The Hollow Crown: Eliot’s latest book is out now!
Eric welcomes Eliot back on publication day for Eliot’s new book, The Hollow Crown: Shakespeare on How Leaders Rise, Rule, and Fall (N.Y.: Basic Books, 2023). Ken Adelman, former Ambassador and Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations and Director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency (ACDA) under President Reagan and National Editor of The Washingtonian for 20 years joins them to discuss Shakespeare and leadership. Ken has taught Shakespeare at Georgetown and George Washington University and is Vice President of Movers and Shakespeares, a consultancy that provides executive training using leadership lessons from Shakespeare. Eliot discusses how he came to study Shakespeare and political leadership and the origins of the title “The Hollow Crown”. He and Ken discuss the performative elements of political leadership, the corrosive effects of hatred and ambition on politicians’ character, as well as their favorite scenes and lines from Shakespeare’s body of work.
Shield of the Republic is a Bulwark podcast co-sponsored by the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia.
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Welcome to Shield of the Republic of Pod sponsored by the Bulwark and the Miller Center of Public Affairs at the University of Virginia and dedicated to the proposition articulated by Walter Littman during World War two. That a strong and balanced foreign policy is the necessary shield of our Democratic Republic. Eric Edelman, Counseler at the Center for Strategic and budgetary assessments, a Bulwark contributor and a non resident fellow at the Miller center. And I’m joined by my co host and my partner in all things strategy. Elliott Cohen, the Robert E Osborne, professor of strategy at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and our Burke Chair and Strategy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
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And for today’s episode, most important, the author of the Hollow Crown on how leaders rise, rule, and fall, published by basic books, and whose publication date is today. Elliot. Welcome back.
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Well, thank you. It’s it’s good to be here. I I do wanna make a preemptive strike, though. I showed you both of you guys drafts of this book. So you can’t criticize any parts of it.
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And I’m gonna introduce our very special guest, a friend of shield of the Republic, a former colleague in government, Ken Edelman, who, if I really did a full introduction, we wouldn’t have time to do the rest of the podcast. But
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Alright. Don’t hold back though, Eric. Don’t be shy.
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I won’t be shy.
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I think I think all I think all of your listeners want that. You know, and then to wrap it up afterwards.
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We could do that. He he has done enormous public service. He he was assistant to the secretary of defense. Donald Rumsfeld in the, Gerald Ford administration. He was the deputy perm rep at the United Nations to Jean Kirk Patrick, at the beginning of the Reagan administration and later served with distinction as the director of the arms control and disarmament.
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Agency for twenty years, he was the national editor of the Washington magazine, and for our purposes, he has taught Shakespeare, at Georgetown University and George Washington University, and he is vice president of movers and Shakespeare, a company that does executive training, in leadership, using Shakespeare to educate corporate leaders can welcome to the show. It’s really wonderful to have you.
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Thank you. And, it’s a pleasure to be here for two reasons. Number one is I love the shield of the Republic. I listen to it every every time it comes out, and I wait for it to come out. So you two guys do a wonderful job.
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And secondly, I read, Elliot’s book and was very impressed with it. It’s really very strong. And if it’s coming out today, it should be lying off the shelves even as we
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Well, and Elliott’s going to have a special treat for our listeners. Shielded or public listeners are gonna get, at some point here in the show, a product code that’s gonna allow them to get a discount on on the hollow crown. But before we get to that, Elliot, let me kick this off by asking you what brought you to write about Shakespeare and Leadership? How did that come about?
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So, actually, it was a result of, really a happenstance. You know, there are two great Shakespeare theaters in Washington, DC, one of the falger, which is one of the great Shakespeare libraries, the other Shakespeare Theater company. We went we were at the folger, and we saw Henry the eighth, which has not performed all that much. And some people used to think that it was not written by Shakespeare. I think the view now is it was a collaborative work with a man named John Fletcher, and there was a there’s a great moment in it, which is all Shakespeare, where cardinal Wolsey, who’s basically been the prime minister for Henry the eighth.
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Is suddenly deposed, and he’s he’s stunned by it. And if you’ll forgive me, I’ll read the passage. It goes like this. Fair well, a long farewell to all my greatness. This is the state of man.
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Today, he puts forth the tender leaves of hopes. Tomorrow blossoms and bears his blushing honors thick upon him. The third day comes a frost, a killing frost, And when he thinks good easy man full surely, his greatness is ripening nips his root. And then he falls as I do. I have ventured like little wanton boys that swim on bladders this many summers in a sea of glory, but far beyond my depth, My high blown pride, at length broke under me, and now has left me weary and old with service to the mercy of a rude stream that must forever hide me.
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Oh, Cromwell, Cromwell, had I but served my god with half the zeal I served my king? He would not, in my age, have left me naked to mine enemies. And, you know, I I was, that that passage affected me very powerfully because my first thought was I know that guy, and I suspect the two of you do too. We we know people in Washington who have had that that experience. And then really one thing led to another.
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I was meeting with a bunch of my, students And I said, you know, I’m just so taking with this speech. I’m gonna share it with you. Then they said, wow, the Shakespeare guy is very interesting. Did he were there other speeches in Shakespeare that are paying attention to. And I said, well, yeah, a few.
