Rethinking absolutism

Winston, Jessica; Archer, Harriet; Hadfield, Andrew

doi:10.1017/cbo9781316219768.012

&Lt;I>A Mirror for Magistrates</I> In Context 2016

DOI: 10.1017/cbo9781316219768.012

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Rethinking absolutism

Jessica Winston¹,

Harriet Archer²,

Andrew Hadfield³

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Oedipus at Dover Cliff: Early Modern Receptions of Seneca’sPhoenissae

Engelmayer¹

2022

Classical Receptions Journal

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Major accounts of Renaissance Senecanism argue that tragic protagonists in Seneca and his early modern imitators draw on overwhelming fury to achieve autarkic selfhood. Yet not all plays follow this mould: unlike the better-known Thyestes and Medea, Seneca’s Phoenissae locates tragic identity in the self-conscious rejection of a sudden resolution to violent strife. Oedipus, the play’s protagonist, temporarily relents in response to Antigone’s pleas against self-harm; despite his swift reversion to anger, this short-lived reconciliation aligns the tragedy with structural elements of comedy as understood by Renaissance genre theorists, inviting early modern authors to craft their own versions of the play’s ‘mixed mode’. In the New Arcadia, Philip Sidney rewrites the Phoenissae to privilege reconciliation over rage, but reframes this apparent comic gesture as the source of an escalating cycle of tragedy. In King Lear, William Shakespeare mobilizes the illusion of comic resolution that he found in Seneca’s play to heighten his protagonists’ irreversible suffering. Attending to the nuance and variety of Seneca’s tragic corpus as it was received by Renaissance readers reveals underexplored strands of Senecan influence on early modern literature, broadening the set of generic possibilities afforded by Seneca’s plays in the Renaissance to include tragicomedy and romance.

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Oedipus at Dover Cliff: Early Modern Receptions of Seneca’sPhoenissae

Engelmayer¹

2022

Classical Receptions Journal

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‘Mankind Dame’: John Studley’s early modern Clytemnestra

Spinelli

2024

Classical Receptions Journal

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John Studley’s Agamemnon (1566) explores women’s rule and how it can combine feminine and masculine elements to achieve and maintain political power. To do so, Studley employs the character of Clytemnestra, who simultaneously retains elements of her previous dramatic versions and is shaped to resonate with early modern English audiences. This process is twofold, taking into consideration linguistic and character traits. Clytemnestra’s language is expanded from the Latin through masculine-coded tropes characteristic of vernacular lyric. Moreover, she possesses traits traditionally considered masculine (martial courage, determination, bold speech and skill in weaponry). In Studley’s Clytemnestra, then, endurance and action combined create a gender hybridity in speech and behaviour. In turn, her portrayal resonates with discourses surrounding early modern women rulers, from Elizabeth Tudor to Mary Stuart. Ultimately, Agamemnon reshapes the treacherous queen of Mycenae to function as a commentary on how a woman in power could appear, speak and behave.

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Rethinking absolutism

Cited by 2 publications

References 2 publications

Oedipus at Dover Cliff: Early Modern Receptions of Seneca’sPhoenissae

Oedipus at Dover Cliff: Early Modern Receptions of Seneca’sPhoenissae

‘Mankind Dame’: John Studley’s early modern Clytemnestra

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