Review of Quiring, Bjôrn. 2014. Shakespeare’s Curse. The Aporias of Ritual Exclusion in Early Modern Royal Drama. London / New York, NY: Routledge. 266 pages. ISBN: 978–0– 415–51756–0

Abstract

Review of Quiring, Bjorn. 2014. Shakespeare's Curse. The Aporias of Ritual Exclusion in Early Modern Royal Drama. London / New York, NY: Routledge. 266 pages. ISBN: 978-0- 415-51756-0.The book by Bjorn Quiring, Shakespeare's Curse. The Aporias of Ritual Exclusion in Early Modern Royal Drama, sets itself within the by-now flourishing critical production on Shakespeare and the law. It starts by trying to define and circumscribe the several meanings of 'curse', a term that basically indicates a reaction to a transgression. Dating back to the Bible, the curse indicated either an act of punishment by God or an appeal to God's justice. It implies a juridical order which has in some way been violated and which must be restored through the curse. In this perspective, the curse has a transcendental value: it is established as strictly connected to law, which it presupposes and determines at the same time.As the avenger, the curser appears to act in God's name: he acts as God's mouthpiece to reaffirm the law but, at the same time, he becomes blemished by the utterance. The curser shows his power in the utterance but is endangered by it: power and impotence are mixed in the act of cursing because the curse follows a ritual, but it also marks a of exception. Therefore, the curse is an ambiguous act that is an on the one hand, but is ritualized on the other hand, thus becoming a political act. Correctly, Quiring asserts that the curse can be set as a borderline: it is an individual act that operates onto a body politic.I agree with Quiring's connecting the curse to Schmitt's idea of the state of exception (1985; see also Agamben 2008) because it stems from a disruption of the law and aims at reinstituting the law itself. If equity acts as a supplement of the law, in the same way the curse represents the inside/outside of the law, because it codifies a transgression as a transgression, thus re-inscribing it into the legal system.These remarks can be connected to the theories concerning 'revenge' that come to the forefront in Elizabethan revenge plays. The revenger acts as God's arm, as he recreates the law that has somehow been violated by a murder, so the revenger must be considered as part of the juridical system. Microcosm and macrocosm can be reunited by the restoration of cosmic harmony through the punishment of the culprit. However, the revenger falls back into the sin of murder: he once again commits a crime, which blemishes his conscience. This is one of Hamlet's many doubts that prevent him from acting out the ghost's requests till the very last moment. This marks the liminal situation of the Elizabethan age, stressed by Quiring himself in the course of the volume. The age sets itself between two historical epochs and two juridical systems: the medieval one, which accepts private revenge, the revenge that marks the protection of one's family or clan; and the modern one, where justice is left in the hands of political authority. A patent example is Romeo and Juliet, where Romeo does not want to revenge Mercutio so as not to trigger a family feud, while Mercutio expects Romeo to revenge the insult to his family. The Prince in the text feels his authority baffled by this juridical 'mutiny' that is committed by his citizens, who do not respect political authority.The curse falls into a similar paradigm: the person who curses violates the Christological commandment to pardon offences or crimes, and to leave punishment in the hands of God (the supreme authority who should punish the culprit). Hence, from a transcendental perspective, the curser is blemished; but from a worldly perspective the curser helps carry out punishment, thus contributing to worldly justice. Quiring speaks of the paradoxical nature of the curse.What is particularly interesting is Quiring's connection of the curse to Schmitt's (1985) and Agamben's (2008) of exception, but the curse can also be an instrument of power in the hands of authority. …