Richard III

Introduction

Richard III was the Bard’s sixth play and his first acknowledged masterpiece. He started writing plays the year after the invasion of England by the Spanish Armada in 1588. Spain (along with France and much of the Catholic world ) was outraged that King Henry VIII, Queen Elizabeth’s father, adopted Protestantism, and in doing so, rid England of Catholicism, explaining, therefore, the attempted Spanish invasion of England. However, the English, in a real shocker, unexpectedly repelled the attack, thus preserving Elizabeth’s reign and the Protestant faith, along with the emerging English Renaissance and theatre scene.  There was an enormous tide of English patriotism following the defeat of the mighty Spanish Armada and Shakespeare saw this as an opportunity to write plays extolling English History, beginning with Henry VI, Part I-III, depicting the famous blood soaked War of the Roses, as the Houses of Lancaster and York battled for the throne. Henry VI was of the House of Lancaster.  Toward the very end of the weak and ineffective reign of Henry VI the House of York, led by brothers Edward, Clarence and our subject, Richard, finally seized the Crown, when Richard murdered Henry VI, placing his older brother Edward on the throne, signalling a major shift in the War of the Roses and temporarily restoring peace to England. 

However, as you will read in the famous opening soliloquy, Richard despises this peace and will do anything to usurp the throne from members of his own family, who have succession claims ahead of him. Richard III is the story of Richard’s bloody quest for the crown, his brief reign as king (a bit more than two years) and his murder in battle by Richmond, who becomes Henry VII, father to Henry VIII and Grandfather to Queen Elizabeth I.  Queen Elizabeth loved the works of William Shakespeare and saw every dramatic piece he ever completed in her lifetime and he did all he could to maintain this excellent relationship, which explains why he made Richard III into such a villain and celebrated her grandfather’s murder of Richard, which ushered in the reign of Elizabeth’s Tudor family. Many English people today still feel that Shakespeare did Richard, and perhaps England, a great dis-service by depicting Richard as purely evil. This is Shakespeare’s permanent imposition of the official Tudor version of history upon our imaginations. The drama itself was way more important to Shakespeare than the depiction of authentic history. There is nothing new about ‘fake news’. Shakespeare’s creation of his very own Richard has obliterated the historical Richard, where there is scant evidence of either his deformities or crimes. He may have even ruled well. And yet this is Shakespeare’s first clear masterpiece due to the Richard he does create. He had to free Richard from historical accuracy in order to create him as the anti-hero of our play. So history becomes drama with every new act and scene. As mentioned, Shakespeare was endearing himself to Queen Elizabeth in this play by depicting Richard as a homicide who will only be stopped by the heroic Richmond, who becomes Henry VII, her grandfather. We celebrate, at the end of Richard III, the establishment of the Tudors, the family of Elizabeth I, Shakespeare’s Queen.

This is a tremendous, timeless and archetypal themed story of rise and fall, typical of the Bard’s tragedies. Neither Othello, Hamlet, Lear, Romeo or Juliet, Antony or Cleopatra, Caesar, Richard II, Macbeth or Coriolanus survive their own plays. The main difference between Shakespeare’s comedies and tragedies is how the final act (act 5) plays out. In the comedies it all rather miraculously comes together, usually with at least one marriage, whereas the last act of the tragedies tend to fall apart mercilessly, at least for the main characters. Richard III is a history play but also with much comedic wit sprinkled amongst scenes of monstrous tragedy. In addition to being a sinister villain, Richard is actually Shakespeare’s first real comic genius, finding great amusement in the ease with which he leads us and each new victim by the nose. It is, indeed, Richard’s comic wit and dramatic rise and fall that capture audiences to this day.

Act I (4 scenes)

Scene i

London. A street.

Enter Richard, Duke of Gloucester

Richard: (aside) “Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this sun of York; now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths; our bruised arms hung up for monuments; out stern alarums changed to merry meetings; our dreadful marches to delightful measures. Grim-visaged war hath smoothed his wrinkled front, and now, instead of mounting barbed steeds to fright the souls of fearful adversaries, he capers dimly in a lady’s chamber to the lascivious pleasing of a lute. But I – that am not shaped for sportive tricks, nor made to court an amorous looking glass – I – that am rudely stamped, and want love’s majesty to strut before a wanton ambling nymph – I – that am curtailed of this fair proportion, cheated of feature by dissembling nature, deformed, unfinished, sent before my time into this breathing world scarce half made up, and that so lamely and unfashionable that dogs bark at me as I halt by them – why, I, in this weak piping time of peace, have no delight to pass away the time, except to spy my shadow in the sun and descant on mine own deformity. And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover to entertain these fair well-spoken days, I am detrmined to prove a villain and hate the idyl pleasures of these days. Plots have I laid, inductions dangerous, by drunken prophesies, libels and dreams, to set my brother Clarence and the King in deadly hate the one against the other. And if King Edward be as true and just as I am subtle, false and treacherous, this day should Clarence closely be mewed up. Dive thoughts, down to my soul. Here comes Clarence.

Enter Clarence guarded

Richard: “Brother, good day, what means this armed guard?”

Clarence: “His majesty has appointed this conduct to convey me to the Tower.”

Richard: “Upon what cause? What’s the matter, Clarence? May I know?”

Clarence: “Yea, Richard, when I know. He says a wizard told him that by ‘G’ his issue disinherited should be, and for my name of George begins with ‘G’, it follows in his thought that I am he.”

Richard: “Why, this it is when men are ruled by women. Tis not the King that sends you to the Tower. Lady Grey, his wife, Clarence, tempers him to this extremity. We are not safe, Clarence. We are not safe. This deep disgrace in brotherhood touches me deeper than you can imagine. Well, your imprisonment shall not be long. I will deliver you.“

Exit Clarence and guard

Richard: (aside) “Simple, plain, Clarence, I do love thee so that I will shortly send your soul to heaven.“

Enter Lord Hastings

Richard: “What’s the news abroad?”

Hastings: No news so bad abroad as this at home: the King is sickly, weak and melancholy, and his physicians fear him mightily.”

Richard: “That news is bad indeed. He hath kept an evil diet long and overmuch consumed his royal person!”

Exit Hastings

Richard: (aside) “He cannot live, I hope, and must not die till George be packed up to heaven. I’ll urge his hatred more to Clarence, and if I fail not, Clarence hath not another day to live, which done, God take King Edward to his mercy, and leave the world for me to bustle in. But Clarence still breathes and Edward still lives and reigns. When they are gone, then must I count my gains.”

Analysis

In Henry VI, Richard of Gloucester became increasingly dangerous and blood-thirsty in the Yorkist quest for the throne, and here in his own play he immediately picks up where he left off, planning to hew his way through his own family, now that they hold the crown.

Richard III starts with the most incredible scene Shakespeare had written to date: his opening Soliloquy, in which Richard shares directly with us, his audience, his dissatisfaction with these times of peace (“Now is the winter of our discontent”), his physical abnormalities (“Deformed, unfinished… scarce half made up… so lamely and unfashionable that dogs bark at me as I halt by them”) and his sinister plan to murder his way right through his own family to attain the seemingly distant crown. (“and therefore I am determined to prove a villain. Plots have I laid…”) He has two older brothers and the one who is king has two male heirs. So his chances at succession are not good.

We will want to acknowledge the effectiveness of this device of the soliloquy, which serves to expose Shakespeare’s Richard, if only to us, therein making us seemingly complicit in the play’s subsequent rendering. It is the pivot point of the play for several reasons. First, it exposes Richard for who he really is, according to the Bard. It is a beautiful Shakespearean device, to be used often and most famously later in Hamlet, and, as suggested, it manages to establish an intimate relationship between us, the audience, and Richard. Indeed, the greatest originality achieved in Richard III is this shockingly intimate relationship Shakespeare establishes with us, his audience, right from the opening curtain. We are on unnervingly confidential terms with Richard and can seem unable to resist his admitted charms. We are there to be entertained by the suffering of others in the play and Richard seemingly co-ops us as fellow tormentors. In this sense he plays the role of ‘master of ceremony’ or ‘chorus’, working us over as an audience the way a comedian works a house or a trickster his dupes. His soliloquies are the enduring crowning achievements of the play, much like in House of Cards, when Kevin Spacey so often chillingly turns directly to the camera and speaks his truth only to us. As it were, Spacey spent years on the stage as Richard III.

