Abstract
4 윤민우 “그녀에게 망령들어”: 복수자의 비극의 기호와
섹슈얼리티의 혼란 Medieval and Early Modern English Studies Volume 22
No. 2 (2014) 83 ~ 105
[Yun Min-u: “Doting on her Beauty”: Sign and
Sexuality in The Revenger’s Tragedy]
In Renaissance drama, a revenger begins his
action as a Platonist whoaspires to rehabilitate the violated
value of the past. He cannot perform a facile mourning for the
value he has cherished. Along the way, he realizes the channel to
the public justice is closed.or, he himself closes it.to resort to
private revenge. In The Revenger’s Tragedy, however, this process
is omitted. In attempting at paying back for the immoral event
perpetrated on him nine years ago, Vindice already decided to take
a private revenge. The play seems to go straight to the confusion
of public discourse which already everywhere reaches its full
ripeness and capacity. One's public identity frequently fails, and
the absolute signifier of God is parodied, and further, the
revenger is cynical about his own act of revenge. This confusion
of signs is finally amplified by the symbolic value of woman. In
the revenger’s mind, woman takes the place of the futile public
justice and transcendental authority represented by the king and
God. But rather than remaining a Platonic Idea, woman soon becomes
a fluid sign most susceptible to social change. Related to this
sense of change, what is special in The Revenger’s Tragedy is a
strong social criticism by Vindice, a disinherited son. The
malcontent attitude toward society enables him to keep distance
from the courtly value, including his respect for woman. In this
regard,The Revenger’s Tragedy is no longer in the morality
tradition. Although dramatis personae of the play are all
allegorical abstractions, Vindice is not Everyman, but an
individual entity under subjection to social change. Utter
confusion, parody and decadence coexist with social criticism in
the play.
Key words: revenge, pastoral elegy, skull, misogyny,
mourning