Henry V

Introduction

Henry V continues the eight play / five monarch sequence from Richard II (1377-1399) to Richard III (1483-1485). King Henry V is by far the most respected and capable of these five monarchs, but the competition for that title is hardly robust, as Richard was murdered for his incompetence, Henry IV was paralyzed by the murder of Richard, Henry VI was less than a year old when he assumed the throne and, although he served a lengthy term as King, he was beleaguered by dissension and the civil war known as the War of the Roses. Finally, Richard III was pretty much a walking homicide, and will be the last English monarch to be killed on the battlefield. Nonetheless, Henry V was a very strong and effective king, who leads his soldiers to one of England’s greatest victories over the French at the Battle of Agincourt. King Henry V may have had a bad reputation prior to ascending the throne, but he united the English as the last great warrior king of the Middle Ages and proved victorious in the famous Battle of Agincourt in 1415 before uniting the English and the French crowns and marrying the daughter of the King of France. Unfortunately, he likely contracted dysentery while conducting a siege of the French town of Meaux and died back home not long afterwards at the age of 35. Henry V stands in vivid contrast to the Prince Hal of the two Henry IV plays, although many of his finest characteristics were honed in Eastcheap with Sir John Falstaff. Shakespeare, in fact, humanizes Henry in this play, portraying him with a tremendous common touch, an abundance of self-awareness, political pragmatism and human understanding. In contrast, the French royal court and military leadership come across as highly artificial and ineffective. The Boar’s Head Tavern crowd is brought forward into this play but they are radically transformed in this new age with a new king. Falstaff is reputed dead, meaning Shakespeare failed to keep his promise made in the epilogue of Henry IV, Part II, to ‘continue the story with Sir John in it’. Mistress Quickly dies of grief and venereal disease, both Bardolph and Nym are hanged, and Pistol decides to leave the army and return to Eastcheap and continue thieving. This is a new age, indeed, and the Eastcheap crew is out of place in it.

What we are witnessing in this play is nothing short of the birth of modern England, and it is achieved, make no doubt about it, through war. War is examined from a variety of perspectives, both glorious and tragic. Henry is an effective Warrior-King, both in his strategic leadership and in his rhetoric. The speeches attributed to King Henry are both manipulative and inspiring, as Shakespeare continues to both stretch and create the newly emerging English language into dizzying fresh heights of expression never before encountered or even envisioned. ‘Once more into the breach, dear friends’ and ‘We few, we happy few, we band of brothers’ have been cited repeatedly throughout English culture. But in the final analysis this is a story about a genuine high point in English history, when a smaller ‘band’ of English soldiers routed a much larger French army. This is the most nationalistic play in English history and Shakespeare’s most patriotic. Speeches have been lifted from this play at various patriotic moments in English history, such as during world war two when Winston Churchill used ‘we few, we happy few, we band of brothers’ in his radio broadcast describing ‘how many owe so much to the so few’ English pilots who held off the Nazi air force and saved the country during the Battle of Britain in 1940. Perspectives have altered tremendously about this play, depending on precisely when it was staged and by whom. There was absolutely no romanticizing world war one and in its immediate aftermath there was a version highly critical of such jingoistic glorification of the brutality of war. At other times King Henry V is celebrated a great conqueror, a national hero and the strongest English monarch prior to King Henry VIII. He was certainly fond of war and had developed a common touch as Prince Hal. But the Prince Hal who Falstaff was every bit in love with is certainly not the King Henry V of this play, who is more like Hotspur than one of the Eastcheap staples. It has been suggested that he took his father up on his advice to ‘busy giddy minds with foreign quarrels’ and it worked out exceedingly well for him. One can only guess what his reign might have been had he remained home. Henry V is rarely included on a list of Shakespeare’s most vaunted works of genius. It is tremendous heroic English history but it lacks the character depth of those finest plays. This is a play about great events more than great individuals, as we don’t penetrate the interior of King Henry’s individuality or motivations as we do Hamlet, Lear, Juliet or Falstaff. This is a play about exterior life, in which we admire King Henry because it seems we ought to. Shakespeare’s history plays were among the most popular productions staged in his lifetime and Henry V, with its reformed Prince Hal assuming the throne and becoming a great warrior king in his astonishing conquest of France, is a great example of why this remains true. Today, the popularity of the play has much to do with the films starring Laurence Olivier (1944) and Kenneth Branagh (1989), both most highly recommended and available free on youtube.

Act I

Prologue

Enter Chorus

Chorus: “O for a muse of fire, that would ascend the brightest heaven of invention, a kingdom for a stage, princes to act, and monarchs to behold the swelling scene! Then should the warlike Harry, like himself, assume the port of Mars; and at his heels, should famine, sword and fire, crouch for employment. But pardon, gentles all, can this cockpit hold the vast fields of France? Or may we cram within this wooden O the very casques that did affright the air at Agincourt? Let us, ciphers to this great account, on your imaginary forces work. Suppose within the girdle of these walls are now confined two mighty monarchies. Piece out our imperfections with your thoughts; into a thousand parts divide one man; think, when we talk of horses, that you see them printing their proud hoofs in the receiving earth; for ’tis your thoughts that now must deck our kings, carry them here and there, jumping over times, turning the accomplishment of many years into an hour-glass; for the which supply, admit me Chorus to this history; who, prologue-like, your humble patience pray gently to hear, kindly to judge, our play.“

Analysis

Chorus opens each act of Henry V. In this prologue he reminds us that we will need to use our imaginations to really see the great events we are to witness. We must believe that this Globe Theatre is actually the fields of France and that the few actors are really the grand armies who will fight and die on those fields. Large battles, like Agincourt, are hard to represent on a small theatrical stage, so Chorus hopes we might overcome the limits of the stage by using our mental powers of imagination to experience what is truly intended.

Act I (2 scenes)

Scene i

London. The King’s palace

Enter the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of Ely

Canterbury: “My lord, I’ll tell you; that self bill is urged.”

Ely: “But, how, my lord, shall we resist it?”

Canterbury: “If it passes against us we lose the better half of our possession; for all the temporal lands which men devout by testament have given to the Church would they strip from us.”

Ely: “But what prevention?”

Canterbury: “The King is full of grace and fair regard.”

Ely: “And a true lover of the Holy Church.”

Canterbury: “The course of his youth promised it not. The breath no sooner left his father’s body but that his wildness seemed to die too; yea, at that very moment, consideration like an angel came and whipped the offending Adam out of him, leaving his body as a paradise to envelope and contain celestial spirits. Never was such a sudden scholar made as in this king.”

Ely: “We are blessed in the change.”

Canterbury: “Since his addiction was to courses vain, his companies unlettered, rude and shallow, his hours filled up with riots, banquets, sports…”

Ely: “And so the Prince obscured his contemplation under the veil of wildness.”

Canterbury: “We must needs admit the means how things are perfected.”

Ely: “But my good lord, how now for mitigation of this bill urged by the Commons? Doth his Majesty incline to it, or no?”

Canterbury: “He seems indifferent; or rather swaying more upon our part than against us; for I have made an offer to his Majesty – upon our spiritual convocation as touching France – to give a greater sum than ever at one time the clergy yet did to his predecessors part withal.”

Ely: “How did this offer seem received, my lord?”

Canterbury: “With good acceptance of his Majesty; save that there was not time enough to hear, as the French ambassador upon that instant craved audience; and the hour, I think, is come to give him hearing. So we go in.”

Analysis

A bill has been passed by the Commons which would strip the Church of much of its possessions and help to finance the King’s government. Naturally, these two powerful church figures want to prevent this bill from gaining royal assent. Their hope is to encourage the king to fight to reclaim lands lost in France by his predecessors, to which the Church will make an unprecedented contribution. There is much discussion, as always with King Henry V, of his wayward days and the extraordinary transformation that has thankfully occurred in him since his father’s death. The French ambassador has arrived and their meeting is the subject of scene ii.

Act I

Scene ii

London. The palace

Enter the King, Exeter and Westmoreland

King: “Where is my gracious Lord of Canterbury? Send for him.”

Westmoreland: “Shall we call in the ambassador, my liege?”

King: “Not yet. We would be resolved, before we hear him, of some things of weight that task our thoughts, concerning us and France.”

Enter the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of Ely

Canterbury: “God and the angels guard your sacred throne, and make you long become it!”

King: “We thank you. My learned lord, we pray you to proceed, and justly and religiously unfold why the law should or should not bar us from our claim. For God doth know how many, now in health, shall drop their blood in approbation of what your reverence shall incite us to. Therefore, take heed how you awaken our sleeping sword of war. For never two such kingdoms did contend without much fall of blood. May I with right and conscience make this claim?”

Canterbury: “Gracious lord, unwind your bloody flag, look back into your mighty ancestors. Go, my dread lord, to your great-grand-sire’s tomb, invoke his warlike spirit and your great uncle’s, Edward the Black Prince, who on the French ground played a tragedy, making defeat on the full power of France.”

Ely: “Awake remembrance of these valiant dead, and renew their feats. You are their heir; you sit upon their throne; the blood and courage that renowned them runs in your veins, ripe for exploits and mighty enterprises.”

Exeter: “Your brother kings and monarchs of the earth do all expect that you should rouse yourself, as did the former lions of your blood.”

Westmoreland: “They know your Grace hath cause and means and might – never King of England had nobles richer and more loyal subjects, whose hearts have left their bodies here in England and lie in the fields of France.”

Canterbury: “O, let their bodies follow, my dear liege; with blood and sword and fire to win your right! In aid whereof we of the spirituality will raise your Highness such a mighty sum as never did the clergy at one time bring in to any of your ancestors.”

King: “We must not only arm to invade the French, but lay down our proportions to defend against the Scot, who will make road upon us with all advantages. For you shall read that my great-grandfather never went with his focus into France but that the Scot on his unfurnished kingdom came pouring, like the tide into a breach, with ample and brim fullness of his force, that England, being empty of defence, hath shook and trembled at the ill neighbourhood.”

