HERE IS AN ESSAY I WROTE AT UNI in the Early Holocene. It goes into the weeds a bit, but makes a couple of good points I thought the reader might take along with them.
Cheers, Jake.
IN THE INTRODUCTION TO HIS BOOK, SHAKESPEARE'S TRAGIC COSMOS, Thomas McAlindon states that Shakespeare had a “fundamentally traditional” (4) understanding of nature. By “traditional”, McAlindon suggests that many Renaissance thinkers, including Shakespeare, kept their belief in a system that was developed in Classical Greece and was adopted by Europe during the Middle Ages, even as it's tenets were being challeged by new formulations of nature then emerging in scientific circles.
This system was two-fold: One part consisted of a hierarchical ordering of the universe; the other part consisted of a “dynamic system of interacting, interdependent opposites.” (5).
"In the first
part, the hierarchical order of the universe gave everything a fixed place and
identity. It ordered everything at both a macrocosmic level and a microcosmic
one, an order that extended from the stars down to the physical elements of the
earth."
The second part
of this system was a structure of opposites or “contrariety” (9) that operated
within the hierarchy to establish ranking and to maintain the order of the
chain. Both parts, McAlindon states, were “treated as twin aspects of universal
order” (5), but this second structure helped to provide an understanding of the
actions and processes that were observed to occur in the universe. In such a
scheme, the universe was seen to operate on a grand scale of checks and
balances, with one element, or attribute, or process acting upon its opposite.
This action resulted in a state of equilibrium for that element (or attribute
or process). For example, the heat of a fire acted upon the cold of the air
surrounding it to affect its (the air’s) mean temperature. The cold of the air,
in turn, acted upon the heat of the fire to affect the fire’s mean temperature.
Whereas today, science would explain this phenomenon in terms of a chemical
reaction, Medieval and early Renaissance thinking had it that “hotness” was a quality separate
from “coldness” and each, because they were opposed, acted upon the other.
In terms of the physical world, we see this system suggest, for example, that water, by its nature, is contrary to air, and this was the reason they remained separate. Again, modern science would suggest chemistry as the reason. Or in terms of processes, the process of decay was opposed to the process of growth and was therefore “acting” upon it. This system operated, as well, on the level of the human psyche as found in the theory of opposing and counterbalancing “humors” (choler, melancholy, blood, and phlegm).
On the human level, this system helped to explain how people arrived at decisions and why they acted in the manner they did. Human characteristics such as nobility, love, honour, and respect existed alongside their opposites. Each opposite acted upon the other to establish a “mean” or equilibrium. Furthermore, while each characteristic operated ideally around its own mean, this balance was by no means a given. Each characteristic could swing like a pendulum away from its mean and toward its opposite. An excessive sense of nobility, for example, could “swing” this characteristic away from its optimal level and toward its opposite. I will return to this idea in more detail later.
For this essay, I will use McAlindon’s concept of “contrariety” to suggest how Shakespeare develops the idea of responsible action for his characters. Several characters will be examined as to how they make their decisions, and whether there is a common theme running through their actions. I suggest there is, and I will begin exploring it by examining Shakespeare’s first tragedy, "Titus Andronicus".
Enter Tribune Marcus Andronicus—immediately—holding the imperial crown. Marcus comes between the two brothers, these two extremes, not as a mediator, but rather, as a bond uniting them: He provides a “mean” point, a balance. In terms of the plot, he provides a third alternative for the crown—his own brother, Titus, a respected general recently returned from a successful military campaign fighting the Goths. By coming between the two brothers as he does, Marcus both unites them to a common, ‘middle ground’ purpose, and at the same time allows them to remain separate and intact: one extreme does not supersede or absorb the other. McAlindon says of this role of the mean:
"The bond which simultaneously unites the opposites in nature and keeps them apart was thought of as a mean between extremes; thus Aristotle founded his whole ethical theory on the idea of virtue as a mean between the opposites of excess and deficiency." (19-20, McAlindon).
It can transform
someone into a hero, or it can degenerate him into a state of murderous revenge. In the
latter case, as we will shortly see, Titus will be carried to such an extreme.