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And it ended up turning into a course. The course turned into a book. And I think what I found is, as I reflected on what I’ve seen in Washington, the history I’ve studied, frankly, my own experience as a Dean, is just how much Shakespeare has to contribute to our understanding of the workings of power. And, I decided to write a book, which would really, really try to grapple with that in a serious way. So that’s really the the genesis of it.
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Can, you know, you have been for many years, a Shakespeare aficionado. I’m curious. Did you come to your admiration, for Shakespeare through a similar process to what Elliot just described. I mean, did it resonate with you because of your experiences in government, or did it actually come before your time in government?
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Well, there is nothing so elevated as Elliot is experience with that, beautiful beautiful quote from Henry the eighth. I never liked Henry eight all that much, but I admire those who do like Elliot. And, what I found was Shakespeare offered three things that, really moved me. Number one is He told stories, and people learn best through stories. We have all these power points.
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We have all these do’s and don’ts. We have you know, deuteronomy, do this, and don’t do that. And no one remembers any of them. At least I, I don’t remember any of them. But you tell a story and people remember the story.
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You remember Jesus’s parable. She remember if it’s some of the great stories of the bible. You remember And Shakespeare told stories like nobody else. Number two, he had the greatest insights into human beings. And Elliot is talking about the insight of somewhat in power and then kind of, disturbed by that and then falling from power.
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But, you know, he did insights into, you know, wives and husbands and sisters and brothers and kings and rulers and subjects and, you know, go on and on all these relationships that you have in life. And Shakespeare is Lake I think a gigantic MRI machine that puts really large on the whole wall what all of us feel and see in in tiny versions. So it’s the greatest insights into human beings and human nature and insights makes any organization. It’s what’s really, so profoundly important on any organization or any and a relationship. And three thirty use the greatest words.
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And Elliott’s quote is, typical of, just the beautiful, beautiful language that Shakespeare has.
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Yeah. You know, I I I, completely agree with that. And I’m I’m seized by a lot of the same things. Was Samuel Johnson, I think, said that, Shakespeare is a mirror of life. And and, that’s really true.
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And that’s why so many different kinds of people have admired him, including some pretty unsavory people, let it let it be said. There is, really, there is all of life in him. I I I’d add, you know, from the point of view of this book, he he is absolutely a profound student of character. He’s not interested in mass movements or economics and, you know, those are not his subjects. He he is focused on character and and all of its different manifestations.
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But I think there are, there are two other aspects in particular that I would mention and that I think a relevant to the book. One is he sees politics as a kind of theater and the exercise of power as a kind of theater And one one of the things I try to do in the in the book is really meditate on that. What does that really mean that, you know, somebody’s the or somebody’s the actors, there’s an audience, and so forth. The the other thing is, he he deals with different kinds of power. But he’s particularly interested, I think, in, power relationships and the politics and human relationships of courts.
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And you might say, well, we don’t live in monarchies by and large. But the truth is any human organization, I think, when you get to the very top, it’s a court, you know, there’s somebody in charge. There may be a crown prince or a crown princess. There are courtiers. They’re all the behaviors that you see in in so many of Shakespeare’s plays.
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And If you pay a lot of attention to that, I think he he really has an enormous amount to teach.
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I, read a few years ago that out of the thirty seventh place, something like, twenty two of them or twenty six of them have court scenes in them. And I have on my shelf a big book, a very thick book that ver by a NYU law professor called the Shakespeare in the law. And people thought, well, those missing years of Shakespeare before we, you know, history caught up with them, he must have been a lawyer, but, you know, he could have been a falconer. He could have been a soldier. He could have been a traveler to Italy.
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He could have been all these things. It is true that he has these insights into rulers and understanding theater. But it also is, he has some characters that after a while, you realize that are kind of funny. And I’ll give you an example that took me several readings of a very obscure play, Troyless and Cresita, which I like, But not many people do. It kind of dumps on both war and, and, relationships love.
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But it’s Charlie Sykes Maccresteta, and they have a character in there that’s Nestor. Okay? And he’s part of the tribunal. Shakespeare hits the play when the war has been going beyond, I think, seven years. And, everybody realizes it’s kind of stupid.
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And, really, very wasteful. Anyway, the point is that Nestor gives a number of speeches in the war tribunal that are all start out the same way. Master says I’m very old, I’m very experienced. I’m very learned. I’m, really, quite an expert in life, but I’m kind of old.
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And then he goes on to talk. Neckister talks and talks. Tux is very wordy. And you realize after the play several times, seeing it several times, that Mr. Says exactly what the person right before him, as said, With no greater insights, no greater examples, no greater depth, he just goes on and on with the person right before.
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Alright. Now you take a master mindset, or a character in your mind. You go to government meetings, like you have Eric, and you have, Elliot. And you’re sitting there and you say bingo, here’s master. Yes.
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He said one thing that haven’t heard before. It’s just wordier. And he goes, I’m potificating. And how and saying, how wise he is? Well, he’s not very wise.
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He’s just repeating in lots of words what Ben said. So you get these kind of characters or kind of motifs of human nature that can be very funny like that.
