BOOK / TITUS ANDRONICUS. Marcos Prior

DRAMA

This cartoon version of the Elizabethan play Titus Andronicus depicts, through the art of Marcos Prior and Gustavo Rico, the transition from emperor-by-hereditary rule to emperor-by-quasi-popular acclaim. All of this is intertwined through a spiral of violence provoked by a series of actions and reactions with the common denominator of revenge (fueled by the fire of evil for the love of evil), which alternate until the final paroxysm that culminates many of the works attributed to the central figure of the problematic Western canon: William Shakespeare.

Prior and Rico's Titus Andronicus is an adaptation—"treason," its authors note, in their respectful and well-documented translation into a comic—of the eponymous tragedy, generally dated between 1592 and 1594, years in which theatrical performances were banned in London when weekly deaths from the plague exceeded 30. "Conspiracies, omens, fatality, the disasters of war... If tragedy is defined by its inexorable nature," asserts writer and critic Rubén Lardín, "this adaptation of the classic does so in its timely vibration between black metal masquerade and ultra-gore tableau. A comic interspersed with ecstatic outbursts that, in its political assessment, refers us to the always immoderate reality, to the collusion that governs our social organization here and now, and which does not forget to point us out as responsible for our own calamity."

“With this Titus Andronicus, which subdues us from its cover typography, Marcos Prior and Gustavo Rico have created a fearsome and somewhat bleak book that overflows with blood and exposes us to atrocious scenes, somewhat sacred images that will linger in us like darkness or sunlight,” Lardín concludes.

Title: Tito Andrónico
Author: Marcos Prior, Gustavo Rico
Pages: 104
Size: 19 x 26 cm
Weight: 550 grams
Genre: Drama
Language: Spanish
Binding: Hardcover
Publisher: ASTIBERRI
Year: 2021