Book contents
- Shakespeare at War
- Shakespeare at War
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Notes on Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Note on the Text
- Introduction
- Chapter 1 ‘The Truth for Which We Are Fighting’
- Chapter 2 The Seven Years’ War (1756–1763) and Garrick’s Shakespearean Nationalism
- Chapter 3 Revolutionary Shakespeare
- Chapter 4 Hamlet Mobilized
- Chapter 5 Shakespeare, the North-West Passage, and the Russian War
- Chapter 6 ‘Now for Our Irish Wars’
- Chapter 7 Shakespeare and the Survival of Middle England
- Chapter 8 Ellen Terry Stars at the Shakespeare Hut
- Chapter 9 The 1916 Shakespeare Tercentenary at № 1 Camp in Calais
- Chapter 10 Shakespeare Does His Bit for the War Effort
- Chapter 11 Germanizing Shakespeare during the First World War
- Chapter 12 Readers and Rebels
- Chapter 13 Forgotten Histories
- Chapter 14 ‘Now Good or Bad, ’tis but the Chance of War’
- Chapter 15 ‘Precurse of Feared Events’
- Chapter 16 But What Are We Fighting For?
- Chapter 17 Henry V and the Battle of Powerscourt
- Chapter 18 Unser Shakespeare in Nazi Germany
- Chapter 19 Framing the Jew
- Chapter 20 G. Wilson Knight’s ‘Royal Propaganda’ in ‘This Sceptred Isle’ (1941)
- Chapter 21 Shakespeare’s Desert Camouflage
- Chapter 22 ‘May I with Right and Conscience Make This Claim?’
- Chapter 23 Henry V and the Invasion of Iraq
- Chapter 24 Who Pays the Price?
- Chapter 25 ‘Mere Prattle, without Practice, Is All His Soldiership’
- Chapter 26 ‘Thou Hast Set Me on the Rack’
- Afterword
- Notes
- Index
Chapter 21 - Shakespeare’s Desert Camouflage
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 August 2023
- Shakespeare at War
- Shakespeare at War
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Figures
- Notes on Contributors
- Acknowledgements
- Note on the Text
- Introduction
- Chapter 1 ‘The Truth for Which We Are Fighting’
- Chapter 2 The Seven Years’ War (1756–1763) and Garrick’s Shakespearean Nationalism
- Chapter 3 Revolutionary Shakespeare
- Chapter 4 Hamlet Mobilized
- Chapter 5 Shakespeare, the North-West Passage, and the Russian War
- Chapter 6 ‘Now for Our Irish Wars’
- Chapter 7 Shakespeare and the Survival of Middle England
- Chapter 8 Ellen Terry Stars at the Shakespeare Hut
- Chapter 9 The 1916 Shakespeare Tercentenary at № 1 Camp in Calais
- Chapter 10 Shakespeare Does His Bit for the War Effort
- Chapter 11 Germanizing Shakespeare during the First World War
- Chapter 12 Readers and Rebels
- Chapter 13 Forgotten Histories
- Chapter 14 ‘Now Good or Bad, ’tis but the Chance of War’
- Chapter 15 ‘Precurse of Feared Events’
- Chapter 16 But What Are We Fighting For?
- Chapter 17 Henry V and the Battle of Powerscourt
- Chapter 18 Unser Shakespeare in Nazi Germany
- Chapter 19 Framing the Jew
- Chapter 20 G. Wilson Knight’s ‘Royal Propaganda’ in ‘This Sceptred Isle’ (1941)
- Chapter 21 Shakespeare’s Desert Camouflage
- Chapter 22 ‘May I with Right and Conscience Make This Claim?’
- Chapter 23 Henry V and the Invasion of Iraq
- Chapter 24 Who Pays the Price?
- Chapter 25 ‘Mere Prattle, without Practice, Is All His Soldiership’
- Chapter 26 ‘Thou Hast Set Me on the Rack’
- Afterword
- Notes
- Index
Summary
Since 9/11, a striking number of Shakespeare productions have appropriated the distinctive colours of desert camouflage. The print – marked by faded tones and an overall impression of dry and earthy environs – has become almost the standard choice for productions of Macbeth, Othello, and Henry V. Yet there has been little, if any, discussion of desert camouflage as a costuming decision. Examining productions ranging across two decades – from Nicholas Hytner’s Henry V (2003) to Max Webster’s Henry V (2022) – this essay argues that the use of the print synopsizes the ways in which productions refract contemporary understandings of global conflict. Camouflage costuming ignites a nexus of Shakespearean meanings around the brutality of the protagonist, war-crimes, PTSD, veteran-ship, and spectacular violence. The newly cynical readings that result render irrelevant traditional debates about the pro- or anti-war stance of Shakespearean theatre. In representing – via desert camouflage – a new kind of warfare, theatre in the post-2001 era envisages conflict as self-defeat. Finally, then, these productions speak to incompleteness, irresolution, regret, and a never-ending cycle of global violence.
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- Shakespeare at WarA Material History, pp. 203 - 212Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2023