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No. They can be funny. They can also they can be shocking as well. I mean, the the the trojan Crescent is, is retelling basically of the iliad, but it’s a very dark retelling of of the iliad. Of the things I I described in the book, when when I try to do in the book is to weave in both in and out the plays, but also talking about history and some personal experience.
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Another play, which I I really like, Coriolanus, which doesn’t get performed quite as much, as as some of the others, There’s this great scene with this terrific general storyline as first. He’s a brilliant military leader, and politically, he’s an incomplete I dare say the two of you have encountered one or two people like that.
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I’m gonna say that doesn’t happen in Washington ever.
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But, you know, there’s this great moment where he he’s won these tremendous victories, and he is about to be named consul elected to the consulate in Rome which is that’s the thing that he had wanted most. It’s the, you know, sort of the highest position in the Roman Republic. And then there’s a a moment where the the people say, okay. Yeah. We’ll we’ll do that.
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But first, you have to show us your wounds. And, and of course, you know, he’s got his body’s gotten pretty beaten up in the course of the wars. And he just explodes in fury, and everything goes downhill from there. Well, I was teaching this in a class, and I had a class with you know, our students at SICE, who, professional students, and there were about half a dozen who had served in some pretty hard places. In Libya and Iraq, and Afghanistan have seen some pretty terrible things.
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And I said to them, don’t don’t feel obliged to answer the question I’m about to put to you. Have any of you ever been asked to show your wounds? And how did you react to that? And there was a very emotional half hour, I would say, where Yeah. That that that moment really resonated with them, that that that sense that, you know, they had done some diff very difficult things for their country And everybody else had this kind of voyeuristic interest, and what is it like to kill somebody or or something like that?
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And they were kind of reacting the way Quroyal understood. So I agree. I think, you know, if you’ve have a fair amount of life experience and government or really, I think any certainly any position with authority. There are so many times that Shakespeare resonates with you and frequently in unexpected ways, you know, like you were just describing with with Nestor, Ken. I’m gonna go back and reread Torellis and press it a another time and and look out for that.
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And, Coriolanus is a wonderful play. We just saw it last summer at the, Utah Shakespeare for Festival where we have gone out now for thirty five years, and we have seventy people with us. But, it had it has one of the great lines. First of all, it has one of the great portrayals of mothers that balumbly, Coriolanus’s mother, and Coriolanus of last are the great, great mother lovers. I mean, He doesn’t like anybody else on her, but he loves his mother.
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I mean, Freud was, made and created for, Corey Latus But, Columbia, the, the mother has, one of my favorite, I say this all the time. One of my favorite lines in Shakespeare after, you know, she get gets mad at everybody around her. And but Coriolenas isn’t all for And she finally has kind of discussed it. And she says, if only the heavens had nothing else to do, but to honor my curses. You know, all these gods are busy up there doing other things.
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Why don’t they pay attention to my persons instead? It’s just it’s just a great, great line.
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The two of you have touched on, a couple of themes here that I wanna come back to. One is the sort of performative part of politics. The other is sort of ambition and it’s, you know, its role in political life and and people’s character, and I I suspect both of you, like me, have seen ambition do terrible things to people in this town in particular, but before we get there, I wanna ask you Elliot. The title of the book, comes from a speech in Richard the second, which he uses the epigraph for the book, and I’m just curious, why you chose it.
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So, Okay. Here’s the, the gritty truth of book publishing. Eric, is that the the title of a book is really negotiated with the publisher. And and their main concern is to make sure that people understand what the book is about. So the written the working title I had had was rough magic.
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Because there’s a, the great scene in, the tempest, which I talk about where the magician prospero who’s kind of was first deposed as Duke of Lan, and then he becomes sort of the ruler of this desert island. And He has fantastic magical powers, says I hear with a juror this rough magic. And I’ll break my staff and, bury it several fathoms deep and deeper than did plummet ever sound. I’ll drown my book, book of magical spells. Then it’s really quite interesting because, you know, I asked myself, why does prospero have to do that?
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You know, he’s he’s gonna be Duke Malone again. He has all these magical powers, and and the point is he understands what what the rough magic of power has done to him as a human being. Mean, among other things, it’s gotten in the way of his ability to deal with his daughter. But but, the the real problem is that I think the publisher was concerned, and I think rightly so that people might not instinctively understand, you know, the book is is about Shakespeare and the nature of power. So they instead we used, again, it’s a well known passage.
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It’s from Richard the second. Richard the second is a very weak king who gets deposed, but he he has brilliant speeches because boy can he talk. And it’s, again, if you’ll indulge me, for within the hollow crown that rounds the mortal temples of a king keeps death his court And there, the antic sits scoffing his state and grinning at his pump, allowing him a breath, a little scene, To Mona Charen, be feared, and kill with looks, infusing him with self and vain conceit as if this flesh, which walls about our life were brass impregnable. And humor thus comes at the last, and with a little pin, boars through his castle wall, and farewell king. And it’s it’s it is a very powerful passage to use for a book like this because what one of the things that it that is going on here is if I can use a technical term, it’s called an agnourousis, where a there’s this sudden revelation of this is what’s going on or this is who you really are.
