Language:
English
Year of publication:
1990
Titel der Quelle:
English Literary Renaissance
Angaben zur Quelle:
20,1 (1990) 1-16
Keywords:
Marlowe, Christopher,
;
Antisemitism in literature
;
English literature History and criticism
Abstract:
The play centers on and subverts colonialist constructs, and contextualizes its representation of the Jew amid imperialist conflicts, revealing the stereotype as a product not of religious but of colonialist competitions. Europe's attempts to dominate other worlds is juxtaposed with the Christian governor's attempt to dominate the Jews. Yet the play undermines the Christian/Jew dichotomy and its allied stereotype by depicting discrepancies between the asserted distinctions and the apparent similarities between the two (e.g. greed, villainy). Furthermore, Barabas adopts a strategy of self-representation in which he fashions his role of "difference" to suit his spectators, so that it is impossible to define Barabas absolutely and, therefore, impossible to stereotype the Jew. In the end, as Barabas falls into a "deep pit past recovery, " his position is one of absence beneath the discourses of a dominating authority.
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