Anouilh, Jean (Vol. 21) | Jesse C. Gatlin Jr. (essay date December 1965)
Jesse C. Gatlin Jr. (essay date December 1965)
SOURCE: Gatlin, Jesse C., Jr. “Becket and Honor: A Trim Reckoning.” Modern Drama 8, no. 3 (December 1965): 277-83.
[In the following essay, Gatlin investigates the role of honor in Becket.]
What is honor? A word. What is in that word honor? What is that honor? Air. A trim reckoning! … Honor is a mere scutcheon.
—Falstaff in Henry IV, Part I
Honor travels in a strait so narrow,
Where one but goes abreast.
—Ulysses in Troilus and Cressida
Jean Anouilh uses the phrase “The Honor of God” as the sub-title of his play Becket. In the English translation of the play by Lucienne Hill,1 the word “honor” appears more than twenty times, spoken by a variety of characters in a variety of situations.2 It is as if Anouilh were...
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