Greenblatt’s Perspective on Freedom in Shakespeare’s Works Explored by Translator
Here is an in-depth exploration of Shakespeare’s works through a contemporary critical lens, shedding light on the intricate relationships between literature, history, and human agency.
Four centuries after the creation of his plays, Shakespeare remains one of the most important writers who speaks in his works about themes such as humanity, power, freedom, and the relationship between the individual and society.
However, if we examine his works solely from a literary and aesthetic perspective, we miss a crucial part of their complexity and depth.
The book “Shakespeare and Freedom” is written by Stephen Greenblatt, an author, researcher, and professor of English and American literature who is best known for his studies on Shakespeare and Renaissance literature.
With a historical and interdisciplinary approach, he examines the concept of freedom in relation to history, politics, power, and social constraints within Shakespeare’s works.
In Greenblatt’s view, freedom does not mean complete liberation from all constraints; rather, it is a fragile and complex concept that actually finds meaning in confrontation with limitations.
With this perspective, the characters and situations in Shakespeare’s plays can be examined from a fresh angle.
The book “Shakespeare and Freedom” has been translated in Iran by Fatemeh Siahroud Kalaei and published by Pyleh Publishing.
We sat down for a conversation with Fatemeh Siahroud Kalaei about Shakespeare, this English playwright and poet, and the concept of freedom in his works.
What feature prompted you to choose “Shakespeare and Freedom” for translation?
What gap does this book fill in Shakespearean studies in Iran?
Greenblatt is a prominent Shakespearean scholar, and one cannot simply overlook such a figure.
What motivated me above all to translate this book was Greenblatt’s different perspective on the concept of freedom.
He views freedom not as a complete liberation from constraints, but as a limited, fragile, and sometimes paradoxical possibility—a possibility that emerges precisely from the heart of historical, social, political, and artistic limitations, and in relation to the structure of governance at the time.
This book is a clear and novel example of Greenblatt’s critical method; an approach in which literary criticism is read in conjunction with history, power, culture, and politics, without reducing the literary work to a mere historical document.
In Iranian Shakespearean studies as well, a sense of void compelled me to turn to this author and this work.
Shakespearean studies in Iran have mostly focused on the translation of plays, character descriptions, and thematic readings.
However, what has been accomplished in this book, and what can help fill a part of this void, is the introduction of the New Historicist approach, cultural poetics, and interdisciplinary readings of Shakespeare’s works.
From this perspective, the book can be an important step in introducing these approaches and expanding interdisciplinary Shakespearean studies in Iran.
In this book, Greenblatt considers freedom to be a limited and paradoxical experience.
How does this view differ from common interpretations of freedom in literature?
In this book, Greenblatt regards freedom as a limited and paradoxical experience.
In common understandings, freedom is often perceived as the liberation of the individual from the power of tradition or socially imposed constraints; as if humans possess an independent and free essence that merely needs to be freed from external shackles.
Greenblatt challenges this simplistic notion, arguing that freedom does not arise outside of constraints, but rather takes shape precisely in the struggle and confrontation with those very limitations.
Now, these constraints may include the law, the body, time, death, family, and society, which are not merely barriers to freedom; rather, these limitations give freedom its meaning and shape.
In comedies, accepting these boundaries deepens love, but in tragedies such as “Romeo and Juliet,” “Othello,” and others, the rejection of limits leads to death or destruction.
For this reason, freedom in Shakespeare’s works is not a final and absolute state, but an unfinished and tense process.
Even boundless freedom can lead to self-destruction, violence, or the collapse of relationships with others; something that culminates in “King Lear.”
One of the book’s key ideas is that limitation is not a hindrance to creativity, but rather the very context for its creation.
How is this idea manifested in Shakespeare’s works?
Greenblatt demonstrates in this book that Shakespeare’s creativity was not formed in a vacuum.
He wrote in a society facing censorship, class order, political restrictions, and rigid theatrical rules, yet these limitations drove him toward ambiguity, satire, disguise, play-within-a-play, historical displacement, and polyphony. In fact, Shakespeare’s literary genius and creativity became evident precisely within the heart of these very limitations, an example of which we can see in the play “Measure for Measure”; where Barnardine is a condemned prisoner who absurdly and improbably declares himself that he is unwilling to be executed, a matter that would have been impossible in the society of England at that time, because if a death sentence was issued, it had to be carried out immediately, yet Barnardine spent nine years in prison and even after that refused the sentence.
This actually also demonstrates a kind of individualism in Barnardine.
It is also explained in the core of the book that this part was among those sections which perhaps any other writer would not have seen any need at all to include the role of Barnardine.
Yet Shakespeare wanted to express that limitation which could create freedom.
One of the ways to do so was precisely this.
Shakespeare does not express many sensitive issues directly; rather, he reveals them within the structure of his play or his sonnets, in the conflict between characters.
Therefore, limitation is not merely a restrictive force; it can also make the language and form of the work more complex and creative.
Of course, this does not mean praising censorship or repression; the point is that great art can sometimes forge a new language and fresh possibilities out from the heart of pressures.
Greenblatt believes that Shakespeare’s characters forge their own identities rather than possessing a fixed identity of their own.
How does this interpretation differ from classical readings of Shakespeare’s characters?
This issue differs once again from classical readings.
Classical readings analyze Shakespeare’s characters like real human beings, with a fixed identity and a pre-formed psyche, and the critic attempts to discover the true nature of Hamlet, Macbeth, Othello, or Shylock.