 Imagine an empty stage as the play begins. A solitary figure emerges and strolls to the very edge of the stage, examining us carefully. And then he confides in us his perspective on this time of peace, a peace that suites him not at all. He reflects on his physical deformities, a symbol for Shakespeare of Richard’s twisted internal state as well, and his over arching plan to villainously lay plots to advance his claim to the very throne itself. He may look around to ensure no one else is listening, as he combines charm and terror into art. Richard’s zest in his own diabolism both awes and frightens us, as intended. This gusto becomes a celebration of Shakespeare’s still early and emerging art and genius. 

Richard has a hump on his back and a withered arm and yet remains confident and determined to fulfil his lust for power. He is one character as he speaks directly to us and another in his interactions with characters in his play. We know that he is an actor in his play, acting his way to the power he craves. He pretty much tells us everything in act one, scene one, and we therefore become curiously complicit in his crimes. We learn that he is deeply discontent and that the times do not match his disposition. Nonetheless he has a plan: ” Dive, thoughts, down to my soul”. Indeed, by the end of Act I we have a realistic and sober estimation of just what Richard is capable of doing, rather like Francis Underwood, House Majority Whip, in House of Cards.

Act I

Scene ii

London. Another street.

Enter the corpse of King Henry VI and Lady Anne (King Henry’s son’s widow) as mourner.

Anne: “Cursed be the hand that made these fatal holes! Cursed the heart that had the heart to do it! Cursed the blood that let tis blood from hence. If ever he have child, abortive be it.”

Enter Richard

Anne: “What black magician conjures up this fiend? Avaunt, thou dreadful minister of hell! Thou had but power over his mortal body. His soul thou cannot have, therefore be gone. Foul devil, thou hast made the happy earth thy hell. Behold the pattern of thy butcheries. See, see! Dead Henry’s wounds open their congealed mouths and bleed afresh. Blush, blush, thou lump of foul deformity. For tis thy presence that exhales this blood from cold and empty veins where no blood dwells. Thy deeds inhumane and unnatural provoke this deluge. O God, revenge his death! O Earth, revenge his death! Either, heaven, with lightning strike the murderer dead, or, earth, gape open wide and eat him quick. Villain. No beast so fierce but knows some touch of pity.”

Richard: “But I know none, and therefore am no beast.”

Anne: “O wonderful when devils tell the truth.”

Richard: “More wonderful when angels are so angry.”

Anne: “Defused infection of a man. Didst thou not kill this king?”

Richard: “I grant ye.”

Anne: “Hedgehog! O he was gentle, mild and virtuous.”

Richard: “The better for the king of heaven who has him.”

Anne: “He is in heaven, where thou shalt never come.”

Richard: “Let him thank me who helped to send him thither, for he was fitter for that place than earth.”

Anne: “And thou unfit for any place but hell.”

Richard: “Yes, one place else, if you will hear me name it.”

Anne: “Some dungeon.”

Richard: “Your bed-chamber. It’s a quarrel most unnatural to be revenged on he that loves thee. He that bereft thee, lady, of thy husband did it to help thee to a better husband. He lives that loves thee better than he could.”

Anne: “Where is he?”

Richard: “Here. (she spits on him) Why dost thou spit at me?

Anne: “Would it were mortal poison, for thy sake.”

Richard: “Never came poison from so sweet a place.”

Anne: “Out of my sight. Thou dost infect mine eyes. Would they were basilisks to strike thee dead.”

Richard: “Teach not thy lips such scorn, for they were made for kissing, lady. Here I lend thee this sharp-pointed sword, and humbly beg the death upon my knee.”

He lays his breast open. She offers at it with the sword and then drops the sword.

Anne: “Arise, dissembler, though I wish thy death, I will not be thy executioner.”

Richard: “Then bid me kill myself.”

Anne: “I already have. I would I knew thy heart. Put up your sword.”

Richard: “Then my peace is made. Vouchsafe to wear this ring. Look how my ring encompasses thy finger. After I have solemnly interred this noble king, and wet his grave with my repentant tears – I will with all expedient duty see you.”

Anne: “Much it joys me too to see you become so penitent.”

Exit Anne

Richard: ” (aside) “Was ever woman in this humour woo’d? Was ever woman in this humour won? I’ll have her; but I will not keep her long. To take her in her heart’s extremest hate with curses in her mouth and tears in her eyes. And no friend to back my suit at all. And yet to win her. Ha! Hath she forgot already that brave prince, Edward, her lord, whom I stabbed? And will she yet abase her eyes on me, on me that am misshapen thus? I do mistake my person all this while. Upon my life, she finds, although I cannot, myself to be a marvellous proper man.”

Analysis

Believing that a royal marriage will advance his intentions he decides to court Lady Anne, the widow of King Henry’s son. The problem is that it was Richard who murdered her husband as well as King Henry himself. He is indeed proficient as the manipulating dissembler he promised to be in the opening scene, a twisted soul to match his tortured body. Nonetheless it is a difficult scene to stomach, the idea that he could successfully woo Anne. It does, however, indicate the extreme conniver that he is and how persuasive are his powers in convincing people of his sincerity. Again, once alone he shares a good disturbing chuckle with us: “I will have her, but I will not keep her long.”

Act I

Scene iii

London. The Palace.

Enter Queen Elizabeth, Lord Rivers and Lord Grey

Rivers: “Have patience, madam; there’s no doubt his majesty will soon recover his accustomed health.”

Queen Elizabeth: “If he were dead, the loss of such a lord includes all harms.”

Grey: “The heavens have blessed you with a goodly son to be your comforter when he is gone.”

Queen Elizabeth: “Ah, he is young; and is put in the trust of Richard Gloucester, a man who loves me not, nor none of you. I fear our happiness is at its height.“

Enter Richard

Richard: “They do me wrong and I will not endure it. Because I cannot flatter and look fair, smile in men’s faces, I must be held a rancorous enemy.”

Queen Elizabeth: “Come, come, brother Gloucester, you envy my advancement.”

Richard: “Meanwhile, my brother is imprisoned by your means, myself disgraced and the nobility held in contempt.”

Queen Elizabeth: “I never did incense his majesty against the Duke of Clarence, your brother, but have been an earnest advocate to plead for him. My lord, you do me shameful injury falsely to draw me in these vile suspects. I have too long borne your blunt upbraiding. I will acquaint his majesty of these gross taunts that often I have endured. Small joy have I in being England’s Queen.”

Enter Old Queen Margaret (King Henry VI’s wife)

Queen Margaret: “Out, devil! Thou killed my husband Henry in the Tower, and Edward, my poor son.”

Richard: “Foul, wrinkled witch, what makes thou in my sight. Were thou not banished on pain of death?”

Queen Margaret: “I was; but I do find more pain in banishment than death can yield me here by my abode. A husband and a son dost thou owe me. This sorrow that I have by right is yours, and all the pleasures you usurp are mine.“

Richard: “Have done thy charm, thou hateful withered hag.”

Queen Margaret: “Stay dog, for thou shalt hear me. No sleep close up that deadly eye of thine, unless it be while some tormenting dream affrights thee with a hell of ugly devils. Thou elvish-marked, abortive, rooting hog, Thou that was sealed in thy nativity the slave of nature and the son of hell. Thou slanderer of thy heavy mother’s womb, thou loathed issue of thy father’s loins, thou rag of honour, thou detested –“

Richard: “Margaret!”

Queen Margaret: “Richard!”

Buckingham: “Peace, peace, for shame, if not for charity.”

Queen Margaret: “Urge neither charity nor shame to me. Uncharitably with me have you dealt, and shamefully my hopes by you are butchered. My charity is outrage, life my shame; and in that shame still lives my sorrow’s rage.”

Dorset: “Dispute not with her; she is lunatic.”

Queen Margaret: “O Buckingham, take heed of yonder dog. Have not to do with him, beware of him; sin, death and hell, have set their marks on him.“

Richard: “What doth she say, my lord?”

Buckingham: “Nothing that I respect, my gracious lord.”

Queen Margaret: “O, but remember this another day, when he shall split thy very heart with sorrow, and say poor Margaret was a prophetess!“

Rivers: “I muse why she is at liberty.”

