be buried up to his neck to die slowly. sons along with his own severed hand. Titus urges Lucius to flee to the Goths and raise an army. Lavinia finally is able to write the names of her attackers, using a stick and her arms. Meanwhile, Tamora gives birth her and Aaron's baby. To save his newborn son from Saturnius’s wrath, Aaron kills the nurse and flees. He is captured by Lucius, who threatens to hang the infant. To save his newborn son, Aaron confesses his crimes to Lucius. SEATTLE SHAKESPEARE COMPANY: EDUCATOR RESOURCE GUIDE PAGE 1 CAST OF CHARACTERS DATES AND SOURCES Names in red denote characters killed during the play. Titus Andronicus is one of Shakespeare’s earliest plays and, as such, there is less evidence to pinpoint when it was written TITUS ANDRONICUS, a famous Roman general than is available for later works. At best, scholars are able to LUCIUS: Titus’s eldest son suggest plausible dates, taking evidence from the writings of Shakespeare's contemporaries, clues about performance YOUNG LUCIUS: Lucius’s son, Titus’s grandson history in publications of the script, and comprehensive analysis of interconnected influences between works of Elizabethan LAVINIA: Titus’s only daughter, Bassianus’s fiancée theatre and literature. With no single date of authorship agreed QUINTUS: Titus’s son on, proposed dates range from 1582 to 1593. MARTIUS: Titus’s son To add more complication to the matter of dating Titus Andronicus, we have two other surviving versions of the story. MUTIUS: Titus’s son One is written in prose and was published between 1736 and 1764. Some scholars believe that this work was originally MARCUS ANDRONICUS: Titus’s younger brother, a Tribune penned in Shakespeare’s time and, like many of Shakespeare's PUBLIUS: Marcus Andronicus’s son own plays, published at a later date. The second version of the story is a ballad called Titus Andronicus’s Complaint. While CAIUS: Titus’s kin the earliest surviving publication of the ballad is from 1620, it can be dated much earlier thanks to a mention of the SATURNINUS: the late Emperor of Rome’s eldest son, ballad by printer John Danter in 1594. Because there are not Bassianus’s brother definitive dates for any of the three versions, putting them in chronological order is impossible unless further evidence BASSIANUS: the late Emperor fo Rome’s son, Saturninus’s comes to light. brother, Lavinia’s fiance Shakespeare’s late Roman plays are each anchored to a period in history — Coriolanus in the early Roman Republic and Julius TAMORA: Queen of the Goths, Aaron’s lover Caesar and Antony and Cleopatra at the transition from Republic to Empire. In contrast, Titus Andronicus is vaguely set in the ALARBUS: Tamora’s eldest son late Roman Empire, with no major characters or events having DEMETRIUS: Tamora’s son historic counterparts. CHIRON: Tamora’s youngest son While Roman history did not provide the content of Titus, Roman literature furnishes the play with some of its most AARON: a Moor captured with the Goths, Tamora’s lover heinous moments. The rape and mutilation of Lavinia, as well as her solution for identifying Chiron and Demetrius, are conflated NURSE: serves Tamora from several episodes in Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Titus’s ultimate revenge against Tamora, the unwitting cannibalism of her own GOTHS: a northern people in military conflict with Rome children, combines another story from Metamorphoses and with Seneca’s Thyestes.