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And Richard the second who’s been a delusional character for a large part of his career. You know, he thinks their hosts of angels are gonna save him from the people who are gonna depose him. Suddenly realizes, oh, This is this. This is what I am. And and it’s, Shakespeare makes wonderful use of this.
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One one of the points I make in the book is I mean, here again, this is not just at the addressable device. You occasionally get these moments of an agnoruses in the real world. And the example that I use is something that the two of you may remember, which is, Nixon’s final speech to the assembled White House staff as he’s about to take off having resigned from the presidency, where there is this moment of anagnorisis. He, you know, he realizes that he destroyed himself by his hatreds. And it’s nominally a speech, but I I have to think it’s it’s actually more of a shakespearean soliloquy where he’s he’s revealing what he really thinks about his circumstances And like so many people, not only in Shakespeare, but in the real world, has become wise too late.
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Ken, do do you see Nixon’s menu served in the Nixon administration? Did you see the Nixon’s farewell speech in the same same light as as Elliott just described?
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Well, I think, Elliott is being very flattering to Nixon. And, I spent time with Nixon when I was at the United Nations and he had an office in New York and didn’t have much to do. And so he invite me over to tell him what was happening. Around the world. And I didn’t get that kind of blending insight, but, I think, you know, that Elliot is really on to something, whether he realized it or not.
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That, last talk about how you hate somebody, it’ll eat you up. And we taught a course, and in fact, Carol took taught a course, and then we did it together on forgiveness. And we used the tempest, Elliot, And, we use the tempest, to show that it’s a revenge play, and it goes along because prospero has been very wrong. He was, kicked out of power by his brother and, another a, king in a neighboring, city, and he and his little daughter were put on a rickety boat. To send out to drowned, and he was on this island for twelve years.
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And finally, he has his brother and the other co conspirators who were passing by, coming back from a wedding as it happens in North Africa, and, he calls the storm and he gets them all in. Finally after all these years, he’s seething. He is saying, okay, I’m gonna get them. Alright. I’ve been thinking about this for twelve years.
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And, Ariel who is the kind of mystic or kind of the, power. They’re, although she’s not human, but, she, you know, is rounding them up for prospero. And he’s going in for the kill. And we’re all excited because it’s totally justified, and he should he should get it. And all of a sudden, the aerial says to him, Well, you know, when you see this other fellow who wasn’t part of the conspiracy, and the sadness You know, you you just feel like forgiving these people and and prospero who had no idea.
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To do any such thing says to Ariel, would you, you know, and which is the question, you know, would anybody in this situation, do that. Ariel comes up with a great line, one of the great lines of Shakespeare. Again, I say that hundreds of times. And, Ariel says, I would, were a human, you know, in the largest sense, and prosper, oh, you know, is there. He’s kind of stumbling around instead of slapping his forehead.
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And he says, well, I I I will, you know, temporarily. Because they must be very, very apologetic for what they did. And it turns out they weren’t apologetic for what they did. You know, when we see that Shakespeare shows us, and then they seen. But what the point of it is that prosper realizes something very profound.
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That forgiveness is about us. It’s not about that. They may not be. They may not be regretful. Okay?
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They may not be sad about what they did. They may be dead. And so they can’t, but we have to get over it. Because it eats away at that speech you mentioned there, it eats away at us. And So he has to go, and I’ve always thought, and this is my interpretation, who the health care is about my interpretation.
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I always thought the tempest Meaning the storm was not the storm that starts to play, to put prospero, on the island with Miranda, but, is the tempest in his mind. And it is so For twelve years, this tempest has been beating. He says, my beating mind. And finally, when he decides to forget, and this group that he has there, all entangled, all, you know, ready for his revenge. Then the mind stops beating.
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So the tempest ends.
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You know, that I mean, that’s beautiful. Can I I think the way I’ve always interpreted that is not so much forgiveness as letting go of his hatred and his anger? And and which then actually ripples out. So it’s interesting that if you look at the way he talks about Taliban, his sort of s, you know, somewhat monstrous servant at the beginning of the play and at the end of the play. At the beginning of the play, you know, he’s basically threatening him and torturing him.
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And I mean, he’s using he’s using pain. And at the very end, you know, when he’s talking to the the king with whom he’s reconciled, he says, yeah, this This thing here is mine also. So he kind of acknowledges a a sense of responsibility. So he he does become more human The the book ends, with talking about how people leave power. And I I talk about two people who leave it voluntarily.
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One is prospero. For whom you think it pretty much works out okay, although he does say every third thought will be of death. I mean, he, you know, he knows this is, in some ways, the beginning of the end form, and the other is, of course, Kinglear, who relinquishes power in a very different way. He doesn’t, you know, whereas, I think it’s pretty clear that prospero knows what he’s doing as he relinquishes his magical powers. Leer thinks he can have all the benefits of power without any of the responsibility, and he may also be somewhat senile.
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That’s another matter. And it it’s it’s important how people exit, power and how they choose first, whether they choose to do it, and how they choose to do it. And lord knows, we see plenty of cases around us. If people who are just adamant, they’re gonna cling to it for as long as as possible. I mean, the most if I can put it this way, benign form is, you know, senators who cling to the very, very end.
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And but there are much more malign forms of this. I think that we see all the time.
