Beyond paganism and politics

This chapter talks about the play “Richard III,” which reflects the dreadful evil of the persons being removed from power that are thought to occlude conspiracy, foreign invasion, assassination and regicide. In Richard III, that effect had been compounded by the presence throughout the play of a battery of providential signs, dreams, prophecies and omens. It also discusses the Titus providence, which is defined as the intervention of the supernatural and the prophetic directly into events. The chapter analyzes the “Titus Andronicus” that contains the structures of a typical criminal prosecution for murder. It also looks into Saturninus' failure to observe the conventional legal structures as a central aspect of his emergence as a tyrant.