Political Contextuality of Martin McDonagh’s Hangmen: An Intervention in the Debate over Capital Punishment in Britain

Abstract

Martin McDonagh’s Hangmen (2015) is a contextual play as the work derives its material from an actual historical event, the abolition of capital punishment in the 1960s, and presents this topic at a time in which the same issue is debated again in 2015. The play refers to two distinct socio-historical backgrounds, 1960s Britain as the context of the plot, and the 21 st century as the context of the audience/reader. Hangmen takes place in a very specific date in history, the year in which hanging was suspended in Britain. The portrayal of what seems to be the last hanging case in the country makes it possible to problematise the integrity of the judicial system at the time. Presentation of the rivalry between two famous executioners in the country, Harry Allen and Albert Pierrepoint, also underlines the play’s socio-political relation to a certain context. What is equally noteworthy about Hangmen is McDonagh’s choice of this topic at a time in which the issue of capital punishment is raised again in Britain. Concerning recent arguments about the reintroduction of death penalty in 2015, it is observed that McDonagh also initiates a discussion concerning the legitimation of state violence through a depiction of the history of hanging. In light of this observation, the aim of this article is to discuss McDonagh’s topical dark comedy as a political intervention in the debate over death penalty in Britain by providing appropriate case studies of several hanging offences in the history of Britain.