The Shakespeare Conference: SHK 17.0993  Tuesday, 7 November 2006

[1] 	From: 	HR Greenberg <
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	Date: 	Sunday, 5 Nov 2006 18:33:07 EST
	Subj: 	Re: SHK 17.0987 The Archbishop Wasn't There? So Forth.

[2] 	From: 	Daniel Smith <
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	Date: 	Monday, 6 Nov 2006 13:07:25 +0000
	Subj: 	Re: SHK 17.0987 The Archbishop Wasn't There? So Forth.


[1]-----------------------------------------------------------------
From: 		HR Greenberg <
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Date: 		Sunday, 5 Nov 2006 18:33:07 EST
Subject: 17.0987 The Archbishop Wasn't There? So Forth.
Comment: 	Re: SHK 17.0987 The Archbishop Wasn't There? So Forth.

The Holinshed Chronicle indicates Canterbury's 'scheme' to divert the 
King's attention away from the seizure of church land with a funded 
French invasion. It seems to me that both Canterbury and the King well 
knew of each others' intentions, indeed may have spoken about it in some 
fashion so that each knew of the others' intention.

In that setting, Canterbury's address has a sort of performative 
function -- both King and prelate knowing well knowing what was going 
on, the performance is for the court, the French, and for the world.

Or at least, so I think.

HR Greenberg MD

[2]-------------------------------------------------------------
From: 		Daniel Smith <
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Date: 		Monday, 6 Nov 2006 13:07:25 +0000
Subject: 17.0987 The Archbishop Wasn't There? So Forth.
Comment: 	Re: SHK 17.0987 The Archbishop Wasn't There? So Forth.

I think there is room for productions at both ends of the spectrum of 
Henry's innocence; the Branagh film which portrays an earnest and 
relatively innocent Henry who appears genuinely to ask "May I with right 
and conscience make this claim?" vs Adrian Lester's Blair-like Henry who 
I did feel was orchestrating the presentation of a dossier justifying a 
decision already made as a show for others. I think that the most 
cynical reading of Henry is hard to play well - Henry's rousing idealism 
is key to his leadership as well as his adroit manipulation. This is the 
problem in Julius Caesar, they are unable to lead because Brutus is all 
innocence and Cassius is all manipulation. Cassius fatally loves Brutus 
for that honourable innocence and despises himself for its lack. Perhaps 
a great (and dangerous) leader is able to combine both. I believe we 
would look in vain for any real soul searching by Tony Blair about the 
thousands of deaths in Iraq even were he to be tried at the Hague for 
waging aggressive war.

Gitta Sereny's work with Albert Speer and Frantz Stangl (Kommandant of 
Treblinka) suggests that some real humans in positions of power are able 
to live with the evil they do by compartmentalising their lives - not 
allowing themselves to fully internalise what they know about what they 
have done. When pressed at the extreme moment of doubt, the Henry that 
urges God to "think not upon the fault My father made in compassing the 
crown!"(IV,1,2144) never reflects on his own (identical) fault in waging 
aggressive war for the French crown (although if one was a fault how can 
the other not be?). Perhaps that is the true secret of the successful 
warlord - they use their innocence truly to believe the lies they tell 
themselves.

Dan Smith

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