week 4 lecture 7 - Richard III (writing history)

  • shakespeare invents the history genre

  • one of 8 plays retelling english histories

  • first tetralogy (1591-3) - 1 Henry VI, 2 Henry VI, 3 Henry VI, RICHARD III - wars of the roses

  • second tetralogy (1594-9) - Richard II, 1 Henry IV, 2 Henry IV, Henry V - pre-wars of the roses

  • reigns in historical order - Richard II, Henredward y IV, Henry V, Henry VI, Edward IV, Richard III (1397-1485)

  • subsequent reigns - Henry VII, Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary I, Elizabeth I (1485-1603)

  • all of these people have one common ancestor, they are all family, just two branches

  • Shakespeare’s sources:

    • Polydore Vergil, Historia Angliae (1534)

    • Sir Thomas More, History of King Richard III (written 1513-18 but published posthumously in 1557)

    • Edward Hall, Union of the noble and illustre famelies of lancastre and york (1548)

    • Raphael Holinshed, the chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland (1578, 1587)

  • these historians writing under an agenda during the tudor period, wanting to demonise richard

  • the past of richard and the wars of the roses still present (100 years later, comparable to us and WW1)

  • Richard III and disability, curve in his spine but his disabilities were nowhere near as severe as previously stated

  • remains of Richard III found in Leicester 2012 - Tudor dynasty got rid of remains in order to secure itself and paint whatever picture of him they wanted

  • Richard speaks for 1/3 of the play, has more lines than any Elizabethan character in a play except Hamlet

  • marginalised characters have a voice, brief but significant scenes in which they hold the stage

  • Act 3 Scene 7 - richard publicly accepts the crown, citizens almost entirely without a voice, first part recounts an off-scene event, richard needs the support of the citizens, public support, refusal of citizens to speak translates to inability to speak with language used, no voice - marginalised

  • citizens as pawns - used by politicians, spoken over, silenced by politicians but not by shakespeare, is amen real consent? do they have no choice?

  • act 2 scene 3 - edward iv just died, citizens think his son might succeed him, they are far from “dumb statues”, skeptical perspectives on Richard, capable of intelligent political thought, have historical memories,

  • silence of citizens as only public means of defiance that is available to them not inability to speak

  • dont hear from citizens again but we can imagine the horror they are feeling as Richard’s reign becomes more tyrannical

  • Scrivener’s scene - partiality and selectivity of official history, there are other perspectives to be told

  • women - marginalised by gender, complicate plays exploration of what constitutes history

  • act 4 scene 4 - queen margaret, queen elizabeth, duchess of york - 3 characters onstage having a private moment to reveal thoughts to one another which perhaps they cannot reveal in public

  • by giving women a voice, shakespeare is diverging from the historical sources which his play was based on, Queen Margaret was the widow of Henry VI and her appearance in this play is unhistorical, she wasnt even in England during the war and was dead by the time Richard ascended to the throne

  • scene of women lamenting not taken from a source, put in on purpose by shakespeare

  • understanding suffering of others and relate it to ones own, women previously on opposite sides but united in sorrow

  • equivalence of life and loss, Edwards and Richards in multiples, they relate to each others loss and suffering

  • women intercept richard to try and speak to him, richard desperate to silence them, directly opposes male world of war to female speech, desire of male authority to keep female opposition out of the historical record

  • women pose a threat to his authority as they bring a different perspective

  • directors have manipulated this play, scene of women lamenting and character of queen Margaret often cut from performances, placing emphasis on male characters and Richard III

  • desire of those in power to construct certain narratives, which depend on excluding or manipulating other narratives

  • no history only histories - history is inevitably selective, partial, and subjective

  • this play is a reworking of sources in order to reframe the narrative in favour of tudors