Critical Essay | Michael Taylor

Michael Taylor

SOURCE: '"Here is a thing too young for such a place': Innocence in Pericles," in Ariel, Vol. 13, No. 3, July, 1982, pp. 3-19.

In this essay, Taylor explores the difference between the quality of Pericles* innocence and Marina's.

I

In Shakespeare's plays the corrupt often confuse innocence with stupidity. Swayed by their reductive view of human nature (innocent and simplistic itself) these confident, pragmatic observers of human behaviour cannot acknowledge the possibility that any sensible person can (or should) act beyond his or her immediate self-interest. Such a stance helps to explain why Shakespeare's evil-doers are so sure of their intellectual superiority over their innocent victims, so certain that their interpretation of the world exposes its essential, shabby truth. In Dionyza's jeering tone in Pericles, for instance, as she lords it over her ineffectual husband, can be heard echoes of many of Shakespeare's antagonists to virtue, ranging from the maledictions...
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