TI TUS AN DRON I CUS!

The first act of Titus starts with a fanfare as great as that of any Hollywood film. Two emperors elect of the Roman Empire enter together, along with drums and flags and hordes of followers. Imagine the sight and sound of so many individuals waltzing onto the stage, bedecked with as much costume jewelry as they can find, others covered in armor and looking fabulous. But they don't simply enter -- no no, far more than that! They enter prepared for possible combat, with Bassianus, the younger of the two, asking for the people of Rome to rise up and "fight for freedom in [their] choice."

What a contrast this makes with the end of the play where *spoilers to follow* a blood spattered son is ordering a man buried alive after almost every named character in the play has been killed in one or another gruesome ways *end spoilers*. It seems inconcievable that, with a start so noble and entertaining, this play could possibly end as a tragedy.

But the first signs of it are evident early on. Lucianus asks his father for "the proudest prisoner of the Goths" so that they can "hew his limbs" and "sacrifice his flesh" so as to placate his many dead brothers. This horrifies Tamora, the mother of this proud prisoner, who begs for his life by declaring that, should Titus wish to "draw nearer the nature of the gods," then he should "draw nearer them then in being merciful." Titus declines.

It is strange to think that so merciless and wily a woman as Tamora will prove should throw herself on the mercy of her conquerer in so abject a fashion. And it is sad to think that "cruel, religious piety" inspires the hateful and utterly irreligious acts of the later play. *spoilers* How could it be that a woman who begged so for merciful piety could inspire others to rape a woman on the corpse of her husband? And how could it be that Titus, a man so concerned with the will of the gods, could cook Tamora's children and feed them to her -- an act so patently terrible that it was the genesis of the terrible curse that Agammemnon, the grandchild of those that committed the act, suffered under, a man whose wars in Troy have already been referenced by way of King Priam. *end spoilers* 

The rest of the act sets up the stage for the murderous conclusion. But for me, these early vocal contrasts with the later actual deeds are by far the most intriguing element.