Westmoreland: “There’s a saying, very old and true: if that you will France win, then with Scotland first begin.“

King: “Now we are resolved; France being ours, we’ll bend it to our awe, or break it all to pieces.“

Enter the ambassadors to France

King: “Now are we well prepared to know the pleasure of our fair cousin Dauphin. Tell us the Dauphin’s mind.”

Ambassador: “Thus then, your highness did claim some certain dukedoms in the right of you great predecessor, King Edward III. In answer of which claim, the Prince our master says that you savour too much of your youth, and bids you be advised there’s nought in France that can be with a nimble galliard won; you cannot revel into dukedoms there. He therefore sends you this treasure and desires you let the dukedoms that you claim hear no more of you. This the Dauphin speaks.”

King: “What treasure, uncle?“

Exeter: “Tennis balls, my liege.“

King: “We are glad the Dauphin is so pleasant with us; when we have matched our rackets to these balls, we will in France, by God’s grace, play a set shall strike his father’s crown into the hazard. Tell him he hath made a match with such a wrangler that all the courts of France will be disturbed. And we understand him well, how he comes over us with our wilder days, not measuring what use we made of them. But tell the Dauphin I will be like a king when I do and rouse me in my throne of France. I will rise there with so full a glory that I will dazzle all the eyes of France, yea, strike the Dauphin blind to look on us. And tell the pleasant Prince this mock of his hath turned his balls to gun-stones, and his soul shall stand sore charged for the wasteful vengeance that shall fly with them; for many a thousand widows shall this his mock mock out of their dear husbands; mock mothers from their sons, mock castles down; and some are yet ungotten and unborn that shall have cause to curse the Dauphin’s scorn. Tell you the Dauphin, I am coming on, to venge me as I may and to put forth my rightful hand in a well-hallowed cause. So get you hence in peace, and tell the Dauphin his jest will savour but of shallow wit, when thousands weep more than did laugh at it. Convey them with safe conduct. Fare you well.”

Analysis

Before King Henry speaks with the French ambassadors, he chooses to meet with his Church advisors about the wisdom and practicality of invading France. All of his advisors encourage him toward France. The Church, hoping to get around the ‘self bill’ in the Commons, offers an unprecedented donation to King Henry for these wars in France. Henry is concerned that while invading France the Scots may invade England from the north, as is their historic tendency. He is convinced to only bring one quarter of his forces to France and to leave the rest behind in the defence of England. King Henry agrees to proceed with the invasion of France before he even speaks with the French ambassadors. The Dauphin, son to the French King and heir to the throne, has his ambassador hurl insults before King Henry, suggesting that he is still too young and wild to be a responsible adult or a threat to France. Furthermore, the Dauphin has sent King Henry a gift of tennis balls for the young and playful king, only mocking him further. King Henry is furious and warns the Dauphin through his ambassador, that he could not be more wrong about King Henry, who will descend upon France and ascend to the French throne. He is determined to avenge this insult by wreaking havoc on France. King Henry turns the joking mockery around onto the Dauphin with his bold and avenging rhetoric, which sounds like anything but the words of a child. The stage is set for France.

Act II (4 scenes)

Prologue

Chorus: “Now all the youth of England are on fire; now thrive the armourers, and honour’s thought reigns solely in the breast of every man; they sell the pasture now to buy the horse. For now sits expectation in the air, promised to Harry and his followers. The French, advised by good intelligence of this most dreadful preparation, shake in their fear and with pale policy seek to divert the English purposes. But see thy fault! France hath in thee found out a nest of hollow bosoms, which he fills with three corrupted men – Richard Earl of Cambridge, Henry Lord Scroop and Sir Thomas Grey of Northumberland – have – o guilt indeed – confirmed conspiracy with fearful France. The sum is paid, the traitors are agreed, and the scene is now transported, gentles, to Southhampton. There is the playhouse now, and there must you sit, and thence to France shall we convey you safe and bring you back, charming the narrow seas to give you gentle pass; for, if we may, we’ll not offend one stomach with our play.“

Analysis

Chorus informs us that England is wholly committed to war with France and the French are fearful as they observe the preparations. However, the French have corrupted three prominent Englishmen with payments to have King Henry killed in Southhampton, where our play now moves before we journey to France on seas calm enough to ensure not a single stomach will be upset. Great action is clearly afoot here.

Act II (4 scenes)

Scene i

London. The Boar’s head Tavern in Eastcheap

Enter Nym and Bardolph

Bardolph: “Well met, Corporal Nym.”

Nym: “Good morrow, Lieutenant Bardolph.”

Bardolph: “What, are Pistol and you friends yet?”

Nym: “For my part, I care not.”

Bardolph: “We’ll be all three sworn brothers to France. It is certain, Corporal Nym, that he is married to Nell Quickly, and certainly she did you wrong, for you were troth to her.”

Nym: “I cannot tell; things must be as they may. Though patience be a tired mare, yet she will plod.”

Enter Pistol and Hostess Quickly

Bardolph: “Here comes Pistol and his wife.”

Nym: “How now, mine host Pistol!”

Pistol: “Base tike, call me host? I swear I scorn the term; nor shall my Nell keep lodgers.”

Nym draws his sword

Hostess: “Now we shall see wilful adultery and murder committed.”

Pistol: “Iceland dog! Thou prick-eared cur of Iceland!”

Hostess: “Good Corporal Nym, show thy valour and put up your sword.”

Pistol: “O viper vile!”

Nym: “If you grow foul with me, Pistol, I will scour you with my rapier.”

Pistol: “O braggart vile. The grave doth gape and doting death is near. Therefore exhale.”

Pistol draws his sword

Bardolph: “Hear me, he that strikes the first stroke I’ll run him up to the hilts, as I am a soldier.”

Bardolph draws his sword. Pistol and Nym sheathe their swords

Nym: “I will cut thy throat one time or another.”

Pistol: “O hound of Crete, think thou my spouse to get? I have and will hold Hostess Quickly.”

Enter Falstaff’s boy

Boy: “Mine host, Pistol, you must come to my master; and your hostess – he is very sick, and would to bed. Faith, he’s very ill.”

Exit Hostess and boy

Bardolph: “Come, shall I make you two friends? We must to France together; why the devil should we keep knives to cut one another’s throats?”

Nym: “You’ll pay me the eight shillings I won of you at betting?”

Pistol: “Base is the slave who pays.”

Pistol and Nym draw their swords

Bardolph: “By this sword, he that makes the first thrust I’ll kill him.”

Nym: “I shall have my eight shillings?”

Pistol: “A noble shall thou have, and present pay; and liquor likewise will I give to thee, and friendship shall combine, and brotherhood. Is not this just? Give me thy hand.”

Hostess: “Come in quickly to Sir John. Ah, poor heart! He is so shaken of a burning that it is most lamentable to behold. Sweet men, come to him.”

Nym: “The King hath run bad humours on the knight.”

Pistol: “Nym, thou has spoken right. His heart is fractured. Let us console the knight.”

Analysis

There is quite the contrast between the heroic and patriotic soldiers suggested in the Act II Prologue by Chorus and these men we encounter in scene one in Eastcheap. This is the former haunt of Prince Hal and Falstaff and these were their friends. Now Hal is the King of England and, as we learn here, Falstaff lies heartbroken, sick and dying from Hal’s rejection of him. If these are the soldiers that will fight the French then one wonders why the French are fearful of the English army. Eastcheap seems a very different place without the wit and energetic banter of Prince Hal and Sir John.

Act II

Scene ii

Southhampton

Enter Exeter, Bedford and Westmoreland

Bedford: “His Grace is bold, to trust these traitors.”

Exeter: “They shall be apprehended by and by.”

Westmoreland: “How smooth and even they do bear themselves, as if allegiance in their bosoms sat, crowned with faith and constant loyalty!”

Bedford: “The King hath note of all that they intend, by interception which they dreamt not of.”

Enter the King and the three traitors

King: “Now sits the wind fair, and we will aboard. My Lord of Cambridge, and my kind Lord Scroop, and you, Sir Thomas Grey, give me your thoughts. Think you not that the powers we bear with us will cut their passage through the force of France?

Scroop: “No doubt, my liege, if each man do his best.”

Cambridge: “Never was monarch better feared and loved than is your Majesty. There’s not, I think, a subject, that sits in uneasiness under the sweet shade of your government.”

Grey: “True: those that were your father’s enemies do serve you with hearts of duty and zeal.”

King: “We therefore have great cause of thankfulness. Now to our French causes: who are the late commissioners?

Cambridge: “I am one, my lord. Your Highness bade me ask for it today.”

Scroop: “So did you me, me liege.”

Grey: “And I, my royal sovereign.”

King: “Then, read them, and know I know your worthiness. Why, how now, gentlemen? What see you in the papers, that you lose so much complexion? Look ye how thy change! Why, what read you there that have so coward and chased your blood out of appearance?”

Cambridge: “I do confess my fault, and do submit me to your Highness’ mercy.”

Grey and Scroop: “To which we all appeal.”

King: “You must not dare, for shame, to talk of mercy. See you, my princes and noble peers, these English monsters! My Lord of Cambridge here – this man hath, for a few light crowns, lightly conspired, and sworn unto the practices of France to kill us here in Southhampton; to the which this knight, no less for bounty bound to us than Cambridge is, hath likewise sworn. But O, what shall I say to thee, Lord Scroop, thou cruel, ungrateful, savage, and inhuman creature? Thou that did bear the key of all my counsels, that knew the very bottom of my soul. Treason and murder ever kept together; but thou, against all proportion, did bring in wonder to wait on treason and on murder. I will weep for thee; for this revolt of thine, methinks, is like another fall of man. Arrest them to the answer of the law; and God acquit them of their practices!”

Exeter: “I arrest thee of high treason, by the name of Richard, Earl Cambridge. I arrest thee of high treason, by the name of Lord Scroop. I arrest thee of high treason, by the name of Thomas Grey, knight, of Northumberland.”

Scoop: “I repent my fault more than my death; which I beseech your Highness to forgive, although my body pay the price of it.”

Cambridge: “God be thanked for prevention, which I in sufferance heartily will rejoice, beseeching God and you to pardom me.”

Grey: “Never did faithful subject more rejoice at the discovery of most dangerous treason than I do at this hour joy over myself, prevented from a damned enterprise.”

King: “Hear your sentence: you have conspired against our royal person, joined with an enemy proclaimed and from his coffers received the golden earnest of our death; wherein you would have sold your king to slaughter, his princes and his peers to servitude, his subjects to oppression and contempt, and his whole kingdom into desolation. Touching our person we seek no revenge; but we our kingdom’s safety must so tender, whose ruin you have sought, that to the laws we do deliver you. Get you therefore hence, poor miserable wretches, to your death.”

Exit Cambridge, Scroop and Grey, under guard

King: “Now lords, for France; cheerly to sea; no king of England, if not king of France!

Analysis

Henry and his forces are at the port of Southhampton, preparing to voyage to France, when they have received word of three notable traitors in their midst. They are each respectable peers of the realm and King Henry consults them for their advice on the war against France before exposing their crimes and having them arrested and put to death for treason. They were prepared to murder King Henry before he boarded his ship for France. One of them, Lord Scroop, was a very close friend to the king. Only now, do the king’s forces cross the sea.

Act II

Scene iii

Eastcheap. The Boar’s Head Tavern

Enter Pistol, Hostess Quickly, Nym, Bardolph and Falstaff’s boy

Pistol: “Falstaff is dead.”

Bardolph: “Would I were with him, either in heaven or in hell!”

Hostess: “Sure, he’s not in hell; he’s in Arthur’s bosom, if ever man went to Arthur’s bosom. I saw him fumble with the sheets, and play with flowers, and smile upon his fingers’ end, and I knew there was but one way. I put my hand into his bed and felt his feet; and they were as cold as any stone; and then I felt his knees, and so upward and upward, and all was as cold as any stone.”

Nym: “They say he cried out for sack.”

Hostess: “Ay, that he did.”

Bardolph: “And for women.”

Boy: “Yes, that he did, and said they were devils incarnate.”

Pistol: “Let us for France.”

Bardolph: “Farewell Hostess.”

Hostess: “Farewell; adieu.”

Analysis

Here is the scene of Falstaff’s death. In the epilogue to Henry IV, Part II, the speaker promises to bring him back into this play, but that was never likely. This play is not principally about Eastcheap or the life of the rogues who inhabit it. Falstaff would either have been lost in Henry V or he would have overwhelmed it with his old familiar wit and exuberance. And besides, Shakespeare satisfied the Queen’s craving for more of Falstaff by hurriedly penning the dubious ‘Merry Wives of Windsor’, which is all Falstaff, silly and witless as he is therein presented. So here is the end of a Shakespeare legend. He remains the Bard’s favourite character for countless fans. Pistol brings news of his death and he is mourned at the Boar’s Head, appropriately so, by those who he cavorted with so openly in Henry IV, Part I. They say he cried out for sack and for women just before he died. What a way to go! Au Revoir, Sir John!

Act II

Scene IV

France. The King’s palace

Enter King Charles of France, the Dauphin (his son and heir) and the Constable of France

King of France: “Thus come the English with full power upon us; and more than carefully it concerns us to answer royally in our defences. And you, Prince Dauphin, with all swift dispatch, line and new repair our towns of war with men of courage and with means defendant.”

Dauphin: “My most redoubted father, defences, musters, and preparations should be maintained, assembled and collected, as were a war in expectation. And let us do it with no show of fear, for, my good liege, England is so idly king’d her sceptre so fantastically bourne by a vain, giddy, shallow, humorous youth, that fear attends her not.”

Constable:”O peace, Prince Dauphin! You are too much mistaken in this king. Question your Grace the late ambassadors how well supplied with noble counsellors, how modest in exception, and withal how terrible in constant resolution.”

Dauphin: “‘Tis not so, my Lord High Constable; but in cases of defence ’tis best to weigh the enemy more mighty than he seems.'”

King of France: “Think we King Harry strong; and, Princes, look you strongly arm to meet him. He is bred out of that bloody strain that haunted us in our familiar paths. Witness our too much memorable shame when all our Princes were captive by Edward, Black Prince of Wales. This is a stem of that victorious stock; and let us fear the native mightiness and fate of him.”

Enter a messenger

Messenger: “Ambassadors from Harry, King of England, do crave admittance to your Majesty.”

King of France: “We’ll give them present audience. Go and bring them.”

Dauphin: “Good my sovereign, let them know of what a monarchy you are the head.”

Enter lords with Exeter

King of France: “From our brother of England?”

Exeter: “From him, and thus he greets your Majesty: he wills you, in the name of God Almighty, that you divest yourself, and lay apart the borrowed glories that by gift of heaven – namely the crown. Resign your crown and kingdom.”

King of France: “Or else what follows?”

Exeter: “Bloody constraint; for if you hide the crown even in your hearts, there will he rake for it. In fierce tempest he is coming, and bids you, deliver up the crown; and to take mercy on the dear souls for whom this hungry war opens his vast jaws, turning the widow’s tears, the orphan’s cries, the dead men’s blood, the maidens’ groans, that shall be swallowed in this controversy. This is his claim, his threatening, and my message.“

King of France: “For us, we will consider this further; tomorrow, shall you bear our full intent back to our brother England.”

Dauphin: “For the Dauphin, what to him from England?”

Exeter: “Scorn and defiance, slight regard, contempt doth he prize you at. Thus says my king. He shall chide your trespass and return your mock.”

Dauphin: “I desire nothing but odds with England. To that end, as matching to his youth and vanity, I did present him with the Paris balls.”

Exeter: “He’ll make your Paris Louvre shake for it, and be assured you’ll find a difference, as we his subjects have wonder found, between the promise of his greener days and these he masters now. Now he weighs time even to the utmost grain; that you shall read in your own losses, if he stay in France.

Analysis

The French court is deeply divided. The Dauphin remains eager to fight, as he still believes King Henry to be the foolish youth he was as Prince Hal. But the King and others in the court are not convinced of this. The ambassadors are certain of his might and the King reminds the Dauphin that King Henry is directly descendent of the great warriors from England who have previously plagued France, such as Edward, the Black Prince of Wales and King Edward III. Just then Exeter arrives from King Henry, insisting that the French King surrender his crown to Henry or suffer the grievous consequences for the poor souls of France. The King will announce his decision the following morning. As the battle draws closer we see the perspectives of both the English and the French. King Charles appears wise and cautious, unlike his son, who can’t wait to fight the English. Exeter’s message to King Charles from King Henry is clear and daunting. Deliver up your crown or else suffer the destruction of France and the French people. The first two acts have prepared us for war. Act III will deliver.

Act III (7 scenes)

Prologue

“Thus with imagined wing our swift scene flies. Suppose that you have seen the well-appointed King at Hampton pier embark his royalty. Play with your fancies; and in them behold upon the tackle-ships boys climbing; hear the shrill whistle; behold the threaden sails; draw the huge bottoms through the borrowed sea, breasting the lofty surge. O, do but think you behold a city on the inconstant billows dancing; for so appears this fleet majestical, holding due course to Harfleur. Follow, follow! Grapple your minds to steerage of this navy and leave your England, guarded with grandsires, babies and old women; for who is he that will not follow these culled and choice-drawn cavaliers to France? Work, work your thoughts, and therein see a siege, with fatal mouths gaping on girded Harfleur. Suppose the ambassador from the French comes back; tells Harry that the King doth offer him Katherine his daughter, and with her to dowry some petty and unprofitable dukedoms. The offer likes not; and the devilish canon touches, and down goes all before them. Still be kind, and eke out our performance with your mind.“

Analysis

Chorus describes King Henry’s voyage to France and to the siege of Harfleur. The French King Charles did not offer to surrender his crown, as requested, but rather only offered a few dukedoms and his daughter’s hand in marriage. King Henry rejected this offer and therefore the siege of Harfleur continues.

Act III

Scene i

France, before Harfleur

Enter King Henry and soldiers

King: “Once more into the breach, dear friends, once more; or close the wall up with our English dead. In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man as modest stillness and humility; but when the blast of war blows in our ears, then imitate the action of the tiger: stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood, disguise fair nature with hard-favoured rage; then lend the eye a terrible aspect; set the teeth and stretch the nostrils wide; hold hard the breath, and bend up every spirit to his full height. On, on, you noblest English, whose blood is fet from fathers of war-proof – fathers like so many Alexanders. Dishonour not your mothers. Be copy now to men of grosser blood, and teach them how to war. Let us swear that you are worth your breeding – which I doubt not; for there is none of you so mean and base that hath not noble lustre in your eyes. I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips, straining upon the start. The game’s afoot; follow your spirit; and upon this charge cry ‘God for Harry, England and St George!“

Analysis

As the battle to break the defences of Harfleur begins King Henry commands his men with a gallant and powerful speech intended to inspire them to fight like true Englishmen. He conjures up their ancestors and their manhoods, while evoking English patriotism. ‘Let us swear that you are worth your breeding.’ This is a play about war and we are about to plunge into battle in Acts III and IV. Often considered one of the great passages in Henry V, this speech has become very well known and appreciated over the many centuries it has been recited. ‘Once more into the breach!’

Act III

Scene ii

Before Harfleur

Enter Nym, Bardolph and Pistol

Bardolph: “On, on, on, on! To the Breach, to the breach!”

Nym: “Pray thee, Corporal, stay; the knocks are too hot.”

Pistol: “Knocks come and go; and swords and shield in bloody field doth win the immortal fame.”

Boy: “Would I were in an alehouse in London! I would give all my fame for a pot of ale and safety.”

Pistol: “And I.”

Enter Fluellen

Fluellen: “Up to the breach, you dogs! Avaunt, you cullions! (he drives them forward)

Pistol: “Be merciful, great duke, to men of mould; abate thy only rage.”

