Abstract
IN CRITICISM ON ISSUES OF RACE IN TITUS ANDRONICUS, blackness has usually been the focus, particularly as it is embodied in Aaron the Moor.1 Whiteness remains in the background. In this essay, I will put whiteness in the foreground in an attempt to dismantle a black/white binary. I will explore the denaturalization of whiteness in Titus Andronicus and its construction along an unstable continuum of racial identities. Though Aaron's adulterous lover, Tamora, has attracted much less attention, the racial issues she raises are no less interesting. If Aaron is coded as black, Tamora is represented as hyperwhite. Her husband, himself a Roman, has singled her out and married her for her hue: In the racial thinking of the time, the adulterous liaison between Aaron and Tamora that produces an illegitimate baby appears as a kind of enhanced miscegenation, ultrablack crossed with ultrawhite. Why are these racial extremes paired in this play, and to what cultural anxieties might the sexual misdeeds of Tamora and Aaron have been responding. What are
Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
