“Richard II”:
Through “Richard II”, Shakespeare describes the transition from a medieval conception, the aristocracy, in which the King is seen as the “prince”, in the latin meaning of it: primus inter pares, first among equals. It can be stated that the king is a sort of an elevated duke, who people need for military purposes, for the necessity to be protected (Lecture 10/01). Thus, he is bound to the law: with the sign of the Magna Charta the aristocrats have forced the King to recognize the legal limit to his power. The play opens with a trial, performed in a very static, excessively serious way, so that this type of beginning would have led the audience to abandon the theater. However, the author is perfectly aware of the boredom of his incipit, yet he decided to keep it. The reason is strictly connected to the essence of every legal system: its legitimacy and authority are achieved by following formalities and patterns that make the law predictable. Doing so, the people can have the …show more content…
This depends on the fact that the power and the authority of the law are entirely a result of the observance of form. When Richard proclaims “impartial are our eyes and ears” (R2, 1.1.115), he speaks in an iconic way and the aesthetics of the legal system reaches its highest point: the most important justification of its authority is, indeed, the impartiality. The image of the blind justice is something that has been always vivid throughout the centuries, but it had had two different meanings. Before the Middle Age, the goodness of justice was blindfolded by a fool, symbolizing the judges’ incapacity to take distance from the social environment and the corruption deriving from it. However, in the 15th century, with the centralization of the power, the blind fold became a symbol of impartiality (Tarantino,
Through “Richard II”, Shakespeare describes the transition from a medieval conception, the aristocracy, in which the King is seen as the “prince”, in the latin meaning of it: primus inter pares, first among equals. It can be stated that the king is a sort of an elevated duke, who people need for military purposes, for the necessity to be protected (Lecture 10/01). