Phil Ndlela (photo: www.unizulu.ac.za)
There is, in fact, no need to drag politics into literary theory: as with South African sport, it has been there from the beginning. I mean by the political no more than the way we organize our social life together, and the power-relations which this involves; and what I have tried to show throughout this book is that the history of modern literary theory is part of the political and ideological history of our epoch. From Percy Bysshe Shelley to Norman N Holland, literary theory has been indissociably bound up with political beliefs and ideological values. Indeed literary theory is less an object of intellectual enquiry in its own right than a particular perspective in which to view the history of our times. Nor should this be in the least cause for surprise. For any body of theory concerned with human meaning, value, language, feeling and experience will inevitably engage with broader, deeper beliefs about the nature of human individuals and societies, problems of power and sexuality, interpretations of past history, versions of the present and hopes for the future. It is not a matter of regretting that this is so – of blaming literary theory for being caught up with such questions, as opposed to some “pure” literary theory which might be absolved from them. Such “pure” literary theory is an academic myth ...
Terry Eagleton, Literary Theory, 1996
1. Introduction
This article looks at how Claudius uses his maiden address as King of Denmark as an occasion to entrench and legitimate his tenuous and illegitimate rule. It also argues that Claudius is a politically savvy man who knows how to invest his newly acquired political capital – he cunningly cashes in on a national sense of unity and disquiet generated by the loss of his brother. In addition to dissecting Claudius’s maiden speech, I will explore his deployment of repressive state apparatuses as a means of neutralising Hamlet – and how both he and Hamlet use culture as a site of struggle in the play.
The delivery of this speech is well timed. It is delivered to a nation that is still shell- shocked, emotionally bruised and grieving. A nation that is yet to come to terms with the sudden and permanent loss of their beloved king, Hamlet.
How does Claudius go about his business of consolidating his newly acquired political power? He hits the ground running by portraying himself to the unsuspecting and mourning nation of Denmark as a responsible leader who fully embraces some of the core tenets of democratic governance such as accountability, respect for the governed and consensus. It is a well-structured and well-thought-out address in which he moves strategically from the well-known subject, ie the death of his brother Hamlet, and proceeds to the slightly controversial and eyebrow-raising subject, his recent and hasty marriage to Gertrude, his late brother’s wife. He thanks the nation for going along sheeplike with his controversial marriage to Gertrude, whom he aptly refers to as “our sometime sister”, but he cleverly offers no details of what prompted or necessitated it. It is also interesting to note how he deploys carefully thought-out words of endearment in reference to his departed brother, such as “dear brother” and “our most valiant brother”, to divert attention or suspicion from him as the chief culprit or strategist behind his brother’s sudden death.
From family or in-house matters Claudius moves seamlessly and cunningly to state security matters or potential threats to his hegemony, such as the demands made by young Fortinbras to the state of Denmark:
He hath not fail’d to pester us with message
Importing the surrender of those lands
Lost by his father with all bands of law …
(I. ii 23–5)
Claudius sees the land question as posing a potential threat to the stability of his new rule. But being the calculating and savvy tactician that he is, he also knows that he can gain much-needed political mileage out of it, and use it as an instrument for rallying the nation behind him.
But how does he try to stymie this potential threat embedded in Fortinbras’s demand? Cleverly, instead of trading insults and threats with the young Fortinbras, who probably thinks the timing is right for making his demands, Claudius invokes the tried and tested strategy for the resolution of disputes and tensions between nations: diplomacy.
He also knows that if he handles this ticking time bomb wisely and responsibly enough, it will significantly enhance his chances of holding on to power for a lengthy period of time. Self-preservation and longevity are considered indispensable by people in positions of power – especially those who, like Claudius, ascend the throne through devious and corrupt methods.
This is what Claudius tells the perplexed nation of Denmark:
… we have here writ
To Norway, uncle of young Fortinbras,
Who, impotent and bed-rid, scarcely hears
Of this his nephew’s purpose …
(I. ii 28–30)
Claudius emerges as a master tactician here: he chooses to engage directly with the mature and experienced Norway rather than the impetuous, ambitious, opportunistic, inexperienced and trigger-happy young Fortinbras, who has no clue about the complexity, magnitude and wider political ramifications of this contentious land question.
Is Claudius a democrat? His words to Cornelius and Voltemand, whom he sends to old Norway, are indeed instructive:
You, good Cornelius, and you, Voltemand
For bearers of this greeting to old Norway;
Giving to you no further personal power
To business with the king, more than
the scope. Of these delated articles allow.
