‘I Am the King Himself’: Lear, Seneca and the New Augustus
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Ian Ward
Abstract
This article revisits the kingship of James VI of Scotland and I of England. It argues that there were two defining features of this kingship, its style and its reach. The first is the nature of its absolutism, which drew heavily upon the writings of the Roman public philosopher Seneca. The second is the aspiring imperialism. James cherished the idea of a formal ‘union’ of his crowns, again deriving inspiration from classical Rome. The first part of this article analyses the constitutional theory of James Stuart, as articulated in his writings and those of contemporaries. The second part then conjectures that Shakespeare’s King Lear, first performed in 1606, can be read as a critical, but ultimately approving, commentary on both aspirations, the absolutist and the imperialist.1
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© 2023 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Frontmatter
- ‘I Am the King Himself’: Lear, Seneca and the New Augustus
- Gertrude Atherton’s WWI Propaganda to the Home Front: Mrs. Balfame, The Living Present and The White Morning
- Times Out of Joint: The Spy Who Came in from the Cold
- Narrating Identity: “Former Selves” and Metafiction in Ian McEwan’s Atonement
- “The Famous Republic of Shepherds” (Hall 2015: 382–383): Sarah Hall’s Alternative Pastoral Trajectory in Haweswater (2002) and The Wolf Border (2015)
- Playing on the Expectations: Seth’s It’s a Good Life, If You Don’t Weaken (1993–1996) as Graphic Autofiction
- Reviews
- Juliette Vuille. 2021. Holy Harlots in Medieval English Religious Literature: Authority, Exemplarity, and Femininity. Cambridge: Brewer, 297 pp., 3 b/w illus., £ 65.00 | $ 95.00.
- Harry Parkin (ed.). 2021. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain. Oxford: Oxford University Press, xxx + 1010 pp., ₤ 80.00 / $ 125.00.
- Elaine Auyoung. 2018. When Fiction Feels Real: Representation and the Reading Mind. New York: Oxford University Press, 164 pp., £59.00.
- Mireia Aragay, Cristina Delgado-García and Martin Middeke (eds). 2021. Affects in 21st-Century British Theatre: Exploring Feeling on Page and Stage. London: Palgrave Macmillan, xi + 288 pp., 1 illustr., € 58.84/£ 52.03/$ 63.32.
- Ralf Haekel (ed.). 2017. Handbook of British Romanticism. Handbooks of English and American Studies 6. Berlin/Boston, MA: De Gruyter, x + 715 pp., 25 illustr., € 250.00.
- Stefan Helgesson, Birgit Neumann and Gabriele Rippl (eds.). 2020. Handbook of Anglophone World Literatures. Handbooks of English and American Studies 13. Berlin/Boston, MA: De Gruyter, ix + 580 pp., 2 fig., € 240.00/£ 211.00/$ 241.99.
- George Gissing. 2022. Veranilda, A Story of Roman and Goth. Edited and Introduced by Markus Neacey. Grayswood: Grayswood Press, 416 pp., 1 illustr., 2 maps, £17.50.
- Jens Beutmann, Martin Clauss, Cecile Sandten and Sabine Wolfram (eds . ). 2022. Die Stadt: Eine gebaute Lebensform zwischen Vergangenheit und Zukunft. CHAT Chemnitzer Anglistik/Amerikanistik Today 10. Trier: WVT Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier, 315 pp., 39.50 €.
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Frontmatter
- ‘I Am the King Himself’: Lear, Seneca and the New Augustus
- Gertrude Atherton’s WWI Propaganda to the Home Front: Mrs. Balfame, The Living Present and The White Morning
- Times Out of Joint: The Spy Who Came in from the Cold
- Narrating Identity: “Former Selves” and Metafiction in Ian McEwan’s Atonement
- “The Famous Republic of Shepherds” (Hall 2015: 382–383): Sarah Hall’s Alternative Pastoral Trajectory in Haweswater (2002) and The Wolf Border (2015)
- Playing on the Expectations: Seth’s It’s a Good Life, If You Don’t Weaken (1993–1996) as Graphic Autofiction
- Reviews
- Juliette Vuille. 2021. Holy Harlots in Medieval English Religious Literature: Authority, Exemplarity, and Femininity. Cambridge: Brewer, 297 pp., 3 b/w illus., £ 65.00 | $ 95.00.
- Harry Parkin (ed.). 2021. The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain. Oxford: Oxford University Press, xxx + 1010 pp., ₤ 80.00 / $ 125.00.
- Elaine Auyoung. 2018. When Fiction Feels Real: Representation and the Reading Mind. New York: Oxford University Press, 164 pp., £59.00.
- Mireia Aragay, Cristina Delgado-García and Martin Middeke (eds). 2021. Affects in 21st-Century British Theatre: Exploring Feeling on Page and Stage. London: Palgrave Macmillan, xi + 288 pp., 1 illustr., € 58.84/£ 52.03/$ 63.32.
- Ralf Haekel (ed.). 2017. Handbook of British Romanticism. Handbooks of English and American Studies 6. Berlin/Boston, MA: De Gruyter, x + 715 pp., 25 illustr., € 250.00.
- Stefan Helgesson, Birgit Neumann and Gabriele Rippl (eds.). 2020. Handbook of Anglophone World Literatures. Handbooks of English and American Studies 13. Berlin/Boston, MA: De Gruyter, ix + 580 pp., 2 fig., € 240.00/£ 211.00/$ 241.99.
- George Gissing. 2022. Veranilda, A Story of Roman and Goth. Edited and Introduced by Markus Neacey. Grayswood: Grayswood Press, 416 pp., 1 illustr., 2 maps, £17.50.
- Jens Beutmann, Martin Clauss, Cecile Sandten and Sabine Wolfram (eds . ). 2022. Die Stadt: Eine gebaute Lebensform zwischen Vergangenheit und Zukunft. CHAT Chemnitzer Anglistik/Amerikanistik Today 10. Trier: WVT Wissenschaftlicher Verlag Trier, 315 pp., 39.50 €.
