Titus Andronicus Critical Essay | Rape, I fear, was root of thy annoy: The Politics of
Consent in Titus Andronicus

Sid Ray, Pace University

Scholars cannot resist the temptation to analyze the startling and eerie succession of hand severings in Titus Andronicus.¹ What distinguishes the current study from others is its focus not solely on the hands but on the combined impact of Lavinia's injuries—her rape and the amputation of her hands and tongue—and how they figure within the political context of the play and within early modern ideologies of marriage and monarchy. Only after Lavinia pages through Ovid's Metamorphoses, comparing herself to the raped Philomel, does Titus begin to grasp the range of meaning implied by her injuries. His statement to Lavinia, "rape, I fear, was root of thy annoy" (4.1.49), signals that the rape carries a metonymical significance at least as important as the severed hands and tongue.² Read collectively, the hand (the body part that demonstrates consent), the tongue (the body part that voices consent), and...
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