ABSTRACT
In Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure the state is asserting itself. Two familiar distractions are being applied by the ruling elite. One is military enterprise abroad: ‘If the Duke, with the other dukes, come not to composition with the King of Hungary, why then all the dukes fall upon the King’ (Shakespeare 1965: I.ii.1-3). Another is a witch-hunt for alleged dissidents at home. Declaring that he is construed by the people as having been lax, the Duke thinks it better to absent himself and let his deputies put the laws into effect. In a further tyrannical-paranoid move, he disguises himself as a friar so he can spy on his deputies, and recruits a shady network of holy brothers.
