Bloody Constraint : War and Chivalry in Shakespeare: War and Chivalry in Shakespeare

Cover
War is a major theme in Shakespeare's plays. Aside from its dramatic appeal, it provided him with a context in which his characters, steeped in the ideals of chivalry, could discuss such concepts as honor, courage, patriotism, and justice. Well aware of the decline of chivalry in his own era, Shakespeare gave his characters lines calling for civilized behavior, mercy, humanitarian principles, and moral responsibility. In this remarkable new book, eminent legal scholar Theodor Meron looks at contemporary international humanitarian law and rules for the conduct of war through the lens of Shakespeare's plays and discerns chivalry's influence there. The book comes as a response to the question of whether the world has lost anything by having a system of law based on the Hague and Geneva conventions. Meron contends that, despite the foolishness and vanity of its most extreme manifestations, chivalry served as a customary law that restrained and humanized the conflicts of the generally chaotic and brutal Middle Ages. It had the advantage of resting on the sense that rules arise naturally out of societies, their armed forces, and their rulers on the basis of experience. Against a background of Medieval and Renaissance sources as well as Shakespeare's historical and dramatic settings, Meron considers the ways in which law, morality, conscience, and state necessity are deployed in Shakespeare's plays to promote a society in which soldiers behave humanely and leaders are held to high standards of civilized behavior. Thus he illustrates the literary genealogy of such modern international humanitarian concerns as the treatment of prisoners and of noncombatants and accountability for war crimes, showing that the chivalric legacy has not been lost entirely. Fresh and insightful, Bloody Constraint will interest scholars of international law, lovers of Shakespeare, and anyone interested in the history of war.

Im Buch

Ausgewählte Seiten

Inhalt

Introduction
3
Chivalrys Legacy
11
THREE
47
FOUR
63
FIVE
97
SEVEN
119
EIGHT
132
Urheberrecht

Häufige Begriffe und Wortgruppen

Beliebte Passagen

Seite 129 - Honour pricks me on. Yea, but how if honour prick me off when I come on ? how then ? Can honour set to a leg? No. Or an arm? No. Or take away the grief of a wound ? No. Honour hath no skill in surgery then ? No. What is honour? A word. What is in that word, honour? What is that honour? Air. A trim reckoning ! — Who hath it? He that died o
Seite 117 - Laud be to God ! — even there my life must end. It hath been prophesied to me many years, I should not die but in Jerusalem ; Which vainly I supposed the Holy Land. — But bear me to that chamber ; there I'll lie ; In that Jerusalem shall Harry die.
Seite 49 - The purest treasure mortal times afford Is — spotless reputation ; that away, Men are but gilded loam, or painted clay.
Seite 97 - God's will! I pray thee, wish not one man more. By Jove, I am not covetous for gold, Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost; It yearns me not if men my garments wear; Such outward things dwell not in my desires; But if it be a sin to covet honour, I am the most offending soul alive.
Seite 130 - Is a bold spirit in a loyal breast. Mine honour is my life ; both grow in one ; Take honour from me, and my life is done : Then, dear my liege, mine honour let me try ; In that I live, and for that will I die.
Seite 39 - Examples gross as earth exhort me : Witness this army of such mass and charge Led by a delicate and tender prince, Whose spirit with divine ambition puffd Makes mouths at the invisible event, Exposing what is mortal, and unsure To all that fortune, death and danger dare, Even for an egg-shell.
Seite 97 - My cousin Westmoreland ? — No, my fair cousin : If we are mark'd to die, we are enow To do our country loss ; and if to live. The fewer men, the greater share of honor. God's will ! I pray thee, wish not one man more.
Seite 209 - What stronger breast-plate than a heart untainted ? Thrice is he armed, that hath his quarrel just ; And he but naked, though locked up in steel, Whose conscience with injustice is corrupted.
Seite 30 - Jocky of Norfolk, be not too bold, For Dickon thy master is bought and sold. A thing devised by the enemy. — Go, gentlemen, every man unto his charge : Let not our babbling dreams affright our souls ; Conscience is but a word that cowards use, Devis'd at first to keep the strong in awe : Our strong arms be our conscience, swords our law.

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