Authority, Instrumental Reason and the Fault Lines of Modern Civilization in Peter Brook’s Cinematic Rendering of Shakespeare’s King Lear

Abstract

Peter Brook’s 1971 film adaptation of King Lear dramatizes a paradigm shift from the discretionary authority and divine right of Kings to a recognizably modern rule of law governed by instrumental rationality. The rupture of bonds between power and authority, and between family members, is a result of the emergence of a modern sensibility. In Brook’s hands, the Lear story becomes a malleable myth chronicling the transition from a primitive, patriarchal culture into a culture reflective of Brook’s own post-war, existential sensibility. What makes the film most remarkable is its timelessness and timeliness. Brook’s Lear evokes the primitive world of Shakespeare’s King Lear as well as the inevitable collapse of civilization characteristic of ancient Greek tragedy, while at the same time embodying the apocalyptic vision of post-war avant-garde theatre and film. Thus Shakespeare’s Lear, although clearly the source for Brook’s film, is one of many ‘authorities’ operating as an intertext. In black and white documentary, epic-paratactic style, Brook forwards the tragic consequences of the modern act of giving up personal freedom and power—thus authority—to the state for the sake of security and social order, an act culminating in the erasure of all signs of civilization.