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Masaryk University Faculty of Arts Department of English and American Studies English Language and Literature Lucie Wanderburgová William Shakespeare’s Second Historical Tetralogy: A Study B.A. Major Thesis Supervisor: Mgr. Pavel Drábek, Ph. D. 2007 I declare that I have worked on this thesis independently, using only the primary and secondary sources listed in the bibliography. …………………………………………….. Acknowledgement I would like to thank my supervisor, Mgr. Pavel Drábek, Ph.D., for his kind help, valuable advice and guidance of my work. Table of Contents 1 Introduction .................................................................................................... 1 2 Shakespearean History Play ........................................................................... 5 2.1 Genre .............................................................................................................................. 5 2.2 Sources .......................................................................................................................... 10 3 Historical and Social Background ................................................................ 13 3.1 Reception of the Plays in Elizabethan Period ......................................................... 13 3.2 Political Situation. Queen Elizabeth‟s Case. ............................................................ 16 4 Second Tetralogy – Reality or Fiction? ......................................................... 19 4.1 Richard II ..................................................................................................................... 19 4.2 Henry IV ....................................................................................................................... 25 4.3 Henry V ........................................................................................................................ 35 5 Conclusion .................................................................................................... 41 Works Cited and Consulted ................................................................................... 43 1 Introduction In my thesis, I will be dealing with Shakespeare‟s second tetralogy of history plays, the four-part series, which examines the historical rise of the English royal House of Lancaster. The plays, which constitute the tetralogy, are Richard II, Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2, and Henry V. The series, written at the height of Shakespeare‟s career (around 1595-1599), moves back in time to cover the period between 1398 and 1420. Shakespeare gave here his epic picture of medieval and contemporary England. The plays were written in chronological order and Shakespeare preserved the unity of the history play cycle. My thesis starts with the chapter on Shakespearean history play in general terms. In this part I will be examining what the term „history play‟ exactly means. In the first instance, there is a question of what genre actually Shakespeare‟s history play is. Are these plays pure historical chronicles (i.e. the dramatisation of past events), personal stories, or rather political writings? In point of fact it is well-known that there is political interest in each play. Some critics are even inclined to believe that it would be more profitable to think of these texts as political rather than historical plays. And I will try to show how they have attained this persuasion. Then I will briefly state the main sources from which Shakespeare derived his ideas because it stands to reason that he must have sought somewhere for themes, situations, and language for foundation of his plays. The thesis continues with the chapter on historical and social background to the history plays. I will be interested in the purpose of histories. What was the real reason that Shakespeare depicted the history in such a way he did in these plays? I believe the important thing to know before observation and apprehension of the plays‟ purpose is to learn at least a little bit about the period and situation under which 1 Shakespeare was writing his plays. The main aim of the chapter is to show how the plays were percieved not only by common people but also by the Queen and other courtly people, and what consequences their perception had for future development of Elizabethan history. The last and largest chapter of my thesis is devoted to the question of what in the plays is reality based on fact and what is pure fiction. I will resolve the chapter into three parts, each pursuing one play. I will be discussing the plays by virtue of their specific themes. Nevertheless, the chief questions are whether the texts were heavily adapted, reconstructed from memory, or solely invented by the author, and what the main divergences from Shakespeare‟s sources are. It has been remarked by various historians and critics that Shakespeare‟s deviations from history in these plays are principally changes of time and place, sometimes including new scenes, and often containing misrepresentation of fact or recreation of character. In each study of the particular play I will comment on some differences from Holinshed‟s Chronicles. Although I will do that mostly in general terms, at the end of each subhead I will try to analyse one or two scenes more at large. It is also important to note that I will regard Holinshed‟s Chronicles as the groundwork for historical facts. As I have mentioned earlier in the introduction, I will concentrate, among others, on the view of the plays in Elizabethan era. However, people should have been influenced by performing Shakespeare‟s history plays also in more recent times, i.e. nineteenth and twentieth centuries. A good example of this1 is Franz von Dingelstedt‟s production of two Shakespeare‟s tetralogies of history plays as a sequence in Germany 1 All information on the reception of the plays given in this paragraph is taken from The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare’s History Plays 2 in 1864. He treated the plays as a single, unified work, with relevance to the contemporary politics. The political vision of history was established in a notion of the analogy between the civil wars of old England known as Wars of the Roses and the present state of the German Reich. In this highly nationalistic production, Dingelstedt celebrated the brotherhood of the German Reich, and showed the responsibilities of the political class to its people owing to the history plays performed. Dingelstedt stressed that injustice could lead to disunity and the horrors of civil war; so his basic theme was especially a political one. Another remarkable production which had to influence people‟s views was that by Frank Benson. He directed the first British history play cycle for the Shakespeare festival in Stratford upon Avon in 1902. However, unlike Dingelstedt, Benson did not regard the history plays as a chance for political or social efforts. Even if for him the plays were political allegories of the rise of the Protestant empire, he was even more engaged in current performance methods, e.g. dramatizing of battle scenes. In the 1940s the history plays took on a new political role in the sustaining of the Tudor myth. With the end of the Second World War Shakespeare‟s political function changed from national morale to an instrument of cultural propaganda. Elizabethan performance seen through twentieth-century eyes is presented in the film called Henry V by Laurence Olivier from the year 1944. His first attempt at directing a Shakespearean play on screen seems to be revolutionary. The film was in part an instrument of propaganda because it was dedicated to the commandos and airborne troops of Great Britain. Stanley Wells in Shakespeare: For All Time argues that “Shakespeare had served as a source of spiritual consolation and as a stimulus to patriotic fervour” (368). The film is of course patriotic and it celebrates the virtues of the British officer presented by King Henry V. 3 Basically, the history plays were used for political purposes, and in each country the plays commented upon the country‟s own political problems. There were always certain motives which led the theatre managers to perform the plays on stage. I have demonstrated on a few examples that Shakespeare‟s plays were and still are of a great importance. 4 2 Shakespearean History Play First of all, I should give some basic information supporting the eminence of Shakespeare‟s plays in general. Shakespeare‟s career bridged both the reigns of Elizabeth I (ruled 1558-1603) and James I (ruled 1603-1625), and he was a favourite of both monarchs. Indeed, James granted Shakespeare‟s company and its actors the greatest possible compliment by endowing them with the status of king‟s players. It is no doubt that William Shakespeare is one of the most influential writers of English literature and that he is the most important playwright of the English Renaissance. The fact that the plays survived in the repertory of the King‟s Men after Shakespeare‟s death and, later, when the theatres were closed in 1642 at the outbreak of the Civil War, and that they are widely performed today shows their brilliance. The „histories‟ are evidently not all the same in style or treatment of their historical material. Shakespeare chose different modes in these plays and focused his audience on specific issues. Richard II, for instance, is clearly a sort of tragedy which, as a genre, is historical, and the chief lesson to be learnt is the instability of the world. Generally speaking, Shakespeare represented historical events in various ways,