A GOOD READ FROM OUR CHIEF ECONOMIST: POLITICAL THEOLOGY AFTER THE DELUGE
John Keats “BEAUTY IS TRUTH, TRUTH BEAUTY.” wrote this memorable line in his Ode on a Grecian Urn in 1820. The Ode begins with “THOU still unravish’d bride of quietness”, and the first part ends with “What men or gods are these? What maidens loth? What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape? What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?” It is still an unsettled matter whether Keats claimed “beauty is truth, truth beauty” in order to express his belief that beauty is the bearer of truth, which in its full veracity is far more beautiful in its beatitude than any other truth humans can aspire to consummate. An interpreter believes “humans can experience and fulfil their hearts’ desires, unlike the ‘bold lover, who never, never canst thou kiss’ who, like the other figures in art, is in a moment of anticipation which won’t be fulfilled.”
BEAUTY AND TRUTH
It is also possible to imagine that it is what the Urn is telling him, not Keats’ own thinking. Anyway, Lamia deceives Lycius out of a pure wish to be not only in bliss, but also to be looked at and seen, as opposed to the denigration of vision in the 19th Century French thought Foucault, inter alia, so unforgettably rendered decomposable and reconstructible. And this is what makes the truth of it. That truth can be in itself beauty is unmistakable, and outside the realm of poetics, a theme we can delineate back to the Enlightenment. However, the converse, that “beauty is truth”, could only be rendered intelligible and acceptable insofar as Keats approves the beauty in it. So beauty can in no poetic condition belie any truth. Could it defame it under other circumstances? •r to open up another venue in political theology, can beauty alone pass for poiesis? Here enter Schmitt, Cassirer, Kantorowicz and of course Dante, Shakespeare, and Benjamin. Also come to the forefront Jünger and Niekisch.
TRAUERSPIEL VS. TRAGÖDIE
Both Shakespeare’s Richard II and Hamlet have been seen either as tragedies or as Trauerspiele. The Trauerspiel is a hybrid form, with an unending stream that is sometimes narrated from within as a mournful cry. It doesn’t carry historical generality nor does it generate proper myths. Its plot is full of allegorical schemata that may be symbolic images of an entirely different game. As long as modern politics is intended as a game of games within games, who is game and who is gaming are fluidly indeterminate, the peculiar mirror nature of play will continue to be emblematic. For instance, Richard II has always been a political play in what may be termed a spectral time.
Consider the use of Leviathan by Shakespeare: “We may as bootless spend our vain command/Upon the enraged soldiers in their spoil./As send precepts to the leviathan/To come ashore./Therefore, you men of Harfleur,/Take pity of your town and of your people,/Whiles yet my soldiers are in my command;/Whiles yet the cool and temperate wind of grace O’erblows the filthy and contagious clouds/Of heady murder, spoil and villany”. (Henry V, Act III, Scene III)
Well, nothing allegorical or mythical has been alluded to by this reference. Hobbes’ choice of Leviathan as an image of the Artificial Man, the state, and Shakespeare’s use of it are completely different. Times have changed so quickly between 1595 and 1651 that Leviathan has become a catchy image in the new world of men.
Or else the idea that revolution is street theatre where everyone can watch and participate, that the world itself becomes a theatre scene – theatrum mundi - is actually a Shakespearean idea. Theatrum Orbis Terrarum: the World map published in Antwerp in 1570 may have influenced Shakespeare, an undoubtedly learned man. In fact, a map is a theatre. Hence, we now have the concepts of theatrum mundi, trag(o)edia and Trauerspiel. Starting from the 1920s, the mythical tone of mass politics has more often than not invited crowds to outdoor public performances or even issued calls to help stage them.
For instance, like many modern political dramas, whether the Earl of Essex did really stage a coup against Elizabeth I in 1603 is still unclear. There are claims