Plato's Republic and Shakespeare's Rome

"This study argues the influence of Plato's political thought on Shakespeare's Roman works : The Rape of Lucrece, Coriolanus, Julius Caesar, Antony and Cleopatra, and Titus Andronicus. It contends that Plato's theory of constitutional decline provides the philosophical core of these works; that Lucrece, Coriolanus, Julius Caesar, and Antony and Cleopatra form a "Platonic" tetralogy collectively spanning the stages of timocracy, oligarchy, democracy, and tyranny; that this decline is prefigured and encapsulated in Titus Andronicus; and that all five works are oblique commentaries on England's political milieu. Shakespeare equates the ruin of Rome with what he foresees as the corresponding decline of England deriving from England's kindred political ills, in particular the burgeoning democratic impulses fostered by the policies of both Elizabeth and James - impulses potentially leading to popular rule and the ruin of the state." "Each work, Parker suggests, was occasioned by a political crisis that similarly threatened England's integrity, Lucrece, Titus, and Caesar concern the unsettled succession, Coriolanus mirrors the parliamentary (and thus national) schism arising from James's contempt for the Commons' grievances, and Antony and Cleopatra reflects the dangers posed by James's absolutism and excess. Each work is thus a plea for provident rule and a sound monarchy, sole bulwarks against England's destruction."--BOOK JACKET.