Timon of Athens

I went to see Timon at the National Theatre.

Timon of Athens is, according to the programme and the introduction in the RSC's big book of Shakespeare, a 'difficult' play and, in almost as many words, unpopular. It is easy to see why. There are no machiavellian women, no angst-ridden kings and no happy ending, which makes it different to all the other plays, and therefore, presumably, something of a challenge to directors who like their ogres gross and their star-crossed lovers swoony. It is also 'unfinished', according to the programme (or possibly not, according to the RSC), and authored by two people, of which Shakespeare did all the first bit, according to the programme (or most of the second, according to the RSC), and is therefore something of a challenge. .

What both programme and the RSC's book agree on is that it's all about money, and its corrupting influence. And that's where both of them are wrong. Timon of Athens may use money as a spark, as a means of raising a man up before dashing him to the ground, but it's as much about money as King Lear is about monarchy.

On a superficial level, money features. It is the quarry of the flatterers that bask in the philanthropy of Timon who, lacking friends or family, save a cynic he unwisely spurns, buys his company with lavish gifts, as if determined to hold them in his debt. And, in doing so, indebts himself to others who, unlike himself, pay attention to their accounts and, eventually, foreclose.

That foreclosure is the pivot of the play. That's the point at which he finds his creditors unsympathetic and his merchant friends unhelpful. But, again, that's a structural device, like the shipwreck in the Tempest or the murder in Macbeth. Timon is about money in the same way as the Tempest is about woodcraft or Macbeth is about anatomy.

We have all met Timon. We haven't, for the most part, met him corralled by minders, lurking in his sanctuary or paranoid about his privacy. Instead, we have met him in the park, nursing a tin of cider and imprecating the world and all that's in it. It's easy to blame the booze, as it saves us having to listen, but the booze isn't the point.

Timon is an everyman and his tale is one of disappointment, as it is for billions of us. Although  he began with wealth and advantage, it didn't matter in the end. The only strategies that can forestall the inevitable are those of exploitation, and Timon's humanity is also his downfall. There's a lesson in that, and it's nothing to do with wealth or vanity or even money.

Although portrayed in Hytner's production as a modern philanthropist (against which the programme's liberal listing of donors to the theatre gains some piquancy), he behaves less as a banker and more of a lottery winner. Money itself has no value for him, except in terms of the apparent friendship it brings, and he uses the power it brings not only to please his flatterers but to improve the lot of his servants.

The second half of the play, the supposedly difficult half, is crushingly inevitable. Timon, given the chance to regain some wealth and power, turns from it in disgust. This is not a man hoping for reinstatement to his 'rightful' place, or angling for sympathy for his poor luck. This is a man who has seen the true nature of the society he lived in and wants nothing to do with it. His curses, though inventive, have none of the glib irreverance of the cynic. They are heartfelt and justified, and the conflation of his former enemies and former friends, seen by some as a glib resolution, is a shocking, and fitting, end. This is the point of the play, much as it is in Orwell's 'Animal Farm'.

Timon is not Shakespeare's only play about the futility of trust, but it's the least compromising.

On the Matter of "Gay Marriage"

This is not a pleasant debate. The more I read the arguments in favour, the more I am opposed, and the more I read of those against, the more I am in favour. There is ugliness on both sides and, it would seem, precious little in the middle.

To summarise, the British government is currently proposing to lift the current ban on same-sex couples being regarded by the state as married (whether via a civil process or a religious one) in England (and, possibly other parts of the UK).

The reason for the proposal is to allow mixed-sex and single-sex couples to be regarded by the state as equivalent. This makes little great difference, and there's not much demand for it, apparently. So it's easy to think of it as a bit of box-ticking on the equality front. However, although civil partnerships already exist and fulfil a broadly similar function, it does not ensure full legal equality in terms of the rights of partners in cases of divorce or in the way partners may describe themselves on official forms which, conceivably, may have implications in terms of privacy, and may, possibly, affect the children raised in such families.

 

On balance, these are worthy aims that should be supported.

The government is hoping to achieve this equality by allowing same-sex couples to adopt ‘married’ status, either through a civil marriage ceremony or by ‘converting’ their civil partnership status. Religious marriage ceremonies for same-sex couple will also become possible.

That may seem unlikely, but despite the forthright objections of Catholics, milder protests from the Sikhs, and the mixed response from the Anglicans, the Quakers seem all in favour. It is easy to forget the Quakers, but they've done more to change Britain over the centuries than they get credit for, and mostly for the better.

The government has chosen their solution to the equality problem for bureacratic reasons. Although it would be equally possible for the state to regard both marriages and civil partnerships as, say, ‘personal partnerships’, this would require a considerably body of legislation to be amended, which would be a lengthy and burdensome procedure, not to mention expensive.

However, like all shortcuts, it's not the most sensitive of approaches. The word ‘marriage’ is one that many faith groups relate to a particular spiritual or ritual state, and for them it has meaning beyond that of tax breaks. On the other hand, ‘marriage’ isn't the same for all of them. People considered to be married within their own meaning of the word may not be considered similarly by others. For example, divorcees can remarry in the Anglican church, but not in the eyes of the Roman Catholic church. That said, they all consider marriage to be between a mixed-sex couple and, in theory at least, to be a life-long commitment to attempt to form a procreative unit.

And that's the problem. Suddenly, it looks like the government is trying to change the fundamental meaning of a word that refers to a sacrament (or something like it, depending on the church). And if they succeed, the head of the Anglican Church will have to assent to it.

So, what looks like a semantic inconvenience could seem very much a constitutional liberty.

It is now, it seems, up to The People (though, ultimately, their elected, and heavily directed, representatives), to say what they think. There's a consultation happening and ordinary voters, such as myself, whether churchgoing or not, and whether heterosexual or not, have something very like a duty to respond.

Currently, my thinking goes along the following lines:

In broad terms, marriage is currently assumed to be preparatory to attempts at procreation. It is also true that children are best raised in stable families containing parents of either sex have better outcomes than others.

But that's not always the case, and the miracles of IVF and the possibility of adoption means that children can be raised perfectly well in a two-parent family of which less than two are their biological parents. This is not a problem for churches, some of which run adoption agencies. And if they don't have a problem, neither should I.

So why are the churches objecting? At least some of it, I reckon, is the usual churchish stuff. Churches are there to hand down moral guidance, and they expect their congregations to adhere to rules and regulations above and beyond the letter of the law.  That is right and proper, as people can, for the most part, choose whether or not to follow a faith, and those that do should play by the rules or leave. But they equally have no right to impose those additional burdens on others. Provided faith groups aren't required to change their own definitions or teaching or rituals, they can't really complain.

From what I've seen and heard, apart from religious leaders, most believers don't seem very upset at all. Even the Anglicans, with the tricky constitutional position to ponder, seem to remember the tropes about rendering unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and loving your neighbour as yourself, and are providing a cheerful counterpoint to the more lively pronouncements of the clerics. The live-and-let-live principles of liberal Anglicans (and all the Quakers) seem instinctively better than the fire and brimstone being hurled about upstairs.

So, given that the religious arguments seem tenuous and that it's possible (if only in certain unlikely circumstances) that children raised in civil partnerships might not receive the same treatment than if they were raised in a state-recognised marriage,  I'm going to respond in favour.