Date of Award
Spring 5-2012
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
M.A.
Degree Program
English
Department
English
Major Professor
Loomis, Catherine
Second Advisor
Piano, Doreen
Third Advisor
Easterlin, Nancy
Abstract
As a passing glance at the popular texts of any given period reveals, the subject of vengeance is nearly inescapable; on billboards, websites, and year end lists, revenge represents a curious constant even amid disparate media. This study explores the cultural commonalities that align revenge texts of the English Renaissance and exploitation films of late 20th century America. As in-depth inquiry reveals, numerous ideas and narrative tropes popularized during the Early Modern period are pushed to their logical extremes in these films. The central factor that aligns London during the Renaissance and New York at the cusp of the 1990s relates to traumatic, far-reaching changes in the urban landscape and its uses. There is an observable preoccupation, on the part of playwrights and filmmakers, with the subject of vengeance as tied to notions of locality, space, and rightful ownership.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Sevieri, Dominic M., "The Persistence of Vengeance from Early Modern England to Postmodern New York" (2012). University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations. 1480.
https://scholarworks.uno.edu/td/1480
Included in
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Rights
The University of New Orleans and its agents retain the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible this dissertation or thesis in whole or part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. The author retains all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis or dissertation.