Richard II (play)

Richard II is a play by William Shakespeare, based on the life of King Richard II of England, written in 1595.

Richard II is not a stand-alone work, but the first part of a tetralogy; the other plays which belong to this series are Henry IV, part 1, Henry IV, part 2, and Henry V. Although the First Folio (1623) version of the Richard II lists it as a history plays, the first edition called itself a tragedy and the play is indeed structured to follow the decline and fall of its main character.

Historical context

At the time of publication, the succession of the then monarch of England, Elizabeth I was an important political concern as she was childless. The play was seen to be making political comment on the current situation, paralleling the weak Richard with Queen Elizabeth and implicitly arguing in favour of her replacement by a monarch capable of creating a stable dynasty.

Although it cannot be certain that Shakespeare intended the play's revolutionary implications, it was certainly viewed as subversive at the time. In 1601, supporters of Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex paid for a performance of the play at the Globe Theatre on the eve of their armed rebellion. Elizabeth was outraged when she learned of this, allegedly saying "I am Richard II, know you not?" Less than a month later, Essex was tried and executed. The Globe players were also interrogated but do not seem to have been severely punished. However, the scene of Richard's forced abdication was censored from the first three editions of the play, and was not printed until 1623, long after Elizabeth's death.

Synopsis

As the title suggests, Richard II is the main character of the play. The first Act begins with King Richard sitting majestically on his throne in full state. We learn that Henry Bolingbroke, Richard's cousin, is having a dispute with Thomas Mowbray, and that both want the king to act as judge. The subject of the quarrel is Bolingbroke's accusation that Mowbray killed Richard's brother the Duke of Gloucester. What is more, Mowbray is also accused of having stolen money which would have been used for military purposes. Although Richard is powerful and acts as a king he cannot calm the quarrel down. Instead, he decides to have the dispute solved by tournament.

The tournament scene is very formal with a long, cremonial introduction. But Richard interrupts the duel at the very beginning and sentences both men to banishment from England. Bolingbroke has to leave for six years, whereas Mowbray is banished forever. The king's decision can be seen as the first mistake in a series that will lead eventually to his usurpation and death. Indeed, Mowbray predicts that the king will fall sooner or later.

After that, Bolingbroke's father, John of Gaunt, dies and Richard II seizes all of his land and money. This angers the nobility, who accuse Richard of wasting England's money, of taking Gaunt's money to fund a war with Ireland, of taxing the commoners, and of fining the nobles for crimes their ancestors committed. Next, they help Bolingbroke secretly to return to England and plan to usurp Richard II. However, there remain some subjects faithful to Richard, among them Bushy, Bagot, Green and the Duke of Aumerle. King Richard leaves England to administer the war in Ireland, and Bolingbroke takes the opportunity to assemble an army and invade the north coast of England. When Richard returns, Bolingbroke first claims his land back but then additionally claims the throne. He crowns himself King Henry IV and Richard is taken into prison to the castle of Pomfret. There, an assassin, who actually intended to kill someone else, murders Richard. King Henry hypocritically repudiates the murderer and vows to journey to Jerusalem to cleanse himself of his part in Richard's death.

Structure and language

Shakespeare used a fall and rise structure in the plot. At the beginning, Richard is in power and therefore can banish Bolingbroke from England. As Richard II falls and dies, Bolingbroke rises to become king of England.

Unusually for Shakespeare, Richard II is written entirely in verse. The play contains a number of memorable metaphors, including the extended comparison of England with a garden in Act IV, and of its reigning king to a lion or to the sun.

Characters

• King Richard II
• John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, uncle to the king
• Edmund of Langley, Duke of York, uncle to the king
• Henry Bolingbroke (sometimes spelled Bullingbrook), Duke of Hereford, son of John of Gaunt, afterwards King Henry IV
• The Duke of Aumerle, (Edward, Duke of Albermarle, later Duke of York), son to the Duke of York
• Thomas Mowbray, 1st Duke of Norfolk
• Duke of Surrey (Thomas Holland, 1st Duke of Surrey)
• Earl of Salisbury (John Montacute, 3rd Earl of Salisbury)
• Lord Berkeley
• Sir John Bushy, Sir John Bagot, Sir Henry Green, all favorites to King Richard
• Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland
• Henry "Hotspur" Percy, his son
• Lord Ross
• Lord Willoughby
• Lord Fitzwater
• Bishop of Carlisle
• Abbot of Westminster
• Lord Marshal
• Sir Stephen Scroop
• Sir Piers Exton

• Queen to Richard (Isabella of Valois)
• Duchess of York (Isabelle of Castile)
• Duchess of Gloucester (John of Gaunt, II,i,42-54

No matter where. Of comfort no man speak:

Let's talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs;

Make dust our paper, and with rainy eyes

Write sorrow on the bosom of the earth;

Let's choose executors and talk of wills:

And yet not so — for what can we bequeath

Save our deposed bodies to the ground?

Our lands, our live, and all are Bolingbroke's,

And nothing can we call our own but death,

And that small model of the barren earth

Which serves as paste and cover to our bones.

For God's sake, let us sit upon the ground

And tell sad stories of the death of kings:

How some have been depos'd, some slain in war,

Some haunted by the ghosts they have depos'd,

Some poison'd by their wives, some sleeping kill'd;

All murder'd."

—King Richard, III,ii, 148-164

Further reading

• Bullough, Geoffrey. "Narrative and Dramatic Sources of Shakespeare". Early English History Plays: Henry VI Richard III Richard II, volume III, Routledge: London, New York, 1960.
• Shakespeare, William. Richard II, ed. by Andrew Gurr, Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, 1990.
• Smitd, Kristian. Unconformities in Shakespeare's History Plays, St. Martin's Press: New York, 1993.
• Tillyard, E. M. W. Shakespeare's History Plays, Chatto&Windus: London,1944.of Virginia

See also