Exit all but the boy

Boy: “As young as I am, I have observed these three swathers. I am boy to them all three; but indeed three such antics do not amount to a man. For Bardolph, he is white livered and red faced but fights not. For Pistol, he hath a killing tongue and a quiet sword; he breaks words and keeps whole weapons. For Nym, he scorns to say his prayers lest he should be thought a coward; but his few bad words are matched with as few good deeds; for he never broke any man’s head but his own, and that was against a post when he was drunk. They will steal anything, and call it purchase. Bardolph stole a lute-case, bore it twelve leagues, and sold it for three halfpence. Nym and Bardolph are sworn brothers in filching, and in Calais they stole a fire-shovel. They would have me as familiar with men’s pockets and their gloves or their handkerchiefs; which makes much against my manhood, if I should take from another’s pocket to put into mine; I must leave them and seek some better service; their villainy goes against my weak stomach.“

Enter Fluellen and Gower, the King’s officers

Gower: “Captain Fluellen, you must come presently to the mines; the Duke of Gloucester would speak with you.”

Fluellen: “To the mines! Tell the Duke it is not so good to come to the mines.”

Gower: “The Duke of Gloucester is directed by an Irishman.”

Fluellen: “It is Captain MacMorris, is it not?”

Gower: “I think it be.”

Fuellen: “He is an ass; he has no more directions in the true disciplines of war than a puppy-dog.”

Enter MacMorris and Captain Jamy

Gower: “Here he comes; and the Scot’s captain, Captain Jamy with him.”

Fuellen: “Captain Jamy is a marvellous gentleman and of great knowledge in the wars.”

Gower: “How now, Captain MacMorris! Have you quit the mines?”

MacMorris: “By Christ, I swear the work is ill done! But it is no time to discourse. The day is hot, and the wars, and the King and the Dukes; it is no time to discourse. The town is beseeched and the trumpet calls us to the breach; and we talk, and ’tis shame for us to stand still. There are throats to be cut, and work to be done; and there is nothing done.”

Fuellen: “Captain MacMorris, I think there is not many of your nation -“

MacMorris: “Of my nation? What is my nation? Who talks of my nation? I will cut off your head.”

Analysis

The first English soldiers we meet after that great inspirational speech are Bardolph, Nym and Pistol and this does little to suggest that King Henry’s speech to the troops was effective. These are not good soldiers, by anyone’s definition. They simply want to be back in Eastcheap drinking beers. An officer sees them hanging about and beats them back toward the fight but they merely run off again. Falstaff’s boy has become their collective boy now that Falstaff is dead and he appraises them for who they are: cowardly thieves and drunkards and the boy wants done with them before they drag him down with them. These two scenes of the heroic speech and the pathetic soldiers contrast nicely with each other, no doubt just as Shakespeare intended. Then there is this curious encounter between the King’s officers and an Irishman and a Scot, who are digging tunnels under the walls of the town. The purpose of this encounter seems to have little to do with the plot advancement. In fact Shakespeare is offering us a glimpse of the variety of ethnicities at odds with one another under the King’s banner. Fluellen, one of the officers, does not want to go down in the mines because the Irishman in charge is apparently blustery but incompetent. An argument ensues between Fluellen and the Irishman, which ends with the Irishman threatening to cut off Fluellen’s head. They are supposed to be one army against the French but the English, Scots, Irish and Welsh struggle with each other as well. No doubt, Shakespeare’s English audiences would have appreciated this scene perhaps more than we can.

Act III

Scene iii

Before the gates of Harfleur

Enter the governor of the town on the wall and the King and his officers at the gates

King: “How yet resolves the governor of the town? This is the last parle we will admit. If I begin the battery once again, I will not leave the half-achieved Harfleur till in her ashes she lie buried. The gates of mercy shall be all shut up, and the flesh’d soldier, rough and hard of heart, mowing like grass your fresh fair virgins and your flowering infants. What is it then to me if impious war, arrayed in flames, like to the prince of fiends, do all fell feats enlinked to waste and desolation? What is it to me if your pure maidens fall into the hand of hot and forcing violation? You men of Harfleur, take pity of your town and your people. If not, look to see the blind and bloody soldier with foul hand defile the locks of your shrill-shrieking daughters, your fathers taken by the silver beards, and their most reverend heads dashed to the walls; your naked infants spitted upon pikes. What say you? Will you yield, and this avoid? Or, guilty in defence, be thus destroyed.“

Governor: “Our expectation hath this day an end. The Dauphin returns to us that his powers are yet not ready to raise so great a siege. Therefore, great King, we yield our town and lives to thy soft mercy, for we no longer are defensible.”

King: “Open your gates. Uncle Exeter, go you and enter Harfleur; use mercy to them all. Tonight in Harfleur we will be your guest.”

The King and his officers enter the town

Analysis

The sides parle and the King states that unless the English be admitted into the town the soldiers will fight their way in and rape and murder all of the inhabitants. The governor has no choice, essentially, and opens the gates to the English. The King tells his troops to use mercy on them all in the town. The town is taken… the easy way.

Act III

Scene iv

Rouen. The French King’s palace

Enter Katherine, daughter to the King, and Alice, her lady

(This entire scene is presented in French. I am working off of a translation here)

Katherine: “Alice, you have been to England and you know the language.”

Alice: “A little, madam.”

Katherine: “Please teach me English. I must learn to speak it. What is the word for ‘la main’ in English?”

Alice: “That is the hand.”

Katherine: “The hand. And ‘les doigts’?

Alice: “Good lord; I believe it is the fingers.”

Katherine: “I think I am a very apt student. I have learned two words already. What is the word for ‘les ongles’?”

Alice: “That is the nails.”

Katherine: “Tell me the English for ‘le Bras’.”

Alice: “The arm, madam.”

Katherine: “And ‘le coud’?”

Alice: “The elbow.”

Katherine: “Let me practice all of the words you have taught me so far: The hand, the fingers, the nails, the arm and the elbow. What is the word for ‘le col’?”

Alice: “The neck.”

Katherine: “Ane ‘le menton’?”

Alice: “The chin.”

Katherine: “The chin.”

Alice: “Your highness pronounces the words like a native English speaker.”

Katherine: “What are the words for ‘le pied’ and ‘la robe’?”

Alice: “The foot and the gown.”

Katherine: “That is enough for one lesson. Let’s go to lunch.”

Analysis

Katherine’s father has offered her to be King Henry’s wife, so she is wise to learn a bit of English from her lady, who has spent some time in England. There is a humorous set of lines wherein two of the English words (for foot and gown) are very similar to the vulgar words fuck and cunt, and Katherine determines that English is a very disgusting language and she is unimpressed with it. We will meet her again in a very touching scene with King Henry in Act V, when they will, indeed, agree to marry.

Act III

Scene v

The French King’s palace

Enter the King of France, the Dauphin and the Constable of France

Constable: “Where have they this mettle? Is not their climate foggy, raw and dull?“

Dauphin: “By faith and honour, our madams mock at us and plainly say our mettle is bred out, and they will give their bodies to the lust of English youth.“

King of France: “Where is Montjoy? Let him greet England with our sharp defiance. Up, Princes, and, with the spirit of honoured edged more sharper than your swords, hie to the field. Harry of England sweeps through our land. Go down upon him, you have power enough, and in a captive chariot into Rouen bring him our prisoner.”

Constable: “Sorry am I his numbers are so few, his soldiers sick and famished in their march; for I am sure when he shall see our army, he’ll drop his heart into the sink of fear.”

King of France: “Quickly bring us word of England’s fall.”

Analysis

The English are moving across France and the French cannot figure out how they came to be so courageous, coming from such a dreary climate. They are humiliated and determined to turn the tide on King Henry’s forces, who are ‘sick and famished in their march’. In fact, the historical truth is that the English army suffered enormous contagions in their time in France. King Henry himself will die of an illness caught during these battles. So the French have every reason to believe that thy have the English right where they want them and the French King expects results: ‘Quickly bring us word of England’s fall.’

Act III

Scene vi

The English camp in Picardy

Enter Fluellen and Gower

Gower: “How now, Captain Fluellen! Come you from the bridge?”

Fluellen: “I assure you there are very excellent services committed at the bridge. The Duke of Exeter is a man who I love and honour with my soul and my heart and my duty. He, God be praised, keeps the bridge most valiantly, with excellent discipline. There is a lieutenant there at the bridge; he is as valiant a man as Mark Antony.”

Gower: “What do you call him?”

Fluellen: “He is called Pistol. Here is the man.”

Enter Pistol

Pistol: “Fortune is Bardolph’s foe, and frowns on him; for he hath stolen a pax, and hanged must he be – a damned death! Let gallows gape for dog; let man go free. But Exeter has given the doom of death for pax of little price. Therefore, go speak, for the Duke will hear thy voice.”

Fluellen: “If he were my brother I would desire the Duke to put him to execution; for discipline ought to be used.”

Pistol: “Die and be damned!”

Gower: “Why, this is an arrant counterfeit rascal; I remember him now – a bawd, a cutpurse. ‘Tis a gull, a fool, a rogue, that now and then goes to the wars to grace himself, under the form of a soldier. You must learn to know such slanders of the age, or else you may be marvellously mistook.”

Enter the King and his poor soldiers with Gloucester

King: “How now, Fluellen! Came thou from the bridge?”

Fluellen: “Ay, so please your Majesty. The Duke of Exeter has very gallantly maintained the bridge. I think the Duke hath never lost a man, but for one that is likely to be executed for robbing a church – one Bardolph, if your Majesty knows the man; his face is all bubukles and knobs and flames of fire.”

King: “We gave express charge that in our marches through the country there be nothing taken but paid for, none of the French upbraided or abused in disdainful language.”

Enter Montjoy

King: “What shall I know of thee?”

Montjoy: “Though we seemed dead we did but sleep. Now we speak upon our cue, and our voice is imperial: England shall repent his folly, see his weakness, and admire our sufferance. Bid him therefore consider of his ransom, which must proportion the losses we have borne and the disgrace we have digested.”

