ABSTRACT
In a bold, experimental move, Shakespeare stages the blazon of the Petrarchan sonnet in his revenge play Titus Andronicus, transforming Ovid to embody the violence and vulnerability embedded in the conventions of Renaissance love poetry. Writing from an inherited tradition of the English sonnet, which developed following generations of Petrarchan adaptations, Shakespeare traces the love lyric to its Latin roots in his plays and poems, reviving and regenerating a new take on Ovid. On stage, Shakespeare juxtaposes the erotic poetic language of the blazon with the physical presence of the raped and mutilated Lavinia, as personified by a male actor, to fabricate an elaborate, dark vision from the blatant violence, vulnerability, and sexuality of Ovid's stark erotic imagination. Shakespeare employs the revenge play genre to expose the brutality inscribed in the Elizabethan lyric and to stage the vulnerability and violence inherent in the Petrarchan blazon, transforming Ovid's outlandish, savage, and wickedly humorous tales for the Elizabethan theater.
