The four plays in the Second Tetralogy, and particularly Henry V, raise different kinds of questions resulting from the clash of a spiritually and metaphysically assumed sovereign order with the practical realities of politics. The theology often invoked to sustain order is a political theology whose fissures and contradictions were beginning to emerge at the end of the sixteenth century. At the same time, nationalist questions concerning strangers and alternative forms of political organization were also beginning to surface in the distinction between England’s monarchical republic and other republics such as Venice. Economic and political organization become areas of tension as late Elizabethan and early Jacobean cultures are forced to confront emergent forces while deploying discourses that were backward-looking. The Merchant of Venice and Othello are closely aligned in their exploration of necessary but marginalized commercial practices and of the vexed question of the outsider in a republic that was famed for its welcoming of strangers.

In all these cases, religion provides a discourse whose contradictions were beginning to emerge, and which Shakespeare’s theater explored. John Drakakis, emeritus professor of English at the University of Stirling, in conversation with Professor Michael Scott, will examine how much of the discussion of religion in the Shakespeare canon has revolved around the dramatist’s own personal affiliations, and in particular whether Shakespeare espoused Catholic or Protestant views.

Find out more and register: global.georgetown.edu/events/putting-religion-to-the-question