Let me make an observation: If I went into any American bar (or English pub for that matter) I could go up to just about any table, introduce myself and strike up a conversation about William Shakespeare. That is a conversation about how the historical Shakespeare is a fraud and that the real Shakespeare is (insert nonsensical conspiracy theory here). They might not agree or even care very much but I wouldn’t trigger any walls of insecurity. My belief that the original works of Shakespeare are part of a code that shows the true location of the Ark of the Covenant and the rest of the Templar treasure (and obviously 🙄 its origin from ancient aliens) in a pirate chest buried off the eastern coast of Canada wouldn’t make anyone feel out of their depth. The party would go on.
Now let’s run that same scene except instead of my talking to a bunch of strangers about the above conspiracy I instead opened up about my passion for the actual works of Shakespeare. Why those characters and the power of the bard’s language (our language really) so inspires and moves me today. That, my friend , is a conversation that would dry up as fast as a Scientology audit at a Florida spring break kegger. I would be greeted with polite stultification. The same stranger who would comfortably engage in a conversation about who Shakespeare was will shut down completely in a conversation about what Shakespeare is. Don’t believe me: go to a bar (or party) and try for it yourself. Trust me, you’ll need a drink or two by the time you’re done.
So let me tell you about my Shakespeare. If I started to talk about the play Henry the 4th Part 1 I think most people would run for the proverbial hills. Here goes another dry, dull story about patriarchal kings and wars.🥱 And you’d be right in a sense. But indulge me for a moment. When Shakespeare endeavored to dramatize the life of Henry the 4th he didn’t do it the way you might expect. The play really isn’t about him much. Instead it’s about his son: the prince Hal. The man who would eventually grow into the lion of Henry the 5th (Shakespeare’s most patriotic play, in the best sense of that word).
But as the story of Henry the 4th starts the old king is frustrated with his son. And his son is estranged from him. Instead the teenage boy has found a spiritual father; Shakespeare’s greatest creation: Sir John Falstaff. Falstaff is a lazy, broke dissolute drunk who whores and borrows his way through life. He’s old, tired and about as disreputable a companion as a young prince could have...in a way. But his knows life. Knows it in a way the old king doesn’t. And it’s that wisdom that cements the bond between them. One of the most famous and wise of all Shakespearean quotes is the line “discretion is the better half of valor”. And those are words Falstaff utters before battle. He knows better than most the truth of that statement.
Any boy who (and I am one) has grown up with either an estranged or abortive relationship with their father can understand this dynamic: The surrogate father. It’s how you fill that void.
I love Falstaff as Shakespeare created him. I have known and am a Falstaff in my way. And I’m growing into one more and more each day. I’m not a rogue exactly but I am a wise ass, old soul who isn’t above the company of friends in low places...and I fit right in😉. And the thing is audiences have loved Falstaff from the first night that play opened. Queen Elizabeth loved the old dog so much Shakespeare wrote a special play for her (The Merry Wives of Windsor) in which the corpulent and hilarious Falstaff pompously tries to woe 3 rich women who see him coming about a mile away.
The truth about the relationship with Falstaff and the boy who will be king is that it can’t last. Soon Hal will be sovereign and unable to afford the luxury of such associates. And Falstaff needs and is borrowing (literally) against the day Hal does become king and his expected place at court. Hal must (as is the fate of the literary Oedipus) kill his surrogate father while reconciling with his real one. And so the prince does: banishing Falstaff. A move that breaks Falstaff’s heart and is his death. They both know deep down, I believe, this is how it has to be.
There is an incredible scene (before Hamlet was even written BTW) in which there is a play within a play. In a brothel Hal plays (for the entertainment of the women) the king with a pot for a crown and Falstaff stands in for Hal the prince. The play king denounces his son (as played by Falstaff) for his association with “that abominable, misleader of youth...Falstaff!”. And Falstaff makes the case (playing Hal but really speaking for himself) why Falstaff should not be banished. He says weeping banish the others but banish Jack Falstaff and banish all the world...
And the boy playing the king he will soon become says “I do....I WILL”. And he means it. Then Hal hugs him. There isn’t a more powerful moment in the entire cannon of English language theater. That is my Shakespeare! No aliens 👽 needed, thank you very much.
Shakespeare isn’t great because he wrote about kings, queens and princes. He’s great because of what he did with those kings, queens and princes. I wish people could get that into their heads. Those characters live in me. Their flaws, follies and triumphs are my own. I can see the truth in the people he created. Like all great writers they are people we already know, already are...no need for introduction. The truth is Shakespeare is the birthright of every human being on this planet, he is for all mankind for all time. One of the greatest things I and you have ever been given. Let us stop wasting time over the authorship nonissue and instead glory in the triumph of Shakespeare’s unnerving humanity as displayed in his pantheon of characters. Free the folio from its pedagogical and pop cultural prison of high school lit PTSD and reality show garbage.
Let me finish with this. At the end of Shakespeare’s history cycle in the last act of the last play stands not a Falstaff but one of English literature’s greatest villains: Richard the 3rd, the birth defect riddled monster king.
Richard is losing the battle and about to be killed. An attendant urges him to flee. Yet Shakespeare grants this child murdering tyrant glorious words. The doomed king says “
I have set my life upon a cast, And I will stand the hazard of the die” A dower pun indeed yet It’s always struck me that those are fine words. My I meet my doom with such steadfastness.
I had been taught by everyone (including a book I picked up at the Tower of a London!) that Richard’s hunchbacked deformity was not true but rather Shakespeare’s attempt at Tutor propaganda. (Richard had after all been killed by Queen Elizabeth’s real life grandfather Henry Tutor ie Henry the 7th). And I had accepted this.
Except that a few years ago they found Richard’s actual skeleton buried under a church parking lot. And sure enough his spine was twisted with what must have been an excruciating scoliosis. And I thought to myself: never again underestimate William Shakespeare...