Warren Chernaik

Rehearsing the revolution : radical performance, radical politics in the English Restoration

Role of performance and theatre in popularising the Whig platform during the English Restoration

Milton and the Burden of Freedom

h roughout his writings, Milton, deeply engaged in political and theological controversy, sought to clear a space for human freedom in a world ruled by an omniscient and omnipotent deity. Paradise Lost and Samson Agonistes , as well as other works by Milton in verse and prose, explore the problematical aspects of a universe ruled by an Old Testament God of wrath, demanding obedience, who allows his creatures the freedom to be ‘authors’ of their own fate. Milton and the Burden of Freedom examines the contradictions inherent in Milton’s religious, political and ethical beliefs as expressed in his poems, prose writings and the treatise De Doctrina Christiana. Milton, whose writings are rooted in the Reformed tradition while challenging Calvinist orthodoxy, is both radical and conservative. Warren Chernaik traces the evolution of Milton’s attitude towards freedom, servitude and virtue during a century of political upheaval and disappointed hopes.

Review of Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice (directed by Jonathan Munby) at Shakespeare's Globe, London, 30 April 2015

One of the problems faced in any production of this controversial, problematical play is how to get the balance right between tragedy and comedy, to work out the relationship between the Venice and Belmont scenes. Another, even more difficult, is how to handle the explosive issue of anti-Semitism: does the play stir up feelings of hatred and contempt for Jews, or is it a critique of the anti-Semitic attitudes of the society depicted? When I was growing up in New York, there were attempts to ban the play from the curriculum in schools on the grounds that “young people . . . don’t have the antibodies to resist the infection that Shakespeare so skilfully offers” (Kakutani). Some productions have in effect rewritten the play as “Shylock: A Tragedy”, presenting a wholly sympathetic, victimized Shylock, often portraying the Venetian characters as vicious antiSemites. The excellent production directed by Trevor Nunn for the National Theatre in 1999, with Henry Goodman as Shylock, set the play in the Germany of the early 1930s, with explicit hints of the rise of Nazism. Other productions have taken the risk of presenting a deeply unsympathetic Shylock (Antony Sher’s Shylock in 1987 resembled an Islamic suicide bomber), in an attempt to make the audience confront their own possible fear and hatred of Jews and other outsiders. The recent production at the Almeida, directed by Rupert Goold, with Ian McDiarmid as Shylock, setting the play in contemporary Las Vegas, made both Shylock and the Venetians unpleasant and unsympathetic, and made Portia the play’s central figure. The principal strength of Jonathan Munby’s production was a powerful, dignified Shylock by Jonathan Pryce, who dominated the play while never sentimentalizing the character, bringing out the full complexity of a character who could at one moment be manhandled and spat upon by contemptuous Venetians and at another moment tyrannize over his daughter and his servant. The great moments like “Hath not a Jew eyes” (3.1.54) or “I would not have given it for a wilderness of monkeys” (3.1.114) were deeply moving, and convincing psychologically. Jonathan Pryce’s Shylock brought out clearly the motive of revenge against those who had scorned and humiliated him: “The villainy you teach me I will execute, and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction” (3.1.66–68). Pryce held the audience in the palm of his hands throughout, in a confident, nuanced portrayal of the character: in an interview, he said of the special characteristics of the Globe, “the great thing is the audience: you’ve got 700 people standing at your feet . . . It’s almost like having another cast member”.

Areopagitica: ‘The Known Rules of Antient Libertie’

Though Milton at no point in Areopagitica attacks monarchical government directly, his position in this treatise is implicitly republican. The vocabulary of Areopagitica is full of echoes of republican discourse, with terms like “tyranny,” “slavery,” “yoke,” “servile,” “thraldom,” as well as “true liberty.” In a number of eloquent metaphorical passages, the search for truth is presented both as a sacred duty and as a communal task, performed by free individuals working independently in a common cause. The extended metaphor of “the virgin Truth,” hewed into “a thousand peeces” to be patiently reassembled “in every joynt and member,” like many passages in Areopagitica, is simultaneously classical and Christian in its allusions and its imagery. In the celebrated “fugitive and cloistered virtue” passage, anticipating the action of Paradise Lost, the reading of books is presented as one of many instances of the exercise of moral choice, “triall … by what is contrary.” Conflating Biblical and classical allusions, Milton here redefines “the rules of antient libertie” in terms of the freedom of the will, extended to Adam and Eve and their descendants by their creator, in accordance with Miltons Arminian theology.

