Why Coriolanus matters

Let's say, for argument's sake, that there's an American presidential candidate who appears to hold his country's electorate in such contempt that no stunt or lowly trick is beneath him or his advisors. Every new week only seems to bring new ways for him to display his unrivaled cynicism and to further debase the political process.

Well, in that case, do I have a play for you.

It's Shakespeare's Coriolanus, and it's not particularly well known or widely staged. That's unfortunate.

Here's an excerpt from a BBC production:



The snippet above comes from Act 3, Scene 1, in which the title character, a celebrated Roman war hero, scuttles a plan by the Roman Senate to provide some relief-- in the form of food handouts to a starving populace -- in a time of financial crisis. (Hmm.... no parallels here. Move on. Nothing to see.) Coriolanus calls the Roman populace "common fools" and "the mutable, rank-scented many." His derision for the public at large is matched by a vainglory and narcissism that can be almost uncomfortable to watch:

CORIOLANUS For the mutable, rank-scented many, let them
Regard me as I do not flatter, and
Therein behold themselves: I say again,
In soothing them, we nourish 'gainst our senate...
As for my country I have shed my blood,
Not fearing outward force, so shall my lungs
Coin words till their decay against those measles,
Which we disdain should tatter us

It is, in fact, Coriolanus's Machiavellian disdain for his countrymen that makes the play so difficult to stage as it's typically presented: A tragedy. A tragedy requires that we somehow sympathize with the hero whose rise and later fall is the lifeblood of the play.

But Coriolanus is such a contemptible figure, and not nearly as fascinatingly contemptible as Richard III, that productions of this "tragedy" often fall flat.

The key to the play, though, is found in a quip by George Bernard Shaw. Coriolanus, Shaw said, "is the greatest of Shakespeare's comedies."


The weapons of satire, not tragedy, belong in the director's arsenal. Coriolanus himself gets only one soliloquy in the whole play, and a none too revealing one at that: The text reveals that we are not meant to care about the title character or his plight. He's a foil, not some misunderstood tragic figure.

The insightful critic Oscar J. Campbell, dissenting from standard views of this "tragedy," writes in his 1943 book Shakespeare's Satire that "Coriolanus exhibits over and over again his one ruling passion--the choler which Renaissance philosophers regarded as the inevitable result of wounded pride."

The Bard, Campbell elsewhere writes, "fills the tragedy so full of the spirit of derision that the play can be understood only if it be recognized as perhaps the most successful of Shakespeare's satiric plays."

I would only add, from a biographical p.o.v., that the Elizbethan historical inspiration for Coriolanus only underscores Shaw's and Campbell's biography-agnostic readings of the play. A haughty general called the Earl of Essex -- tremendously popular with the Elizabethan public -- was in the author's crosshairs. Edward de Vere hated Essex. Coriolanus is Essex's comeuppance.

But, in 2008, highlighting the Elizabethan parallels wouldn't be nearly as fun or fascinating as it would be to bring out the modern-day parallels, and let the audience judge for themselves.

My director's kit for an ideal modern-day production of Coriolanus, then, would be this: Campbell's book... and a chronicle of John McCain's greatest hits from the 2008 presidential campaign.

As one of the play's nameless lords observes of Coriolanus's downfall, "His own impatience takes... a great part of blame. Let's make the best of it."


UPDATED to clarify that I'm not advocating some sort of matrix of one-to-one parallels between Coriolanus and present-day events. There's a difference between a nod to topical interpretations and an airhorn that blasts it to anyone within earshot. Maybe a DVD of Robert Altman's dark satire M*A*S*H would be part of my ideal director's kit, too...

UPDATED AGAIN: If McCain-as-Coriolanus is the feature attraction, here's the sideshow:

See more funny videos and funny pictures at CollegeHumor.

If music be the food of love, press "on"

Readers in the New York city area may want to tune their teevees and TiVos to Channel 13 (WNET) on Thursday night at 8 for a great little documentary on the acclaimed Hudson Valley Shakespeare production of Twelfth Night blogged about below.

As the show's director and one of its cast members told the SBAN blog, Edward de Vere's life story played no small role in inspiring the present production of Shakespeare's Illyrian comedy. Channel 13's cameras were on the scene recording the making-of this Twelfth Night -- a behind the scenes documentary that the New York Daily News said is "a lot of fun."

