Staging Fantasy or Anxiety:

This paper examines how the representation of the rape of Lavinia in Titus Andronicus references war rape that arouses both fantasy and anxiety. It particularly looks into the ways in which armed conflicts and nationalist ideas work together regarding Lavinia’s “ravished” body. As a tragic outcome of conflicts and revenges between patriarch and matriarch, Titus and Tamora, Lavinia’s rape is often situated within a simply gendered frame. Such a commonly accepted discourse of revenge and chastity is reconsidered in this paper in terms of the political turmoil that Shakespearian Rome faces both inside and outside, nationally and internationally, due to the inclusion of the Goths, which informs what happened in reality during Rome’s decline. Bloody armed conflicts in the complicated situation in Titus that involve the concept of the racial ‘Other’ render the rape of Lavinia an expectable atrocity in war. By representing how the Andronici respond to and deal with Lavinia’s “ravished” body, Shakespeare ultimately shows the Elizabethan audience how rape, war, and nationalist ideas are interconnected.