Vindictive justice and participatory revenge : English revenge tragedy's engagement with early modern law

Abstract

This thesis demonstrates revenge tragedy's ongoing engagement with early modern law in its myriad forms during the late sixteenth and early seventeenth century. I begin by showing in the introduction the relevance of an interdisciplinary approach to law and literature, and how much revenge tragedy has to offer from a legal-literary perspective (Methodology). I also investigate the genre's long-standing critical neglect, since it is frequently seen by academics as neither socially engaged nor legally sophisticated (Literature Review). I finish my introduction with a basic account of England's participatory justice system in the period, while also pointing towards the major stresses and strains that system was undergoing at the time. These include exponential growth in litigation, jurisdictional conflicts, and increasing professionalisation within the legal system that undermined the participatory structures on which English common law was founded.