Your complimentary articles

You’ve read all of your complimentary articles for this month. To have complete access to the thousands of philosophy articles on this site, please

SUBSCRIBE NOW

If you are a subscriber please sign in to your account.

To buy or renew a subscription please visit the Shop.

If you are a print subscriber you can contact us to create an online account.

Philosophy & Literature

Shakespeare: Folly, Humanism & Critical Theory

Sam Gilchrist Hall surveys folly and wisdom in Shakespeare’s world and beyond.

When Roman emperors rode in triumphal processions, they would have a fool in the chariot with them, continually whispering to them something along the lines of “You are only human. You too will die – just like beggars and slaves do.” Shakespeare returns to the idea of mortality obsessively in Hamlet (c.1600); for instance, when the antic Prince rhymes: “Imperious Caesar, dead and turn’d to clay, / Might stop a hole to keep the wind away.” Indeed, one of the most striking images of late medieval Europe is the Dance Macabre or Totentanz, in which all classes join hands with death.

…