Yet, from Greenblatt’s perspective, identity is not something ready-made, pre-constructed, and fixed.
Characters construct their own identities through language, action, role-playing, obedience, resistance, and confrontation with power, and here society also plays a part in shaping them.
For instance, it can be said that Shylock is not defined solely on the basis of his individual traits; rather, social humiliation due to being Jewish, the law, religion, the memory of suffering, and the gaze of Christian society are influential in shaping his character, and he possesses no isolated identity independent of the outside world—the very world that labels him as the “Other,” an other simply because of his Jewishness.
Likewise, in the play “Measure for Measure,” Barnardine proves his individuality by refusing death.
With this approach, it can be said that the characters both shape themselves and are shaped by the forces that surround them.
This very tension generates their complexity and vitality.
Throughout the book, reference is frequently made to the relationship between power and performance.
From Greenblatt’s perspective, how does Shakespeare bring the mechanisms of power onto the theatrical stage?
This is one of the complex questions that requires further reflection.
From Greenblatt’s viewpoint, Elizabethan theater was not merely for entertainment; it was not the case that people simply went to watch an entertaining show and be amused, but rather it served as a context and arena for exposing the mechanisms of power.
By bringing to the stage the full power of a government—which included its set design, rituals, and splendor—Shakespeare actually unmasks it and displays power in its naked form, part of which is theatrical.
That is, a part of this power is theatrical in nature.
He does not reduce power merely to decrees, laws, and violence; rather, in order to be recognized, this power must put itself on display.
Ultimately, this insightful volume opens new horizons for understanding how Shakespeare transformed historical constraints and institutional power into timeless artistic freedom.
The following is a comprehensive editorial exploration that weaves together diverse literary, cultural, and sociopolitical discussions, beginning with an examination of theatrical power, historical context, and contemporary literary releases. Their example can be seen once again in the play “Measure for Measure”, where the Duke attempts to step aside from the scene of power and deems himself powerless, but ultimately is forced, through a complex theatrical design, to re-establish his authority in order to impose order on society according to his own power, given that his deputy has committed a wrongful act.
Of course, another subtle point is that this does not exempt the authority of the playwright himself, namely Shakespeare, from this question; meaning that in Shakespeare’s plays, Shakespeare himself holds a power akin to the Duke.
His power is constantly visible in the creation of his work; he acts like a ruler and moves the characters in whatever way he pleases.
Here, we consequently conclude that theater and politics draw close to one another, and both depend on role-playing and plausibility.
In this way, Shakespeare demonstrates that power is not merely exercised, but constantly represented and reproduced.
Greenblatt speaks of “dark freedom”; a freedom that can lead to hatred and violence.
What is the relation of this concept to today’s world?
I must say that dark freedom emerges when freedom is severed from responsibility, limitation, and the recognition of the Other.
In this state, the individual desires no laws or relationships to restrict them, and establishes their own identity through the elimination or negation of others.
Greenblatt examines this condition in characters such as Iago.
Iago finds his freedom in controlling others, constructing narratives, and ruining their lives.
He turns others into mere tools for his own scheme, and as a result, this concept has a clear connection to today’s world, where we see it in many political and media discourses, where freedom is sometimes interpreted as the right to humiliate, eliminate, or demonize.
When an individual or a group perceives any dissent as a threat to themselves, freedom can transform into hatred and violence, serving as a reminder that autocracy and fascism arise through the abuse of freedom and democratic structures. Greenblatt’s warning is not against freedom itself, but rather against a freedom that is devoid of responsibility and the preservation of human dignity.
Can it be said that Greenblatt portrays Shakespeare more as a political thinker than merely a playwright?
Greenblatt emphasizes the political dimension of Shakespeare’s thought, but by no means reduces him to a systematic political philosopher; because Shakespeare does not write political treatises, nor does he present a coherent theory of freedom, power, or governance.
Shakespeare’s thinking takes place through character, conflict, metaphor, silence, and dramatic situation.
He brings political questions to the stage: How does power gain legitimacy?
Where does obedience turn into complicity?
Who has the right to punish or forgive?
And how does language justify violence?
Therefore, regarding Shakespeare, the playwright cannot be separated from a political thinker.
For him, the play is a mode of thinking itself.
One of Greenblatt’s characteristics is reading literary works within the context of history and politics.
Does this approach not push the aesthetic aspects of the work to the sidelines?
Here I must say that this danger exists with any historical reading.
If the text is viewed merely as a reflection of power or the conditions of the times, its literary and aesthetic features are ignored.
However, in his best works, Greenblatt distances himself from such reductionism, usually starting from the details of language, imagery, structure, and form, and then placing them in their historical context.
In Shakespearean Negotiations, history helps us understand why an image, character, or dramatic choice had a specific meaning in its own time.
Conversely, literary form also shows how a work can repeat, displace, or even disrupt the norms of the era.
Thus, in Greenblatt’s method, history and aesthetics are not opposed to each other.
History helps to deepen the understanding of form, and form also demonstrates how literature transcends its own historical context.
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The translator of the book “Shakespeare and Freedom” stated: According to Greenblatt, freedom does not mean complete liberation from all constraints, but rather a fragile and complex concept that actually finds meaning in its encounter with limitations.
With this perspective, the characters and situations in Shakespeare’s plays can be examined from a fresh angle.
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The following text is a translation of an article published on the “Arab 48” website on September 17, 2026.
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Capitalism has sometimes adapted to democracy and at other times resisted it.
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منبع: IBNA (FA)
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