This system of duality, of nature based on opposing extremes, has what McAlindon calls a “horizontal rather than vertical” (19) view of the self. He suggests it is not the case of lower or baser instincts supplanting the higher, more virtuous ones. Rather, it is a case of all the instincts (or virtues or characteristics) operating within their own means or limits. Problems arise when one or the other goes beyond its boundaries and becomes unbalanced. Such a system contrasts with the Christian concept of human nature as a battle between virtue and vice. Instead, all our human attributes are seen to operate (optimally) at their mean points, with opposing attributes located, not below or above, but alongside each other, on the same continuum.
Unlike the Christian perspective, in this Classical scheme, virtue and vice exist, if not as equals, at least as equal “competitors”. As an example, excessive love can swing or move to its opposite. Love can move like a bar of colour moves from white into various shades of grey, and finally into ever-deepening black. Titus’ love moves in such a manner. We witness his grief over the murders of his children as it carries him further and further into a state that resembles the opposite of love, and it is out of this state that he commits his bloody excesses of revenge. The significant point to remember is that Titus’s actions begin from a state of love and move to its opposite. To make this point clear, we must examine love according to its mean.
This complex scheme of checks and balances between the extremes of opposites; this system of contrariety that places virtue and vice on the same continuum helps us to understand the sense of moral ambiguity often found in Shakespeare’s plays. Take for example the character of Aaron. What does Shakespeare want us to make of him? Do we conclude that he is a good man gone bad, or that he is simply evil or insane? How are we to judge his character? The point is that Shakespeare deliberately leaves unresolved any final interpretation of his character. (Similarly, characters such as Iago or Richard III, or other dramatists’ creations, such as Middleton’s and Rowley’s Deflores, for example, or Marlowe’s Barabbas, also leave us feeling that simple condemnation of them is inadequate, if not inappropriate.)
To return to the play’s first scene, it is interesting to note that Bassianus is seen to grant the authority of the crown, unreservedly, to Titus as the compromise choice. He says:
That I will here dismiss my loving friends;
And to my fortunes and the people’s favour
Commit my cause in balance to be weigh’d. (I.i.53-55).
Bassinanus’s use of “balance” and “weigh’d” are significant here because they suggest the mean that we have been examining. They suggest that Bassianus has achieved a balance. His decision to allow Marcus to arbitrate the succession question reflects a state of calm and reasoned deliberation. On the other hand, Saturninus dismisses his followers, saying:
I thank you all and here dismiss you all,
And to the love of favor of my country
Commit myself, my person and the cause. (I.i.58-59).
He goes on to say in lines that foreshadow the tragic events to come:
Rome, be as just and gracious unto me
As I am confident and kind to thee.
Open the gates and let me in. (I.i.60-62).
At this point in its history, the imperial city is factionalized, its leadership in crisis, its citizens divided in their support. The “Rome” Saturninus addresses does not exist in reality. To return Rome to a state of political equilibrium, Saturninus needs to deal directly and practically with its people who are listening to him. That he fails to understand this essential requirement indicates his own imbalanced nature, his own extreme state.
Bassianus, on the other hand, is aware of the crisis. He will allow the choice of succession to be determined by fortune and the people of Rome, as he accepts Marcus's proposal of Titus as the new emperor.
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| Lawrence Olivier "Titus" |
To return to the play, Shakespeare provides a powerful example of this duality (of nature being composed of opposites) in his descriptions of the forest in Act II. For Aaron, the forest is a place ‘[f]itted by kind for rape and villainy” (II.i.116). It is “ruthless, dreadful, deaf and dull” (II.i.128). But for Tamora, the forest is a sensual delight where:
Birds chaunt melody on every bush
The[snake] lies coiled in the cheerful sun,
The green leaves quiver with the cooling wind (II.iii.12-14).
In the woods, beauty and delight are side by side with ugliness, danger, and death. The suggestion is that such equilibrium can quickly change. Tamora’s “sweet shade” (II.iii.16) can in an instant become the evil gloom envisioned by Aaron. (But, of course, the opposite is also true.) Tamora’s view of the forest is held in place by a precarious and complex system of checks and balances.