Richard: “I cannot blame her, by God’s holy mother, she hath had too much wrong, and I repent my part thereof that I have done to her.“

Exit all but Richard

Richard: (aside) “I do the wrongs and then the secret mischiefs that I set I lay unto the grievous charge of others. But then I sigh and with a piece of scripture tell them that God bids us to do good for evil. And thus I clothe my naked villainy with odd old ends stolen forth of holy writ, and seem a saint when most I play the devil.“

Enter two murderers

Richard: “But soft, here come my executioners. How now my hardy stout resolved mates. Are you going to dispatch the thing?”

1 Murderer: “Ay, we are, my lord.”

Richard: “But, sirs, be sudden in the execution. Do not hear him plead. For Clarence is well spoken, and perhaps may move your hearts too pity.”

1 Murderer: “Tut, tut, my lord. Talkers are no good doers. be assured.”

Richard: “I like you, lads.”

Analysis

Richard will be berated by several women in the play and we caught a glimpse of this in the previous scene with Lady Ann. Queen Elizabeth is queen to King Edward and after a testy encounter with Richard, Queen Margaret, wife to Henry VI, enters the room. Richard murdered both her husband, the king, and her son, the prince and heir apparent. She rips into him immediately and it is hardly the last time we will hear from Margaret. Indeed, later in the same scene she is warning Richard’s loyal dupe, Buckingham: “Oh Buckingham, take heed of yonder dog! Have not to do with him; sin, death and hell have set their marks on him. Remember this another day, when he shall split thy very heart with sorrow, and say poor Margaret was a prophetess.” Richard exposes a rare sentiment of compassion when asked by Rivers why Margaret is at such liberty to speak to him as she does. “I cannot blame her… she hath had too much wrong, and I repent my part, thereof, that I have done to her.” And this about the woman who taunted and murdered his father. The women share centre stage with Richard in his play, speaking to him in such a way that only they can get away with. No man would survive a minute if he spoke but a single critical word. But Queen Margaret (King Henry’s wife), Queen Elizabeth (King Edward’s wife), Lady Anne (King Henry and Queen Margaret’s son’s wife) and the Duchess of York (King Edward, Clarence and Richard’s mother) seemingly get away with anything.

Act I

Scene iv

London. The Tower

Enter Clarence and his keeper

Keeper: “Why looks your grace so heavily today?”

Clarence: “I have passed a miserable night, so full of fearful dreams. Me thought that Gloucester stumbled, and in falling, struck me.”

Enter the two murderers and exit the keeper

2 Murderer: “Shall I stab him as he sleeps?”

1 Murderer: “Art thou afraid?”

2 Murderer: “Not to kill him, but to be damned for killing him. So I am to let him live. Some certain dregs of conscience are yet within me.”

1 Murderer: “Remember our reward.”

2 Murderer: “Zounds, he dies. I had forgot the reward.”

1 Murderer: “Where is thy conscience now?”

2 Murderer: “In the Duke of Gloucester’s purse!”

1 Murderer: “He wakes!”

Clarence: “In God’s name, what art thou? Your eyes do menace me. Wherefore do you come? To murder me?”

Both Murderers: “Ay, ay.”

Clarence: “You scarcely have the hearts to tell me so, and therefore cannot have the hearts to do it.”

2 Murderer: “Prepare to die.”

Clarence: “What is my offence?”

1 Murderer: “What we do we do upon command.”

Clarence: “I will send you to my brother Gloucester, who shall reward you better for my life.”

2 Murderer: “You are deceived: your brother Gloucester hates you.”

Clarence: “Oh no, he loves me.”

1 Murderer: “Tis he who sends us to destroy you here.”

2 Murderer: “Make peace with God, for you must die, my lord.”

Clarence: “My friends, I spy some pity in thy looks.”

1 Murderer: “Take that and that.

The murderers stab Clarence

2 Murderer: “A bloody deed and desperately dispatched.“

Analysis

Shakespeare’s 5 act plays generally adhere to a pattern. Act I will usually introduce us to the characters and plot. The middle three acts tend to see matters complicate, often dreadfully so in the tragedies and uproariously in the comedies. Act 5 is always the great resolution scene, for better or for worse, as we shall see.  Act I in Richard III establishes the connection with the previous Henry VI plays, reveals Richard’s frustration and inner/outer deformities and then sketches out his plan and initiates its execution. He is that much closer to the throne by the end of Act I. Only King Edward, his brother, and his two princely sons remain in his way.

Act II (4 scenes)

Scene i

London. The Palace

Enter King Edward (ill), Queen Elizabeth, Richard, Dorset, Rivers, Hastings, Buckingham and Grey

King: “More at peace my soul shall part to heaven, since I have made my friends at peace on earth.”

Richard: “Tis death to me to be at enmity; I hate it and desire all good men’s love. I thank my God for my humility.”

Queen Elizabeth: “My sovereign lord, I do beseech your highness to take our brother Clarence to your grace.”

Richard: “Who knows not that the gentle Duke is dead?”

King: “Clarence dead? But the order was reversed.”

Richard: “But he, poor man, by your first order died.

King: “My soul is full of sorrow. My brother killed no man, and yet his punishment was bitter death. Who sued to me for him? Who spoke of brotherhood? Who spoke of love? None of you once begged for his life. Ah, poor Clarence.”

Analysis

One more out of his way. Richard pretends to be a man of peace and then delivers the news of Clarence’s death, which is calculated to further bereave the ailing King, as he blames himself for not reversing the death sentence in time. So he has a royal marriage lined up for himself and a brother ahead of him in succession killed and the king himself perilously distraught. Not bad considering it is only Act II, Scene i. And he is Lord Protector over the King’s two princely sons.

Act II

Scene ii

London. The Palace

Enter Queen Elizabeth and Rivers

Queen: “Ah, who shall hinder me to weep and wail and torment myself? Edward, my lord, our king, is dead.”

Rivers: “Madam, bethink you, like a careful mother, of the young prince, your son. Send straight for him and let him be crowned. Plant your joys in living Edward’s throne.”

Analysis

Richard has engineered the death of the King, from the grief of Clarence’s murder at the King’s orders. All that stands between Richard and the crown he has so long sought are the two princes and how could he permit two children to stand in his way?

Act II

Scene iii

London. A street

Enter two citizens

1 Citizen: “Woe to the land that is governed by a child.”

2 Citizen: “O, full of danger is the Duke of Gloucester.”

1 Citizen: “Truly, the hearts of men are full of fear.”

Analysis

The word on the street is that now that the King is dead, his small son, Prince Edward, will reign, as did Henry VI, who was but an infant. But the commoners know how poorly that turned out. The word is also out about Richard and how full of danger this Lord Protector is. It is a frightening time for the people of England when the succession is unclear. Just ask the American citizens in 2020.

Act II

Scene iv

London. The Palace

Enter the Archbishop of York, Queen Elizabeth, and the Duchess of York (Edward, Clarence and Richard’s mother)

Enter Messenger

Messenger: “Lord Rivers and Lord Grey are prisoners.”

Duchess: “Who hath committed them?”

Messenger: “Gloucester and Buckingham.”

Queen Elizabeth: “Ay me, I see the ruin of my house! The tiger has now seized the gentle hind. Welcome destruction, blood, and massacre! I see, in a map, the end of all.”

Analysis

Immediately, Gloucester and his minion, Buckingham, in the absence of a king, start rounding up and imprisoning all who might oppose what they are about to do and Queen Elizabeth realizes this is only the beginning of the end. There is virtually no one remaining to oppose him. The Queen must fear for the lives of her sons, as the only heirs to the throne ahead of Richard. Hence her final quote above.

Act III (7 scenes)

Scene I

London. A street.

Enter the Prince of Wales, Richard, Buckingham, Catesby, Cardinal and others

Prince: “I want more uncles here to welcome me.”

Richard: “Those uncles which you want were dangerous. Your Grace looked not on the poison of their hearts. God keep you from them.”

Prince: “God keep me from false friends.”

Buckingham: “Lord Cardinal, Persuade the Queen to send her son, the Duke of York, unto his princely brother presently. If she deny, from her jealous arms pluck him perforce.”

Prince: “Say, uncle Gloucester, if my brother comes, where shall we sojourn till our coronation?”