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I think that in Shakespeare’s characters, Elliot, they have a tougher time than we did. Okay? The three of us were in government. At least two of us, YouTubes are very noble and really gifted, servants, of the Republic. And then you left.
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Okay. When the three of us leave, we can go do something else. We can go do and you guys are doing important things. And so it’s not all of our identity. It’s not, you know, our main identity.
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It’s not our main life. Okay. It’s it was an important factor in our lives. I think it would all three of us would agree that it was probably some of the most challenging and some of the most wonderful parts of our life, but it wasn’t the whole life. Richard II, who you quoted before, Elliot says at the end, I have no name.
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Okay? I mean, without the kingship, I am nothing. Nothing. And so that is really a situation that, you know, us in a, free country like the United States can serve for a while and then leave. That gives, let me just say, that gives a enormous power to us.
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Okay? Because you don’t have to do this. Stuff that is embarrassing or is wrong. You see all these, if I may be partisan because I was a Republican for many years, I’m not certainly not. Now.
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But you see all these Republicans, especially in the house. And you think to yourself, why do they say this? Why do they do this? Well, because they don’t wanna give up power. Well, they have nothing else in life going for them.
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Do they have a wife? Do they have any kids? Do they have a dog? Do they have another profession? Do there any other part of life that can fulfill them?
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And, you know, I mean, how bad can they be? To say, this is all I have. That’s really sad.
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Well, I
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think there are a lot of powerful people who are like that. I mean, well, I talk a little bit about, l b j. And, you know, it is very strong. As soon as l b j leaves the presidency, this is a guy who lived for power, was extraordinarily adept at using it, sometimes in benign ways, sometimes in pretty malign ways. And he but basically, you know, as soon as he leaves power, he he crumples up and he dies very shortly thereafter.
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And I think it’s because you know, at at at a certain point, his understanding of himself, he is a little bit like Richard the second, not nearly as slutty. I mean, LPG would have killed a lot more people. But but in a way like Richard the second, he he no longer knows who he is when he’s no longer in a position of of power.
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Yeah. And King Leer comes up with a great line of course. He says, can anybody tell me who I am? Yep. Because he he can’t understand.
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Who he is.
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We’ve talked, a bit about leaving power and, you know, the difficulty of leaving power. And one thing that does strike me, Ken, with regard to your comments, it it’s true that in democratic societies, people have sometimes trouble realizing when their sell by date has been reached, but it strikes me as different from some of the places I served as a foreign service officer, particularly Russia and Turkey, for instance, where you’ve got authoritarian leaders who For them, the prospect of leaving power is kind of existential because if if they leave they’re likely to end up imprisoned or dead. And I wonder if that makes a difference and if that in some sense is more akin to what Shakespeare is describing than our own political experience.
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The answer is yes. Yeah. I mean, you know, they they can, you know, face jail. And I I think that’s the true trump today. I think he’s running for office to stay out of jail.
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And I think should he God, you know, willing, not get the nomination. That’s my first choice, but certainly not when the election, that would be an existential threat on the Republic. You know, he’ll be in jail.
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Yeah. Well, bibi Natanyo is the same way.
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Absolutely the same way. And look at the contortions that he put himself through. As, you know, bending himself like a pretzel in order to, you know, defy what was it. Fourteen years as prime minister, which is pretty good, before this round. And, just to keep himself out of jail, the contortions.
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Let me just say, we’ve been talking these particular stories, and they’re wonderful. There also is something grand about the philosophy of Shakespeare. Okay? And and not just in a particular situation, not just with particular people who are in power, leaving power, cleaning its power, whatever it is. But, you know, kinda the meaning of life kind of, questions.
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And, what determines life? And, you know, when Hamlet says there’s a divinity that shapes our end, rough hew them as we might, the readiness is all. Hamlet’s saying, you know, just what Lincoln has said many times over and over I influence events here and there. I push them along. I I help them.
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I discourage and I pull back here. But you know what? There seems to be a divinity that, you know, is shaping our end. There seems to be some other fate, call it, design plan. I don’t know what you call it, but let’s call it orange.
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Okay. There’s an orange out there that seems to be controlling things more than we think it should, maybe that that we realize it does, but we we can modify it a little bit along the way. And the readiness is all. We just have to be prepared for what comes next. And the those kind of big thoughts are, also what really grabs me about shakespeare.
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I wonder if, you know, Bismarck’s comment about statesmen, you know, listening for the Russell of god you know, coming by and then grabbing the hem of his garment before making decisions, you know, is applicable here.
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Well, I think, you know, there’s there’s some of that, but there’s also and again, I I I think I probably have a particularly dark view part because of the the plays that I decide to concentrate on. You know, there’s this, moment. I think it’s in Henry the fourth, part two. Where Henry the fourth is he’s about to die, and Henry the fifth is gonna become the king, his son, with whom he has a very, very difficult relationship. And and Henry the fourth is kinda, he he’s kinda trying to come clean about his previous career to how, but he can’t really say his greatness and I were compelled to kiss.
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And and, no, I don’t think so at all. I think he, you know, he got a sense of what royal power was like. And he wanted it, and he kinda connived his way to it. And he actually in other ways, rather admit that. And I think so I think another, you know, another dimension of of Shakespeare, which is absolutely something one sees in in politics and business and universities, too, is the way in which powerful people can convince themselves of things.