This system of contrariety we have been looking at is helpful in the analysis of “evil” characters such as Aaron. Aaron ("The Moor") is unrepentantly evil: He plots the rape and mutilation of Lavinia, and similarly, the deaths of Bassianus, Quintus and Martius. He murders Tamora’s nurse. His relationship with Tamora is one he uses to further his own ends. We condemn him for all of this, and yet we praise him for saving the life of his son. With this contradiction in mind, what can we say about Aaron? Is he evil? When Aaron says he would have “done a thousand dreadful things, / As willingly as one would kill a fly,” (V.i.141-42), we again condemn him for such a wish. At the same time, we compare his statement with the Act III scene that has Titus kill a fly. The suggestion is that the two are somehow connected, that there is complicity in their actions; after all, both men conspire and commit murder. However, when we compare their acts, it must be remembered that Titus’s own deeds of revenge, in terms of their ferocity, far exceed those of Aaron. Aaron’s singular act of murder is done as a matter of “policy” (IV.ii.148). This suggests that if "policy" had dictated otherwise then he would not have murdered the nurse. Interestingly, Aaron stabs her and then likens her to a “pig prepared to the spit” (IV.ii.146) which echoes the horrific dinner Titus plans in Act V. However, Aaron is not seen to revel in his deed, as Titus does; chance and a quick policy decision, have formed his act.
Shakespeare,
then, is suggesting that to label Aaron as evil is too simple. After all,
Tamora is an adulteress, and her two
sons were already predisposed to rape and violence before Aaron began to
manipulate them. The point being, it's not as if Aaron has corrupted 'the virtuous'. The sense
is that Aaron’s evil nature is partly a result of imbalances exhibited by the
people around him and in his newly-adopted society. His litany of evil in Act V is also interesting. Here he lists the misdeeds he has accomplished
in the past and ones (some bizarrely comic) he wishes he could have done if he'd had the time: such as putting
dead people on neighbour’s porches; causing cattle to break their necks;
setting fire to bars and so on. His listing of evil takes on an almost incantatory, mystical, quality that seems more a part of some malevolent, natural
force than something coming from an individual person. (I'll also state that Aaron's evil has an absurd quality to it, a mawkishness, that suggests a pendulum swing from the logical--his "policy"--to the absurd; i.e. another 'imbalance'.) This is the point
Shakespeare wishes to leave with us: Aaron’s evil comes from a
complex process of checks and balances operating within the Moor and those
around him. It is not simply a matter that Aaron is evil. How he arrives at such a state is equally important.
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| Anthony Hopkins "Titus" |
If we compare Titus's son, Lucius, to Titus, we see in him a contrasting balance. For example, he steps between Saturnius and Titus, just as his uncle Marcus did, and clarifys a misunderstanding Saturnius had with respect to Titus's intentions, preventing possible bloodshed in the heat of the moment. But at the beginning of the play, Lucius’s demand for a blood sacrifice for his dead brothers is seen as excessive and cruel (at least for a modern audience; Elizabethans may have felt more sacrifices were needed.) We judged him then as we now judge Titus and Saturninus: as operating from an abstract set of ideals instead of a balanced sense of humanity. However, by the play’s end, it is Lucius who brings stability to Rome, and it is interesting that he has had to travel to the Goths (murderers of his brothers, his city’s enemy, its ‘opposite’ and his, as well) in order to establish his own equilibrium, and to bring that balance back to Rome. His enlistment of Goth soldiers in his pursuit of justice in Rome suggests a bridging of opposites on a societal level. And we see his sense of balance and proportion acting on a personal level when he responds to Aaron’s confession. When he learns his family has suffered because of Aaron, he responds—not with bloody revenge as Titus will at his banquet—but as a statesman, sparing Aaron’s child and reserving his punishment for later.
Beginning with the body motif: in "Coriolanus", the Roman population as ‘a body’ is more evident than in "Titus". We witness several public scenes suggesting large gatherings; the plebeian representatives Sicinius and Brutus play important, if minor, roles and there is much presentation of plebeian dialogue. Menenius’s speech, in which he depicts Rome as a body with its parts in conflict with each other, is another example. And throughout the play there are scenes of eating and feasting. What are we to make of all these references to the body and its functions? I think it is evident that Shakespeare is asking us to compare the body of the state with the body of Coriolanus. By Act II, we are aware of the physicality of Coriolanus: of his explosive temper, of his efforts on the battlefield, with Menenius recounting the number and type of wounds he received. Here, his description has an almost voyeuristic quality in that it seems out of place for someone professing to be a friend of Coriolanus, as Menenius does. This scene is followed shortly by Coriolanus’s public disrobing where he reveals his wounds to the people and asks, as his reward, to be made Consul.
