《马耳他的犹太人》中的海外扩张与帝国想象

伊丽莎白一世时期,英格兰脱离罗马天主教会,成为独立的民族国家,进而转向海外意欲建立殖民帝国。马洛戏剧《马耳他的犹太人》对基于海外扩张的帝国想象进行了或隐或显的描述,因此,本文旨在对16世纪英国民族国家形成的大背景下的《马耳他的犹太人》和伊丽莎白一世时代的英格兰进行逐一剖析,发现《马耳他的犹太人》影射伊丽莎白时代英格兰的东方贸易、海上掠夺、奴隶贸易和殖民地尝试,隐喻英格兰早期的海外扩张和帝国想象,同时传递作者对早期现代英格兰从民族国家向殖民帝国过渡的积极思考。

During the reign of Queen Elizabeth I,England broke away from the Roman Catholic church and became an independent nation.It then turned its focus towards overseas expansion with the intention of establishing a colonial empire.Marlowe's The Jew of Malta presents the imagination,whether implicit or explicit,of empire-building rooted in overseas expansion.Therefore,this paper aims to compare The Jew of Malta with Elizabethan England in the context of the formation of the English nation-state in the 16th century.It is concluded that The Jew of Malta alludes to Elizabethan England's Oriental trade,maritime plunder,slave trade,and colonial attempts,and metaphorically represents early English overseas expansion and imagination of the empire-building.At the same time,it conveys the playwright's positive reflections on England's transition from a nation to a colonial empire in the early modern period.