The Histrionics of Warrior Masculinity in <i>1 & 2 Tamburlaine</i> (1587)

Abstract

This essay analyses the histrionics of warrior masculinity in 1 & 2 Tamburlaine in light of the social, political and technological shifts that transformed warfare in early modern England. It first looks at the contexts of these shifts and how they necessitated new models of masculinity in keeping with early modern civil society. The prospective elimination of the nobility’s warrior masculinity caused great anxieties about the foothold of masculinity in society more generally, which became a major subject of discussion in public discourse at the time. The early modern theatre, with its particular function in formulating topical issues and discussing questions about identities, staged the anxiety about effeminacy brought about by the demise of pre-modern warriorship. This essay, however, proposes that English Renaissance drama of war mediates the transition of the model manhood from that of martialism to that of civility. It argues that Christopher Marlowe’s 1 & 2 Tamburlaine, as a famous play centering on war and conquest, engages in such mediation through the hyperbolic characterisation of the pre-modern warrior. By doing so, it renders such a figure unhuman and thereby unviable in early modern society. The essay further analyses how the dramaturgy of the plays estranges the audience from the figure of pre-modern warrior and discredits its legitimacy.