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And and among other things can convince themselves the rectitude of their own behavior when really it’s it’s not. I mean, the you know, Shakespeare is a wonderful student of self self deception and how people try to, make themselves or create themselves. And and and I think one of the points he makes is, you know, you could be brilliant and still do that, you know, still delude yourself about who you really are. And you know, it ends up having consequences.
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I think you’re half right there, Elliot, but it’s tough to say whether they are diluting themselves or going back to your first point we made in this podcast, whether it’s theater, whether it’s just presenting to others, that, they were right and not deluding themselves. You do have characters who are, you know, get kind of blinding insights after a while of what what happened to them in life. Certainly, you do that with McBeth. You have other characters who really don’t, Richard, the third, and Diego really don’t get that. But even in the dark place, Elliot, that you mentioned and you concentrate on, you do get some of those grand thoughts that, that I’ve been talking about.
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One of the last speeches of McBeth of all people. He says, you know what? In my situation, he’s about to be killed. He’s on the battlefield. He says, in my situation, my stage of life.
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There are things that you come about. And he names three. He says, love, honor, and hoops of friends. I got none of them. Okay.
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And I’m telling you he’s lamenting that, but he has insights. And if you had to list three things, that all of our listeners out there with this wonderful shield of the Republic podcast should think about in life is would you at your battlefield Will Saletan stages of life, fulfill what McBeth of all people says know, you should have been living for. Love, honkers, and hopes of friends.
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McBeth figures it out, as you say, too late. He does become wise, too late. He decides to go down. He decides to go down swinging. I’ve you know, McBeth is such a fantastic blade, you know, for me, the thing that’s so powerful about it is when we first encounter him, it’s not he’s not a bad guy.
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And there is there’s some hints that he has the potential for enormous violence in him. And there’s description of this battle, he’s just fought against a rebel. And, somebody’s describing it, and he says he he unseen him from the nave to the chops. Which would be me, you know, basically disemboweled him. And I when I taught that to my students, I would say, let’s not skip over that phrase.
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Let’s think about what that really means. And what somebody who can do that is really like. And there are other other things there, but but that You know, for me, this is part of the other greatness of Shakespeare, and I and I think a source of insight into the political power that people change. And it it’s quite amazing that, you know, in a play, which might only last a couple of hours. You can see a tremendous evolution.
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One of the things I talk a little bit about in the book is which is the third and how it kinda helped me think of a little bit about whether or not, Putin would invade Ukraine the way he did on in two thousand twenty two. And the, you know, the thing that struck me in the in one of many rereadings of the play is that Richard, who is a villain, although he’s a villain you can empathize with, it and for the first three acts of the play, he’s clever. He’s indirect. He’s using cut outs. I mean, he’s doing terrible things.
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He’s having his brother ground in a task of wine. But, when he gets to act four, and he’s been finally been crowned, and he commits the really big crime, which is the murder of his nephews in the tower. He doesn’t hide it at all. He and he, you know, he says to his number two, you know, I’m playing. I wish the bastard’s dead and want it done suddenly.
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Do you understand me? And and that’s not the way he would have spoken before. And the other thing that’s even more sinister is when the murderers come back, he he wants them to describe how they killed two children. He’s getting off on it. It it’s it’s it’s exciting to him.
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And and, you know, for me, that was the the, you know, it did make me think about Putin that a guy who could be clever and limited, and quite cunning. I mean, horrible. But if you think about Georgia, if you think about the seizure of Dunbos. If you think about the seizure of Crimea, who was clever in a droid and calculated and so on. And February twenty fourth two thousand twenty two.
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It it’s just open and brutal. And he’s concealing nothing. The language he like Richard the third, the language he uses is, contains references to rape. You know, he’s he says to, in some sort of speech to the, Ukrainians, you know, like it or not, my beauty, you you have to accept it. And it’s clear that the reference is to a man raping a woman.
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And and I just thought to myself, you know, there’s the the the what Shakespeare one of the things Shakespeare is teaching us is people are not static. And they evolve. And they can sometimes they can evolve for the better. Sometimes they can evolve in self knowledge, and sometimes they could just really deteriorate in from a number of points of view, and you need to be aware of that.
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I have an idea for you, Elliot. This is, news you can use. Next time you teach your class, and your students are very lucky to have you all tell you that. And you teach Richard the third, which I’m sure you love doing. Have them concentrate on one other aspect.
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And that is, look at the people who supported Richard the third along his journey. This is what has taken me after exhausting Richard in going through. His gyrations. And as you say, he changes, you know. But who are these people?
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Well, there’s a whole group of people there. Some of them thought he’s going nowhere. You know, he’s not gonna get anywhere near power, which is his view when the when hundred and six goes and when, Richard, the third starts, so it’s harmless to support them. Others say, well, he’s gonna get into office, but, you know, he doesn’t have any competence in here. And if he gets into office, he’ll just screw it up and, you know, so it’s kind of harmless in that way.
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Another group will think and say, well, you know what? When he gets into office, I’m gonna benefit. Because I’m gonna get some of the goodies. I’m gonna get some of the jobs. I’m gonna I’m gonna be there.