Richard: “If I may counsel you, some day or two your highness shall repose you at the Tower for your best health and recreation.”

Prince: “I do not like the Tower, of any place. Did Julius Caesar build that place, my lord?”

Richard: “He did.” (aside) “So wise and so young, they say, do never live long.”

Enter young Duke of York

York: “Brother, will you go unto the Tower?”

Prince: “My Lord Protector needs will have it so.”

York: “I shall not sleep in quiet at the Tower.”

Richard: “Why, what should you fear?”

York: “My uncle Clarence’s angry ghost. My grandam told me he was murdered there.”

Prince: “I fear no uncles dead.”

Richard: “Nor none that live, I hope.”

Prince: “And if they live, I hope I need not fear. But come, my lord; with a heavy heart go I unto the Tower.”

Exit all but Richard, Buckingham and Catesby

Buckingham: “Think you, my lord, this little prating York was not incensed by his subtle mother to taunt and scorn you thus?”

Richard: “No doubt, no doubt; tis a perilous boy; bold, quick, ingenious, forward, capable. He is all his mother, top to toe.”

Buckingham: “Come hither, Catesby. What think’s thou to make Lord Hastings of our mind for the instalment of this noble Duke in the seat royal of this famous isle?”

Catesby: “He so loves the Prince that he will not be one to aught against him.”

Buckingham: “Well then, gentle Catesby, sound Lord Hastings and how he doth stand affected to our purpose.”

Exit Catesby

Buckingham: “Now, my lord, what shall we do if we perceive Lord Hastings will not yield to our completes?”

Richard: “Chop off his head. And look, when I am king, claim thou of me the Earldom of Hereford.”

Analysis

Richard’s encounter with the young Prince of Wales and the even younger Duke of York is telling indeed, for they seem to see right through him. They know that their uncle Clarence was killed in the Tower and they are quite cheeky with Richard. Richard and Buckingham are wheeling and dealing with the remaining lords about who will or will not support his bid for the throne. Dangerous times indeed… especially for Lord Hastings it would seem. We have seen in Act I what Richard is capable of planning and executing on his own behalf. In Act II we see him reap the fruit of his scheming. The throne is empty and both brothers are dead. Only King Edward’s two sons now stand between Richard and the throne of England. Richard gets bolder and bolder, the closer he gets to the crown, which does not bode well for the two young boys.

Act III

Scene ii

Before Lord Hasting’s house

Enter Catesby and Hastings

Catesby: “It is a reeling world, indeed, my lord, and I believe it will never stand upright till Richard wear the garland of the realm.”

Hastings: “I’ll have this crown of mine cut from my shoulders before I see the crown so foul misplaced.”

Catesby: “On this very day the kindred of the Queen, Rivers, Grey and Vaughan, must die at Pomfret.”

Hastings: “I live to look upon their tragedy.”

Catesby: “Tis a vile thing to die, my gracious lord, when men are unprepared and look not for it.“

Analysis

Lord Hastings seals his fate here when he vows to Catesby, who is a friend to Richard, that he would die before he ever sees Richard wear the crown. Farewell Lord Hastings! 

Act III

Scene iii

Pomfret Castle

Rivers, Grey and Vaughan are being led to their deaths by Ratcliff.

Ratliff: “Dispatch; the limit of your lives is out.”

Rivers: “O Pomfret! O thou bloody prison! Richard the Second here was hacked to death.”

Grey: “Now Margaret’s curse has fallen upon our heads.”

Rivers: “Come, Grey; come Vaughan; let us here embrace. Farewell, until we meet again in heaven.”

Analysis

The above victims were friends and family of Queen Elizabeth and Richard dispatches them quickly. Let’s discuss Margaret’s curse. She was wife to the previous King, Henry VI, and witnessed the murder of virtually her entire family in the transition to Richard’s bother Edward being crowned king. She issued hysterical curses upon the heads of all who would support the new King Edward and his family, saying that their day would come as well, when bloody Richard will clean house of them all. So several characters in our play will reflect on her curse just as they are led off to their deaths or somehow witness the fruition of the curse. Margaret was banned from Edward’s court but has been permitted by Richard to shuffle around reiterating her curses. Historically speaking Margaret was never at Edward’s or Richard’s court. But Shakespeare places her there to great effect. Is Shakespeare admitting to a sliver of Richard’s humanity in his tolerance to Margaret and her curses? We will see just how far the various women are permitted to curse Richard in Act IV. One of the great mysteries of the play is why these women are allowed to rant and curse Richard as they do, when the mere word “IF” from Hastings in the very next scene will be enough to have his head immediately removed. 

Act III

Scene iv

London. The Tower

Enter Richard, Hastings, Buckingham, Derby, Ratcliffe, Lovell and others

Richard: “I pray, tell me what they deserve that do conspire my death with devilish plots of damned witchcraft and that have prevailed upon my body with their hellish charms.”

Hastings: “The tender love I bear your Grace makes me most forward to doom the offenders, whomsoever they be. I say, my lord, they have deserved death.”

Richard: “Be your eyes the witness of their evil. Look how I am bewitched; behold my arm is like a blasted sapling withered up. And this is Edward’s wife, that monstrous witch, that by her witchcraft thus has marked me.”

Hastings: “If they have done this deed, my noble lord -“

Richard: “If? – thou protector of this damned strumpet, talk’st thou to me of ifs? Thou art a traitor. Off with his head! The rest who love me, rise and follow me.”

Exit all but Hastings and Ratcliff

Hastings: “Woe, woe for England. O Margaret, Margaret, now thy heavy curse is lighted upon poor Hastings’ wretched head! O bloody Richard! Miserable England! I prophesy the fearful’st time to thee that ever wretched age hath looked upon.“

Analysis

Hastings used the ‘if’ word and loses his head over it. His first thought is of Margaret’s curse before declaring a prophesy of his own. Many notable individuals, as they face their own doom, declare a prophecy for the living and their descendants… and they virtually all come true. 

Act III

Scene v

London. The Tower

Enter Richard and Buckingham

Richard: “Come, cousin, can thou quake and change thy colour, murder thy breath in the middle of a word, and then again begin, and stop again, as if thou were distraught and mad with terror?”

Buckingham: “Tut, I can counterfeit the deep tragedian; speak and look back, and pry on every side, tremble and start at the wagging of a straw, intending deep suspicion. Ghastly looks are at my service, like enforced smiles; and both are ready in their offices at any time to grace my stratagems.“

Enter the mayor

Enter Ratcliff and Lovell with Hasting’s head

Lovell: “Here is the head of that ignoble traitor, Hastings.”

Richard: “So dear I loved the man that I must weep.”

Buckingham: “The subtle traitor this day had plotted to murder me and my good Lord of Gloucester.”

Mayor: “Had he done so?”

Richard: “What! Think you we would, against the form of law, proceed thus rashly in the villain’s death?”

Mayor: “Now, fair befall you. He deserved his death. I will acquaint our duteous citizens with all of your just proceedings in this case.”

Exit all but Buckingham and Richard

Richard: “Infer the bastardy of Edward’s children. Moreover, urge his hateful luxury and bestial appetite in change of lust, which stretched unto their servants, daughters and wives. Tell them, that when my mother went with child, of that insatiate Edward, noble York, my princely father then had wars in France, and by true computation of the time, found that the issue was not his begot.”

Analysis

Richard and Buckingham boast of their manipulative natures to one another and then convince the mayor of the justification for killing Hastings. The mayor will then smooth over everything with the common citizens. Now it is on to the Princes and Richard has figured out a way to discredit them: “Infer the bastardy of Edward’s children.” So Edward was born a bastard, which would necessitate that the Princes are anything but royal.  He is very close to the throne at this point, especially with Buckingham’s conniving support.

Act III

Scene vi

London

Enter a scrivener

Scrivener: “Here is the indictment of the good Lord Hastings. And yet within these five hours Hastings lived, untainted, unexamined, free, at liberty. Who is so gross that cannot see this device? Yet who so bold but says he sees it not? Bad is the world.”

A scrivener, or clerk, reviews the paperwork on the death of Lord Hastings, provided to him by Catesby, a friend to Richard. The scrivener can see very clearly what a sham it is but understands why nobody will choose to point it out. “Bad is the world” he concludes.

