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REVIEW
- Stirling, Brents. The Populace in Shakespeare.
- New York: Columbia UP, 1949.
Thesis: Stirling is very concerned about the relationship
between literature and society. His opening and closing chapters
thrash around with the topic of whether or not literature has
anything to teach society, and in the main part of the book he
examines how Shakespeare was influenced by society's views about the
common people. His conclusion is that Shakespeare and his audience
accepted the negative picture of the common people that was used for
conservative propaganda purposes:
We are now . . . in a position to imagine an
audience of Shakespeare's time as it witnessed the Cade scenes [in
2 Henry IV], Julius Caesar, or Coriolanus. On
the stage a notorious rebel of English history incites his blundering
followers to level all distinctions of property and of caste. Or a
Roman mob, fickle and discordant, by asserting its democratic
influence makes of the political scene a shambles or a madhouse.
Lively drama and astringent conservative satire—these the
audience enjoys with abandon . . . .
Something, however, has taken its toll long before they entered the
theater. They have heard it preached and have heard it said
unceasingly that the muster of nonconformists is growing steadily,
that the inescapable goal of nonconformity is wholesale leveling, and
that the true ancestors and equals of troublemakers in their midst
are English peasant rebels and the unstable Roman plebs. They have
been told in sermons and have heard it rhymed in season and out that
Jack Cade, Jack Straw, the Roman mobs, and the Anabaptists are all
one and that together or individually they spell out the Puritan,
"Presbyterial," or Brownists disciplines all of which are to be
lumped together. (149)
According to Stirling, Shakespeare offered his audience exactly what
they expected: violent mobs of thoughtless troublemakers who were a
clear and present danger to society.
Evaluation: Stirling's account of the politics of the texts of
Shakespeare's time is very thorough, which can make his book heavy
going for someone who is not a fan of cultural history.
Bottom Line: ok
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