Titus Andronicus

critical responses to the play
Titus Andronicus was an immensely popular play when it was first performed but critical responses have varied greatly over the centuries. T.S Eliot all but wrote the play off whereas Gerald Freedman, who directed the play in New York in 1967 called it 'a particularly modern play for today - with its flawed hero, its existence in violence and yet its inevitable compassion.'

'The barbarity of the spectacles, and the general massacre which are here exhibited, can scarcely be conceived tolerable to any audience.'
Samuel Johnson

'One of the stupidest and most uninspired plays ever written.'
T.S. Eliot

'In the civilised Victorian age the play could not be performed because it could not be believed. Such is the horror of our own age, with the appalling barbarities of prison camps and resistance movements paralleling the torture and mutilation and feeding on human flesh, of the play, that it has ceased to be improbable.'
A.L. Rowse

'I have always had a soft spot for Titus Andronicus, in spite of the fact that I have often heard it called the worst thing Marlowe ever wrote. Whoever wrote it ... he deserves our thanks for having shown us, at the dawn of our drama, just how far drama could go.'
Kenneth Tynan

'When the notices of Titus Andronicus came out, giving us full marks for saving your dreadful play [Stratford, 1955], I could not help feeling a twinge of guilt. For to tell the truth, it had not occurred to any of us in rehearsal that the play was so bad.'
Peter Brook

'Titus Andronicus is by no means the most brutal of Shakespeare's plays. More people die in Richard III. King Lear is a much more cruel play. In the whole Shakespearean repertory I can find no scene so revolting as Cordelia's death. In reading, the cruelties of Titus can seem ridiculous. But I have seen it on the stage and found it a moving experience. Why? In watching Titus Andronicus we come to understand - perhaps more than by looking at any other Shakespeare play - the nature of his genius: he gave an inner awareness to passions; cruelty ceased to be merely physical. Shakespeare discovered the moral hell. He discovered heaven as well. But he remained on earth.'
Jan Kott

'To me it's a marvellous, tremendous play as epic as Lear. It is a remarkable examination of grief and madness and it looks at the very centre of violence. Of all the Roman plays it is the most apposite for our present time, it seems quite up to date. It takes a look at an empire in decay and a system which has become so hard, so brittle that it breaks.'
Colin Blakely

'I admit to finding Titus a real puzzle. Of course we know such things can happen - we've seen it all too recently with Idi Amin and the heads in the fridge and all that - but I don't agree that we can't really do this kind of play nowadays.'
Patrick Stewart

'Shakespeare allows each individual scene of Titus Andronicus an idiosyncratic movement that beats through from scene to scene, act to act, and adheres quite carefully to the discipline he has imposed upon himself. After all, there are 13 murders, 4 mutilations and 1 rape during the course of the play. Shakespeare has created a very slender, but strong, tightrope of absurdity between comedy and tragedy - and the performer has to be very careful how he traverses that tightrope.'
Brian Cox

'Titus Andronicus is a sophisticated revenge tragedy, where the binary oppositions of good and evil, Roman and Goth, civilization and barbarism are systematically questioned. The aftermath of the unrelenting deconstruction of Roman values leaves Titus stranded in a nightmare world, where Lavinia's body becomes his new "map of woe" and her speechless complaint a new alphabet. The first act of Titus Andronicus, which was often attributed to George Peele because of the un-Shakespearian quality of its dramatic diction, is now regarded as one of Shakespeare's most daring experiments with contemporary stage conventions.'
Stanley Wells


			Titus Andronicus was an immensely popular play when it was first performed but critical responses have varied greatly over the centuries. T.S Eliot all but wrote the play off whereas Gerald Freedman, who directed the play in New York in 1967 called it 'a particularly modern play for today - with its flawed hero, its existence in violence and yet its inevitable compassion.' 'The barbarity of the spectacles, and the general massacre which are here exhibited, can scarcely be conceived tolerable to any audience.' Samuel Johnson 'One of the stupidest and most uninspired plays ever written.' T.S. Eliot 'In the civilised Victorian age the play could not be performed because it could not be believed. Such is the horror of our own age, with the appalling barbarities of prison camps and resistance movements paralleling the torture and mutilation and feeding on human flesh, of the play, that it has ceased to be improbable.' A.L. Rowse 'I have always had a soft spot for Titus Andronicus, in spite of the fact that I have often heard it called the worst thing Marlowe ever wrote. Whoever wrote it ... he deserves our thanks for having shown us, at the dawn of our drama, just how far drama could go.' Kenneth Tynan 'When the notices of Titus Andronicus came out, giving us full marks for saving your dreadful play [Stratford, 1955], I could not help feeling a twinge of guilt. For to tell the truth, it had not occurred to any of us in rehearsal that the play was so bad.' Peter Brook 'Titus Andronicus is by no means the most brutal of Shakespeare's plays. More people die in Richard III. King Lear is a much more cruel play. In the whole Shakespearean repertory I can find no scene so revolting as Cordelia's death. In reading, the cruelties of Titus can seem ridiculous. But I have seen it on the stage and found it a moving experience. Why? In watching Titus Andronicus we come to understand - perhaps more than by looking at any other Shakespeare play - the nature of his genius: he gave an inner awareness to passions; cruelty ceased to be merely physical. Shakespeare discovered the moral hell. He discovered heaven as well. But he remained on earth.' Jan Kott 'To me it's a marvellous, tremendous play as epic as Lear. It is a remarkable examination of grief and madness and it looks at the very centre of violence. Of all the Roman plays it is the most apposite for our present time, it seems quite up to date. It takes a look at an empire in decay and a system which has become so hard, so brittle that it breaks.' Colin Blakely 'I admit to finding Titus a real puzzle. Of course we know such things can happen - we've seen it all too recently with Idi Amin and the heads in the fridge and all that - but I don't agree that we can't really do this kind of play nowadays.' Patrick Stewart 'Shakespeare allows each individual scene of Titus Andronicus an idiosyncratic movement that beats through from scene to scene, act to act, and adheres quite carefully to the discipline he has imposed upon himself. After all, there are 13 murders, 4 mutilations and 1 rape during the course of the play. Shakespeare has created a very slender, but strong, tightrope of absurdity between comedy and tragedy - and the performer has to be very careful how he traverses that tightrope.' Brian Cox 'Titus Andronicus is a sophisticated revenge tragedy, where the binary oppositions of good and evil, Roman and Goth, civilization and barbarism are systematically questioned. The aftermath of the unrelenting deconstruction of Roman values leaves Titus stranded in a nightmare world, where Lavinia's body becomes his new "map of woe" and her speechless complaint a new alphabet. The first act of Titus Andronicus, which was often attributed to George Peele because of the un-Shakespearian quality of its dramatic diction, is now regarded as one of Shakespeare's most daring experiments with contemporary stage conventions.' Stanley Wells