Henry VI part III: Act I
So …
Part III begins, as Part II ended, with Warwick, perhaps reinforcing his role as ‘kingmaker’, and with the suspicion – to be dealt with later, maybe – that Henry is a ‘Jonah’ on the battlefield. Whoever’s side he appears on (note I don’t say ‘fights’ on) he seems to suck the fighting spirit out of the army like a Dementor whose puppy has just been killed in a hit-and-run accident …
Continue reading “PTS 03/014: Deliberate cruelty is not forgivable …”
subtitled: The Middle Child, and Darth Vader
It seems an eternity since that I fell into this play, full of fears for my adopted country, and so it has been. My views on how work has impacted on my ability to blog over the last month or so probably need to wait until I’m not feeling as ‘wasp stung and impatient’ as Harry Hotspur. Anyway, as we hit the end of this play my fears for England have receded, at least. In fact, I’m struggling to feel fearful at all. I’m a spectator, but a fully engaged one.
Continue reading “PTS 02/013: The Force is strong in you, young Skywalker”
HENRY VI part II: Act IV
‘death, a necessary end, will come when it will come’ (JULIUS CAESAR: Act II, sc ii)
subtitled: ‘The not very tragic or lamentable death of the serial rotter, Suffolk, and the deservedly doomed distraction caused by Cade.’
It’s not quite acts three or four of Antony and Cleopatra, but this act does get into double-figures in terms of scenes – something I find irritating as a reader, in a way that I don’t find when listening to or watching the plays. Still, basically, Act IV boils down into two episodes, as the subtitle suggests.
Henry VI part II: Act III
‘Small curs are not regarded when they grin’ (QUEEN MARGARET III.i.18)
Act III starts where Act II left off: the smell of blood in the water; fins thrashing as a pack of ruthless hunters circle our hapless king; bites being taken from the already-doomed Gloucester.
Continue reading “PTS 02/011: Small curs are not regarded when they grin”
What mightst thou do, that honour would thee do,
Were all thy children kind and natural!
But see,thy fault France hath in thee found out,
A nest of hollow bosoms. (CHORUS, Henry V: II.0.18-21)
Henry VI II: Act I
It’s a strange thing, patriotism.
I’ll try to make this the final time I mention how I don’t feel especially patriotic towards England as opposed to Britain, but the beginning of the play causes me to examine my attitudes again. It probably says something about my pedantic nature that I can’t simply conflate the two. Or maybe it’s simply the fact that my Welsh girlfriend would probably dump me! Either way, I suddenly became acutely aware of an inchoate fear for the country. Ye-e-es, there was some fear for Henry, about to be eaten alive by his Queen like a hapless spider, but the sympathy I felt for Henry as a child effectively evaporated in the white heat of his ineffectuality. It facilitated of the betrayal of my new Shakespearean heroes, the Talbots, and so isn’t easily forgiven or forgotten. So it wasn’t what Margaret might or might not do to Henry that worried me. It was how she might treat England …
Continue reading “PTS 02/009: England – A Nest of Hollow Bosoms”
Henry VI 1: Act V
[subtitled: “It’s always the quiet ones you need to watch out for.”]
As I finished the play, it occurred to me that women play a much larger role than I might have guessed back in the heady days of January, when I started seriously thinking about this project. Perhaps I might refine that to say that French women.
What was/is it about the allure of French women to English men?
Abstract for the busy: this paradigm crystallises or articulates my recent thinking about kingship/leadership as it applies in Shakespeare’s plays and, I increasingly suspect, beyond. It gained critical mass after teaching Richard III at Key Stage 5 (Age 16-17) in Autumn 2016, where I found myself returning again and again to questions of Legitimacy, Authority and Dynasty, in plotting not just Richard’s journey and motives, but Richmond’s and, in fact, Queen Elizabeth’s.
‘Please Please Me’ or ‘Abbey Road’?
‘Surfin’ Safari’ or ‘Pet Sounds’?
‘Hangin’ Tough’ or ‘The Block’?
[please note – I’ve only ever listened to just four of those albums. Promise. I hope you can infer which they are!]
As I approach the first monthly instalment of my Arden Amble, what are my expectations from a work I know relatively little about? Why start the journey of a thousand steps with a month reading and blogging about Henry VI Part 1?
Continue reading “Shakespeare’s ‘Salad Days’. Expectations of HVI part 1”
Back in November I compared the next President of the USA to Richard III. A little reluctantly, given I have some sympathy, and a degree of fondness, for Richard.
O, is it all forgot?
All school-days’ friendship, childhood innocence?
What does the Shakespeare curriculum look like in the UK in 2017?
The Boar's Head, Eastcheap 