The sense of “body” can be summed up as follows: the body of Rome is unbalanced. Its various constituent parts are at war with each other. Its arms and legs are at war with its stomach. It is not its head, but, as Menenius suggests, its “great toe” (I.i.155) that leads it—the “lowest, basest, poorest,” (I.i.157-58) member of the body politic. If we see the state of Rome as a “headless” body, unbalanced and (as headless) unreasoning, then we see Coriolanus’s body in contrast. He is not at war with himself. He is intact and complete. He is singular in nature, as Menenius says:
…[h]e has been bred i’th’wars
Since he could draw a sword, and is ill school’d
In bolted language; (III i.318-20)
Menenius suggests that Coriolanus’s nature is that of a soldier. He is a man of action, not words. In an earlier scene, his fellow general, Cominius, says of Coriolanus that he “rewards / His deeds with doing them, and is content, / To spend the time to end it.” (II.ii.127-29). His reward comes not in the telling of his deeds, nor in the fame that follows, nor in any spoils of war, but rather, his reward is in the doing of them. The reward of being called a hero and having to accept as a laurel the name of the city he has conquered is a burden for Coriolanus. He, Caius Martius is 'rewarded' for conqueoring the enemy city of Corioli by having to be called with the honorific "Coriolanus".( It was common for returning generals after a successful campaign to receive titles that referenced the city or region they conqueored.)
He would rather act as an instrument of policy or as an anonymous fighter in the battlefield than accept the labels fame presents him. It is interesting to note that in the battle scene with the Volsces at Corioles, he asks his soldiers, “make you a sword of me?” (I.vi.76). He asks to be their weapon, their anonymous tool in battle, to be used in a pure act of noble combat. Honour and title are meaningless to someone like Coriolanus; action is all.
In Rome, the people blame him for policies that cause hardship for the population. And it is true that he has little care for the social classes beneath him. But he also sees his new Consular role as one that must be used as an instrument of aristocratic power; he will carry out the policies of his class. He is fiercely loyal to the nobility and fears a “headless” Rome:
To know, when two authorities are up,
Neither supreme, how soon confusion
May enter ‘twixt the gap of both, and take
The one by th’ other. (III.i.109-12)
We see Coriolanus intact and ordered in a way that a headless Rome is not. The problem is, that like Titus and Saturninus, Coriolanus is also unbalanced. Both his pride in himself, and his loyalty to the Roman aristocracy are excessive.
Coriolanus's main concern in life is to ensure that he acts the part of a noble warrior, something he has been raised to do all his life. But the bargains he makes as he engages with the ensnaring, layered politics of Rome are intolerable for him. He cannot compromise his ideals and, as such, he is like Titus, clinging to an excessive belief in his honour. In terms of his loyalty to Rome’s aristocracy, he is loyal to an extent even the nobles are uncomfortable with. He clearly identifies himself with the nobility and opposes any concessions to the plebeians:
In soothing them we nourish them ‘gainst our Senate
The cockle of rebellion, insolence, sedition,
Which we ourselves have plough’d for, sow’d for and scatter’d[.] (III.i.69-71).
In terms of the system of contrariety, Coriolanus is, like Titus, operating in the abstract. He sees only his own rigid conceptions of loyalty and nobility and, like Titus, such an extreme position will prove fatal for him. Coriolanus is not a tyrant. His actions within Rome are based on his exaggerated sense of order and loyalty. We see such traits as admirable, even desirable in a leader but not to the extent they over-ride all other considerations. When a citizen tells Coriolanus to ask for his boon (his counsulship) “kindly” (II.iii.75), he tells him he asks for too much. Coriolanus is the opposite of "kind". Not only is he ‘unkind’ in the sense that he does not consider himself to be 'of their kind'; he cannot ask for something kindly (i.e., in a friendly, supplicating manner) that he does not want to ask for in the first place.
