Temporo-Corporeal Politics in Shakespeare's Henry V and Other Monster Texts. (3rd April 2021)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Naum Scuro, Courtney
• Is Part Of: Shakespeare. Volume 17:Number 2(2021)
• Page Start: 184
• Page End: 209
• Publication Date: 2021-04-03
• Subjects: Henry V -- monster -- time -- Shakespeare -- history play -- body; Periodicals; 822.33
• DOI: 10.1080/17450918.2021.1887335
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1745-0918

Abstract

ABSTRACT: This article offers new perspective on Henry V by surfacing a string of overlooked monster references in the play. In Henry V, the intertwining corporeal and temporal uncertainties that monsters embody trouble ideas of Englishness by undermining the glorified constructions of subject, king, and country that the play at first appears invested in advancing. This article uncovers how the mutation of times and bodies together work to destabilize identities and disrupt expectations not only in Shakespeare's play, but in the popular monster ephemera whose figurative and rhetorical forms Shakespeare repeatedly borrows. In particular, it is the monster's category-breaking, untimeliness, and didacticism that help to transform perceptions of the body politic in this play. Henry V may not be a text known for its monsters. However, by reorienting focus onto Shakespeare's perverse and mutable temporo-corporeal imaginary and exposing its political repercussions, this article demonstrates how central contemporary conversations on monstrosity are to Shakespeare's efforts to complicate dominant, positivist views on history, subject, and nation-building in Henry V .