Even those of us who opposed the Iraq war remember with some fondness the first Iraqi election in that nation’s history, which took place about 15 years ago, when jubilant Iraqis waved their ink-stained blue thumbs in the air, the ink offering proof that its possessor voted only once. Our election technology here in the U.S. is more advanced, but clearly less effective, indeed to the point of embarrassment. (The joke running across South America right now? The Americans can choose our presidents faster than they choose their own.)

And yet, even a year ago, few of us would have believed a U.S. election could give rise to credible concerns that the proper outcome was overturned by a large-scale, coordinated fraud. But in the aftermath of the election, a high majority of republicans, and even 30% of democrats, find that charge to at least be credible.

How could we have let our essential affairs, which clearly include procedures ensuring fair elections, deteriorate to this state? Shakespeare knows how. Prospero explains it all in The Tempest, even as he explains to his daughter Miranda how the two of them had become shipwrecked on an uncharted island in the Mediterranean, a steep fall from his prior position as Duke of Milan. He failed to keep track of his affairs:

Prospero: “…The government I cast upon my brother
And to my state grew stranger, being transported
And rapt in secret studies. Thy false uncle—
Dost thou attend me?”

Miranda: “Sir, most heedfully.”

Prospero, sovereign over Milan, and perhaps similarly to the sovereign American people. neglected his duties and instead became rapt in secret studies. This allowed his brother (and here will will substitute whoever may have been undermining our electoral system) to undermine his regime (the creatures means the government officials):

Prospero: “Being once perfected how to grant suits,
How to deny them, who to advance and who
To trash for over-topping, new created
The creatures that were mine, I say, or changed ’em,
Or else new form’d ’em; having both the key
Of officer and office, set all hearts i’ the state
To what tune pleased his ear; that now he was
The ivy which had hid my princely trunk,
And suck’d my verdure out on’t. Thou attend’st not.”

Miranda: “O, good sir, I do.”

Verdure means lush vegetation, but Shakespeare uses the word to refer to his power and authority, that was being sucked out of him by the ivy (his brother) which encircled him. For ivy, some of us today would substitute the image of a swamp:

Prospero: “I pray thee, mark me.
I, thus neglecting worldly ends, all dedicated
To closeness and the bettering of my mind
With that which, but by being so retired,
O’er-prized all popular rate, in my false brother
Awaked an evil nature; and my trust,
Like a good parent, did beget of him
A falsehood in its contrary as great
As my trust was…”

Well, we haven’t been neglecting our proper oversight of our government in favor of the bettering of our minds, unless binge-watching Netflix and sharing TikTok video memes constitutes the bettering of our minds, but the parallel holds otherwise. In our false brothers, within the faceless bureaucrats in the alphabet soup of federal agencies, and within the tech lords in their gilded offices, there has been awaked an evil nature.  This false brother, having gained the power of the state, began to persuade himself that he himself was the rightful sovereign, Prospero (or the sovereign citizens of today) be damned:

Prospero: “…He being thus lorded,
Not only with what my revenue yielded,
But what my power might else exact, like one
Who having into truth, by telling of it,
Made such a sinner of his memory,
To credit his own lie, he did believe
He was indeed the duke; out o’ the substitution
And executing the outward face of royalty,
With all prerogative: hence his ambition growing—
Dost thou hear?”

Miranda: “Your tale, sir, would cure deafness.”

Prospero: “To have no screen between this part he play’d
And him he play’d it for, he needs will be
Absolute Milan. Me, poor man, my library
Was dukedom large enough:…confederates—
So dry he was for sway—wi’ the King of Naples
To give him annual tribute, do him homage,
Subject his coronet to his crown and bend
The dukedom yet unbow’d—alas, poor Milan!—
To most ignoble stooping.”

In that last part, Prospero reveals that his brother has placed Milan, formerly independent, under the protection of Naples. (So dry he was for sway means so thirsty he was for influence.)And so who today plays the part of Naples? That’s an easy one. China. We can do no more than agree with Miranda.

Miranda: “O the heavens!”

 

I write this blog because the classics, and Shakespeare chief among them, can keep us connected to the highest and best in Western culture, and because modern life can reveal richer meanings when it’s seen through a Shakespearean lens. Hope you enjoyed!