Yes, this took me a while to read but I kept putting it on the backburner. I do appreciate the eARC from NetGalley and the publisher, and I wish I would have finished this before I taught Macbeth. 4/5 stars.

This is literally what I love in one book: politics, power, and Shakespeare. This is such an interesting way to look at different Shakespeare plays. While it focuses mostly on the histories, there are also many other plays mentioned and referenced and analyzed. It was sometimes a struggle to truly understand some of them since I hadn't read the plays, but it is still easy to follow (if one has a background in knowledge of power and politics). I particularly enjoyed the analysis it had of Macbeth and plan to incorporate that into future teachings.

Eliot A. Cohen The Hollow Crown Shakespeare on How Leaders Rise, Rule, and Fall, Basic Books: New York, 24 October 2023.

Thank you, NetGalley, for providing me with this uncorrected proof for review.

This is an exciting read, from an author whose political experience and preceptive approach to politics, power and Shakespeare is rarely influenced by his own politics. Eliot A. Cohen’s is a book to be read, savoured, read again, and used to interpret both modern and historical politics as well as every time you read or see a Shakespeare play. Although his political plays with their power-oriented characters predominate, there is an occasional reflection on a wider range of Shakespeare’s work. Readers of this book will find it difficult to watch any of Shakespeare’s plays without thinking about the way in which Cohen might approach them. This is an added joy to this thoroughly compelling work.

The book is divided into three sections: Acquiring Power; Exercising Power; and Losing Power. Chapter 1, Why Shakespeare? And the Afterword, Shakespeare’s Political Vision provide sharp and detailed bookends to the sections. Cohen acknowledges that Shakespeare’s political views, if any, were not known. Nor are they conveyed sharply through his work. As Cohen observes, Shakespeare’s characters are ambiguous, their arguments and stances are ambiguous, the plays do not simplify the political themes he addresses. However, as Cohen also observes, the questions and themes inform aspects of power, and it is these he addresses in detail.

Power can be acquired through inheritance, acquiring it through ‘cunning or skill’ and seizing it through ‘conspiracy or coup’ . He expands upon inheritance of power, moving from the inheritance of monarchical power to that inherited because of the desire to create a dynasty, of either family or, more perceptively perpetuation of a vision. This section deals with politicians, but also business enterprises in the modern world, and in Shakespeare’s with Cymbeline and Henry IV. In the succeeding chapters in this section the mixture of non-Shakespeare and Shakespearian works remains pertinent to understanding both the modern world and the plays.

Exercising power introduces murder as a part of exercising power but begins with what appears to be and uplifting notion associated with power – inspiration. Julius Caesar, Richard III, Henry V mix with John Kennedy, Abraham Lincoln and Winston Churchill in a chapter that resounds with impassioned and inspirational speeches. Cohen’s interpretation of what makes them great, and also their intended impact is packed with compelling insight which is not always easy to accept about heroes. We are at one with Shakespeare’s audiences in the unease that is part of understanding the mixed motivations of seekers of power.
Losing power and its consequences for Shakespeare’s characters and modern leaders is another section filled with complexity. Cohen has already dealt with the challenges to the power that a person might inherit, acquire or seize. However, the discontent that attends losing power whether by ‘folly, by mischance, and sometimes even relinquishing it voluntarily’ makes for poignant reading. From those who wish to advise American presidents to business moguls to Cardinal Wolsey in Henry VIII, Henry IV, V and VI, Duncan in Macbeth, the loss of power, or contemplation of losing is shown to influence their behaviour, often to their detriment, and usually to their moral decline.

Eliot A. Cohen’s The Hollow Crown Shakespeare on How Leaders Rise, Rule, and Fall is a thoroughly engrossing read.

I’m a sucker for Shakespeare - I got to enjoy an advance copy of The Hollow Crown by
@EliotACohen It’s all about viewing real-world leadership situations through the lens of the bard’s plays. Lots of recent historical analogies, Obama, Trump etc.. Great coverage of the Henriad, Caesar & the Tempest. It comes out October 24th. If you like history, politics and leadership mixed with William S - it’s for you.