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Some of the groups say, I kinda like his goals, although it’s unclear because he doesn’t have any really goals except power. So if you do all these five types, I would say, people who support it, Richard, along the way. You can find them in, you know, trumpian characters. And none of them turn out well. None of them get rewarded none of them, you know, get the nicest thing in return.
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And, you know, Buckingham who is campaign manager. The one guy who really was close to him throughout this journey when the hanger is on and the, you know, the types I just described, he goes through all of them. He’s the Mark Meadows of it. He’s goes through all of them. Then at the end, you know, He just said, this has been a terrible ride.
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I I made him a terrible mistake here, and he’s taken out and hung.
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When we think about Shakespeare plays, we think about the big characters Henry the fifth, McBath, and so on. We sometimes forget that he does a wonderful job with the courtiers. You know, with and and it’s not just in Richard the third. You see it in Henry the sixth, where, you know, you have these different aristocrats jockeying for power who are all quite flawed. For me, the so here’s an, another play which people tend not to read as much or perform symboline.
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You know, people have asked me, okay, Donald Trump. Which is, is he Richard the third? Is he McBeth? And, you know, my response is no. He’s too much of a he’s a dangerous doofus, but he’s too much of a doofus.
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To be either of those. He’s like, let’s figure cloten. So cloten is, the stepson of the king He wants, to rape, the king’s daughter by previous marriage and kill her husband. And he’s he’s a joke. He’s, you know, he’s he’s an idiot in the buffoon, but he’s very dangerous.
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And the thing that is so striking to me about the Shakespeare’s depiction of him is the way in which his courtiers at the same time they make fun of him They mock him in asides to the each other and to the audience, and they, in no way, try to block him. They enable him. And boy, there’s a profound truth there as well about the nature of of courtier politics. That you can have people who understand that, you know, they’re dealing with somebody who’s impaired in any of a number of different ways whether it’s morally or politically. But they will go along with it.
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And, you know, there’s, again, something that we see perfectly well in our politics today.
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And you’re right to concentrate on some, you know, lesser characters. One of the things I love about a play, which everybody loves. So, Romeo, Julia, is there’s a scene where Juliet takes to the the quasi poison or sleeping sleeping, potion, up in a room the night before her you know, wedding to Paris. And, you know, the nurse Caesar and thinks she’s dad, you know, and then everybody in the household goes crazy, of course, because on the eve of her wedding, there she is, died. And everybody thinks, died.
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They don’t know this. He took this temporary potion. Anyway, there is going to be because this is the night before the wedding, there’s going to be a party at the, at the house for her. And a number of, musicians come to perform at the party. Okay?
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They walk in our daughter is a violinist with Richmond Symphony. And so, we’re kinda sympathetic to this. They walk in ready, you know, for this, they hear the screaming up there. They ask somebody, you know, what is all this about? Oh my god, Juliet is dead?
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And they talk among themselves real quickly. This is mostly taken out of every production of Romeo Juliet that I’ve ever seen. And they talk among themselves real quickly. Oh, Christ. You know, we’re not gonna get paid for this gig.
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You know, here we are. They’re running around. You know, no one’s paying any attention to this. And the other one says, I understand that. So let’s take some food as we’re leaving because they’re not gonna do anything with the food either.
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So this group of musicians No. How did Shakespeare think of that? I mean, why did he think of these musicians? And when I pointed this out to my daughter. She says that’s exactly what we do.
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Of course, we do. We get paid. It’s a very small, even if we get paid for our gigs. We might as well take some of the food when we go.
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So let me ask, the two of you this question. You know, we’ve touched on the notion of performance art and politics and the role that political theater plays. And I wonder whether our listeners listening to this podcast would say, yeah, but in the United States today, we’ve reached the point of diminishing returns in, you know, performance art as politics that the performative part now is outweighing almost everything else. It is, is there an element here that Shakespeare can illuminate?
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I mean, there’s something to that in the context of our politics, but the You know, the performative element of politics can be very, very important. Again, something I’d talk about a little bit in the book. I once had a director who’s done a lot of Shakespeare plays speak to my students. And one of the questions I ask him is, okay, so what are your first decisions when you’re about stage the Shakespeare play. He said, but the most important decisions are, costuming and stage set.
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I went wow, really. And, you know, he then he went on that. And I that came into my mind the first night again of the Ukraine war, where you think about Volodymyr Zelensky, so costuming. He he is he dresses himself in a quasi military clothing. It’s olive drab.
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It’s not a uniform. And I think he was probably very self conscious about that. And of course, he was an actor. So he had a sense of of theater. So he’s kind of the, as Chicks, or we might say a warrior for the working day.
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But but he’s his status is clear that he’s a he’s going to be a fighting civilian leader his stage set is are the streets of Kiev. And the the way he stages it is if you remember he has all of his close advisors around in the minister of defense and the chief of staff, and he gives a a fairly Shakespeareian speech. Which is actually has some churchillian over time. So, you know, we’re here. Mr.
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Defense is here. The chief of staff is here. We’re gonna fight this out to the end. It it really is as echoes of Churchill in in nineteen forty. And of course, you you compare that with the the staging of Vladimir Putin, you know, talking at the end, you know, thirty feet away at the, you know, with his kind of cowed subordinates.
