Critical Quotes Flashcards
Paola Dionisotti
her portrayal of Isabella for the RSC in 1978
“My Isabella was very frightened of sexuality… and doesn’t particularly enjoy being among people”
“because people are so complicated to deal with… their contradictions force you to look at your own, which Claudio does to Isabella”
“I think she’s scared. My Isabella was very frightened of sexuality. My Isabella was going to be a bride of Christ - that costume was actually her wedding dress”
Roger Allam
an actor who played the Duke on his interpretation of the final scene
the final scene “felt as if I was subjecting them, Isabella, Angelo and Mariana, to some kind of ordeal by fire…. this sequence as a whole had the ritual of purification”
Samuel Johnson
Angelo’s final punishment
“Angelo’s crimes were such as must sufficiently justify punishment… and I believe every reader feels some indignation when he finds him spared”
early reception
earliest critics of MFM were somewhat stunned by this strange, complex and dark play
some were even offended and embarrassed by its depiction of both illicit and coercive sexuality
many were unhappy with the final judgement on Angelo, believing he should have been severely punished rather than spared (Samuel Johnson)
one problem that many early critics found was that there was a lack of characters they could wholeheartedly admire, it was felt that they ought to be able to approve of the Duke and Isabella but their behaviour may this near impossible
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
early reception of the play
Coleridge called the play “a hateful work” and agreed that the ending was morally unsatisfactory
“our feelings of justice are grossly wounded by Angelo’s escape”
“Isabella contrives to be amiable…. Claudio is detestable”
William Hazlitt
19th-century criticism: unlikeable characters
Hazlitt also found the main characters dislikable, stating that “our sympathies are repulsed”
he argued that the Duke is “more absorbed in his own plots and gravity than anxious for the welfare of the state”
he also said that Isabella’s “rigid chastity” is unappealing
A. C. Swinburne
19th-century criticism
expressed dissatisfaction with the play’s resolution
George Bernard Shaw
20th-century criticism
MFM resonates with the modern period due to its themes which transcend through history
George Bernard Shaw stated that the play is “ready and willing to start at the twentieth century”
the themes of MFM appealing to the 20th-century audiences
the themes of MFM have appealed to the sceptical 20th century
the decline of religion and the changing attitudes towards gender and sexuality in the 20th century have heightened the play’s philosophical and dramatic strength
modern audiences seem more willing to accept the play’s ambiguities and darker moral themes
20th-century views towards the Duke
MFM dramatises authoritarian oppression; the Duke’s undercover surveillance of his people and the Christian morality that regards sex as guilt both keep the population of Vienna under a sinister form of ideological control
the Duke’s surveillance can be seen as a version of the 19th-century Panopticon, an invention of a vantage point from which a large area can be surveilled and controlled
few modern critics have positive views of the Duke
20th-century feminist perspective
challenge the stereotypical characterisation of women in the play
Isabella may seem to resist such stereotypes by being assertive and determined, but this makes her dislikeable to audiences (her punishment)
she is also reduced to silence and submission by the end of the play, becoming a pawn in the Duke’s grand strategy, symbolising patriarchal control and the silencing of the female voice
Daniel Massey
his view on Isabella’s dilemma, helps the audience sympathise with her and her dilemma
“in such an atmosphere, a dilemma such as Isabella faces… condemn herself to eternal damnation but save her brother’s life, is seething with painful irony and hair raising moral danger”
Andrew Sanders
the title
“as its title suggests, Measure for Measure offers a series of juxtapositions rather than coalescences”
(between justice and mercy, power and responsibility, liberty and restraint, sexual desire and conscience, appearance and reality, etc)
John Mortimer
“a great play doesn’t answer questions, it asks them”
Andrew Sanders
measure for measure as a dark and ambiguous play
“Measure for Measure is a play of dark corners, hazy margins, and attempts at rigid definition”
“it poses the necessity of passing moral judgement while demonstrating that all judgement is relative”
Peter Kirwan
relevance of the play
the play’s “concern with social policy and urban governance continues to find more echoes around the world, making Shakespeare’s view of the city one of his most enduringly contemporary achievements”
Daniel Massey
Shakespeare’s fascination with power
“power, in all its manifestations, fascinated Shakespeare… not just the symbol of power, but much more importantly, the human face behind it”
Mike Pennington
the Duke’s journey of self-discovery
