King Richard II’s Garden
The Tragedy of King Richard the Second is a William Shakespeare play written around 1595. The play is the first of a series of four depicting the rise of Lancaster’s British throne. It is set around the year of 1398 and presents the transition of power from King Richard II to King Henry IV. Through the acts, Richard is portrayed as a regal but wasteful king, caring more to things like fashion and friends as opposed to state issues. When Richard II begins to lease parcels of English land to fund one of his many wars, Henry (Bolingbroke), forms a rebellion to overtake Richard II’s court. Shakespeare uses several metaphors to project the despair of the common people of England under the rule of Richard II. The first …show more content…
He says in lines 50 and 51, “this blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England…” Not only does John of Gaunt boast on the belief that England is a great land with great people, it would appear that he believes England is the best land. These words spoken by John of Gaunt bear importance to the faith within his words in describing his fear of the direction of England and the anguish amongst its common people; anguish that will arise in other acts of the …show more content…
In the act, King Richard II’s queen arrives in the garden along with two of her ladies to take their mind away from the state’s situation. When she here’s the gardener enter, the Queen steps back to conceal herself in surveillance. Being obvious to the detriment of the King’s court, the gardener instructs his men to mend the garden while alluding to it as a government. “Go bind thou up young dangling apricots, which like unruly children, make their sire stoop with oppression of their prodigal weight (3.4.29-31),” the gardener says to one man. And to the other, “Go thou, and like an executioner, cut off the heads of too-fast-growing sprays that look too lofty in our commonwealth (3.4.33-35). As to question the reason for caring for the king’s garden, the man asks the gardener, “Why should we… when our sea-walled garden, the whole land, is full of weeds, her fairest flowers choked-up, her fruit trees all un-pruned, her hedges ruined, her knots disordered, and her wholesome herbs swarming with caterpillars (3.4.40-47)?” presumably a common man himself, the man understands that metaphor of the weeds being members of English society that receive greatly from the country but in return, give nothing and the caterpillars that spoil the herbs are leaches who use the nutrients of
The Tragedy of King Richard the Second is a William Shakespeare play written around 1595. The play is the first of a series of four depicting the rise of Lancaster’s British throne. It is set around the year of 1398 and presents the transition of power from King Richard II to King Henry IV. Through the acts, Richard is portrayed as a regal but wasteful king, caring more to things like fashion and friends as opposed to state issues. When Richard II begins to lease parcels of English land to fund one of his many wars, Henry (Bolingbroke), forms a rebellion to overtake Richard II’s court. Shakespeare uses several metaphors to project the despair of the common people of England under the rule of Richard II. The first …show more content…
He says in lines 50 and 51, “this blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England…” Not only does John of Gaunt boast on the belief that England is a great land with great people, it would appear that he believes England is the best land. These words spoken by John of Gaunt bear importance to the faith within his words in describing his fear of the direction of England and the anguish amongst its common people; anguish that will arise in other acts of the …show more content…
In the act, King Richard II’s queen arrives in the garden along with two of her ladies to take their mind away from the state’s situation. When she here’s the gardener enter, the Queen steps back to conceal herself in surveillance. Being obvious to the detriment of the King’s court, the gardener instructs his men to mend the garden while alluding to it as a government. “Go bind thou up young dangling apricots, which like unruly children, make their sire stoop with oppression of their prodigal weight (3.4.29-31),” the gardener says to one man. And to the other, “Go thou, and like an executioner, cut off the heads of too-fast-growing sprays that look too lofty in our commonwealth (3.4.33-35). As to question the reason for caring for the king’s garden, the man asks the gardener, “Why should we… when our sea-walled garden, the whole land, is full of weeds, her fairest flowers choked-up, her fruit trees all un-pruned, her hedges ruined, her knots disordered, and her wholesome herbs swarming with caterpillars (3.4.40-47)?” presumably a common man himself, the man understands that metaphor of the weeds being members of English society that receive greatly from the country but in return, give nothing and the caterpillars that spoil the herbs are leaches who use the nutrients of