Stories

Probably the last time I had read Richard II was in 1967 in Dr. Wise’s Shakespeare class. I was a college student then majoring in English. I have been advised that I ought to describe my academic focus as English literature to differentiate it from studies of English as a Second Language, but in fact my major included significant courses in American literature as well and some literature in translation. But I am certain that the department in which I studied was known as “English,” and I announce myself to whoever asked as an English major. In Dr. Wise’s class we read sixteen plays. And yesterday under the stimulus of an episode of the Netflix series The Crown in which Charles (later to be Charles III) plays King Richard, I read again Shakespeare’s play, and I enjoyed a very pleasant though very warm day (outside the temperature topped 100 degrees!) engaged in the history play.
            The moment in the play to which I now refer occurs in Act III scene ii. Richard is under siege from Bolingbroke, soon to be Henry IV, who has returned from Richard’s banishment and has organized a rebellion against the King to recover the lands and wealth Richard has appropriated in Henry’s absence. Henry has gathered a mass of other disaffected nobles and commoners to battle Richard and the campaign has succeeded. Richard, aware that his throne and kingdom have been lost, speaks to those who have remained loyal and who now accompany him, “For God's sake, let us sit upon the ground/And tell sad stories of the death of kings.” Richard is then chastised by one of his loyal followers for his willingness to sit and tell stories rather than to act. But I suppose the time for action has passed and now Richard would rather tell stories. A Chasidic teaching suggests, “All of us are asleep. By telling stories we are awakened,” and Richard’s stories augur a passiveness that approaches sleep.
            I think a lot about stories. Walter Benjamin distinguishes between oral stories and written ones, as in novels, but I don’t discriminate between the two. I have heard and I have read a great number of stories and I have even told not a few, some of which might have even possessed some truth. And thus, I have some sympathy with Richard’s desire to sit and tell stories, in his case of the death of kings. These days the idea of stories govern our social world. I have noted that newspapers no longer report the news: rather, they write stories about it. As for me, I would rather read the news in my newspapers and not in them be told stories. Information has value only in the moment. Perhaps Richard’s stories of the death of kings might serve as the offering for his pity-party but for him there seems to be in them little of what Walter Benjamin refers to as ‘counsel,’ an invitation to continue the story. Richard’s stories have little resonance. Counsel offers something useful: it invites question. Richard’s stories seem a dead end; they possess no wisdom to affect his present condition. 
            Stories can be powerful. Here is one: when the Baal Shem Tov had a difficult task to fulfill he would go to a certain place in the woods, light a fire, prayer and then he became able to perform the task. Years later, the wise man of Mezrich, too, found he had a difficult task to fulfill, and he went to the same place but he had forgotten how to light the fire. But he prayed the same prayers and then he was able to complete the task. Many years later Rabbi Moshe Lev found he was troubled by a difficult task he had to perform. He went to the same place in the forest but he had forgotten how to light the fire and the prayers he was to say. But he did know the place and that would have to suffice. Finally, many years later, Rabbi Salanter was called upon to complete a similar task. But the rabbi had forgotten the place in the woods, he did not recall how to light a fire and he had forgotten the prayers. He said, “I cannot light the fire. I cannot speak the prayers. I do not know the place in the forest. But we can tell the story of how it was once done and that must be sufficient.” And so it was. Stories throw the world open to possibility; stories are open questions that demand responses; stories are the place for endless answers.
            Stories sustain me. They are sufficient though, of course, they are not all I need: I do keep a ready supply of ice cream sandwiches in the freezer. Nonetheless, even those other things I say I need are actually part of the story I would tell. Richard’s stories were a replacement for action. They would not suffice. I know that sometimes engagement with stories is a means to preclude possibility and avoid action as it was for Richard II. My more recent engagement with Shakespeare’s Richard II was an exercise in study, and study requires active participation and therefore, commitment to it opposes passivity. Study is the place, the fire and the prayer. So might be story telling.