When comparing the body of Coriolanus with the ‘body’ of Rome, we see that both are unbalanced: Coriolanus’s imbalance stems from the singular excess of his noble traits; he is too noble, too loyal, too honourable, etc. The body of Rome, on the other hand, is unbalanced because its traits are too disparate, too individualized and self-centered. As the citizen says in an Act II prose passage:
…our wits are so diversely
color’d; and truly I think if all our wits were to issue
out of one skull, they would fly east, west, north, south,
and their consent of one direct way should be at once to
all the points a’ th’ compass. (II.iii.20-24).
(Shakespeare provides this passage in prose to suggest the less articulate, less ordered status of the speaker.)
Examining the word “traitor” is helpful to complete our understanding of Coriolanus’s actions. The reasons for his actions are simple enough. They are guided by three basic principles: his loyalty to Rome (as its defender), his loyalty to the aristocracy, and his loyalty to his mother. When Sicinius calls him a traitor in Act III, this proves to be an insult that moves Coriolanus past the bounds of reasoned discourse. His anger takes hold of him and results in his expulsion from the city. The question to ask is why does he react so strongly to this word? The answer is to be found in these three guiding principles upon which he has based his life. By calling him a traitor, by labelling him, by using words that categorize him as disloyal to Rome, Sicinius calls into question Coriolanus’s very existence. Thus, it is no wonder he reacts violently to the accusation. Similarly, in Act V, when Aufidius also calls Coriolanus a traitor, he reacts in an equally uncompromising manner. This time his actions brings about his death.
A contradiction seems to arise at this point. One asks: does Coriolanus, himself, not betray Rome? Is he not, in fact, a traitor? We must again remember the three ordering principles that have guided his life. When Rome banishes him in Act III, two of those three principles are no longer valid (his loyalty to Rome and to its aristocracy). In this respect, Coriolanus is even more inflexible than Titus in his adherence to abstract principles. Both of them show that their belief in ideals is extreme and imbalanced, and they result in actions that reflect the opposite of those ideals (Titus’s cruelty, Coriolanus’s betrayal of Rome). However, Coriolanus’s extreme sense of loyalty is highly personal, whereas Titus’s loyalty extends to tradition with, for example, his respect for the dead, and his concern for his family's name and honour. Coriolanus, on the other hand, is loyal only to those to whom his body serves. Once he has been physically expelled from Rome, the connection is broken. This view of Coriolanus suggests an individual who is profoundly alienated from his society. And he is—except for his connection to his mother.
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| "Coriolanus" and "Volumnia" |
There is a contrast between Volumnia’s return in triumph to Rome and Coriolanus’s return to Corioles. In Rome, a Senator shouts as Volumnia enters the city: “Unshout the noise that banish’d Martius! / Repeal him with the welcome of his mother.” (V.v.5). The sense is that, in Rome, Coriolanus is to be remembered in the light of Volumnia’s return and in the acknowledgement that he should not have been banished in the first place. (Those voices that banished him were wrong—they must be “unshout[ed]”.) In the city of Corioles, by contrast, Coriolanus's warlike deeds--against Rome, which he renounced--are recounted. But Aufidius is jealous of the accolades Coriolanus receives from his fellow Volscians and has him assassinated following Aufidius’s accusation that Coriolanus is now a traitor to the Volscian cause. After the murder, Aufidius says Coriolanus, nevertheless, will have a “noble memory” (V.v.153). The sense is he will be remembered differently in Rome than in Corioles, and while he acted the same in both cities, his actions will be remembered differently, depending upon whose words will be used. All his life, Coriolanus wanted actions to speak louder than words, but in the end, it is words that will have the last say.
In the Act IV scene where Coriolanus arrives in Antium, we witness a different Coriolanus. He reflects on the world. He thinks of friends who were inseparable one minute, and became enemies in the next: “Shall within this hour / On a dissension of a doit, break out / To bitterest enmity” (V.iv.16-18). He thinks of enemies that could become “dearest friends” (V.iv.21). He reflects, in other words, on the contrariness of life, of how it is composed of opposites, and how easily one opposite moves toward the other. When Lucius sought out the Goths in their city in "Titus Andronicus", he was searching, in fact, for his “opposite” to help him achieve a balanced life. Coriolanus’s journey to Antium reflects a similar quest, but there is no opposite there for him to find. Instead, in Aufidius he finds someone much like himself. Aufidius cannot help Coriolanus achieve his equilibrium because Aufidius, like Coriolanus, also believes in a rigid and uncompromising system of honour and nobility; Coriolanus merely transfers his 'system' over to the Volscians. In the end, both Titus and Coriolanus fail to achieve their equilibrium.
