What is it about?

This is an essay on the topic of Shakespeare's 'fascination with royalty' in the context of the coronation of King Charles III in the UK in 2023. It further draws on the novel by AS Byatt, 'The Virgin in the Garden', which deals with the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953 along with a sometimes satirical exploration of 'neo-Elizabethanism'. The author is a South African writing in the context of 'State Capture' in this land, and the internal harm this has done to South Africa's own sovereignty as a nation state.

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Why is it important?

The value of this essay in a Shakespeare journal is its perspective on the notion of sovereignty, and the integrity of sovereign states or indeed sovereign selves, in the context of extensive corruption in South Africa. It is an argument for the salvaging of the perhaps dated concept of virtue (as distinct from the more abstract notion of public or political or business ethics).

Perspectives

I draw throughout this essay on the concept from traditional Latin grammar of the subjunctive mood of the verb. The subjunctive is about pledges, promises, conditionality, trust and hope. It seems to me a grammatological take on ethics, morality, and indeed some of the fundamental themes in Shakespeare's plays. The tension between the protasis ('if') and the apodosis ('then') is at the heart of human endeavour. Above all, certain aspects of the subjunctive mood are fundamentally performative (as in the Coronation Oath, and South Africa's presidential Oath of Office).

Peter Merrington
unaffiliated scholar

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This page is a summary of: Editorial, Shakespeare in Southern Africa, April 2024, African Journals Online (AJOL),
DOI: 10.4314/sisa.v36i1.1.
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