On Class, Context, and a Redemptive Commons with the Social Energies of Shakespeare's Richard II (c. 1596)

Abstract

This talk investigates different cultural forms of class, historical context, and the redemptive commons, the latter of which may emerge from a split regal subject, one of which is the dethroned King Richard 2, and the other a Saint Richard-like martyr figure, as so many forms of social, experimental, unconscious, and aesthetic energy that both constitute and make Shakespeare’s play Richard II a powder keg, and pertinent to thinking about our contemporary situation in the twenty-first century.

Keywords

• class
• energy
• historical context
• King Richard 2
• redemptive commons
• Richard II
• Shakespeare