4 lessons on how to be a good neighbour, from Shakespeare

Be a good neighbour.

When Prime Minister Anthony Albanese recently urged Australians not to hoard fuel, he drew on this familiar trope. Indeed, most of us still value being thought of as good neighbours.

Yet in an age of social disconnection, political and social polarisation and growing economic inequality, we might need some help to revive the art of neighbourliness.

Luckily, we can learn a thing or two from one of history’s most famous storytellers: William Shakespeare.

In Shakespeare’s age, neighbourliness was front and centre in people’s understanding of how to hold their relationships and society together. As stated in a popular book of wise sayings, first published in 1597:

Men are not born for themselves, but for their country, parents and neighbours.

That’s a massive step up from simply being friendly, or bringing in the neighbour’s bin.

Indeed, as a relational category “neighbour” was both expansive and unsettling. One’s “neighbour” could be potentially anyone: the person next door, friends and family, strangers – even one’s enemy.

I argue this emphasis on the high ethical priority of the neighbour strongly influenced how Shakespeare and his contemporaries saw themselves. To be human was to be relational and morally bound to others. This challenges more modern understandings of the self as a standalone individual.

Many of Shakespeare’s dramas absorb and play with his culture’s concern with neighbourliness. Take his famous tragedy King Lear, and his Romance The Winter’s Tale.

In both, the main character is a king whose unneighbourly behaviour is the catalyst for crisis. These stories offer us lessons on what it means to a good neighbour.

In King Lear, the eponymous ruler offers his daughters a third of his kingdom each in return for their flattery. The youngest, Cordelia, refuses to play along.

Incensed, Lear declares he will no longer “neighbour” Cordelia. He will never “see that face of hers again” as he marries her off, dowerless, to the King of France. Brutal words and harsh actions, which Lear lives to regret.

In The Winter’s Tale, King Leontes is gripped by jealousy when he suspects his wife Hermione and closest friend Polixenes are having an affair. Leontes convinces himself his “pond” is being “fished by his next neighbour”.

He is wrong, and he devastates his family, oldest friendship, and potentially his society by insisting he is right.

Setting aside Lear and Leontes, Shakespeare’s characters mostly move towards – and not away from – those they disagree with, reflecting a belief that people can change.

Lear’s loyal courtier, Kent, stands up for Cordelia. In The Winter’s Tale, Paulina, a lady of the court, defends Hermione. These moves are risky. Lear banishes Kent, while Leontes threatens to burn Paulina for treason.

Kent and Paulina’s costly willingness to engage with the kings contrasts sharply with today’s common approach of shutting down those we disagree with.

Thrust into a “pitiless storm” by his other daughters, Lear, without shelter and vulnerable, has a moment of recognition. As king, he overlooked the “houseless heads and unfed sides” whose hardships he now tastes.

Lear vows to bring about justice for the poor. This echoes the significant weight placed on caring for needy neighbours in Shakespeare’s society. But by the time Lear recognises his unjust neglect of his neighbours, he is powerless to fix what is broken. His society and relationships fall apart.

In The Winter’s Tale, it takes a supernatural perspective (an oracle from Apollo) and the tragic death of Leontes’ son for him to see he has “too much believed mine own suspicion” and caused much “injustice”. Like Lear, Leontes seems headed for tragedy – until Shakespeare steers the plot in a different direction.

Leontes will get a miraculous second chance to reconcile with the neighbours he had cast away, most importantly Polixenes (whom Leontes tried to murder), Hermione (whom Leontes thought he had killed with his cruelty) and his daughter Perdita (whom Leontes had exiled as a newborn, presuming she was Polixenes’ child).

For Shakespeare’s characters, moral growth comes from seeing themselves through others’ eyes. This is a humbling experience, at odds with our algorithmically driven echo chambers and socially conditioned resistance to admitting when we’re wrong.

Fast forward 16 years after Leontes tears his world apart, a shepherd’s son, the Clown, is on the road, loaded with cash. He’s shopping for his family’s sheep-shearing feast. In Shakespeare’s day, this yearly celebration brought together neighbours – rich and poor, landowners and shearers – to share “good cheer and welcome”.

Enter Autolycus, a rogue. He fakes his own robbery and injury to pick the pockets of the gullible yet generous Clown who offers to help. Autolycus’ ruse works, but it doesn’t stop the party, which begins as he exits, crowing over his success. I argue that the happy turn of events that follow pivot on the Clown’s willingness to be a good neighbour to a stranger in “need”.

The neighbourhood arrives. The family “welcomes” “unknown friends”. There is food for all. These celebrations set the tone as the play progresses towards its joyful end that reunites its once-estranged characters.

At a time when Australians report having fewer friends, Shakespeare shows us how being a good neighbour might turn up unexpected friendships.

Could seeing ourselves as good neighbours help us navigate the present-day churn of disconnection, polarisation and uncertainty? At the very least, Shakespeare invites us to try.