Jacobean Revenge Tragedy and the Politics of Virtue by Eileen Allman

MLR, 98.2, 2003 433 In addition to limitations, Greenblatt gives short shriftto various other texts that might have greatly enhanced his examination of purgatory and the ghost-world: most notably medieval plays (and their palpable influence in the Renaissance) and Elizabethan and Jacobean non-Shakespearean plays. For example, in simplistically stating in chapter 4, 'Staging Ghosts', that 'two of the greatest playwrights of the age, Marlowe and Jonson, show surprisingly little interest in the popular stage figure of the ghost' (p. 154), Greenblatt shows surprisingly little interest in the drama of anyone other than Shakespeare. In addition, Greenblatt fails even to survey common theatrical conventions in which Shakespeare, Marlowe, Jonson, and their contem? porary dramatists engaged. Robert Greene (in Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay and in A Looking Glass for London, co-written with Thomas Lodge), William Rowley, Thomas Dekker, John Ford (in The Witch of Edmonton), and George Chapman (in Bussy D'Ambois) are a few examples among those who use the dramatic convention of ghosts or 'hellish spirits' to remind audiences of the wages of sin. Most strikingly, Greenblatt demonstrates a reluctance to confront Dante's profound and especially widespread cultural legacy in regard to purgatory. A recent, sold-out exhibition of Botticelli's late fifteenth-century illustrations of The Divine Comedy at London's Royal Academy of Arts more than demonstrated the exceptionally powerful cultural impact of Dante's concept of purgatory in the fifteenthand almost certainly the six? teenth and seventeenth (and later) centuries. The form and meaning that Dante gave to purgatory have never become obsolete, nor have they failed to filter into postmedieval literature, including Renaissance drama. In the book's prologue Greenblatt eloquently describes how as a Jew he came to Catholic concepts of purgatory as a somewhat cynical adult. At times in the book, he offers a new convert's zeal in discussing the wonders of purgatory. But at other times he offers an amateur's naivety: for example, his continual complaints about the terrifyingaspects of purgatory do not take into consideration the comfort that purgatory could offer to the practising, or non-practising, Catholics (and less than enthusiastic Protestant converts) in Shakespeare's time, and since. For Catholics who embrace a vision of purgatory from childhood, a few indulgences, purchased through extra prayers or even cash, offera soothing promise of eventual salvation, an option denied to Protestants. Some might even enjoy, as I did as a child, the heavy rituals associated with learning about purgatory's limits and margins. Greenblatt may find it incomprehensiblethat many practising Catholics still purchase 'mass cards' designed to help release the souls of their dead relatives from purgatory. But I can imagine, as Greenblatt apparently cannot in this book, why Shakespeare and his audience (many still steeped in the remnants of Catholic liturgy and belief even if Protestant), and the medieval and Renaissance authors and artists who influenced them, would find the option of purgatory marvellously palliative. I would recommend this book espe? cially for its last chapter on Hamlet, 'Remember Me' (portions of which Greenblatt delivered over the years in conference papers). As for the rest of the book, I was left wondering why today's new historicists must work so hard to convince us, and themselves, that their own highly selective, and sometimes naive, view of history is one that Shakespeare and his audience must have shared. University of Reading Grace Ioppolo Jacobean Revenge Tragedy and the Politics of Virtue. By Eileen Allman. Cranbury, NJ: University of Delaware Press; London: Associated University Presses. 1999. 212 pp. ?30. ISBN 0-87413-698-9. Eileen Allman writes about 'the historical knot of gender and authority in revenge drama' (p. 17) and she subscribes to some of the feminist and historicist premisses of 434 Reviews those critics who have found the genre to be disturbingly misogynist. However, she comes to differentconclusions herself, arguing that the misogynist elements in the plays are countered by a strong admiration forvirtuous women who resist tyrannyand who use the language of religious piety to authorize their far from silent or obedient behaviour. While admitting that political and social authority in Jacobean drama is conventionally gendered, she shows how the link between...

Fetched live from OpenAlex and de-inverted. Abstracts are not stored in this database: the inverted indexes are 8.6 GB of the frame’s 9.3 GB of text, and the host has 13 GB free.