On October 10, 2016, New Yorker talks about “putting Marx back” in his nineteenth century surroundings.” (Louis Menand, “Karl Marx, Yesterday and Today”)

On October 17, 2016, New Yorker talks about “modernizing” Shakespeare into the twenty-first century. (Adam Gopnik, “Why Rewrite Shakespeare?”)

Menand critiques two recent books arguing to put Marx back in his context, and Gopinik critiques current adaptions of several Shakespearean plays. While the two essays seem to be addressing movements towards different directions, both discuss the same question:

What is our relationship with works of the past and their authors, and how should we treat them?

1. Where to Place Marx and Shakespeare

Putting Marx back to the nineteenth century:

Menand first lays out the main arguments Marx claims in “The Communist Manifesto,” from the wealth stemming from modern industry, to the worker revolution he predicts the unequal distribution of such wealth would trigger. He then brings up two recent books that “are committed to returning [Marx] to his own century,” written by Jonathan Sperber and Gareth Stedman Jones respectively.

Menand argues that such Historizing as “correcting for the tendency to presentize the past” is worthy. As Jonathan Sperber insists, “Marx is more a figure of the past than a prophet of the present.” Many of his arguments are directed against “thinkers now obscure” and “interpretations of events largely forgotten.” That is, much of Marx’s fights are over parochial stakes rooted in his time, and knowing this allows us to correct our tendency of wrongly assigning the fights meanings grander than they have.

Nonetheless, Menand stresses Marx’s relevance even today: “‘The Communist Manifesto’ is like a bomb about to go off in your hand.’” In his words, “You can put Marx back into the nineteenth century, but you cannot keep him there.” Most importantly, Marx changes how people think in at least the following ways. First, he suggests that we use philosophy not only to interpret the world, but also to change it. Second, he concurs that we as humans naturally create ideologies to make sense of the world, but reminds us that they are human inventions, but not “the way things are,” nor are they inevitable. Third, he provides a model of class struggle that applies even to today’s social relations, although not strictly in his bourgeoisie- proletariat divide.

Modernizing Shakespeare to the twenty-first century:

Gopnik goes through the recent adaptions of Shakespeare: “Merchant of Venice” is adapted into “Shylock is My Name,” where the Venice merchant becomes an art collector Simon Strulovitch, and the core conflict on the pound of flesh becomes his insistence on circumcising his soon-to-be son-in-law. “The Taming of the Shrew” is adapted into “Vinegar Girl,” where Kate, a socially awkward woman “becomes more herself by being made to engage with someone as odd as she is.” “Hamlet” is reproduced in twenty-first century context, too, with Hamlet telling the story as a fetus from Gertrude’s womb. In short, they keep the “twists” of the original plays, from anti-Semitism to the subjugation of women to art and isolation, but weave them into different tales.

Gopnik sees merit in such adaptions. He believes that the “twists” are closer to the essence of Shakespearean plays than the “story content,” just as the music is closer to the essence of “Cosi Fan Tutte” than the plot. That is, Gopnik acknowledges that the themes debated in Shakespeare’s plays are still debated today.

However, Gopnik also points out the un-Shakespearean nature of such adaptions. That is, we think in a different way from Shakespeare, and the adaptions “impose a value system that [Shakespeare] did not share.” “Shakespeare believed in fate, order, and forgiveness;” he argues, “we believe in history, justice, and compassion.” While Anne Tyler, the novelist who adapted “The Taming of the Shrew” gives details of Kate’s inner world to make her actions plausible, just as other modern novelists would explain why evil people are evil by looking into their “trauma and history,” Shakespeare would attribute the wickedness to their “nature and destiny.”

 

2. Similar Yet Different: Authors from the Past and Us

Menand and Gopnik both discuss the differences and similarities the authors of past works have with us, although in reversed order. By noting such differences and similarities, they acknowledge the complexity and tension created by the co-existing pair.

On the one hand, we are fundamentally different from the past authors, and our times different from theirs, because nothing can be “unhappened,” and no word can be “unsaid.” Time flows in one direction, and events and literatures necessarily take place between the authors and us. As a result, we would act differently: In our body today there are struggles of our ancestors, and such memories shape the way we act. Having witnessed American Independence and French Revolution, while one can still value “order,” like Shakespeare did, he or she can hardly hold it on the unquestionable pedestal. At the same time, we would also think differently: Words carry thoughts, and more importantly, ways of thinking, and thus we are influenced by literatures that did not influence the authors in the past- including their own works. When looking at current politics, it is inevitable to have Marx sitting in the back of our minds: While the bourgeoisie- proletariat division seems to be alleviated by access to votes, new division such as the immigrants versus natives and the resourced versus the underprivileged can easily fit into the same pattern.

On the other hand, we are similar to them, and our time similar to theirs. We still have the instinct to form ideologies to explain the inexplicable world as Marx has observed, and we still struggle to analyze the relationship between identity and ethnicity, a question raised in “The Merchant of Venice.” In our time, “class wars” still take place, and women are not yet free from the oppressions that chained Kate.

 

3. What Should We Do: Put Marx back to His Time, But Not Keep Him There

Given the juxtaposition of the differences and similarities, how should we treat authors from the past and their works? I believe the quote from Menand summarizes an advisable attitude: We should put Marx back to his time, but do not keep him there. That is, we should actively learn from their work, knowing that one’s time influences one’s ideas. For example, we should closely study the Ancient Greek classics, but bear in mind that to accuse Greeks of moral corruption on the basis of slavery is at best oversimplification.

Putting authors back to their contexts not only removes illusions and misunderstandings about their works, as Sperber and Stedman Jones argue, but also strips away the basis of our self-righteousness: Since we too are in our particular context just as they are in theirs, we are in no position to impose our assumptions and standards on them, but should first critique such assumptions and standards, parsing our own context.

The critique of our own context helps us to understand ourselves better- we can now find what in us might be intrinsic human nature by seeking what has not changed, and analyze what are shaped by history of past events and literature, and how they are so shaped. That is, by recognizing contexts of past works, we inquire into our nature.

With the inquiry into human nature, we would also be able to see the world we essentially construct with our words more clearly- just like philosophers who disillusion us by putting ideologies back to their place as social constructs, by acknowledging ourselves as the source of concepts, we challenge the status quo as not necessarily inevitable, and not necessarily justified.

The similarities between ourselves and our ancestors are crucial to such learning: The fact that while we give different answers from our ancestors, we are after the same questions suggests that we can compare and contrast ourselves with them, and that we would be justified to attribute our differences to history because we are not comparing two essentially difference species.

 

In summary, in the works from the past, we should acknowledge history, and learn from history.

Since we on the right-hand side on the axis of time, we necessarily experience more and remember more, but we are not necessarily wiser and more prudent- unless we learn from the experience and memory, mark the wrong roads and unchain the chains.

That is, we should not only see history as a passive shared memory, but also an active shared inquiry into the just, the good, and the noble.

With history we inquire human nature: Never intimidated by its faults and evils, we understand it with reason and compassion, so that we can torch the future both to see more clearly and make it better.

Over the cities we see, the authors of the past left invisible cities that last longer, and we continue to build such invisible cities, so that generations to come can juxtapose theirs against them-

And we as humans can move forward.

Thin Cities 4: Sophronia by Matt Kish.

http://www.johncoulthart.com/feuilleton/2015/07/03/seeing-calvino-invisible-cities/