Shakespeare ‘made theatre too white and heterosexual’
‘Yet again, ideologues are reducing great art to mere mechanisms for the promotion of an ideology’
THE “disproportionate representation” of William Shakespeare in the theatre has propagated “white, able-bodied, heterosexual, cisgender male narratives”, according to researchers in an £800,000 taxpayer-funded project.
The claim has prompted critics to accuse the Arts and Humanities Research Council, which has funded the study by academics at the University of Roehampton, of promoting “cultural clickbait”.
The project is due to be completed in two years’ time with researchers intending to mount a production of a comedy by Shakespeare’s contemporary John Lyly, Galatea, with characters disguised as the opposite sex.
Writing for the website Before Shakespeare, Andy Kesson, the project’s principal investigator, said that “masculinity and nationalism were crucial motivating factors in the rise of Shakespeare as the arbiter of literary greatness” and that “[w]e need to be much, much more suspicious of Shakespeare’s place in contemporary theatre”.
Lionel Shriver, the author, told The Telegraph that “timeless” Shakespeare “will survive even this dogmatic mangling, and his plays will continue to be enjoyed long after today’s ‘intersectional’ performances have foreshortened into a freakish comical footnote in theatrical history.”
Andrew Doyle, the comedian and author, said: “There’s a very good reason why Shakespeare is performed frequently and John Lyly barely at all. Shakespeare was by far the superior playwright. Yet again, ideologues are reducing great art to mere mechanisms for the promotion of an ideology.”
Jane Stevenson, a Tory MP, who sits on the culture, media and sport committee, said: she was “all for widening repertoire” but “I’m not sure reducing Galatea to a celebration of all things woke, or knocking Shakespeare for being pale, male and stale is much more than cultural click-bait”.
An Arts and Humanities Research Council spokesman said it “invests in a diverse research and innovation portfolio” and projects are subject to “a rigorous peer review process by relevant independent experts”.
A spokesman from the University of Roehampton said: “This project was funded by a national organisation following a rigorous review process.”