(I. ii 34–8)
He appears to be a control freak whose knack for detail will leave no margin for error or sabotage, and he warns Cornelius and Voltemand, whom he deploys as his emissaries or envoys, not to overstep their brief. This injunction to these young gentlemen is an act of self-preservation specifically designed to prevent any potential erosion of his authority.
Look, too, at how his obsession with power plays itself out in the following brief conversation he holds with Laertes, the son of Polonius:
Have you your father’s leave? What says Polonius?
(I. ii 57)
It is a revealing dialogue which betrays his intolerance of dissent, even though here it is cunningly veiled as a legitimate concern for the recognition of parental authority. This concern is nothing else but a political gimmick.
It is probably the sort of dialogue that sets out or defines the parameters of his reign as the King of Denmark – acquiescence and blind loyalty.
In many ways one could read this address as a public relations exercise in which Claudius cleverly projects himself as a paragon of democratic governance who will always take the nation into his confidence. Not only that – by paying so much attention to detail in terms of what is unfolding in Denmark, the strategy is to project himself as equal to the task of leading this bleeding nation and to assure them that he is on top of things, and that their future is in good hands.
Claudius is an astute operator. He knows he lacks legitimacy; he knows he has no moral authority, because he has “stolen” the throne of Denmark and therefore needs to work extra hard and assiduously in order to remain at the helm – even if his stratagem entails a sustained and relentless programme of action centred on posturing and the wearing of masks.
After taking some time mulling over his options and strategy, and also agonising over the ghost’s startling disclosure regarding the circumstances relating to his death, Hamlet finally puts in place a cerebral kind of strategy that centres on the use of culture (ie the play he produces) as a counter-hegemonic, consciousness-raising and subversive mechanism. Instead of using his proximity to, and acquaintance with, some insiders of the King’s Court – some of whom were his friends – and inciting them and openly advocating insurrection, he cleverly opts to use culture (drama) as a site of his subtle and undeclared struggle with Claudius.
In his well-documented essay titled “National Liberation and Culture” Amilcar Cabral offers the following insights on the indispensability of culture to the marginalised or dominated people, and how it is feared and loathed by the oppressors:
When Goebbels, the brain behind Nazi propaganda, heard culture being discussed, he brought out his revolver. That shows that the Nazis, who were and are the most tragic expression of imperialism and of its thirst for domination – even if they were all degenerates like Hitler, had a clear idea of the value of culture as a factor of resistance to domination ... In fact, to take up arms to destroy, or at least to neutralize, to paralyze, its cultural life. For, with a strong indigenous cultural life, foreign domination cannot be sure of its perpetuation. At any moment, depending on internal and external factors determining the evolution of the society in question, cultural resistance (indestructible) may take on new forms (political, economic, armed) in order to fully contest foreign domination. (http://www.historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/cabralnlac.html)
Hamlet’s tactic of deploying culture as a site of his struggle with Claudius is credible and tactically sound. Perhaps his status as a member of the royal family did not allow him to resort to extreme measures, such as open warfare with Claudius.
In his magnum opus, Shakespeare against Apartheid, Martin Orkin explains the “catch” situation that Hamlet is faced with as follows:
If the issues in Hamlet’s situation are, in these ways, highly suggestive, the fact that the prince spends the first four acts debating them places him in a considerable political danger. From the official point of view to avenge his father means also to rid his class of its established ruler. Were his movement into a position of contestation with this ruler made public he would be classifiable as the equivalent of what some twentieth century governments mean by an “enemy” of the state. His first concern therefore is to ensure absolute secrecy – he realises he will have to “go underground”. After the departure of the Ghost he urges his friends to swear that they will never reveal what transpired – in seventeenth-century Christian terms his insistence upon an oath has obvious importance. Furthermore, envisaging what measures of self-protection will in future have to be adopted, he tries to prevent discovery by a watchful and suspicious ruler. (Orkin 1987:31)
Orkin’s argument here is as instructive as it is plausible. He further explains Hamlet’s so-called “madness” as follows:
It is as well as mask, adapted as a political tactic to hide as best he can the truth of his antagonism towards the established ruler. Furthermore, in a social order where behaviour is never free of the surveillance of agents of the ruling class, Hamlet understands that every move of his associates will be scrutinised for their political implications. The young Prince of Denmark is well aware of the political difficulties arising from the injunction which the Ghost of his father made. (1987:32)
When Hamlet invites Claudius and the Queen to the performance of his play, The Mousetrap, Claudius leaves the performance abruptly when one of the actors pours poison in the King’s ear. The authenticity of the Ghost’s disclosure to Hamlet is thus confirmed. So what does Hamlet do after this? Does he mobilise for an insurrection? Does he act irrationally or impulsively after the King’s revealing behaviour during the performance of The Mousetrap?
