Foul is Definitely Foul

I finished Timon of Athens yesterday, and since I am going to see The Tempest tonight at BAM, I thought I should write some of my impressions since before I lay another play over them. I have to say, though, that I hope visiting Prospero's island will help reduce some of the bad taste that reading Timon left in my mouth. It is not a nice play!

This was certainly my least favorite of the plays we have read so far. It is hard to read, and not just because the characters are unappealing and the events are enough to make you lose faith in human decency, but because the writing itself feels disjointed. I know that that is partly because it is a work with two authors, Shakespeare and Middleton, but I think my experience of it was worse because I was switching between reading it in my Bevington "Complete Works" edition, and in the Oxford paperback, which saves me from getting a hernia lugging the entire oevre around. Usually this does not present a problem, but for this play the two editions were so different (Oxford's was not even broken up into 5 acts) that I kept losing my place. It probably didn't help that I wasn't very engaged with the story to begin with. Part of the problem is not just that the emotions all the characters exhibit are so ugly, but that they are very petty. There is no grand villainy or monstrous crime, just a lot of little failings. Except for Timon's epic fits of rage, none of the players even seem to show much emotion.

As I was getting towards the end of the play, however, I had a realization that helped me get into it a little more. This is a play that is basically about a credit crunch and the social fallout it inspires. If I was going to stage it today, I would have Timon be the head of Bear Sterns or General Motors, the senators be Washington politicians, and the steward be someone whose house was foreclosed. The sort of bitter misanthropy, recrimination, and disgust that washes through the majority of the play is certainly evocative of some of the public responses of the last two years. That's not very comforting, but it makes it more engaging to think of it in that way.

Other than that, I don't think I was able to take very much from this play, so I will be interested to hear what the professor has to say. I imagine that he will be able to open it up for me a little more.