 Suit the action to the word, the word to the action;
with this special observance, that you o'erstep not the
modesty of nature: for anything so overdone is from
the purpose of playing, whose end, both at the first
and now, was and is, to hold, as 'twere, the mirror up to
nature; to show Virtue her own feature, scorn her
own image, and the very age and body of the time his
form and pressure. (Hamlet, 3.2.17-24)
The purpose of Plutarch
 when men have led reckless lives, and have become conspicuous,
in the exercise of power or in great undertakings, for badness,
perhaps it will not be much amiss for me to introduce a pair or
two of them into my biographies, though not that I may merely
divert and amuse my readers by giving variety to my writing.
6 Ismenias the Theban used to exhibit both good and bad players
to his pupils on the flute and say, you must play like this one," or
again, "you must not play like this one"; and Antigenidas used to
think that young men would listen with more pleasure to good
flute-players if they were given an experience of bad ones also. So,
I think, we also shall be more eager to observe and imitate the
better lives if we are not left without narratives of the
blameworthy and the bad.
 This book will therefore contain the Lives of Demetrius the
City-besieger and Antony the Imperator, men who bore
most ample testimony to the truth of Plato's saying that
great natures exhibit great vices also, as well as great virtues.
Both alike were amorous, bibulous, warlike, munificent,
extravagant, and domineering, and they had corresponding
resemblances in their fortunes. For not only were they all
through their lives winning great successes, but meeting
with great reverses; making innumerable conquests, but
suffering innumerable losses; unexpectedly falling low, but
unexpectedly recovering themselves again; but they also
came to their end, the one in captivity to his enemies, and
the other on the verge of this calamity.
Life not history
 Opening of Plutarch’s Life of Alexander (parallel life
to Julius Caesar):
 My intent is not to write histories, but only lives. For
the noblest deeds do not always show in men’s virtues
and vices; but oftentimes a light occasion, a word, or
some sport, makes men’s natural dispositions and
manners appear more plain than the famous battles
won wherein are slain ten thousand men, or the great
armies, or cities won by siege or assault.
Here’s sport indeed!
Caesar rebukes Antony’s
playfulness

But to confound such time
 That drums him from his sport and speaks as loud
 As his own state and ours, ’tis to be chid –
 As we rate boys who, being mature in knowledge,
 Pawn their experience to their present pleasure,
 And so rebel to judgment. (1.4)
Homo Ludens

In Homo Ludens (1938), Huizinga identifies 5 characteristics that play must
have:
 Play is free, is in fact freedom.
 Play is not “ordinary” or “real” life.
 Play is distinct from “ordinary” life both as to locality
and duration.
 Play creates order, is order. Play demands order
absolute and supreme.
 Play is connected with no material interest, and no
profit can be gained from it.
 Play is a basic existential phenomenon, just as
primordial and autonomous as death, love, work and
struggle for power, but it is not bound to these
phenomena in a common ultimate purpose. Play, so to
speak, confronts them all – it absorbs them by
representing them. We play at being serious, we play
truth, we play reality, we play work and struggle, we
play love and death – and we even play play itself.
 Eugen Fink, “The Oasis of Happiness: Toward an
Ontology of Play,” Yale French Studies: 41 (1968): 19–
30.
Wasting time
Lust in idleness
 For do they not nourish idleness? And otia dant vitia, idleness is
the mother of vice, and many vicious persons when they know
not how any longer to be idle, for variety of idleness go to see
plays. Do they not draw the people from hearing the word of
God, and godly lectures? For you shall have them flock thick
and three-fold to the play-houses, and with all celerity make
speed to enter in them, lest they should not get place near
enough unto the stage (so prone and ready are they to evil)
when the temple of God shall remain bare and empty.

