Notes on Timon of Athens

A few notes from JE Phillips, The State in Shakespeare’s Greek and Roman Plays .

1) Phillips repeatedly points out that the play depicts corruption flowing from the highest reaches of society downward. The Senators and nobility of Athens are deeply corrupted, unable to recognize and honor true nobility because they are consumed by greed. The entire social and political system of Athens is corrupted as a result. Thus, in Timon , Shakespeare is presenting a moral rather than a structural/constitutional assessment of social and political chaos. Vice causes social decay, and the vice of rulers in particular. The temper of the ruler shapes the temper of the people.

2) For Shakespeare, the greed of the Senators and noblemen is a form of tyranny. Properly ordered society occurs when each member of the society seeks the common good, rather than pursuing self-interest. Rulers who seek only self-interest are by definition tyrants.

3) In Timon’s rant against Athens in 4.1, he curses the city with the threat of social decay, but that decay is already occurring. The city has become bestial, because the citizens have neglected to pursue the good fo the city.

4) One result of greed is the inability to judge genuine nobility. Timon is foolishly free with his money at the beginning, but there is no doubting his faithfulness and generosity. But the rest of Athens only honors him when he is wealthy. Once he is without resources, he is despised and ultimately banished. Similarly, the soldier for whose life Alcibiades appeals (3.5) is sent to his despite his contributions to the safety of the city.

Beyond Phillips, a couple of additional points. First, as in Coriolanus , Shakespeare is here depicting the monstrous results of ingratitude, or the results of monstrous ingratitude. Ingratitude is a solvent of community, just as much as distrust or dishonesty. Second, I am reminded of a recent conversation on Ken Myers’ Mars Hill Tapes in which Craig Gay (author of Cash Values ) points out that money has become the primary measure of value in modern capitalist society. The only thing young people envy in others, he points out, is net worth. Shakespeare is depicting Athens as a similar kind of society. Third, and in the light of this, Timon provides another illustration of the uncanny prescience of Shakespeare, his ability to foresee the directions that modern society would take.