SOURCE: "On Updating Shakespeare: Part I," in Mainstream, Vol. 14, No. 7, July, 1961, pp. 21-32.

In the essay below, Finkelstein argues against updating Julius Caesar to Mussolini's fascist Italy on grounds that such an update misrepresents the actual social conflict in the play—which occurs between patricians, who are anxious to hold on to power, and Caesar, who is supported by the plebeians in his bid for absolute rule.

While this writer has not yet attended any of the American Shakespeare Festival Theatre performances at Stratford, Connecticut, both the advance publicity and the critical reviews of the opening performance of As You Like It indicate that certain methods of misinterpreting the Elizabethan giant, seeing themselves as a fresh look or, to quote a New York Times article of June 4th, as "A New Contemporary Image for the Bard," will be repeated and compounded. Our times are not unique in such...