ABSTRACT
For a play which has been performed so rarely, Sejanus has attracted a considerable amount of critical attention. That criticism has, unsurprisingly, tended to focus on the rise and fall of Sejanus himself and on the Machiavellian subterfuges of Tiberius. This approach has been immensely useful in developing our understanding of Jonson’s complex analysis of the workings of state power. The performance history of Sejanus is puzzling. The text that has come down to us is Jonson’s revision of an earlier work ‘wherein a second pen has a good share’. The likely outcome of Poel’s reading is that Arruntius becomes the character who engages our interest in the play; but Arruntius is powerless. He makes no decisions that affect the turn of events. when Tiberius and Sejanus discuss how they are going to deal with dissent, Sejanus states that they should leave Arruntius unscathed: ‘He only talks’. In reading the play off the page, it often seems almost perversely anti-theatrical.
