'The dark and vicious place': The Location of Sexual Transgression and its Punishment on the Early Modern English Stage

Abstract

In those texts from Kyd to Ford that explore the interconnections between lust, tyranny and death, the 'dark and vicious place' is a generic location that connotes both illicit desire and the grave. Singular in significance, this intimate stage space is literally a plurality of locations ranging beyond the bedchamber, from bower and sunless spot to closet and tomb. Where exactly these sites are located on the stage is seldom clear, though they can only serve their purpose if clearly visible to the audience. As sites of both sexual transgression and murder, they have emblematic functions that play on the notion of false security, sometimes intensifying the sensationalism of the situation and sometimes invoking the witness-function of audience and stage audience. Chronologically, there is an increasing tendency for dramatists to use more 'domestic' versions of the 'dark and vicious place'.