Act III

Scene vii

Enter Richard and Buckingham

Richard: “How now! What say the citizens?”

Buckingham: “The citizens are mum and say not a word.”

Richard: “Touched you the bastardy of Edward’s children?”

Buckingham: “I did. The insatiate greediness of his desire; his own bastardy; I did infer your lineaments, both in your form and nobleness of mind; laid open all of your victories in Scotland, your discipline in war, wisdom in peace, your bounty, virtue and fair humility. I bid them that did love their country’s good to cry ‘God save Richard, England’s royal king!'”

Richard: “And did they so?”

Buckingham: “No. Like dumb statues they stared at each other. I reprehended them. Some followers of mine hurled up their caps and cried ‘God save King Richard!’ The mayor is here at hand. Get a prayer book in your hand and stand between two churchmen and be not easily won to our requests.”

Enter the mayor, aldermen, Catesby and citizens

Catesby: “He is within, with two right reverend fathers, divinely bent to meditation.”

Buckingham: “This prince is not an Edward! He is not lolling on a lewd love bed, but on his knees in meditation. Happy were England would this virtuous prince take on his Grace the sovereignty thereof.”

Enter Richard between two bishops

Mayor: “See where his Grace stands between two clergymen.”

Buckingham: “And see, a book of prayer in his hand. Prince, pardon us the interruption of thy devotion and right Christian zeal. We heartily solicit your gracious self to take on you the charge and kingly government of this your land, your right of birth. In this just cause come I to move your Grace.”

Richard: “God be glad there is no need of me.”

Buckingham: “Refuse not, mighty lord, this proffered love.”

Richard: “Alas, why would you heap this care on me? I am unfit for state and majesty.”

Buckingham: “Yet know, whether you accept our suit or not, your brother’s son shall never reign our king. We will plant some other on the throne to the disgrace and downfall of your house; and in this resolution here we leave you.”

Richard: “Will you enforce me to a world of cares? Call them again. I am not made of stones, but penetrable to your kind entreaties, albeit against my conscience and my soul. For God doth know , and you may partly see, how far I am from the desire of this.“

Mayor: “God bless your Grace.”

Buckingham: “Then I salute you with this royal title – long live King Richard, England’s worthy King!”

All: “Amen.”

Buckingham: “Tomorrow may it please you to be crowned?”

Richard: “Even when you please.” (to the bishops) “Come, let us to our holy work again.”

Analysis

He has done it, as he proclaimed he would back in the third part of Henry the Sixth. He has brilliantly manipulated and maneuvered himself into a position to be crowned King of England by murdering King Henry’s son, Prince Edward, and Henry VI himself, in the previous play. In this, his own play, he had his own brother Clarence murdered, which deliberately caused the death of his other brother, King Edward. Then he ruthlessly cleared house of all remaining opponents, such as the lords Rivers, Grey, Vaughan and Hastings. He will kill Anne, his own wife, in order to marry his brother’s daughter, and then, most famously, he arranged the murder of the two princes in line for the throne. You might say it could not have been accomplished without Buckingham, who played his role as king-maker perfectly. One act set up the plan (I), two acts brought him the crown (II-III), one act will see him as king (IV) and in just one act (V) he will be dead. In real time Richard reigned for just over two years. Now let’s hear what the women have to say in Act IV.

Act IV (5 scenes)

Scene i

Enter Brackenbury, Queen Elizabeth, Duchess of York, Anne of Gloucester and Margaret

Queen Elizabeth: “Lieutenant Brackenbury, how doth the Prince and my young son of York?”

Brackenbury: “Right well, dear madam, but I may not suffer you to visit them. The King has strictly charged the contrary.”

Queen Elizabeth: “The King! Who’s that?”

Brackenbury: “I mean the Lord Protector.”

Queen Elizabeth: “The Lord protect him from that kingly title! Hath he set bounds between their love and me? I am their mother; who shall bar me from them?”

Duchess: “I am their father’s mother; I will see them.”

Anne: “Their aunt I am in law, in love their mother.”

Brackenbury: “No madam. I am bound by oath, and therefore pardon me.”

Enter Stanley

Stanley: (to Anne) “Come, madam, you must straight to Westminster, there to be crowned Richard’s royal queen.”

Anne: “Despiteful tidings! O unpleasing news.”

Queen Elizabeth: “If thou will outstrip death, go across the seas and live with Richmond, beyond the reach of hell. Get thee from this slaughter-house, lest thee increase the number of the dead.“

Duchess: “O ill-dispersing wind of misery! O, my accursed womb, the bed of death!“

Anne: “And I with all unwillingness go. Annointed let me be with deadly venom. Within so small a time, my woman’s heart grossly grew captive to his honey words. Besides, he hates me and will, no doubt, shortly be rid of me.”

Queen Elizabeth: “Stay and look back with me unto the Tower. Pity, you ancient stones, those tender babes; rough cradle for such little pretty ones.“

Analysis

In scene i (of five) the women tune their voices. Just a quick reminder of who is who, so we understand the feminist rage that is about to explode in Act IV. The Duchess is Richard’s own mother. He has had her other two sons killed along and her two princely grandsons and heirs to the throne are hanging on by a thread. Elizabeth was King Edward’s wife. Richard has had her husband, brother in law (Clarence) killed and both princely sons are in peril. Anne was wife to Prince Edward, heir to the throne, and daughter in law to King Henry VI. Richard has had both of them killed in the prior play. He now intends on making Anne his wife. Margaret was wife to King Henry VI and mother to Prince Edward. Richard killed both King Henry and Edward.

So as Act IV opens the women are intent on visiting the two princes in the Tower. However, Lieutenant Brakenbury has his orders: “I may not suffer you to visit them. Now that Richard has attained the crown he must preserve it in the face of all sorts of opposition. The women of Act IV know him all too well and their exchanges with each other and Richard are vintage Shakespeare.

Act IV

Scene ii

London, the palace

Enter King Richard and Buckingham

King: “Ah, Buckingham, now do I play the touch, to try if thou be current gold indeed. Young Edward lives – think now what I would speak.”

Buckingham: “Say on, my loving lord.”

King: “Am I King? Tis so, but Edward lives.”

Buckingham: “True, noble Prince.”

King: “O bitter consequence that Edward still should live. Cousin, thou was not wont to be so dull. Shall I be plain? I wish the bastards dead. And I would have it suddenly performed. What say thou now? Speak suddenly and be brief.“

Buckingham: “Your Grace may do your pleasure .”

King: “Tut, tut. Have I thy consent that they should die?”

Buckingham: “Give me some little breath, some pause, dear lord, before I positively speak on this.“

Catesby (aside to another) “The King is angry.”

King: “High-reaching Buckingham grows circumspect. The deep-revolving witty Buckingham no more shall be the neighbour to my counsels. Stops he now for breath? Well, be it so. Rumour it abroad that Anne, my wife, is very grievous sick and likely to die. I must be married to my brother Clarence’s daughter, or else my kingdom stands on brittle glass. Uncertain way of gain, but I am in so far in blood that sin will pluck on sin. Tear-falling pity dwells not in this eye.“

Enter Tyrell, a murderer

Tyrrel: “James Tyrrel, your most obedient subject.”

King: “Art thou, indeed?”

Tyrrel: “Prove me, my gracious lord.”

King: “Dar’st thou resolve to kill a friend of mine?”

Tyrrel: “I would rather kill two enemies.”

King: “Why, then thou has it. Two deep enemies, foes to my rest, and my deep sleep’s disturbers. I mean those bastards in the Tower.”

Tyrrel: “Let me have open means to come to them and I’ll soon rid you the fear of them.”

King: “Thou sings sweet music, Tyrrel.”

Tyrrel: “I will dispatch it straight.”

Exit Tyrrel

Buckingham: “My lord, I have considered in my mind the late request that you did sound me in.”

King: “Well, let that rest.”

Buckingham: “My lord, I claim the gift, my due by promise, the Earldom of Hereford, which you have promised I will possess. What says your Highness to my just request?”

King: “Henry the Sixth did prophesy that Richmond should be king when Richmond was a little peevish boy.“

Buckingham: “My lord, your promise of the Earldom -“

King: “Richmond! A bard of Ireland told me once I should not live long after I saw Richmond.“

Buckingham: “I am thus bold to put your Grace in mind of what you promised me.”