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And I I have to think Zelensky was thinking about that. That that can be very, very powerful, stuff. I think there’s look, I remember in the middle of this dreadful war in, Gaza. I think it was a piece of political theater for president Biden to go to Israel. And it was a really important thing to do.
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The and and I can tell from, Israeli friends who I’ve been talking to. Had a huge impact. Now did he say anything that he couldn’t have said on a video teleconference? Of course not. You know, the there was was there anything substantive as a result of that that made a, that would have made, you know, been any different whether he was doing it in person or remotely.
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No. But the fact of being there, being on the ground, and there’s the president of the United States and all that, hugely important. So I and in any case, you know, the performative element of politics is inescapable. And the performative element of power is inescapable. Whether you, you know, famous episode, Henry the fifth, who, by the way, I really can’t stand as a human being, It’s a wonderful play.
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I mean, but I really loathe him as a as a leader, although he’s absolutely absolutely brilliant, you know, and and extremely successful. He the night before the battle of Asian Corps when, you know, every the the troops are they know they’re outnumbered, when the movie versions, it’s usually raining. I mean, it’s they know that the cause of this war isn’t all that. Justin’s on but he goes from Camp Fire to Camp Fire, and the chorus says a a touch of Harry in the night. Well, you know, that’s that’s the theater of leadership.
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And, you know, there are plenty of examples of that from World War II or, you know, I make a reference to Daniel Morgan of the Battle of cowpads in seventeen eighty one. Same same thing. He goes around, can’t fire to can’t fire, for a bunch of American soldiers who are outnumbered and think that they may very well lose the next battle. So the, you know, there could be great performative art. And unfortunately, I think if we if we wanna think about why it is that particularly Donald Trump, none of us particularly admire, or like has been so successful.
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It’s because he is unfortunately, really good at a certain kind of theater. Hillary Clinton did not, I think, understand the theater of politics, particularly well, certainly couldn’t plan it. He unfortunately did. Now it’s a limited he had as as, you know, you might say in the theater world a limited performance range, and he does. And I think that will eventually it’s one of the reasons why I think he will eventually sync, but what what shouldn’t deny the power of what he was able to to pull off just the way kind of the presence he is on the stage the way he talks to people, where he talk to to crowds of people.
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You know, David French made the point that, know, he went to a number of his rallies and said, you know, people are having a good time. They’re enjoying. So I I think we’re we’re stuck with
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There’s there’s an entertainment factor there. No. No. No question. And and I think one of the reasons why Ron DeSantis has been such a flop as a presidential candidate is despite the fact that he has political positions and virtually indistinguishable from Trump’s.
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He’s not nearly as entertaining.
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Yeah. He’d be the despair of a casting director, I think.
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Part of it part part of it is also the follow-up on Elliot’s very good point, is that, the best of the lot understand their performance. And, I love the story that, FDR heard that Osen Wells was in town one time, and said, you know, this is just get them in here. Get them in here. And so, orson Wells comes into the executive office. And FDR sticks out his hand, he says, I just wanted to meet the second greatest actor in the Western old.
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And, president who I I served was lucky enough to serve. Let me say that. For seven years. Ron Reagan was asked. You know, how can an actor be in this job?
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He says, I can’t understand being in this job without being an actor. Yeah.
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I think that that is a perfect note, on which for we should draw this, episode of Children Republic to a close. It’s it’s been, great, Ken having you as a guest. We appreciate you very much. And, I hope when your terrific book Reagan at Rekjavík finally makes it to the small screen. We can have you back to talk about, talk about that.
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I have to say I have to interrupt you. Sorry about that, but Greg when you’re making a pitch for my buck. Sure. Why would I?
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Not at all.
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Never interrupt you. Right.
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I invited it.
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Dedicated, Ray, then at RECovic, when I wrote it, it’s the story of the RECovic Summit in nineteen eighty six, October nineteen eighty six. And I dedicated the book to Carol Ann Will. I can’t imagine life without them. I’ve been asked a hundred times since then. We all know who Carol is.
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That’s your wife. I didn’t know you had a brother will. I I know you had a son will. I didn’t know you had a father will. I didn’t know what who’s will?
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And I said, I can’t imagine life without them.
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Elliott tell our listeners how they can get their discount, from basic books.
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If you go to basic books is part of the Hachette book group that’s h a c h e TTE book group. We’ll put this on the website. If you go to that website and you use the code h l l w twenty three, you will get a twenty percent discount. So you have to order it from the Hachette website But again, if you go there, log on, you put in, there’ll be a section where you can put in a discount code h l l w twenty three. You’ll get twenty percent off.
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And let me tell you it’s a bargain.
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It’s a very good book. It’s a very good book. I would copy all that, and I would do it and paste it right now. Where I’m not expecting to get a free copy that’s inscribed without having done that. So we’re gonna get a twenty percent discount.
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I’m hoping for a hundred percent discount. Alright?
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Well, we may be able to arrange that. We’ll see.
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I think you’ve earned it, Ken. Thank you. And with that, I’m gonna close with an admonition to our listeners to thine own self be true. And that’ll bring this episode of shield of Public UN Air.