Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- Acknowledgments
- English revenge plays discussed in this book
- Standard MLA abbreviations for Shakespeare's plays
- Note on the text
- PART I RAMPANT REVENGE
- PART II ECONOMIC UNFAIRNESS: REVENGE AND MONEY
- 3 Balancing the books: revenge, commercial mathematics, and the balance of trade
- 4 Payback time: reward, retaliation, and the deluge of debt
- 5 The goddess with the scales – and the blindfold
- PART III POLITICAL UNFAIRNESS: REVENGE AND RESISTANCE
- PART IV SOCIAL UNFAIRNESS: VENGEANCE AND EQUALITY
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
5 - The goddess with the scales – and the blindfold
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 06 December 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures
- Acknowledgments
- English revenge plays discussed in this book
- Standard MLA abbreviations for Shakespeare's plays
- Note on the text
- PART I RAMPANT REVENGE
- PART II ECONOMIC UNFAIRNESS: REVENGE AND MONEY
- 3 Balancing the books: revenge, commercial mathematics, and the balance of trade
- 4 Payback time: reward, retaliation, and the deluge of debt
- 5 The goddess with the scales – and the blindfold
- PART III POLITICAL UNFAIRNESS: REVENGE AND RESISTANCE
- PART IV SOCIAL UNFAIRNESS: VENGEANCE AND EQUALITY
- Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
A false balance is abomination to the Lord; but a just weight is his delight.
Proverbs 11: 1Are ye then deaf, ye gods, ye cannot hear it?
Or is just Libra fallen out of your spheres,
That wronged states must to the earth appeal
For justice and revenge?
Mulleases the TurkRevenge-play audiences knew what injustice looked like: kangaroo courts, perjury, conviction without right to testify, summary executions. Revengers turn vigilante when tyrants deny them justice, or higher-status figures block access to the courts. And they knew what Justice should look like. In emblem books, poems, and plays, majestic Justitia held scales (a “balance”) in one hand, a sword in the other. Ripa's Iconologia explained, “The scale, used to measure quantities of material things, is a metaphor for justice, which sees that each man receives that which is due him” (120). Henry V charges the Chief Justice to “bear the balance and the sword” (2H4 5.2.102). Daniel's Vision of the Twelve Goddesses stages Justice “with her balance, and her sword” (118). Even the hired killer Bosola invokes her: “When thou kill'd'st thy sister, / Thou took'st from Justice her most equal balance, / And left her naught but her sword”; the murder merits “a most just revenge. / The weakest arm is strong enough, that strikes / With the sword of Justice” (Duchess of Malfi 5.5.38–40, 5.3.338–40). Othello identifies with Justitia: “O balmy breath, that dost almost persuade / Justice to break her sword!” (5.2.16–17).
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- Chapter
- Information
- English Revenge DramaMoney, Resistance, Equality, pp. 106 - 126Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010