Art speaks to its moment, and our own. We rummage through familiar plays and books, images and songs, apparently secure in our understanding. Then the times shift ever so slightly and new readings appear.

The prospect of Donald Trump as president of the United States sent literary scholar Stephen Greenblatt back to the texts of Shakespeare, thinking again about characters that seemed settled. Suddenly for Greenblatt the texts demanded a new urgency. What could we learn about power from Richard III or from other tyrants in Shakespeare’s cast? They teach of cruelty, of the cynicism of authority in dangerous hands. Revisiting the canon, Greenblatt found Shakespeare warning of chaos when leaders with no administrative capacity or constructive vision seize control. Even reasonably stable societies possess few resources ‘to ward off damage from someone sufficiently ruthless and unscrupulous’.³⁸