Here's a video clip.

Then, from 9 to 11, WNET airs the truly inspired production itself. While the director's proselytizing about de Vere (and "Shakespeare" By Another Name) didn't quite make the final cut in the "making-of" doc, the proof is ultimately in the show itself. The evening I was fortunate enough to be in the audience, last month, the end-result was as clear as could be: This director and these actors, quite simply, nailed it. I've not seen a funnier, more musical, more lyrical, more vivacious Twelfth Night.

Thankfully, the show, at least briefly, lives on.

The big debate and why it matters

The debate over Edward de Vere's contribution to (or authorship of) the Shake-speare canon has been smoldering for generations, since a British schoolmaster with a funny name first suggested de Vere might indeed be da Bard. And the fallback position one often hears is "Really, though, why does any of this matter?"

The following comment from a recent BBC article on the authorship controversy aptly summarizes the point:

What does is matter who wrote the books? They are great reads regardless of the class or caste of the author. It's a silly argument and we should just appreciate the work.

There are, of course, many earnest attempts to straightforwardly answer this objection that are already online. I won't add to that volume here.

Instead, I recently put the "What does it matter" question to two members of a New York Times and Wall Street Journal-acclaimed production of Twelfth Night, staged by the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival in Garrison, N.Y.

The play's director, John Christian Plummer, had come across a copy of "Shakespeare" By Another Name two weeks into rehearsals. He says, from this first-hand experience, that knowing the historical context of de Vere's life and times helps both Shakespeare directors and actors tremendously.

The actor here, Eleanor Handley (pictured above, left), also drew from de Vere's life (and particularly that of de Vere's sister Mary) in her brilliant portrayal of Twelfth Night's trickster Maria.



In fact, the New York PBS affiliate WNET chronicled the rehearsals and behind-the-scenes perspectives on the Hudson Valley Shakespeare's production of Twelfth Night and will be airing a documentary about it on September 18 -- followed by an airing of this truly inspired adaptation of the Bard's Illyrian comedy.

Twenty-one score and ten years ago...

On this day in 1578, a Portuguese king did something really really stupid. And the aftershocks of said king's blunder reverberate throughout the play Twelfth Night.

Don Sebastian of Portugal was a 24-year-old warmonger who had taken it as his destiny to invade an Islamic nation -- a militaristic and foolhardy little crusade. (Thank god nothing like that ever happens anymore.) In the summer of 1578, Sebastian set sail for Morocco, confident that he would return with a new jewel in the Portuguese crown. On August 4, Sebastian led his outnumbered troops into, essentially, a Christian slaughterhouse, the Battle of Alcacer Quibir.

Sebastian disregarded the pleas of his commanders, who implored him to flee, once the Portuguese army's defeat was assured. But the bullheaded king soldiered on. He was last seen fighting furiously deep behind enemy lines.

King Sebastian was almost certainly killed 430 years ago today. But many in his country refused to give up hope. They insisted that their lost leader would one day wash ashore and spearhead the great Portuguese empire that never came to be. "Sebastianism" is, in fact, an undercurrent of Portuguese (and by extension, Brazilian) culture to this day. The polymorphous 20th century poet Fernando Pessoa -- a writer who assumed an astonishing number of pseudonyms -- chronicled Sebastianism in his poem "The Message." (An epic that was later translated into English and recorded by pioneering hip-hop group Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five.)

(OK, that last parenthetical remark isn't quite true.)

The reason the Bard cared about any of this was that with Sebastian's death -- or alleged death -- came a succession struggle that was ultimately settled, in 1580, by King Philip II of Spain incorporating Portugual, along with its massive navy, into his dominions. This meant Spain was now a naval power to rival any in Europe and could thus confidently embark on her own (Catholic) crusade to destroy the heretic Queen of England. Cue the Spanish Armada.

Circa 1580, however, there was a dwindling but still distant hope that a different successor to the Portuguese throne could be found. Inserting this alternative king onto the Portuguese throne would have cut off Spain's anti-Protestant invasion plans at the knees.

