Conclusion

Summary

This section extends the insights generated by exploring the Shakespeare Tercentenary to the cultural and political debates of our own time. Since the crises of 1916 lay the foundations of the modern world order, many issues with which we struggle – anxieties about belonging, immigration, globalisation, and ethnic diversity – echo the problems that came to the fore then. The 2016 Quatercentenary commemorations demonstrated that Shakespeare continues to be evoked as a guarantor of common values on which diverse, often competing groups build their collective identities. He is still attractive both to those who believe that he is global and universal and those who view him from a more exclusive, nationalistic perspective. While homogenising ideas of imperial and national identities often dominate the debate, Shakespeare also provides an outlet for the silenced and ignored voices of marginalised social, racial, and ethnic communities. This book brings these voices out of oblivion. It also offers a window into the processes whereby our very identities are formed, debated, and reformulated. Revisiting the 1916 versions of Shakespeare – multiple, conflicting, entangled in debates surrounding belonging and otherness – can help us understand our own identity politics and culture wars.