King: “I am not in the giving vein today. Thou troublest me.”

Exit the King

Buckingham: (aside) “And is it thus? Repays me my deep service with such contempt? Made I him King for this? O, let me think on Hastings and be gone while my fearful head is on.”

Analysis

King Richard is eliminating potential threats to his crown until all he has left by his side is Buckingham and one slight instant of hesitancy by Buckingham regarding the killing of the young princes seals his fate as well. Buckingham fears for his head and flees. The killing of the princes in the Tower is one of the great mysteries in English history, although Shakespeare leaves no doubt that Richard is wholly responsible.

Act IV

Scene iii

London, the palace

Tyrrel: (aside) “The tyrannous and bloody act is done, the most arch-deed of piteous massacre that ever yet this land was guilty of.”

Enter King

King: “Kind Tyrrel, am I happy in thy news?”

Tyrrel: “If to have done the thing you gave in charge beget your happiness; be happy then, for it is done.”

King: “But did thou see them dead?”

Tyrrel: “I did, my lord.”

King: “Think how I may do thee good. Farewell till then.”

Exit Tyrrel

King: (aside) “The sons of Edward sleep in Abraham’s bosom, and Anne, my wife, hath bid this world good night.”

Analysis

The princes are dead, indeed. A great controversy exists to this day, stemming from the Richard the Third Society, which has determined that King Richard was hardly the villain Shakespeare has made him out to be and they advocate on his behalf. Historically, it is unclear how bad a king Richard was or if he was responsible for the death of King Edward’s two small sons. Shakespeare wants to tell a great story and have it end with his Queen Elizabeth’s grandfather, Richmond (later King Henry the Seventh), as the heroic figure who rescues England from villainous Richard the Third. This he does convincingly; too much so for many supporters of Richard near Leicester, where his remains were recently uncovered in 2012 and definitively identified by virtue of carbon-dating at the University of Leicester. In 2015 his remains were transferred to Leicester Cathedral. Now on to the women…

Act IV

Scene iv

London, before the palace

Enter Queen Margaret

Margaret: “Here in these confines slily have I lurked to watch the waning of mine enemies.”

Queen Elizabeth: “Ah, my poor princes! Ah, my tender babes!”

Duchess of York: “So many miseries have crazed my voice that my woe-wearied tongue is still and mute.”

Queen Elizabeth: “Will thou, O God, fly from such gentle lambs and throw them into the entrails of the wolf?”

Queen Margaret: “From forth the kennel of thy womb has crept a hell-hound that doth hunt us all to death. That dog, who had teeth before his eyes; that foul defacer of God’s handiwork, thy womb let loose to chase us to our graves. bear with me; I am hungry for revenge, and now I cloy me with beholding it. Richard yet lives, hell’s black intelligencer. Earth gapes, hell burns, fiends roar, saints pray to have him suddenly conveyed from hence. Cancel his bond of life, dear God, I pray, that I may live and say, ‘the dog is dead’.”

Queen Elizabeth: “O, thou did prophesy the time would come that I would wish for thee to help me curse that bottled spider, that foul hunch-backed toad.“

Queen Margaret: “Where is thy husband now? Where be thy brothers? Where be thy two sons? Wherein dost thou joy? Who kneels and says ‘God save the Queen’? Where be the bending peers that flattered thee? Decline all this, and see what now thou art: for happy wife, a most distressed widow; for joyful mother, one that wails the name; for she that scorned at me, now scorned of me; for she being feared by all, now fearing one; for she commanding all, obeyed of none; thus has the course of justice whirled about and left thee but a very prey to time, having no more but thought of what thou was to torture thee the more being what thou art. Thou did usurp my place and dost thou not usurp the just proportion of my sorrow?“

Queen Elizabeth: “O, thou well skilled in curses, stay awhile and teach me how to curse my enemies.”

Queen Margaret: “Forebear to sleep the nights and fast the days; compare dead happiness with living woe; think that thy babes wee sweeter than they were and he who slew them fouler than he is. Revolving this will teach thee how to curse.“

Duchess of York: “In the breath of bitter words let’s smother my damned son.“

Enter King Richard marching with his train

King: “Who intercepts me in my expedition?“

Duchess of York: “O, she that might have intercepted thee by strangling thee in her accursed womb, from all the slaughters, wretch, that thou hast done!“

Queen Elizabeth: “Hidest thou that forehead with a golden crown where should be branded, if that right were right. Tell me, thou villain slave, where are my children?“

Duchess of York: “Thou toad, thou toad, where is thy brother Clarence and little Ned, his son?“

Queen Elizabeth: “Where is the gentle Rivers, Vaughan and Grey?”

Duchess of York: “Where is kind Hastings?”

King: “A flourish, trumpets, drums! Let not the heavens hear these tell-tale women rail on the Lord’s anointed.”

Duchess of York: “Art thou my son?“

King: “Ay, and I thank thee.”

Duchess of York: “O, let me speak!“

King: “Do, then, but I’ll not hear. And be brief, dear mother, for I am I haste.”

Duchess of York: “Thou came on earth to make the earth my hell. A grievous burden was thy birth to me. Wayward was thy infancy; thy school days frightful, desperate, wild and furious; thy age confirmed subtle, sly and bloody. What comfortable hour can thou name that ever graced me with thy company.“

King: “If I be so disgracious in your eyes, let me march on and not offend you, madam. You speak too bitterly.”

Duchess of York: “Hear me a word; for I shall never speak to thee again. Either thy will die by God’s just ordinace or I with grief and extreme age will perish. Therefore take with thee my most grievous curse: bloody thou art; bloody be thy end. Shame serves thy life and doth thy death attend.“

Queen Elizebeth: I say amen to her.”

King: “Stay, madam, I must talk a word with you.”

Queen Elizabeth: “I have no more sons for thee to slaughter.“

King: “You have a daughter called Elizabeth, virtuous and fair.“

Queen Elizabeth: “And must she die for this? O, let her live and I’ll corrupt her manners, stain her beauty, throw over her the veil of infamy, so she may live unscarred of bleeding slaughter. My babes were destined to a fairer death, if grace had blessed thee with a fairer life. My tongue should to thy ears not name my boys till that my nails were anchored in thine eyes.“

King: “Madam, I intend more good to you or yours than ever you or yours by me were harmed! From my soul I love your daughter and do intend to make her Queen of England.”

Queen Elizabeth: “How can thou woo her?”

King: “That would I learn of you.”

Queen Elizabeth: “Send to her then, by the man who slew her brothers, a pair of bleeding hearts, and thereon engrave ‘Edward’ and ‘York’. Then happily will she weep; therefore present to her – as Margaret did to thy father, a handkerchief; which, say to her, did drain the purple sap from her sweet brother’s body, and bid her wipe her weeping eyes withal. If this inducement move her not to love, send her a letter of thy noble deeds.”

King: “You mock me, madam. This is not the way to woo your daughter.”

Queen Elizabeth: “There is no other way; unless thou could put on some other shape and not be Richard who has done all this.”

King: “Look, what is done cannot be now amended. If I did take the kingdom from your sons, to make amends I’ll give it to your daughter. The loss you have is but a son being King, and by that loss your daughter is made Queen. To thy daughter go and prepare her ears to hear a wooer’s tale. Tell her the King, who may command, entreats. Say she shall be a high and mighty queen. Say I will love her everlastingly.“

Queen Elizabeth: “But how long shall that title ‘ever’ last?“

King: “Until her fair life ends.”

Queen Elizabeth: “But how long fairly shall her sweet life last?“

King: “As long as heaven and nature lengthens it.”

Queen Elizabeth: “As long as hell and Richard likes of it.“

King: “If, with holy thoughts, I tender not thy beauteous daughter, without her, follows to myself and thee, herself, the land, and many a Christian soul, death, desolation, ruin, and decay. It cannot be avoided but by this. Therefore, dear mother – for I must call you so – be my attorney of my love to her. Plead what I will be, not what I have been.“

Queen Elizabeth: “Yet thou did kill my children.“

King: “But in your daughter’s womb I bury them, where, in that nest of spidery, they will breed selves of themselves, to your recomforture.“

Exit Queen Elizabeth

King: “Relenting fool, and shallow, changing woman.”