One of the leading pretenders to the Portuguese crown, one supported by both Queen Elizabeth and a number of her prominent courtiers at the time, was a distant relative of Sebastian named Don Antonio.


The story of Shake-speare's Twelfth Night is in part the story of two friends, ANTONIO and SEBASTIAN, who are reunited when the latter washes ashore and into the action of the drama. SEBASTIAN is widely believed to have perished at sea, and he and his chum ANTONIO spend much of the play attempting to disentangle themselves from a series of misapprehensions that are the stock-in-trade of Shake-spearean comedy.

Twelfth Night, in other words, paints a satirical portrait of European geopolitics from 1580 -- two decades before the play is thought to have been written.

As I discussed at the Concord Shakespeare Conference in May, this is just one of a series of topical references in Twelfth Night that would seem to date it to circa 1580, not circa 1600.

As blogged below, there is a chronology problem in the Shake-speare canon. But the problem is that a vast majority of the evidence points to initial composition dates for these plays years -- decades, in some cases -- earlier than is now accepted. And it all comes to a halt in 1604, the year Edward de Vere died.

That is a harangue for another time. (How about, say, October 10 in White Plains, N.Y.?)

For now, though, it's enough, I think, just to marvel at that vast Rube Goldberg device also known as history.


If a crazy Portuguese king hadn't launched an even crazier invasion of Morocco on this date 430 years ago, the king of Spain wouldn't have had the military might to launch the Spanish Armada, which would have left Protestantism in England unchallenged, which may have set other rivalries in motion (e.g. Holy Roman Empire and/or Italy v. England? Spain v. Portugal? France and Holland sit this dance out?), which would have left the history of New World exploration in a complete tizzy. Who knows what country or countries would have divvied up the American spoils? (And who's to suppose Amerigo Vespucci's name would have still been memorialized as the new continent's namesake?)

Bienvenue auf Nuovo Deutschland, señor!

Shakespeare in Sin City

Welcome to the Las Vegas strip, where a roller coaster zips past the Statue of Liberty every five minutes, and -- a few long blocks north -- Venetian Gondolas swarm up and down an oversized swimming pool.

There's always room to belly up at the "1 cent" slot machines (these of course cost a dollar), but you may have to stand in line for the oxygen bar.



Yes, you read that last item correctly. Some extremely clever bastard, please note the level of jealousy rising in your correspondent's voice, has actually figured how to get people to pay good money for gourmet air.



By now it must be abundantly clear what a natural market a hotel-casino on the strip is for a debate on the Shakespeare authorship question.

So yesterday afternoon, Friday, July 11, Profs. Alan Nelson, William Rubinstein and I sat down for a one-on-one-on-one debate at Bally's Casino, part of the larger FreedomFest '08 conference, a primarily libertarian-oriented gathering. Not surprising, I suppose, that our 100-minute confab was programmed during the same time slot as debates on "Islam: radical or peaceful?" and "Should we regulate Wall Street more or less?" as well as talks about "rare coins and collectibles" and "the hottest commodity for 2009: copper!" [sic]. A live teleconference with former Republican presidential contender Rep. Ron Paul of Texas also competed for butts on seats.

Shakespeare, it seems, was not on the high priority list of most 'fest attendees. Still, a despite relatively low draw (the attendance fluctuated between c.15 and 40), the debate itself was actually quite good.


Prof. Alan Nelson, long known to Oxfordians for his often strident stance about both heretics and Edward de Vere himself, presented the case for Will Shakspere of Stratford. Bill Rubinstein, co-author of the recent book The Truth Will Out presented the arguments for the arriviste Bard contender Henry Neville. And yours truly made his case for an Elizabethan literary earl who, they both claimed, died too soon to have been Shakespeare.

This was the point I decided to go on the attack about, rather than taking a defensive posture. In my allotted eight minutes for presenting the pro-de Vere case (the first half provided another 11 minutes to make the case against the Stratfordian theory), I argued three points: The Shake-speare chose settings from de Vere's life, the author characterized people from de Vere's life and the Bard stopped creating new works in 1604, the year de Vere died.