Review of Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale (directed by Blanche McIntyre) at Shakespeare's Globe, 27 June 2018

Blanche McIntyre’s new production of The Winter’s Tale at the Globe was an opportunity missed. The play’s two great scenes, the trial scene and the statue scene at the end, were in this production moving and effective, helped by an excellent performance by Priyanga Burford as Hermione, and there was a second strong performance in the key role of Paulina (a favourite role both for actors and audience, who are likely to cheer her on as she defies the tyrannous Leontes) by Sirine Saba. Will Keen dominated the production as Leontes, though at no point did this production bring out that as a king and domineering master of his family he expects at all times to be obeyed without question. This production sidestepped the question of why he should be overwhelmed with unreasoning jealousy without any preparation by presenting him as mad as a hatter, palpably unfit to rule from the very beginning of the play, waving his arms about and behaving like a wind-up toy. The production made use of the Globe’s characteristic interaction of actor and audience by having him deliver his asides and soliloquies in direct address to the audience, far downstage. In some ways, this worked, but it meant, among other things, that such key moments as “play, boy, play” (1.2.188), addressed to the young Mamillius while Leontes writhed in torment, were smudged, robbing one of the play’s most powerful, disturbing speeches of much of its effectiveness. Saba as Paulina brought out the character’s comic side, as well as her honesty and forthrightness, in her confrontation with Leontes after Hermione’s imprisonment, and Keen played this scene well. But in general his performance robbed the character of any tragic dimension until the final scene, where he was far more convincing as a broken man, repenting his past actions, than as the jealous tyrant of the first half of the play. The words “tyrant” and “tyranny” echo throughout the play, but not in this production, in which the stage was mostly bare of courtiers or any sense that what was being presented in Sicilia was a court, with many of the characteristic failings of the court world in Shakespearean drama. The production was stripped-down, with virtually no props and a small cast, on a bare stage. The contrast between the two very different worlds of Sicilia and Bohemia, unclear in the opening scenes (in which Polixenes, visiting King of Bohemia, seemed oddly to be wearing a white summer-weight suit while everyone else was in robes), was brought out more clearly in the Bohemia scenes, which were set in the twenty-first century, rather than in some land of antique romance. In Bohemia, the characters all seemed to be dressed out of Gap or T.K. Maxx, in t-shirts with slogans, flowered shirts, Bermuda shorts, and jeans. The Bohemia of this production was a generally happy place, where the characters spent much of their time dancing, all laid-back except for the glowering Polixenes, observing his son’s unfilial behaviour in disguise. The Bohemian scenes included a lively cross-dressed Autolycus (Becci Gemmell), presiding over the comic interludes, but were lacking in poetry. The blank verse lines of the exchange between Perdita and Polixenes about art and nature were rushed through as quickly as possible, as though the actors were embarrassed with what the dramatist had made them say. If Sicilia represents winter and Bohemia spring, there was nothing in this production that would indicate that. Though much is made in the script of class divisions and the possibility of

Milton in the Long Restoration

period and more broadly of the early Principate. Meticulous scholarship throughout will rightly impress general readers, though many will likely find some parts less thrilling than others. In any case, all will be fascinated by the cumulative portrait that emerges of a Nero who prompted contemporaries so to represent and often to caricature him, later generations of writers to evaluate him, that notorious young suicide who in the end resists simplistic vilification.

Review of Shakespeare's Measure for Measure (directed by Dominic Dromgoole) at Shakespeare's Globe, London, 1 July 2015

Measure for Measure presents enormous challenges to any producer. As the title, with its Biblical echoes, suggests, it concerns itself with serious issues, both ethical and political: “Judge not, that ye be not judged . . . and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again” (Matthew 7: 1–2). The play, with its unjust judge Angelo, its troubled heroine Isabella, its Duke unwilling to shoulder the responsibilities of his office, and its low-life denizens of a corrupt society, fits well into a Globe season of plays exploring the ideas of Justice and Mercy. Its principal characters are tested again and again, discovering things about themselves they might not have expected. In three powerful scenes of dramatic confrontation, the innocent Isabella is pitted against Angelo, the unbending representative of coercive authority, then Isabella and Angelo confront each other once again, on different terms, and finally Isabella is faced with an almost impossible choice, locked in conflict with her imprisoned brother Claudio. All three of these scenes, full of memorable lines and creating extraordinary opportunities for the actors, are in the first half of the play. The play also has two splendid comic parts in the cynical Pompey, who starts out as pimp and tapster and ends up as hangman’s assistant, and the witty, foppish Lucio, who serves both as satiric commentator and as an index of the corruption infesting the society depicted. With all this material at the disposal of the director and actors, it is hard to see how any production of the play could go wrong. And yet, Measure for Measure is one of the hardest of Shakespeare’s plays to bring off successfully. One of the problems of the play lies in its structure, with a largely tragic first half followed by a largely comic second half, and a potentially uneasy balance between these two elements throughout the play. Several speeches of Isabella, Angelo and Claudio in these scenes of confrontation have all the hallmarks of tragedy, and seem to point toward a stage littered with dead bodies at the end. Here, for example, Claudio is in prison, facing a death sentence, which he can only escape if his sister sacrifices her honour to the remorseless Angelo:

Oliver Cromwell: God’s Warrior and the English Revolution

in particular on such “trespasses” as racism, violence, warfare, greed, dietary laws and sexual taboos, the destruction of the environment, and so on. The book should, perhaps, be read as a collection of essays, rather than as a coherent argument developed at full book length. The author himself refers to the book as a set of “interrogations,” and this is a very good description. The overall effect is that of a set of challenging and inspiring lectures of the sort some of us were privileged to hear when universities were less driven by the student as customer, and more by scholarship and the ideals of the academy. Because the book is so wide-ranging, it is impossible to give an overall summary in a short review. For this reviewer, however, some of the highlights are: the discussion of the dual nature of enmity (attraction and revulsion at the same time) in the “Diabolization” chapter; the brief, but thoughtful consideration of menstrual taboos and female genital mutilation in “Mouths and Genitals”; and the discussion of ancient and modern time in “Hurry.” The book is mercifully free from any grand sociological theory or methodology. As the author himself puts it: “This book does not espouse any particular sociological theory or any combination of structural functionalism, rational choice, or conflict theory, three of the major perspectives in the field. Nor does it offer a set of methods which, if applied, promise to lead to objective truth. Instead, it speaks to a kind of ‘sensibility’; one that in the last few decades has come to inform cuttingedge work in virtually every inquiry that touches on the human condition.” The final two chapters are rather different from what has come before—two reflections on “the self (or the soul, if you like)” (125). Drawing on the thinking of a wide range of philosophers, writers, anthropologists, sociologists and even the odd cyberneticist, Aho considers some ancient conundrums about the self and the other, about individuality and selfknowledge, about sympathy and empathy. Aho accepts, rather ironically, that he is perhaps out of step with current higher education: “this conception of sociology barely comports... to what passes by that title in today’s university. ...Where is his methodology, it might be asked? his theoretical presuppositions? his empirical data? Above all, where is his program of social reform?” [ix]. You will have gathered by now that the sympathies of this reviewer lie very much with the author; it is a joy to read this distillation of the reflections and wisdom of a long academic career, whether you agree with it all or not.

Review of John Webster's The Duchess of Malfi (directed by Dominic Dromgoole) at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, Shakespeare's Globe, London, 30 January 2014

The new, intimate Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, providing an indoor theatrical space comparable to the Blackfriars Theatre of Shakespeare’s acting company in the early seventeenth century, is a triumph. The theatre is tiny, especially as compared to the Globe, with only 340 seats in a horseshoe shape, and is entirely built of wood, mostly pale oak, with a decorated ceiling and an upper-stage balcony, used for musicians and occasional scenes involving eavesdroppers. Seats are arranged in two tiers, surrounding a relatively small pit, in which the audience is seated rather than standing. The small proportions of the theatre mean that actors can speak softly, rather than shouting, as occasionally they do at the larger, outdoor space of the Globe. The Sam Wanamaker Playhouse is by no means a replica of the Blackfriars, about which evidence is fairly sketchy, and is probably smaller in its proportions. A useful programme note by Heather Neill, “Building the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse”, explains that an extant architectural drawing of an indoor theatre by John Webb, sometimes claimed as an analogue for the Blackfriars, probably dates from after 1660 and cannot be relied on as a model, to be followed in all details. The theatre as designed by Jon Greenfield is by no means “authentic” – how could it be? – but provides a theatrical space which is a twenty-firstcentury equivalent of what Shakespeare and his acting company are likely to have known four centuries ago, allowing modern audiences to experience Jacobean plays like The Duchess of Malfi in a new way. The most striking innovation is the absence of any artificial lighting. Although a series of narrow windows, with shutters that can be drawn, allows some light from outside, the main source of light in productions is candlelight. Beeswax candles are lit and extinguished throughout the performance, in chandeliers that can be raised and lowered, and there are candles in fixed positions around the perimeter of the stage, as well as being held by the actors. I found the effect mesmerising, and the flickering, everchanging light of the candles was particularly suitable for the conspiratorial whisperings of the corrupt courtiers in this dark Jacobean tragedy. One scene, stunningly, was played in total darkness, as the Duchess’s vicious brother Duke Ferdinand taunted his imprisoned sister and then, as the lights suddenly flared up, presented her with a dumbshow of wax figures, ostensibly her murdered husband and son. In print and in other productions, the

Shakespeare at Work: Four Kings and Two Shrews

This article examines three instances of the early Shakespeare at work on material provided by another dramatist, in plays in the repertory of the Queens Men or Pembrokes Men: The Troublesome Reign of King John, King Leir and The Taming of a Shrew. In writing King John and King Lear for the Chamberlains Men, Shakespeare takes as his starting point a play by someone else, transforming the material. In all three cases the differences can be characterised as a move from relative simplicity to relative complexity, allowing for greater latitude in interpretation – and in productions of The Shrew, such latitude is encouraged by the instability of the Folio text.