Enter Ratcliff and Catesby

King: “What news?”

Ratcliff: “To our shores throng many doubtful hollow-hearted friends. Tis thought that Richmond is their admiral, expecting aid of Buckingham to welcome them ashore.”

Enter Lord Stanley

King: “What news?”

Stanley: “Richmond is on the seas.”

King: “There let him sink.”

Stanley: “Stirred up by Buckingham, he makes for England to claim his crown.”

King: “Is the chair empty? Is the King dead? Go then and muster men.”

Enter a messenger

Messenger: “Many more confederates are in arms, and every hour more flock to the rebels, and their power grows strong. The army of great Buckingham -“

Richard strikes the messenger

King: “There, take that till thou brings better news.”

Catesby: “My liege, he Duke of Buckingham is taken – that is the best news.”

Analysis

At the end of Henry VI Queen Margaret, Henry’s queen, has lost everything to King Edward, Queen Elizabeth, Richard and the entire York clan. She declared a prophecy that their day would come as well and although she was banished she has returned to bear witness to the prophecy’s fulfilment. Indeed, she takes great delight watching Queen Elizabeth and the Duchess of York lose everything to Richard. And yet, there is also recognition that the women are all in it together now, as Margaret instructs Elizabeth how to better curse her fate. This is a powerful scene, as the women attack Richard with scathing tongues. Indeed, his own mother’s curses are especially virulent and shocking.

Richard determines that he must marry Queen Elizabeth’s daughter, Elizabeth, in order to best secure his claim to the throne. So Anne is murdered and only after the women have collectively confronted Richard with their rage does he propose to Queen Elizabeth his plan to marry her daughter, having murdered her other two children, the Princes, in the Tower. The young Princess Elizabeth will in fact marry Richmond and be the Queen to his reign as Henry VII. She will be mother to King Henry VIII and grandmother to Queen Elizabeth I, Shakespeare’s queen.

Finally, in this scene of over 540 lines, we learn that rebel forces are landing on the coast, led by Richmond and that a variety of armed uprisings are occurring throughout the kingdom. The noose is beginning to tighten around Richard, due to his bloody carnage. Act V will resolve matters nicely, though not for him.

Act IV

Scene v

Lord Derby’s House

Scene v is brief and is simply Lord Stanley withholding his support for Richmond because Stanley’s son is being held ransom by Richard and will be murdered if Lord Stanley is disloyal. Stanley also sends the message to Richmond that Queen Elizabeth heartily consents that Richmond should marry her daughter Elizabeth, freeing her from having to marry that homicide, Richard.

Analysis

Queen Elizabeth’s daughter, Princess Elizabeth, will, in fact, marry Richmond and be queen to him as King Henry VII, essentially ending the War of the Roses, as she is of the House of York and he is of the house of Plantagenet. They will be the parents of Henry VIII and grandparents to Shakespeare’s Queen Elizabeth.

Act V (5 scenes)

Scene i

Salisbury, an open place

Buckingham, being led to his execution

Buckingham: “Will not King Richard let me speak with him?”

Sheriff: “No, my lord.”

Buckingham: “Thus Margaret’s curse falls heavy on my neck. Come, lead me, officers, to the block of shame.”

Analysis

Act V does quickly what it is meant to do, which is to chronicle Richard’s fall. But first, Buckingham, his one time most ardent supporter, must face his doom, as Margaret predicted he would.

Act V

Scene ii

Camp, near Tamworth

Enter Richmond, Oxford and Blunt

Richmond: “Fellows in arms, bruised underneath the yoke of tyranny, thus far into the bowels of the land have we marched on without impediment. In your embowll’d bosoms the foul swine is now even in the centre of this isle, near to the town of Leicester. Tis but one day’s march. In God’s name cheerly on, courageous friends, to reap the harvest of perpetual peace by this one bloody trial of sharp war.”

Oxford: “Every man’s conscience is a thousand men, to fight against this guilty homicide.“

Blunt: “He hath no friends but what are friends for fear.”

Richmond: “All for our vantage. Then in God’s name march!”

Analysis

In scene ii we finally meet the hero of the play, the aforementioned Henry Richmond, the future King Henry VII. He and his forces are confident of their advantage as they approach Bosworth Field and the camp of King Richard.

Act V

Scene iii

Bosworth Field

Enter King Richard, in arms, with Norfolk and Ratcliff

King: “Up with my tent. Here will I lie tonight. The King’s name is a tower of strength. Let’s lack no discipline, for tomorrow is a busy day.”

Enter, on the other side of the field, Richmond

Richmond: “The weary sun hath made a golden set and gives token of a goodly day tomorrow.”

Enter King Richard to his tent

Richard: “I will not sup tonight. I am satisfied. Give me a bowl of wine. I have not that alacrity of spirit nor cheer of mind that I was wont to have. Leave me.”

Richard sleeps

Enter Richmond to his tent

Richmond: “Good lords, I’ll strive with troubled thoughts to take a nap. Good night kind gentlemen.”

Richmond sleeps

Enter the ghost of Prince Edward, son to Henry VI

Ghost: (to Richard) “Think how thou stabbed me in the prime of my youth. Despair, therefore, and die.”

Ghost: (to Richmond) “Be cheerful, Richmond. King Henry’s issue comforts thee.”

Enter the ghost of Henry VI

Ghost: (to Richard) “When I was mortal, my anointed body by thee was punched full of bloody holes. Think on the Tower and me. Despair and die.”

Ghost: (to Richmond) “Virtuous and holy, be thou conqueror. I, who prophesied thou should be King, do comfort thee in thy sleep. Live and flourish!”

Enter the ghost of Clarence

Ghost: (to Richard) “Poor Clarence, by thy guile, betrayed to death! Tomorrow despair and die!”

Ghost: (to Richmond) “Good angels guard thy battle. Live and flourish.”

Enter Ghosts of Rivers, Grey and Vaughan

Ghost of Rivers: (to Richard) “Let me sit heavy on thy soul tomorrow. Despair and die.”

Ghost of Grey: (to Richard) “Think upon Grey, and let thy soul despair!”

Ghost of Vaughan: (to Richard) “With guilty fear, despair and die.”

All three Ghosts: (to Richmond) “Awake and think our wrongs in Richard’s bosom will conquer him. Awake and win the day.”

Enter the ghost of Hastings

Ghost: (to Richard) “Bloody and guilty, guiltily awake, and in a bloody battle end thy days.”

Ghost: (to Richmond) “Quiet and untroubled soul, awake! Arm, fight and conquer, for fair England’s sake!”

Enter the ghosts of the two young Princes.

Ghosts: (to Richard) “Dream on thy cousins smothered in the Tower. Let us be lead within thy bosom, Richard, and weigh thee down to ruin, shame and death! Thy nephew’s souls bid thee despair and die.”

Ghosts (to Richmond) “Sleep, Richmond, in peace, and wake in joy. Live and beget a happy race of kings!”

Enter the ghost of lady Anne, his wife

Ghost: (to Richard) “Richard, thy wife, who never slept a quiet hour with thee, now fills thy sleep with perturbations. Tomorrow in the battle think on me and despair and die.”

Ghost (to Richmond) “Thou quiet soul, sleep thou a quiet sleep; dream of success and happy victory.”

Enter the ghost of Buckingham

Ghost: (to Richard) “The first was I who helped thee to the crown; the last was I who felt thy tyranny. In the battle think on Buckingham and die in terror of thy guiltiness.”

Ghost: (to Richmond) “I died for hope I could lend thee aid; but cheer thy heart and be thou not dismayed. God and good angels fight on Richmond’s side, and Richard falls in height of all his pride.”

The ghosts all vanish. Richard starts out of his dream

King: “Have mercy, Jesu! Soft! I did but dream. O coward conscience, how dost thou afflict me! What do I fear? Myself? There’s no one else by. Richard loves Richard. Is there a murderer here? No – yes, I am. Then fly. What, from myself? Why? Lest I revenge. What, myself upon myself? Alack, I love myself. Wherefore? For any good that I myself have done unto myself? O, no! Alas, I rather hate myself for hateful deeds committed by myself! I am a villain; yet I lie, I am not. Fool, of thyself speak well. Fool, do not flatter. My conscience hath a thousand several tongues, and every tongue brings in a several tale, and every tale condemns me for a villain. There is no creature loves me; and if I die no soul will pity me. And wherefore should they, since I myself find myself no pity to myself? Methouht the souls of all that I had murdered came to my tent, and everyone did threat tomorrow’s vengeance on the head of Richard.”