__________________________________________
* "Titus Andronicus" is only nominally set during a period of the Gothic Invasions. It is not a "history" play in this sense. The specific time frame is unclear but it appears to be in the early Christian era of Roman history, before Christianity became widespread, possibly in the 3rd or 4th Century A.D.
** It is important to remember that Titus's decision to execute only the eldest son of the Goth queen Tamora will have grave repercussions in the future. It is his unbalanced belief in Roman nobility and what you might call 'proper ettiquette' that leads him decide not to kill ALL the Goths he has captured to avenge the deaths of his numerous sons during the wars ("five-and-twenty valiant sons,/Half of the number that King Priam had..." Ii.79-80). His excessive mercy in this case leads to bloody murders later on, with following reprisals in an ever-arcing pendulum of mayhem.)
Works Cited
McAlindon, T. Shakespeare’s Tragic Cosmos. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991.
Shakespeare, William. "Titus Andronicus" and "Coriolanus" in The Riverside Shakespeare. Ed. G.B. Evans. NY: Houghton Mifflin, 1974.
Abrams., M.H., ed. A Glossary of Literary Terms, fifth edition. Fort Worth, Chicago: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc., 1988
https://naturalisticpaganism.org/2011/10/27/what-does-responsible-action-mean-to-you/
Great Chain of Being—"is a hierarchical structure of all matter and life, thought by medieval Christianity to have been decreed by God. The chain begins with God and descends through angels, humans, animals, and plants, to minerals. It is a concept derived from Plato, Aristotle, and other Greek philosophers, and further developed during the Middle Ages; it reached full expression in early modern Neoplatonism.
It is credited by the Catholic Church in keeping the peace in Europe for centuries. The very concept of rebellion simply lay outside the reality within which most people lived for to defy the King was to defy God. The Enlightenment broke this supposed divine plan, and fought the last vestiges of feudal hierarchy, by creating secular governmental structures that vested power into the hands of ordinary citizens, rather than in those of divinely ordained monarchs.” (Wikipedia)
Contrariety—"opposition or inconsistency between two things” (O.E.D.)
Responsible Action—“It affirmed that humanity has both the capability and the responsibility to meet our challenges without recourse to supernatural aid…The question for today is: within what larger contexts ought we be responsible? To whom or what are you responsible?” (Naturalistic)
Tribune—an official in ancient Rome chosen by the plebeians to protect their interests.
Consul—the highest elected political office of the Roman Republic (509 to 27 BC), Each year, the citizens of Rome elected two consuls to serve jointly for a one-year term. There were two consuls to create a check on the power of any individual. After the establishment of the Empire (27 BC), the consuls became mere symbolic representatives of Rome's republican heritage and held little power and authority, with the Emperor acting as the supreme authority. (Wikipedia)
Gothic Wars—were a long series of conflicts against the Roman Empire between the years 249 and 554.
Revenge Tragedy—"is derived from Seneca’s favorite materials of murder, revenge, ghosts, mutilation, and carnage with most acts done off-stage…Elizabethan writers had them acted out on stage to satisfy the audience’s appetite for violence and horror.” (Glossary)
Morality
Plays and Mystery Cycle Plays—Popular from the 9th to 15th
centuries; unknown authorships, originating within the church as dramatizations
as part of the Latin liturgical services; eventually local guild societies
would put on cycles of plays during major holy day events (i.e., Christmas,
Lent, etc.), some at fixed stations, others on movable “pageant wagons”. Morality
plays were “dramatized allegories of representative Christian life. “Everyman” and
“Mankind” were characters in plays, for example. (Glossary)
Prof comments: GRADE=A-
A very interesting analysis of the two plays. I'm not equally convinced by all points of it, but I think you tackle some extremely interesting issues, and have some subtle insights into the dialectics of the 2 plays. I phoned you when I got your message--but you weren't there--to say that I've put your name forward for consideration for the English essay prize. You will be no doubt being contacted by Mrs. Thomas about this soon; hang on to the essay!
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