Abstract
The so-called New Historicism in literary studies began with a disconcerting insight borrowed from Foucault that was applied to Shakespeare’s history plays: namely, that subversive opposition has a way of reinforcing Power. The plays seem to invite subversive skepticism by highlighting the fraudulence and Machiavellian calculation behind the workings of Power. And yet, somehow, as Henry V leads his outnumbered troops in battle against the French, audiences and readers invariably get swept away by nationalistic passions (“We few, we happy few, we band of brothers”). My essay explores how the history plays illuminate the phenomenon of Donald Trump, whose improbable rise has been so crucially fueled by relentless subversive opposition. The essay looks in particular at how Trump combines the Machiavellian cunning of Prince Hal with the shameless but subversive egomania and excess of Falstaff to become a Lord of Misrule that feeds on opposition.
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- 1.
For a great introduction to this topic, see Geoffrey Galt Harpham, “Foucault and the New Historicism,” American Literary History 3.2 (1991): 360–75.
- 2.
Ibid., 372.
- 3.
Henry V , John Russell Brown, ed. (New York: The Signet Classic Shakespeare, 1988a): 5.3.60. All further references to this play will be to this text.
- 4.
1 Henry IV , Part 1, Maynard Mack, ed. (New York: The Signet Classic Shakespeare, 1988b): 3.2.132. All further references to this play will be to this text.
- 5.
E.M.W. Tillyard, Shakespeare’s History Plays (London: Chatto & Windus, 1944), 17–21.
- 6.
In his comprehensive study of the Morality pattern, Bernard Spivack, for instance, asserts that Falstaff’s “banishment and imprisonment are regular punishments for the Vice” (Shakespeare and the Allegory of Evil [New York: Columbia Univ. Press, 1958], 204).
- 7.
See, for example, Jonathan Dollimore and Alan Sinfield, “History and ideology: the instance of Henry V,” in John Drakakis, ed. Alternative Shakespeares (London and New York: Methuen, 1985): 206–27.
- 8.
See, for example, Graham Holderness’s Shakespeare’s History (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1985), in which he suggests that the plays “affirm the reality of historical transformation, and imagine the infinite possibilities of change” (131). In this connection, see also Walter Cohen, “Political Criticism of Shakespeare,” in Shakespeare Reproduced: The Text in Ideology and History, ed. Jean E. Howard and Marion F. O’Conner (New York and London: Methuen, 1987), in which he challenges the “leftist disillusionment” (36) seen in new historicist emphasis on the “triumph of containment” (35), and attempts to retrieve the ways in which the Henry IV plays can generate “subversive religious, social, and political ideologies” (36). See also Michael Bristol, Carnival and Theater (NY: Methuen, 1985).
- 9.
“Invisible Bullets,” in Shakespearean Negotiations (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press), 55–6.
- 10.
Henry IV , Part 2, Norman Holland, ed. (New York: The Signet Classic Shakespeare, 1988c), 4.5.213–14. All further references to this play will be to this text.
- 11.
See, for example, C. L. Barber, Shakespeare’s Festive Comedy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1959), especially, “Rule and Misrule in Henry IV.”
- 12.
Phillip Stubbes, Anatomie of Abuses … in the Country of Ailgna (London, 1583), 148. Quoted in Barber, Shakespeare’s Festive Comedy, 28.
- 13.
Rabelais and His World, Hélène Iswolsky, trans. (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1984), 10.
- 14.
See, for instance, A. P. Rossiter, Angel with Horns (NY: Theatre Arts Books, 1961), 46.
- 15.
See, for instance, Muzaffar Chishti, Sarah Pierce, and Jessica Bolter, “The Obama Record on Deportations: Deporter in Chief or Not?” Migration Policy Institute, January 26, 2017: http://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/obama-record-deportations-deporter-chief-or-not.
- 16.
See Donna Borak and Henry Williams, “Where Trump Stands on Wall Street,” The Wall Street Journal, November 9, 2016: http://graphics.wsj.com/elections/2016/where-trump-stands-on-wall-street/.
- 17.
For a video of the conversation and a transcript, see “Transcript: Donald Trump’s Taped Comments About Women,” The New York Times, October 8, 2016: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/08/us/donald-trump-tape-transcript.html?mcubz=0.
- 18.
- 19.
See FiveThirtyEight: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/clinton-couldnt-win-over-white-women/.
- 20.
See Jeff Manza and Ned Crowley, “Working Class Hero? Interrogating the Social Bases of the Rise of Donald Trump,” The Forum 15.1 (2017): 3–28.
References
Bakhtin, Mikhail. Rabelais and His World. Translated by Hélène Iswolsky. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1984.
Barber, C.L. Shakespeare’s Festive Comedy. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1959.
Bristol, Michael. Carnival and Theater. New York: Methuen, 1985.
Cohen, Graham. “Political Criticism of Shakespeare.” In Shakespeare Reproduced: The Text in Ideology and History, eds. Jean E. Howard and Marion F. O’Conner. New York and London: Methuen, 1987.
Dollimore, Jonathan, and Alan Sinfield. “History and Ideology: The Instance of Henry V.” In Alternative Shakespeares, ed. John Drakakis. London and New York: Methuen, 1985.
Greenblatt, Stephen. Shakespearean Negotiations. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1988.
Harpham, Geoffrey Galt. “Foucault and the New Historicism.” American Literary History 3, no. 2 (1991): 360–75.
Holderness, Graham. Shakespeare’s History. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1985.
Manza, Jeff, and Ned Crowley. “Working Class Hero? Interrogating the Social Bases of the Rise of Donald Trump.” The Forum 15, no. 1 (2017): 3–28.
Rossiter, A.P. Angel with Horns. New York: Theatre Arts Books, 1961.
Shakespeare, William. Henry V. Edited by John Russell Brown. New York: The Signet Classic Shakespeare, 1988a.
———. 1 Henry IV, Part 1. Edited by Maynard Mack. New York: The Signet Classic Shakespeare, 1988b.
———. Henry IV, Part 2. Edited by Norman Holland. New York: The Signet Classic Shakespeare, 1988c.
Spivack, Bernard. Shakespeare and the Allegory of Evil. New York: Columbia University Press, 1958.
Tillyard, E.M.W. Shakespeare’s History Plays. London: Chatto & Windus, 1944.
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Ko, Y.J. (2018). Donald Trump: Shakespeare’s Lord of Misrule. In: Jaramillo Torres, A., Sable, M. (eds) Trump and Political Philosophy. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74445-2_9
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