King: “Thou dost thy office fairly. Tell thy king I do not seek him now, but could be willing to march on to Calais, though ’tis no wisdom to confess so much into an enemy of craft and vantage. My people are with sickness much enfeebled; my number lessen’d; and those few I have almost no better than so many French. Tell thy master here I am; my ransom is this frail and worthless trunk; my army but a weak and sickly guard; yet, God before, tell him we will come on. The sum of all our answer is but this: we would not seek a battle as we are; nor as we are, we say, we will not shun it. So tell your master.”

Monty: “I shall deliver so. Thanks to your highness.”

Gloucester: “I hope they will not come upon us now.”

King: “We are in God’s hand, brother, not in theirs.”

Analysis

The English captains marvel how Exeter has managed to hold the bridge without losing a single soldier, except for one Bardolph, who must be hanged for stealing a photo of a crucifix from a church. Pistol asks one of the captains to intercede on Bardolph’e behalf but the captain refuses. The king has made it very clear that there will be no stealing from the French in the march across France. Everything taken must be paid for and the French people must not be abused in any way. One of the captains knows Bardolph to be slanderous rogue. When the King is informed that it is Bardolph, his Eastcheap friend of old, he does not even flinch. Montjoy has a parle with King Henry. The English have been severely affected by ill heath and the French are preparing to annihilate them. Henry admits that he would prefer not to fight at this time, but will not shun a fight if a fight presents itself. This is the setup for the famous Battle of Agincourt, fought in Act IV, where the profoundly outnumbered English will fight the French indeed on the Feast of St Crispian.

Act III

Scene vii

The French camp near Agincourt

Enter the Duke of Orleans, the Dauphin and Lord Rambures

Orleans: “Will it never be morning?”

Dauphin: “What a long night is this.”

Orleans: “The Dauphin longs for morning.”

Rambures: “He longs to eat the English.”

Orleans: “He’s a gallant Prince and simply the most active gentleman of France.”

Enter a messenger

Messenger: “The English lie within fifteen-hundred paces of your tents.”

Constable: “Poor Harry of England! He longs not for the dawning as we do.”

Orleans: “What a wretched and peevish fellow is this King of England.”

Rambures: “That island of England breeds very valiant creatures.“

Orleans: “Foolish cures, that run winking into the mouth of a Russian bear, and have their heads crushed like rotten apples! You may as well say that’s a valiant flea that dares to eat his breakfast on the lip of a lion.”

Constable: “They will eat like wolves and fight like devils.”

Orleans: “Ay, but these English are shrewdly out of beef.”

Contable: “Then shall we find tomorrow they have only stomachs to eat, and none to fight.”

Orleans:”It is now two o’clock; but by ten we shall each have a hundred Englishmen.”

Analysis

The French eagerly await the morning so that they can destroy the pitiful remains of the English army, decimated by illness. This scene is a set up. The French are depicted as arrogant and frivolous in their regard of the English, although Rambures admits that ‘the island of England breeds very valiant creatures’ and Constable suggests they will ‘fight like devils’. The Battle of Agincourt is next up in Act IV.

Act IV

Prologue

Chorus: “From camp to camp, through the mould womb of night, the hum of either army sounds, that the fixed sentinels almost receive the secret whispers of each other’s watch. Fire answers fire; each battle sees the other’s umber’d face; steed threatens steed, in high and boastful neighs piercing the night’s dull ear, and from the tents the armourers accomplishing the knights, with busy hammers, giving dreadful note of preparation. The poor condemned English, like sacrifices, by their watchful fires sit patiently and ruminate the morning’s danger; and their gesture sad presents them so many horrid ghosts. The royal captain of this ruined band walking from watch to watch, from tent to tent, bids them good morrow with a modest smile, and calls them brothers, friends and countrymen. Upon his royal face there is no note how dread an army has surrounded him; but freshly looks, with cheerful semblance and sweet majesty; beholding him, plucks comfort from his looks; a largess universal, his liberal eye doth give to every one, thawing cold fear, that mean and gentle all behold, a little touch of Harry in the night. And so our scene must to the battle fly; where – to the name of Agincourt. Yet sit and see, minding true things by what their mockeries be.“

Analysis

On the night before the battle we check in on both sides. The French outnumber the English five to one and they have already decided how they will divide up the spoils of victory. The English realize they may very well die in the morning, but they sit patiently, comforted by King Henry, who moves amongst the troops with a good word for every man.

Act IV (8 scenes)

Scene i

France. The English camp at Agincourt

Enter King Henry and Gloucester

King Henry: “Gloucester, ’tis true that we are in great danger; the greater therefore should our courage be. There is some soul of goodness in things evil, for our bad neighbour makes us early stirrers. Besides, they are our outward consciences and preachers to us all, admonishing that we should dress us fairly for our end.”

Enter Thomas Eppingham

King Henry: “Lend me thy cloak, Sir Thomas.”

Exit all but the King. Enter Pistol

Pistol: “Art thou officer, or art thou base, common and popular?

King Henry (disguised) “I am a gentleman of a company. Even so, what are you?”

Pistol: “As good a gentleman as the Emperor.”

King Henry: “Then you are better than the King.”

Pistol: “The King’s a heart of gold, a lad of life, an imp of fame. I love the lovely bully. What is thy name?”

King Henry: “Harry Le Roy.”

Pistol: “A Cornish name.”

King Henry: “I am a Welshman.”

Pistol: “Know’st thou Fluellen?”

King Henry: “Yes.”

Pistol: “Tell him I’ll knock his leek about his pate upon St Davy’s Day.”

King Henry: “God be with you.”

Pistol: “My name is Pistol called.”

Exit Pistol

Enter Fluellen and Gower

Gower: “The enemy is loud; you hear him all night.”

Fluellen: “If the enemy is an ass, think you that we should also be an ass?”

Gower: “I will speak lower.”

Fluellen: “I pray that you will.”

Exit Gower and Fluellen

Enter three soldiers, Bates, Court and Williams

Bates: “We have no great cause to desire the approach of day.”

Williams: “We see yonder the beginning of the day, but I think we shall never see the end of it. Who goes there?”

King Henry: (in disguise) “A friend.”

Williams:”Under what captain serve you?”

King Henry: “Under Thomas Eppingham.”

Williams: “A good old commander. I pray, what thinks he of our estate?”

King Henry: “Even as men wrecked upon a sand, that look to be washed off the next tide. I think the King is but a man as I am; the violet smells to him as it does to me; all his senses have but human conditions; in his nakedness he appears but a man; his fears be of the same relish as ours. I will speak my conscience of the King: I think he would not wish himself anywhere but where he is.“

Bates: “Then I would he were here alone; so should he be sure to be ransomed, and a many poor man’s lives save.“

King Henry: “Methinks I could not die anywhere so contented as in the King’s company, his cause being just and his quarrel honourable.“

Williams: “That’s more than we know. But if the cause be not good, the King himself hath a heavy reckoning to make when all those legs and arms and heads, chopped off in a battle, shall join together at the latter day and cry all ‘We died at such a place’ – some swearing, some crying for a surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their children rawly left. I am afeared there are few die well that die in a battle.“

King Henry: “So, if a son that is by his father sent about merchandise do sinfully miscarry upon the sea, the imputation of his wickedness, by your rule, should be imposed upon his father that sent him. But this is not so: the King is not bound to answer the particular endings of his soldiers; for they purpose not their death when they purpose their service. If they die unprovided, no more is the King guilty of their damnation than he was before guilty of those impieties for the which they are now visited. Every subject’s duty is the King’s; but every subject’s soul is his own.”

Williams: “‘Tis certain, every man that dies ill, the ill upon his own head – the King is not to answer for it.”

King Henry: “I myself heard the King say he would not be ransomed.”

Williams: “Ay, he said so, to make us fight cheerfully; but when our throats are cut he may be ransomed, and we never the wiser.”

King Henry: “If I live to see it, I will never trust his word after.”

Williams: “You’ll never trust his word after! Come, ’tis a foolish saying.”

King Henry: “I should be angry with you, if the time were convenient.”

Williams: “Let it be a quarrel between us, if you live.”

King Henry: “I embrace it.”

Williams: “How shall I know thee again?”

King Henry: “Give me any gage of thine, and I will wear it in my bonnet; then if thou dares to acknowledge it, I will make it my quarrel.”

Williams: “Here’s my glove; give me another of thine.”

King Henry: “There.”

Williams: “This will I also wear in my cap.”

King Henry: “If I ever live to see it, I will challenge it.”

Williams: “Keep thy word. Fare thee well.”

Bates: “Be friends, you English fools, be friends; we have French quarrels now.”

Exit the soldiers

King Henry: “Upon the King! Let us our lives, our souls, our debts, our careful wives, our children and our sins, lay on the King! What infinite heart’s ease must kings neglect that private men enjoy! And what have kings that privates have not too, save ceremony? What kind of God art thou, that suffers more of mortal griefs than do thy worshippers? Art thou ought else but place, degree and form, creating awe and fear in other men? Wherein thou art less happy being feared than they in fearing. What drinks thou often but poison’d flattery? Be sick, great greatness, and bid thy ceremony give thee cure! I know ’tis not the balm, the sceptre, and the ball, the sword, the mace, the crown imperial, the robe of gold and pearl, the throne he sits on, nor the tide of pomp that beats upon the high shore of this world – no, not all these, can sleep so soundly as the wretched slave who, with a body filled and vacant mind, gets him to rest, crammed with distressful bread; never sees horrid night, but, all night sleeps in Elysium; and follows so the ever-running year with profitable labour, to his grave. And, such a wretch, winding up days with toil and nights with sleep, enjoys it; but the king keeps the peace whose hours the peasant best advantages. O God of battles, steel my soldiers’ hearts, possess them not with fear! Not today, O Lord, think not upon the fault my father made in compassing the crown! I Richard’s body have interred new, and on it have bestowed more contrite tears than from it issued forced drops of blood; five hundred poor I have in yearly pay, who twice a day their withered hands hold up toward heaven, to pardon blood; and I have built two chantries, where the sad and solemn priests sing still for Richard’s soul. More will I do.“

Analysis

King Henry borrows a cloak and moves among the common soldiers in disguise, talking to whoever he encounters. He first chats with Pistol. When Henry brings up the king Pistol praises Henry rather enthusiastically but then moves away angrily when Henry brings up Fluellen. Next, the King observes a conversation between Fluellen and Gower, with Fluellen reprimanding Gower for speaking too loudly while so close to enemy lines. Finally, three common soldiers join Henry at the campfire. They discuss the pending battle and the soldiers doubt the wisdom and courage of the king. Henry defends the king and one of the soldiers, Williams, challenges him and they agree to single combat if they both survive the battle. Naturally, he has no idea that this is, in fact, the King. Henry goes off on his own and ruminates about the loneliness of a KIng’s life compared to his commoners. He determines that it would be better to be a slave than a king. At least the slave can sleep at night and not constantly worry about keeping the country safe. He prays for his soldiers and asks God not to punish him for the crimes of his father. This is a powerful scene which illustrates King Henry’s close connection to his subjects. The only difference between him and them are the ceremonies associated with the crown. Other than that he is a man, as they are. He reflects on the burdens of kingship and concludes that the king is expected to protect everyone all the time and can never truly rest or be comforted.