Enter Ratcliff

King: “O Ratcliff, I have dreamed a fearful dream. I fear! I fear!”

Ratcliff: “Nay, good my lord, be not afraid of shadows.”

King: “Shadows tonight have struck more terror to the soul of Richard than can the substance of ten thousand soldiers, led by shallow Richmond.”

Enter the lords to Richmond in his tent

Lord: “Good morrow, Richmond! How have you slept, my lord?”

Richmond: “The sweetest sleep and fairest-boding dreams that ever entered into a drowsy head have I since your departure had. Methought their souls whose bodies Richard murdered came to my tent and cried on victory. Richard except, those whom we fight against had rather have us win than him they follow. For who is he they follow? Truly, a bloody tyrant and a homicide; one raised in blood, and one in blood established. If you do sweat to put a tyrant down, you sleep in peace, the tyrant being slain. God and Saint George!”

Enter King Richard and Norfolk

Norfolk: “Arm, arm, my lord; the foe vaunts in the field.”

King: “Let not our babbling dreams affright our souls; jConscience is but a word that cowards use, devised at first to keep the strong in awe. Our strong arms be our conscience, swords our law. March on bravely, if not to heaven, then hand in hand to hell. Remember whom you are to cope withal – vagabonds, rascals and runaways, a scum of Britons, and base lackey peasants, whom their over-cloyed country vomits forth to desperate adventures and assured destruction. And who doth lead them but a paltry fellow, a milk-sop. Let’s whip these stragglers. Shall these enjoy our lands? Lie with our wives? Ravish our daughters? Fight, gentlemen of England! A thousand hearts are great within my bosom. Advance upon our foe! Saint George, inspire us with the spleen of fiery dragons!”

Analysis

A classic scene in which the ghosts of Richard’s many victims visit both Richard and Richmond in their dreams and the contrast between the two sets of visitations could not be more vivid. Richard is condemned by all and Richmond instructed to win the day. Richard wakes up afeared and we come face to face with his conscience, a scene most unlike the play’s opening soliloquy. Richard has been a witty two-dimensional homicidal tyrant up to this point, but now his psychological state is revealed as he acknowledges being a murderer and admits that he hates himself for the deeds he has committed. His very conscience condemns himself for a villain and he reflects that no one either loves or pities him. It is too late for redemption, as he has gone too far and the fateful battle is about to begin. He tells Ratcliff that these dreams have struck terror to his soul. Nonetheless, Richard delivers a bitter oration to his troops about the ragged nature of both the stragglers they will face and Richmond himself.

Act V

Scene iv

Another part of the field

Enter Catesby

Catesby: “Rescue, rescue, rescue! The King enacts more wonders than a man! His horse is slain, and all on foot he fights, seeking Richmond in the throat of death. Rescue, or else the day is lost!”

Enter the King

King: “A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse! I think there be six Richmonds in the field; five have I slain today instead of him.”

Analysis

The writing is on the wall. Richard fights furiously but is overwhelmed by the forces allied against him.

Act V

Scene v

Enter Richard and Richmond fighting. Richard is slain. Enter Richmond and Derby, bearing the crown.

Richmond: “The day is ours, the bloody dog is dead.”

Derby: “Courageous Richmond, here this long-usurped royalty from the dead temples of this bloody wretch have I plucked off, to grace thy brows withal.”

Richmond: “Proclaim a pardon to the soldiers fled that in submission will return to us. And then we will unite the white rose and the red. England hath long been mad, and scarred herself; All this divided York and Lancaster. O, now let Richmond and Elizabeth, the true succeeders of each royal house, by God’s fair ordinance conjoin together! And let their heirs, God, if they will be so, enrich the time to come with smooth faced peace, with smiling aplenty, and fair prosperous days! Now civil wounds are stopped , peace lives again – that she may long live here, God say amen!”

Analysis

The long and bloody War of the Roses is over along with the monstrous reign of King Richard III. The two rival houses are securely united in Richmond and Princess Elizabeth. Renaissance England under King Henry VIII, Elizabeth I and James I is just around the corner. One can experience much of the entirety of these Wars of the Roses by reading Shakespeare’s eight play history sequence beginning with Richard II and continuing through Henry IV, Parts I and II, Henry V, Henry VI, Parts I, II and II and concluding with Richard III. Later in his career Shakespeare will write Henry VIII as well.

Final thoughts:

By way of analysis, let’s see what we can make of Act IV. Easily, the most egregious crime purportedly committed by Richard was the murder of the two young Princes in the Tower. There is little doubt that it was Shakespeare who has made such a villain of Richard, and his greatest weapon in rendering him so was making him appear guilty of the horrific murder of the princes. There is little historical evidence that he had them killed and yet this play will become gospel to future generations who see many plays but read little actual history.

Also remember that Margaret was never present in the court of Edward or Richard. She is yet another effective dramatic devise, condemning Richard and his family to their profound griefs. 

As well, Anne and Richard were married for 12 years, with no evidence of Shakespeare’s vile hatred between them, nor Anne’s murder at his hands, either recorded by subsequent historians or chroniclers of the age itself.

The entire drama is a fiction, at best, and the tremendous apprentice work of a young dramatist, at the very least.

And yet the Bard knew precisely what he was doing. Remember that Richmond (Henry VII) was grandfather to Queen Elizabeth I and that Queen Elizabeth’s censors approved all plays before they went public. Shakespeare will also write a play about her father, King Henry VIII, which, in its final scene, has glorious reference to Elizabeth’s birth and prophetic future: “Heaven send prosperous life, long and ever happy, to the high and mighty princess of England, Elizabeth… This royal infant… promises upon this land a thousand thousand blessings, which time shall bring to ripeness…. All princely graces shall be doubled on her. Truth shall nurse her. In her days every man shall live in safety. God shall be truly known.” Need I say more. 

But she loved Master Shakespeare. She loved his comedies in particular. Therein he was safe, as he was with Richard III, so long as Crookback Dickie was depicted as the villain who her grandfather must destroy in order to restore the peace and well being of the realm. 

Richmond, King Henry VII will reign for 24 years. His son, the famous King Henry VIII, will reign for 36 years. His granddaughter, Queen Elizabeth I, Shakespeare’s contemporary, will reign for 44 years. She will die without issue and the crown will be granted to her 2nd cousin once removed, King James Stuart VI of Scotland, who becomes King James I of England. 

So our King Richard III is sandwiched between the Wars of the Roses and the emergence of the Tudor Dynasty. Yes, Shakespeare created the fictional Richard and then goes on to become so successful and his works so well regarded that his Richard supplants the actual historical monarch in the eyes of nearly everyone outside the ‘Richard the Third Society’, which ceaselessly attempts to discredit Shakespeare’s fiction and restore dignity to the historical Richard.

Shakespeare had previously written Titus Andronicus (1589), Two Gentlemen of Verona (1590) and the trilogy of Henry VI plays (1590-92) before this, his first acknowledged masterpiece, with its lone hero-villain, who is shamelessly destroyed by Elizabeth’s family, endearing the Bard significantly to his Queen. A Comedy of Errors (1592), Taming of the Shrew (1594) and Love’s Labour’s Lost (1594-95) will follow. Elizabeth loved Shakespeare’s work. He was regularly summoned to perform his plays at her Royal Court. She died in 1603 and would have seen all of those mentioned above in addition to the classics such as Romeo and Juliet (1595), A Midsummer Night’s Dream (1594-95), The Merchant of Venice (1596-97), Richard II (1595), Henry IV, Parts I-II (1596-98), Much Ado About Nothing (1598-99), As You Like It (1599-1600), Henry V (1599), Julius Caesar (1599), Hamlet (1599-1600), and Twelfth Night (1601). Elizabeth especially loved Shakespeare’s comedies. Once James I is crowned a steady flow of the finest tragedies ever staged commences, including Othello, Macbeth, King Lear and Anthony and Cleopatra.