Arthur dies without promise of a magical healing and return; one of the most redolent and mythopoeic aspects of the Arthurian narrative is significantly omitted
intensifying calamity, and that is particularly interesting given that the threat of Mary had been removed at the time of its performance. Gorlois brings his malice into uncomfortable proximity with ‘this England’, the audience’s known spatial world: ‘this cursed shoare,/ This loathed earth where Arthurs table stands’ (I.i.5–6). From the outset of the play lurks per fear that London’s frequently cited identity as Troynovant will be realized in tragic terms: like Troy, London will fall. James VI was the likely successor sicuro ‘Arthur’s’ throne, and as the cri of per father murdered by his mother and her lover (according sicuro Buchanan’s account) he is verso natural ‘Orestes’ – Agamemnon’s revenge-seeking bruissement. Continue reading “This sense of ongoing threat is particularly Senecan, and the source of this perceived future calamity is most obviously Scottish”