Act IV

Scene ii

The French camp

Enter the Dauphin, Orleans, Rambures and Grandpre

Orleans: “The sun doth gild our armour; up, my lords.”

Constable: “Hark how our steeds for present service neigh!”

Dauphin: “Mount them, and make incision in their hides, that their hot blood may spin in English eyes.”

Rambures: “What, will you have them weep our horses blood? How shall we then behold their natural tears?”

Constable: “To horse, you gallant Princes! Do but behold yonder poor and starve band, and your fair show shall suck away their souls, leaving them but the shales and husks of men. There is not enough work for all of our hands; scarce blood enough in all their sickly veins to give each axe a stain. Let us blow on them, the vapour of our valour will overturn them. A very, very little let us do, and all is done. England shall couch down in fear and yield.“

Grandpre: “Why do you stay so long, my lords of France? Yonder carrions, desperate of their bones, ill-favoredly become the morning field; and big Mars seems bankrupt in their beggar’s host. And their executors, the knavish crows, fly over them, all impatient for their hour.“

Constable: “They have said their prayers and they stay for death. Come, come, away! The sun is high, and we outwear the day.”

Analysis

The French prepare for a battle they are certain will be easy. The English army appears small and ragged and the French are extremely confident of victory.

Act IV

Scene iii

The English camp

Enter Gloucester, Bedford, Exeter, Salisbury and Westmoreland

Westmoreland: “Of fighting men they have full three-score thousand.”

Exeter: “That’s five to one; besides, they are all fresh.”

Salisbury: “‘Tis fearful odds. I’ll to my charge. If we no more meet till we meet in heaven, then joyfully, my kind kinsmen – warriors all, adieu!”

Bedford: “Farewell, good Salisbury.”

Exeter: “Farewell, kind lord. Fight valiantly today.”

Enter the King

Westmoreland: “O that we now had here but one ten thousand of those men in England that do no work today.“

King Henry: “My cousin Westmoreland? No, fair cousin; the fewer men, the greater share of honour. I pray thee, wish not for one man more. I would not lose so great an honour as one man more methinks would share from me for the best hope I have. O, do not wish for one more! Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, that he that hath no stomach to this fight, let him depart; we would not die in that man’s company. This day is called the feast of Crispin. He that outlives this day, and sees old age, will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours, and say ‘tomorrow is St Crispin’. Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars, and say ‘these wounds I had on Crispin’s day’. Old men forget, yet, he’ll remember, with advantages, what feats he did that day. Then shall our names, familiar in his mouth as household words – Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter, Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester – be in their flowing cups freshly remembered. This story shall the good man teach his son; from this day to the ending of the world, but we in it shall be remembered – we few, we happy few, we band of brothers; for he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother; and gentlemen of England shall think themselves accursed they were not here, and hold their manhoods cheap while any speaks that fought with us upon St Crispin’s Day.“

Salisbury: “My sovereign lord, bestow yourself with speed: the French are bravely in their battles set, and will with all expedience charge upon us.”

King Henry: “All things are ready, if our minds be so. Thou dost not wish for more help from England, coz?“

Westmoreland: “I would you and I alone, without more help, could fight this royal battle!“

Enter Montjoy, the French ambassador

Montjoy: “I come to know of thee, King Harry, for thy ransom before thy most assured overthrow. The Constable desires thee thou wilt mind thy followers of repentance, that their souls may make a peaceful and a sweet retire from off these fields, where, wretches, their poor bodies must lie and fester.”

King Henry: “I pray thee bear my former answer back: bid them achieve me, and then sell my bones. Good God! Why should they mock poor fellows thus? Many of our bodies shall no doubt find native graves; and those who leave their valiant bones in France, dying like men, though buried in your dunghills, they shall be famed; leaving their earthly parts to choke your clime, the smell thereof shall breed a plague in France. Le me speak proudly: tell the Constable we will not fly – and time hath worn us into slovenly. And my poor soldiers tell me yet ere they’ll be in fresher robes. If they do this – as, God please, they shall – my ransom then will soon be levied. Come thou no more for ransom; they shall have none, I swear, but these my joints.“

Analysis

Here is King Henry’s St Crispin speech, so called as it was delivered on the Feast of St Crispin. It is the most famous passage of the play. They face frightening odds of five to one (3,000 French soldier to 600 English) and he hopes to emblazon their fighting spirits. He claims that though their numbers are few, they should not wish for more men to arrive, since the fewer the men the greater the honour for each man who fights. In fact, his desire is that if there are soldiers who wish not to fight then he will readily provide them with passage home. Those who remain and fight will forever be able to boast that they were here on this glorious day and all of those who were not here will regret that they were not a part of this ‘band of brothers’. The French ambassador requests a surrender from Henry and he firmly but politely rejects the very notion and the English prepare for battle. Perhaps the French should not be quite so confident…

Act IV

Scene iv

The field of battle

Enter French soldiers, Pistol and the boy

Pistol: “Yield, cur!”

French Soldier: “You seem like a gentleman of high rank.” (in French)

Pistol: “What is your name?”

French soldier: “O Seigneur Dieu!” (O God)

Pistol: “O Seigneur Dew, perpend my words and mark: thou diest on my sword unless thou do give to me egregious ransom.”

French soldier: “Have mercy. Take pity on me.” (in French)

Pistol: “I will have forty crowns or I will fetch thy rim out of thy throat in drops of crimson blood.”

French soldier: “Is it impossible to escape your mighty arm?” (in French)

Pistol: “Brass cur! Damned and luxurious mountain-goat!”

French soldier: “Oh spare me!” (in French)

Pistol: “Come hither, boy. Ask this slave what his name is.”

Boy: “He says his name is Master le Fer.”

Pistol: “Bid him prepare; for I will cut his throat unless he gives me gold coins.”

French soldier: “Spare me and I will give you two hundred crowns.” (in French)

Pistol: “Tell him my fury shall abate and I will take the crowns.”

French soldier: “On my knees I thank you again and again. I consider myself fortunate to have fallen into the hands of the noblest , most valiant and most distinguished gentleman in England.”

Pistol: “I will show some mercy.”

Exit Pistol and the French soldier

Boy: “I did never know so full a voice issue from so empty a heart; but the saying is true – the empty vessel makes the greatest sound. Bardolph and Nym had ten times more valour than this roaring devil and they are both hanged; and so would this one be, if he durst steal anything adventurously. I must stay with the lackeys, with the luggage of our camp. The French might have a good prey of us, if they knew of this; for there is none to guard it but boys.”

Analysis

In this comic relief scene, Pistol takes a prisoner and pretends to be fierce and valiant. He cannot speak French and the prisoner does not speak English. The hot-headed Pistol convinces the French soldier that he is a ferocious fighter and the Frenchman, to save his life, offers Pistol two hundred crowns, enough for Pistol to take the money and free the prisoner. The boy helps to translate between the two and after they have departed he reflects upon Pistol and what a blowhard he is compared to Bardolph and Nym, who have both been hanged. The boy returns to guarding all of the English luggage while the English fight the French. If only the French knew that all of the luggage was guarded by young boys they could ‘have a good prey of us’. This scene is played for laughs, just as the battle begins, as both Pistol and the French soldier cannot understand one another until the boy translates for them. Pistol blusters and the French soldier falls for it out of fear and agrees to pay him two hundred crowns in order to preserve his life. The boy reflects on Pistol as though he were an irresponsible child. If only the French army knew how weak and hapless the English were they could simply make prey of the English. Now back to the Battle of Agincourt.

Act IV

Scene v

Another part of the field of battle

Enter Constable, Orleans, Bourbon and the Dauphin

Dauphin: “All is confounded! Reproach and everlasting shame sits mocking in our plumes.”

Constable: “Why, all our ranks are broke.”

Dauphin: “O perdurable shame! Let’s stab ourselves.”

Orleans: “Is this the king we sent to for his ransom?”

Bourbon: “Shame, and eternal shame, nothing but shame! Let us die in honour: once more back again.”

Constable: “Disorder, that hath spoiled us, friend us now! Let us on heaps go offer up our lives.”

Bourbon: “Let life be short, else shame will be too long.“

Analysis

Miraculously, the English have the upper hand in the battle and the French are despairing. Their mocking over-confidence has vanished and they speak of killing themselves, but decide to fight further against all odds. They are thoroughly shocked and shamed.

Act IV

Scene vi

Another part of the field

Enter King Henry, Exeter and prisoners

King Henry: “Well have we done, thrice valiant countrymen; but all’s not done – yet keep the French the field.”

Exeter: “The Duke of York commends him to your majesty.”

King Henry: “Lives he, good uncle? Thrice within this hour I saw him down; thrice up again, and fighting, from helmet to spur all blood he was.”