We do well to quote Orkin here:
The resonance of unease in the text about possible disruption within the dominant order is most evident in the presentation of Hamlet himself. The Prince is portrayed as a young man adhering to traditional values of human justice and right action. In one sense this depiction of Hamlet, located in a world he considers unjust at its core, has obvious point for many twentieth-century audiences – Hamlet’s “integrity” is reflected in his manifest concern with the problem of action in the play. The profundity of this concern to understand himself and his world, to act with honour against the trend of ruthless violence in the social order emerges from everything he says, and especially from emotions, contradictions, and the violent as well as rational thoughts to which he is given, bear witness to the intensity of his endeavour. This “integrity” in Hamlet is established especially in language that draws on Christian discourse, evident in the moral undercurrents in his satirical awareness, in his ability to speak not only for the general but for the particular and personal in human experience, and in his capacity for and concern with human feeling – all of which contrast powerfully with the ruler of Denmark and those who work for him. (1987:42–3)
2. Culture as a site of struggle in the play
As a renaissance man schooled in the art of reason and logic, Hamlet eschews the use of violence as a means of avenging his father’s death and rather uses culture as a subtle weapon in his battle with Claudius. He puts together a play (The Mousetrap or Play within the Play) with a view to raising the consciousness of the unsuspecting populace of Denmark – but also in order to prick Claudius’s conscience as well as to undo his mask of innocence.
When Claudius suddenly leaves the play midway, Hamlet feels vindicated and convinced of his uncle’s culpability. Claudius also feels convinced that indeed Hamlet poses a real threat to his hegemony.
This realisation spurs him on to set up a security apparatus consisting of Polonius, Ophelia, Laertes, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern tasked with intelligence-gathering responsibilities whose culmination will be the elimination of Hamlet. Not only that – taking the cue from Hamlet, Claudius also deploys culture as a site of his struggle against Hamlet. But how?
(i) He arranges a sword duel between Hamlet and the more accomplished swordfighter Laertes – and has the tip of Laertes’s sword poisoned – something that the unsuspecting spectators are not privy to.
(ii) He poisons the wine which he offers to Hamlet during the course of the swordfight. Fortunately Hamlet refuses to drink it – but the Queen drinks it and dies. Talk of unintended consequences! The Queen dies, Hamlet kills Claudius and Laertes. He realises that he has been set up and also dies because of the wound he incurs from Laertes’s poisoned sword.
It is therefore plausible to infer that in the play, culture is used both as a subversive, counter-hegemonic and consciousness-raising mechanism and also as a subtle and potent instrument of eliminating perceived political opponents.
In his celebrated essay titled “Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses” Louis Althusser portrays the modus operandi of the state in its relations with its subjects in the following light:
The State is thus first of all what Marxist classics have called the State Apparatus. This term means: not only the specialized apparatus (in the narrow sense) whose existence and necessity I have recognized in relation to the requirements of legal practice, ie the police, the courts, the prisons; but also the army, which (the proletariat has paid for this experience with its blood) intervenes directly as a supplementary repressive force in the last instance, when the police and its specialized auxiliary corps are outrun by events; and above this ensemble, the head of State, the government and the administration. Presented in this form, the Marxist-Leninist theory of the State has its finger on the essential point, and not for one moment can there be any question of rejecting the fact that this really is the essential point.
The State Apparatus, which defines the State as a force of repressive execution and intervention in the interests of the ruling class in the class struggle conducted by the bourgeoisie and its allies against the proletariat, is quite certainly the State, and quite certainly defines its basic function. (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/althusser/1970/ideology.htm, accessed 20 May 2016)
3. Conclusion
Although Polonius, Ophelia, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern perfectly constitute what Althusser defines as a “repressive force”, at least none of them has the morbid or ghastly mandate to administer brutal force or violence on Hamlet, which is what the police are notorious for in repressive and illegitimate states. The roles of Polonius and his fellow agents are at least limited to intelligence-gathering activities – the rest is left to the manipulative and scheming Claudius. Marcellus’s whistle-blowing and consciousness- raising pronouncement at the beginning of the play, “Something is rotten in the State of Denmark”, is given credence and legitimacy by Claudius’s political machinations and Machiavellian disposition in the play.
Bibliography
Althusser, L. 1970. “Lenin and Philosophy” and other essays. Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses. (http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/althusser/1970/ideology.htm)
Dollimore, J and A Sinfield. 1985. Political Shakespeare. Cornell University Press, London.
Eagleton, T. 1996. Literary Theory. University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis.
Orkin, M. 1987. Shakespeare against Apartheid. AD Donker, Cape Town.
Shakespeare, W. 1980. Hamlet. Penguin Books, London.
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