The first two points are, in no small part, the story of "Shakespeare" By Another Name. I discussed the parallels between de Vere's life and Hamlet, King Lear, Othello, and Merry Wives of Windsor. (Rubinstein, I noticed, places emphasis on MWW and how Henry Neville was fat and... er... therefore Falstaffian? The death of Falstaff in Henry V, he says, comes at the receipt of an ambassadorial post in Paris for Neville. Rubinstein's "Shakespeare" needed to kill off his most popular character so the author could go serve Her Majesty's pleasure across the English channel.)

Nelson, on the other hand, centered his pro-Shakspere argument around the claim that during the author's lifetime, everyone who referred to him referred to him as "Master" or "Mister" -- meaning he was of lower class, not aristocratic or courtly class.

I didn't dispute his claim. For instance, I said, John Davies refers to "Mr. Will: Shake-speare" [sic] as "our English Terence," adding that many people at the time believed that Terence was a Roman actor who stood as a front-man for one or more Roman aristocratic authors.

Nelson also denigrated de Vere's skills as a poet, although admitted that de Vere was at least "in the same ballpark" with Shakespeare -- stating that no one recognized Henry Neville as a poet or playwright of any stature during his lifetime, and so the Nevillian case comes way out of left field. He also quoted a lengthy diatribe by David Kathman (proprietor of the Stratfordian Shakespeare Authorship website) against the Nevillians.

As a result, I didn't have to do much work against the Neville case.

The 1604 argument, however, is something I think Oxfordians need to claim as ours. The evidence is on our side, especially now that the new research on The Tempest is beginning to get published.

I'll blog about my 1604 argument another time. (Right now, hotel check-out time looms.)

In the end, those in the audience willing to venture a vote for one candidate over any other broke for Shakspere vs. de Vere vs. Neville by 11 to 8 to 1. Oxfordians were in the minority, but only just.

Now the trick is to get a crowd next time.

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Table Talk

Today NPR's Morning Edition aired the third and final installment of its Shakespeare-under-dispute series. Actor Mark Rylance (below) joined this Mark and two other Oxfordian advocates (Dan Wright of Concordia University in Portland and British author Charles Beauclerk) in making the case for Edward de Vere as the man behind the Shakespeare mask.

Like yesterday's segment, making the case against Will Shakspere of Stratford, today's piece skillfully packed a lot of material into a 7-minute, 45-second time slot.

By way of correction (or as a former editor of mine preferred to call it, "clarification"), I do want to offer up one note about host Renee Montagne's copy. She stated that Edward de Vere's brother-in-law served as a royal emissary to the Danish court at Elsinore, where he recorded his own personal experiences with Danish drinking rituals that are preserved in Hamlet and his bread-breaking with Danish courtiers named Rosenkrantz and Guildenstern.

All of that is true. But Montagne said this material came in the form of personal letters written to de Vere. That's where the clarification comes in. In fact, anyone reading this blog in London can walk into the British Library and see the documents for themselves. The shelf mark is Cotton MSS Titus C VII 224-229.

Recorded on those fascinating, little-studied pages, are the brother-in-law's (Peregrine Bertie's) personal notes of his Elsinorean exploits with the Danish king and his court. None of this material would have been available outside the queen's inner circle or the company of Bertie's immediate family and friends, a group that included de Vere.

De Vere never visited Elsinore himself. But the author of Hamlet did preserve some of the peculiar local lore and legend, courtesy of a roistering brother-in-law whose mission in no small measure was to party down with Danish royalty for a few months and then return to England to tell the tale.

So... party on, Rosenkrantz; party on, Guildenstern.

The Shakespeare Riots -- and the Shakespeare Debate

[Creative Commons image source]

As this blogger prepares to debate the authorship issue next week in Las Vegas, NPR's "Morning Edition" program today began a three-day series on Shakespeare disputes, including the authorship question.

Today's eight-minute segment concerned a riot in 19th century New York over two rival Shakespearean actors and the class warfare that it fanned.

Tomorrow and Friday, host Renee Montagne said, they'll be tackling the authorship question. (Last summer Montagne interviewed yours truly and a number of other Shakespeare heretics as well as defenders of the orthodox standard.)

"Groundlings," she said in her provocative teaser for the upcoming authorship segments, "Grab your tomatoes."

UPDATE 1 (Thursday): Here's the second Morning Edition segment on the Shakespeare heresy.