Exeter: “The noble Earl of Suffolk first died, and York, all haggled over, comes to him and kisses the gashes that bloodily did yawn upon his face, and over Suffolk’s neck he threw his wounded arm and kissed his lips; and so, espoused to death, with blood he sealed a testament of noble-ending love. The sweet manner of it gave me up to tears.”

King Henry: “I blame you not; for, hearing this, I must perforce compound with wistful eyes. The French have reinforced their scattered men. Then every soldier kill his prisoners; give the word through.”

Analysis

The English acknowledge that they have done well, although the French remain active in the field. Exeter relates the heroic and moving story of The Duke of Suffolk and the Duke of York dying together on the field of battle, a story that brings tears to both Exeter and the King. At the end of the scene there is a report that the French are gathering their scattered forces for another attack and King Henry responds by ordering the English to kill all of their prisoners in order to free up the English to fight. This is deeply controversial and unfortunate.

Act IV

Scene vii

Another part of the field

Enter Fluellen and Gower

Fluellen: “Kill the boys and the luggage! ‘Tis expressly against the law of arms; ’tis as arrant a piece of knavery as can be.”

Gower: “‘Tis certain there is not a boy left alive; and the cowardly rascals that ran from the battle hath done this slaughter; besides, they have burned and carried away all that was in the King’s tent; wherefore the King most worthily hath caused every soldier to cut his prisoner’s throat. O, ’tis a gallant King!”

Fluellen: “He was born at Monmouth and I think Alexander the Great was born in Macedon. In the comparisons between Macedon and Monmouth, the situations looks both alike. There is a river in Macedon and there is also a river in Monmouth; ’tis alike as my finger are to my fingers, and there is salmon in both. As Alexander killed his friend, Cleitus, so also Harry turned away the fat knight with the great belly; he was full of jests, knaveries and mocks; I have forgotten his name.”

Gower: “Sir John Falstaff. Here comes his Majesty.”

Enter King Henry

King Henry: “I was not angry since I came to France. If they will fight with us, bid them come down or void the field; they do offend our sight if they’ll do neither; besides, we’ll cut the throats of those we have, and not a man of them that we shall take will taste our mercy. Go and tell them so.”

Enter Montjoy

Exeter: “Here comes the herald of the French.”

Gloucester: “His eyes are humbler than they used to be.”

King Henry:”Come thou again for ransom?”

Montjoy: “No, great King; I come to thee for charitable licence. That we may wander over this bloody field to book our dead, and then to bury them. O, give us leave, great King, to view the field and dispose of our dead bodies.”

King Henry: “I know not if the day be ours or no; for yet many of your horsemen gallop over the field.”

Montjoy: “The day is yours.”

King Henry: “Praised be God. What is this castle called that stands hard by?”

Montjoy: “They call it Agincourt.”

King Henry: “Then we call this the field of Agincourt, fought on the day of Crispin.”

Fluellen: “The Welshmen did good service in a garden where leeks did grow, wearing leeks in their caps; and I do believe your Majesty takes no scorn to wear the leek.”

King Henry: “I wear it for a memorable honour.; for I am Welsh, you know. Bring me just notice of the numbers dead on both our parts. Call yonder fellow hither.”

King Henry: “‘Soldier, why wears thou that glove in thy cap?”

Williams: “‘Tis the gage of one that I should fight, if he be alive.”

King Henry: “An Englishman?”

Williams: “A rascal that swaggered with me last night. I have sworn to take him a box on the ear.”

King Henry: “Then keep thy vow when thou meets this fellow.”

Williams: “So I will, my liege, as I live.”

King: “Fluellen, wear thou this favour for me, and stick it in thy cap; if any man challenge this, he is an enemy to our person.”

Exit Fluellen

King Henry: “My Lord of Warwick and my brother Gloucester, follow Fluellen closely. The glove that I have given him may happily purchase him a box on the ear. Some sudden mischief may arise of it; for I do know Fluellen valiant, hot as gunpowder, and quickly will return an injury; follow, and see there be no harm between them.”

Analysis

French soldiers, fleeing the battlefield, entered into the English camp, attacked the luggage and killed all of the young boys watching over the luggage. The English are furious over this serious violation of the rules of war. We learn that this is why King Henry has ordered the slaughter of all French prisoners. Fluellen and Gower compare King Henry to Alexander the Great. Montjoy, the French ambassador, arrives and requests from King Henry that the French be permitted to scour the bloody battlefield, to identify and bury their dead. Montjoy also declares that the English have won the day. King Henry then encounters Williams, the soldier he had a conflict with in an earlier scene. He plays a joke on Fluellen, by placing the glove in his cap, which will identify him as the man who Williams agreed to fight. He sends men to watch to ensure no harm comes to Fluellen or Williams. So the English have won, against all odds, the Battle of Agincourt. The remainder of Act IV will followup on the feigned conflict between King Henry and Williams and Act V will be mostly about King Henry’s marriage to Princess Katherine, the French King’s daughter.

Act IV

Scene viii

Before King Henry’s pavilion

Enter Fluellen, Gower and Williams

Williams: “Sir, know you this glove?”

Fluellen: “Know the glove? I know the glove is a glove.”

Williams: “I know this; and thus I challenge it.”

Williams strikes Fluellen

Fluellen: “An errant traitor as any in the universal world.”

Williams: “I am not a traitor.”

Fluellen: “That’s a lie in thy throat. I charge you in his Majesty’s name, apprehend him.”

Enter Warwick

Warwick: “How now! What’s the matter?”

Fluellen: “My Lord of Warwick, here is a most contagious treason.”

Enter King Henry

Fluellen: “My liege, here is a villain and a traitor.”

Williams: “My liege, this was my glove; and he that I gave it to promised to wear it in his cap; I promised to strike him if he did; I met this man with my glove in his cap, and I have been as good as my word.”

Fluellen: “Your Majesty, hear now what an arrant, rascally, beggarly, lousy knave he is.”

King Henry: Give me thy glove, soldier. ‘Twas I, indeed, that promised to strike.”

Fluellen: “Your Majesty, let his neck answer for it.”

King Henry: “It was ourself thou did abuse.”

Williams: “Your Majesty came not like yourself: you appeared to me but as a common man. I beseech you take it for your own fault, and not mine.”

King Henry: “Here, uncle Exeter, fit this glove with crowns, and give it to this fellow. Keep it, fellow.”

Enter an English herald

King Henry: “Now, herald, are the dead numbered?”

The herald gives King Henry a paper

King Henry: “This note doth tell me of ten thousand French that in the field lie slain. Where is the number of our English dead?”

The herald gives King Henry another paper

King Henry: “The Duke of York, the Earl of Suffolk, Sir Richard Kikely, Dave Gam, Esquire; none else of name, and all other men but five and twenty. Was ever known so great and little loss on one part and on the other?”

Exeter: “‘Tis wonderful!”

Analysis

Williams has been set up here. King Henry had the confrontation with Williams but then sent Fluellen forth with the glove in his cap so that Williams would attack Fluellen when he saw the glove. Henry tells Williams that it was he that Williams had the argument with. Williams pleads with the King that there was no way he could have known that he was the King when he was disguised as a commoner. Henry has enjoyed his little joke and fills William’s cap full of crowns. A herald arrives with word that there were ten thousand French dead in the Battle of Agincourt but only twenty nine English killed. These numbers, astonishingly, are historically accurate. Apparently, the French broke ranks and fled and the English pursued them and easily picked them off in the heavy rain. King Henry remains an English hero due to this battle, where the English were outnumbered five to one but the French were killed at a rate of four hundred to one. That’ll do it! Time to get back to England, after securing a French wife

Act V

Prologue

“Now we bear the King toward Calais. There seen, heave him away upon your winged thoughts athwart the sea. Behold the English beach. So let him land, and solemnly see him set on to London. Where that his lords desire him to have borne his bruised helmet and his bended sword before him through the city. He forbids it, being free from vainness and self-glorious pride; giving full trophy to God. But now behold how London doth pour out her citizens! The mayor and all his brethren go forth and fetch their conquering Caesar. Now in London place him, till Harry is back again to France. There must we bring him, straight back again to France.”

Analysis

Chorus records King Henry’s travels back to Calais, across the sea to England and back to London, where he is received like Julius Caesar, a conquering hero. Then he is off to France again, before long to woo himself a wife in the fair Katherine, daughter to the French King.

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Act V (2 scenes)

Scene i

France. The English camp

Enter Fluellen and Gower

Gower: “Why wear you your leek today? Saint Davy’s day is past.”

Fluellen: “There is occasion and causes why and wherefore in all things. The rascally, scald, beggarly, lousy, bragging knave, Pistol, he has come to me and brings me bread and salt, and bids me eat my leek; but I will be so bold as to wear it in my cap until I see him once again, and then I will tell him a little piece of my desires.”

Gower: “Why, here he comes, swelling like a cock.”

Fluellen: “‘Tis no matter for his swelling nor his cock. God please you, Pistol, you scary, lousy knave.”

Pistol: “Ha! Art thou bedlam? I am squalmish at the smell of leek.”

Fluellen: “I beseech you hastily, scary, lousy knave, to eat this leek; because you don’t love it, nor your appetite and your digestion does not agree with it, I would desire you eat it.”

Fleullen strikes Pistol

Fluellen: ‘Will you be so good, scald knave, as eat it?”

Pistol: “Thou shalt die.”

Fluellen: “Come, here is sauce for it.”

He strikes him again

Fluellen: “If you can mock a leek, you can eat a leek.”

Gower: “Enough, Captain, you have astonished him.”

Fluellen: “I say I will make him eat some part of my leek, or I will peat his pate four days. Bite, I pray you.”

Pistol: “Must I bite?”

Fluellen: “Yes, certainly. Eat, I pray you; will you have some more sauce with your leek?”

Pistol: “Quiet thy cudgel; thou dost see I eat.”

Fluellen: “Much good do you, scald knave, heartily. Nay, pray you throw none away. The skin is good for your broken coxcomb. Ay, leek is good. If I owe you anything, I will pay you in cudgels. God heal your pate.”

