Revenge Is a Dish Best

Revenge is a Dish Best Not Served: Titus Andronicus It is amazing that William Shakespeare's play, Titus Andronicus, is not more popular today than it is. It contains all of the necessary features we see in modern films such as murder, rape, revenge, blood and outright cruelty. One of the most compelling aspects of this play is the fact that nothing seems to be too extreme.

Revenge comes in many flavors including sexual, physical and mental and it drives the plot, as most of the characters feel compelled to avenge something. His or her actions accumulate, creating only more of a need for blood until nothing and no one is left to kill. Revenge is a deadly disease that begins with a single thought and manifests itself when desire overwhelms reason. In Titus Andronicus, Shakespeare uncovers how revenge is addictive, contagious and unproductive. Revenge is addictive and it grows out of control easily.

Titus likes his revenge because it allows him to feel as though he is making something right. Like many, he wants to get even for a wrong he has suffered but like many, he becomes a slave to emotions involved with revenge. Titus finds using insanity works well to serve his revenge, especially when taking his daughter's life. At this point, it would be easier for the reader to believe Titus was insane than to believe than he could honestly do what he did to Lavinia with a clear conscious.

Revenge coupled with madness serves to create doubt. If the man were truly mad, it would seem harsh that he be held responsible for his actions. Titus performs the most gruesome act of revenge near the end of the play when he serves Tamora her feast. He cuts Demetrius and Chiron's throats and adds their remains to a pie to which he will feed Tamora. Titus welcomes the emperor and the queen and he encourages them to eat from the pie.

They do so in a moment Titus must have enjoyed more than any other. In what must have seemed a strange moment, Titus kills Lavinia. To Tamora's surprise, Titus tells her that Demetrius and Chiron already murdered his daughter. He explains in detail that her sons "ravish'd her, and cut away her tongue" (Shakespeare V.iii.61).

When Saturninus asks to see Demetrius and Chiron, Titus has the glorious joy of telling him and his wife the boys are "both, baked in that pie; / Whereof their mother daintily hath fed, / Eating the flesh that she herself hath bred" (V.iii.64-66). This scene is one of the most chilling in literature because it truly does represent revenge in the worst of ways. Revenge is contagious. Titus begins the wave of revenge when he sacrifices Tamora's son. Her reaction demonstrates her humanity in a sense.

She is outraged, vows revenge and schemes with Aaron to frame Titus' sons for murder. Revenge is more than simply "getting even" in some cases. For Tamora, revenge involves getting even but doing so in the most painful of ways. Her request for her boys to do away with Bessainus is completely self serving. Aaron's suggestion for Demetrius and Chiron to rape Lavinia is only part of a problem; their cutting out her tongue and chopping off her hands adds a depth of sickness that is almost too cruel.

Interestingly, she succeeds with her plan and Titus' sons are murdered yet she does not feel satisfaction. She then places her eyes upon Lavinia. Aaron, too, is preoccupied with revenge. Even as Tamora speaks of being "wreathed in" (II.iii.29) His arms, he confesses his mind is bent on revenge. Revenge is unproductive. Revenge proves to be addictive and yet somehow unsatisfying. Instead, it feeds on itself and only begs for more. There is no end to revenge once emotions have escalated beyond reason, there is no controlling them.

These characters are extreme examples of humanity. While we look at this play and think it is outrageous and completely unbelievable, it is not. Human beings are capable of anything and if one person can imagine it, someone else somewhere else has no doubt it done it. Shakespeare was an astute student of people and this play.