“there must be this journey for the Duke… he comes to learn something about true government, about justice, about the entire system by which he has governed and lived, he now has to question all that”
F. R. Leavis
the Duke
“directing the action from above, his attitude is meant to be ours - his total attitude, which is the total attitude of the play”
Juliet Stevenson
the need to support, rather than criticise Isabella
“the audience should recognise Isabella’s dilemma as opposed to merely observing her in critical detachment… otherwise the audience will not really be challenged by the play”
“the production… has to support Isabella”
Michael Billington
Angelo’s transition throughout the play
“at first, he seems a shy bureaucrat astonished by his promotion… but he visibly grows in authority and then finds himself poleaxed when Isabella comes to plead for her brother’s life”
Michael Billington
2010 Almeida Theatre production
“Rory Kinnear is outstanding… Where most Angelos are propelled by lust, Kinnear’s is smitten by love”
“he sighs that Isabella may see him ‘at any time’ and studiously swaps his specs for contact lenses to make a good impression”
“this doesn’t excuse the sexual bargain he proposes: what it does do is suggest that Angelo is a man floundering in unfamiliar emotional territory”
Michael Pennington
Angelo’s sexuality
Angelo is “a very efficient and competent career man but who knows nothing at all about himself sexually and is very much out of touch with that side of his personality”
“So when his sexuality is triggered, it is of a very adolescent and uncertain kind”
Michael Pennington
Angelo’s crime
“Angelo’s crime is not what he thinks it is. He thinks it is desiring a saint, whereas it is a political crime; it is a monstrous abuse of his position… I think the crux of his downfall is political”
David Tennant’s Angelo
David Tennant’s Angelo, in a 1997 documentary, was very violent; grabbing Isabella, pushing her to the floor and climbing on top of her
Mark Rylance (played the Duke in the 2004 Globe Theatre production)
(playing MFM as a comedy in the 2004 Globe production)
“playing Measure for Measure as a comedy was a bit of a risk; over the last fifty years, the play’s tragedy has been emphasised more frequently than the humour”
“but we thought it’s been written down as a comedy, so maybe we should trust that that’s what Shakespeare wanted it to be”
“we tried to play the story as a thriller, full of well-laid plans that go slightly awry but come good eventually”
the 2004 Globe Theatre production
the 2004 Globe production was very comedic and focused more on the comedic aspects of the play rather than the dark tragedy
the Duke at the beginning of Act 1, Scene 3 was carried on stage hidden in a laundry basket, this explained how he had escaped to the friary
as he stood up he was covered in women’s underwear, suggesting to Friar Thomas that the “dribbling dart of love” may have gotten him into this situation
the Duke is not one of the obviously comedic characters but Mark Rylance demonstrates that he can be played humorously - his preoccupation with other people slandering him can easily be ridiculed and scenes like when he tries to persuade Barnadine to allow himself to be executed can be highly comedic
Mark Rylance’s Duke was a floundering, disorganised and clown-like figure who constantly let his plans go awry
Roger Allam
the Duke’s soliloquy in Act 3, Scene 1, his bleak speech on death
“his sense of self has fragmented into “many a thousand grains” of dust… he realises completely his own sceptical fatalism. But somehow this can only be expressed through someone else’s situation”
Juliet Stevenson
the significance of language and verse
“his rhythms, his pauses… there is a pulse in the verse that will tell you as much about the character as anything she says”
critical history: how was the play first received?
the subject matter and the complex characters made Measure for Measure an uncomfortable play to watch when it was first performed
after its first recorded performance in 1604, there are no further records of performances until 1660 when the low-life scenes and the emphasis on sex were cut in order to make the play more acceptable to audiences
additionally, productions tended to focus heavily on the happy ending and often added elements of romance between the Duke and Isabella, perhaps to compensate for the dark contents of the play
the themes of sexual corruption and the hypocrisy of the ruling class were unacceptable to a Victorian audience and so the play remained largely inside the covers of the book rather than acted out on a stage
John Dryden
in the 17th century, Dryden dismissed the play as…
“grounded on impossibilities, or at least so meanly written, that the comedy neither caused your mirth, nor the serious part your concernment”
G Wilson Knight
the Duke as a divine, Christ-like figure
he saw the Duke as the prophet of universal forgiveness and mercy, pointing out that he is “compared to the Supreme Power” and puts into practice the teachings of Jesus
