Shakespeare’s Histories and Polish History: Television Productions of Henry IV (1975), Richard III (1989) and Othello (1981/1984)
Abstract
The article discusses the reception and signification of select televisual productions of
Shakespeare’s history plays on Polish television. My choice of teleplays has been determined
by two factors: one the one hand, history plays aired on Polish television were rare and their
accessibility limited; on the other hand, I want to illustrate the fate of Shakespeare
productions in the context of Polish post-war history by comparing them with yet another
play, which seems to be resistant to political interpretation: Othello, produced in 1981 and
aired in 1984. My argument is that although officially the teleplays discussed in the article did
not allude to the political situation in Poland at the time of their production/airing, yet one
could attempt to reconstruct a possible political reading of the productions, which could have
been implied in them, or which the then recipients could have come up with. Due to
censorship, official reviews of the productions avoided political references to the current
affairs in Poland. Since Shakespeare’s plays on television have not been extensively discussed
so far, the article is one of the first attempts to suggest a politically-oriented interpretation of
selected teleplays aired before 1990.