 I.G. ‘A Refutation of the Apology for Actors’ (1615) (repr. in
Shakespeare’s Theater: A Sourcebook, ed Tanya Pollard, 2004: 267)
Falsehood and going native
 The proof is evident, the consequent is necessary, that
in stage plays for a boy to put on the attire, the gesture,
the passions of a woman; for a mean person to take
upon him the title of a prince, with counterfeit port
and train; and by outward signs to show themselves
otherwise than they are, and so within the compass of
a lie, which by Aristotle’s judgment is naught of itself
and to be fled.
 Stephen Gosson, Plays Confuted in Five Actions (1582)

Cleopatra. Cut my lace, Charmian, come;
But let it be: I am quickly ill, and well,
So Antony loves.

Antony.
My precious queen, forbear;
And give true evidence to his love, which stands
An honourable trial.

Cleopatra.
So Fulvia told me.
I prithee, turn aside and weep for her,
Then bid adieu to me, and say the tears
Belong to Egypt: good now, play one scene
Of excellent dissembling; and let it look
Life perfect honour.

Antony.

Cleopatra. You can do better yet; but this is meetly.

Antony. Now, by my sword,—

Cleopatra.
And target. Still he mends;
But this is not the best. Look, prithee, Charmian,
How this Herculean Roman does become
The carriage of his chafe.
(1.3)
You'll heat my blood: no more.
Anti-theatrical Octavius
 The wild disguise hath almost / Antick’d us all
(2.7.122)
 Enobarbus on Antony’s challenge to single combat:
 Yes, like enough high-battled Caesar will
 Unstate his happiness, and be stag’d to th’show
 Against a sworder… (3.13.29-31)
 Caesar: The time of universal peace is near… (4.6.4)
Orientalism
 The First World war brought many Australian, British,
New Zealand and colonial troops to Cairo. European
Cairo was a madhouse because of the British and their
self-indulgences. The prices began to rise steeply in
Cairo while the British soldiers were enjoying things
that they had never had before. The people in the
countryside began to suffer greatly from poverty and
malnutrition. It was so bad that during the year 1918
more people died than were born.
Men at Work (3.1)

VENTIDIUS: Caesar and Antony have ever won

More in their officer than person […]

Who does i’th’wars more than his captain can

Becomes his captain’s captain.

[…]

I’ll humbly signify what in his name,

That magical word of war, we have effected;

How, with his banners and his well-paid ranks,

The ne’er-yet-beaten horse of Parthia

We have jaded out o’th’field. (3.1)
Infanticide
 Where art thou, death?
Come hither, come! come, come, and take a queen
Worthy many babes and beggars! (V.2)
Cleopatra, know,
We will extenuate rather than enforce:
If you apply yourself to our intents,
Which towards you are most gentle, you shall find
A benefit in this change; but if you seek
To lay on me a cruelty, by taking
Antony's course, you shall bereave yourself
Of my good purposes, and put your children
To that destruction which I'll guard them from,
If thereon you rely. I'll take my leave.
For play
 Play can be experienced as a pinnacle of human
sovereignty. Man enjoys here an almost limitless
creativity… The player experiences himself as the lord
of the products of his imagination – because it is
virtually unlimited, play is an eminent manifestation of
human freedom… plan can contain within itself… the
clear apollonian moment of free self-determination.
 Eugen Fink, “The Oasis of Happiness: Toward an
Ontology of Play,” Yale French Studies: 41 (1968): 19–
30
 As a civilization becomes more complex, more
variegated and more overladen, and as the technique
of production and social life itself become more finely
organized, the old cultural soil is gradually smothered
under a rank layer of ideas, systems of thought and
knowledge, doctrines, rules and regulations, moralities
and conventions which have lost all touch with play.
Civilization, we then say, has grown more serious; it
assigns only a secondary place to playing. The heroic
period is over, and the agonistic phase, too, seems a
thing of the past.
•
(Huzuinga, Homo Ludens 75)
Infinite jest
 Show me, my women, like a queen: go fetch
My best attires: I am again for Cydnus,
To meet Mark Antony: sirrah Iras, go.
Now, noble Charmian, we'll dispatch indeed;
And, when thou hast done this chore, I'll give thee
leave
To play till doomsday. Bring our crown and all.