Exit Fluellen and Gower

Pistol: “News have I that my Nell is dead. Old do I wax; and from my weary limbs honour is cudgell’d. Well, baud I’ll turn; to England will I steal, and there I’ll steal.”

Analysis

Apparently Pistol had insulted Fluellen regarding his patriotic leek. Fluellen has been waiting to see him and when he shows up Fluellen beats him and humiliates him by making him eat the leek in his cap. Fluellen is Welsh and Pistol English, and no sooner are the English victorious over the French that the various ethnicities in Britain start to turn on each other once again. Afterwards Pistol reflects soberly that his Nell is dead and he is feeling old and will return to England and become a thief. This scene is played for humour until Pistol’s final reflection, which is anything but funny.

Act V

Scene ii

France. The French King’s palace

Enter at one door King Henry, Exeter, Bedford, Gloucester, Warwick, Westmoreland and other lords; at another door the French King, Queen Isabel, Princess Katherine, Alice, the Duke of Burgundy and others

King Henry: “Peace to this meeting! Unto our brother France, health and fair time of day; joy and good wishes.”

King of France: “Right joyous are we to behold your face, most worthy brother England; so are you, Princes English, every one.”

Queen Isabel: “So happy be the issue, brother England, of this good day and of this gracious meeting, as we are now glad to behold your eyes, which hitherto have borne in them the fatal balls of murdering basilisks; the venom of such looks, we fairly hope, have lost their quality; and that this day shall change all griefs and quarrels into love.”

King Henry: “To cry amen to that, thus we appear.”

Burgundy: “My duty to you both, on equal love, great Kings of France and England! That I have laboured with all my wits to bring your most imperial Majesties unto this bar and royal interview, your mightiness on both parts best can witness. What rub or what impediment there is why that the naked, poor and mangled peace should not in this best garden of the world, our fertile France, put up her lovely visage? Alas, she hath from France too long been chased! And all her husbandry doth lie in heaps, corrupting in its own fertility, her vine unpruned dies; her hedges put forth disordered twigs. My speech entreats that I may know why gentle peace should not expel these inconveniences and bless us with her former qualities.”

King Henry: “You must buy that peace with full accord to all our just demands, whose particular effects you have in your hands.”

Burgundy: “The King hath heard them; to the which as yet there is no answer made.”

King Henry: “Well then, the peace, which you before so urged, lies in his answer.”

King Of France: “I have but with a cursory eye overbalanced the articles; please your Grace to appoint some of your council presently to sit with us once more, to re-survery them.”

King Henry: “Go, uncle Exeter, and brother Clarence, and you, brother Gloucester, Warwick and Huntington, go with the King; and take with you free power to ratify, augment or alter anything in or out of our demands. Yet leave our cousin Katherine here with us; she is our capital demand.”

Exit all but King Henry, Princess Katherine and Alice

King Henry: “Fair Katherine, and most fair, will you vouchsafe to teach a soldier terms, such as will enter into a lady’s ear, and plead his love to her gentle heart?”

Katherine: “Your Majesty shall mock at me; I cannot speak your England.”

King Henry: “O fair Katherine, if you will love me soundly with your French heart, I will be glad to hear you confess it brokenly with your English tongue. Do you like me, Kate?”

Katherine: “I cannot tell vat is like me.”

King Henry: “An angel is like you, Kate, and you like an angel.

“Katherine: (in French) “Oh Lord, the tongue of men are full of deceit.”

King Henry: “In faith, Kate, I am glad thou canst speak no better English; for if thou could, thou would find me such a plain king that thou would think I had sold my farm to buy my crown. I know no ways to mince it in love, but directly to say ‘I love you’. Give me your answer, in faith; how say you, lady? I speak to thee as a plain soldier. If thou can love me for this, take me. Yet I love thee. And while thou lives, dear Kate, take a fellow of plain and uncoined constancy; for these fellows of infinite tongue, that can rhyme themselves into ladies’ favours, they do always reason themselves out again. A speaker is but a prater; a rhyme is but a ballad; a straight back will stoop; a black beard will turn white; a curled pate will turn bald; a fair face will wither; a full eye will wax hollow. But a good heart, Kate, is the sun and the moon; or rather, the sun, and not the moon – for it shines bright and never changes, but keeps his course truly. If thou would have such a one, take me; and take me, like a soldier; take a soldier; take a king. And what says thou, then, to my love? Speak, my fair, and fairly, I pray thee.”

Katherine: “Is it possible dat I should love de enemy of France?“

King Henry: “No, it is not possible you should love the enemy of France, Kate, but in loving me you should love the friend of France; for I love France so well that I will not part with a village of it; I will have it all mine. And, Kate, when France is mine and I am yours, then yours is France and you are mine. It is as easy for me, Kate, to conquer the kingdom as to speak so much more French. I shall never move thee in French, unless it be to laugh at me.”

Katherine: (in French) “Your French, sir, is better than my English.”

King Henry: “Can thou love me?”

Katherine: “I cannot tell.”

King Henry: “Can any of your neighbours tell, Kate? I’ll ask them. Come, I know thou loves me. But, good Kate, mock me mercifully.”

Katherine: (in French) “Your majesty has false French enough to deceive the wisest lady in France.”

King Henry: “By mine honour, in true English, I love thee, Kate; by which honour I dare not swear thou loves me, yet my blood begins to flatter me that thou dost. In faith, Kate, the elder I wax, the better I shall appear: old age can do no more spoil upon my face; tell me, most fair Katherine, will you have me? Take me by the hand and say ‘Harry of England, I am thine’. Which word thou shall no sooner bless mine ear withal but I will tell thee aloud ‘England is thine, Ireland is thine, France is thine, and Henry Plantagenet is thine’; come, your answer is broken music – for thy voice is music and thy English broken; therefore, Queen of all, Katherine, break thy mind to me in broken English, will thou have me?“

Katherine: “That is as shall please the King, my father.”

King Henry: “It will please him well, Kate.”

Katherine: “Then it shall also content me.”

King Henry: “Upon that I kiss your hand, and call you my queen.”

Katherine: (in French) “No sir, stop. Heavens! I can’t allow you to lower yourself by kissing the hand of one of your humble servants.”

King Henry: “Then I will kiss your lips, Kate.”

Katherine: (in French) “It is not the custom of French maidens to kiss before they are married.“

King Henry: “O Kate, nice customs curtsy to great kings. Dear Kate, you and I cannot be confined within the weak list of a country’s fashion: we are the makers of the manners, Kate.”

He kisses her

King Henry: “You have witchcraft in your lips, Kate. Here comes your father.”

Enter the French King and the English lords

Burgundy: “My royal cousin, teach you our Princess English?”

King: “I would have her learn, my fair cousin, how perfectly I love her; and that is good English.”

Burgundy: “Is she not apt?”

King Henry: “Our tongue is rough, coz, and my condition is not smooth, so that, having neither the voice nor the heart of flattery about me, I cannot so conjure up the spirit of love in her that he will appear in his true likeness. Shall Kate be my wife?”

King of France: “So please you.”

King Henry: “I am content.”

King of France: “We have consented to all terms.”

Westmoreland: “His daughter first; and then in sequel, all.”

King Henry: “Give me your daughter.”

King of France: “Take her, fair son, that the contending kingdoms of France and England may cease their hatred, that never war advance his bleeding sword ‘twixt England and fair France.”

Lords: Amen!”

King Henry: “Now, welcome, Kate; and bear me witness all, that here I kiss her as my sovereign queen. Prepare for our marriage.”

Analysis

King Henry has returned to France to establish lasting peace between the two contending kingdoms. Among Henry’s demands is that he marry Katherine, the Princess of France, so that Henry and his heirs will inherit France as well as England. The French King and English lords meet to review Henry’s demands while Henry is left alone with Katherine and her lady, Alice. A playful scene emerges in which Henry attempts to woo Katherine, although his French and her English are rudimentary at best. He does his very best and eventually she agrees to marry him. This encounter is meant to end the play on a light note, as both sides are content that the wars are over, while Henry returns home to marry Katherine. They will be parents to King Henry VI, the subject of Shakespeare’s next play in the sequence. Henry VI will be murdered by the future Richard III, but his son (Henry VII) will kill Richard and be father to Henry VIII of the six wives, who will be father to Shakespeare’s Queen Elizabeth. That’s how close Shakespeare’s audiences will be to the action in this play about King Henry V. It was certainly not ancient history to them.

Epilogue

Chorus: “Thus far, with rough and all-unable pen, our bending author hath pursued the story, in a little room confining mighty men, greatly lived this star of England. Fortune made his sword; and of it left his son imperil lord. Henry the Sixth, an infant crowned king of France and England, did this king succeed; whose state so many had the managing that they lost France and made his England bleed.“

Analysis

The news starts off good about this ‘star of England’, Henry, and his sword of fortune. However, his infant son, Henry VI, became king and so many lords mettled in the affairs of state that France was lost and England did bleed. And so it did, as you can read for yourself in Henry VI, Parts I, II, and III.

Final Thoughts

Once again, Holinshed’s Chronicles were the primary source for this play and the others in this series of history dramas. As well, he appears to have accessed a few anonymous biographies of Henry V, including one, ‘Deeds of King Henry of England’, by a soldier who served at Agincourt. Henry V was very popular during Shakespeare’s lifetime, with the first known performance sometime in 1599, the year it was written. Richard Burbage likely acted in the title role in the first performance at court on 7 January 1605. Then the play disappeared. There is no record of another performance until 1735. Just prior to World War Two, in 1938, an extremely patriotic version was staged by Ivor Novello and yet another such production starring Laurence Olivier was put on in 1944. Many versions have succeeded since then, with Kenneth Branagh’s 1989 production presenting a dramatic interpretation of the warrior king. Both Olivier’s and Branagh’s films are available free on youtube, along with much analysis and many clips from a variety of productions. Other great depictions of Henry V were rendered by Ralph Richardson and Richard Burton. Finally, Christopher Plummer graced the stage in Stratford, Ontario in 1956, in a most memorable Canadian performance.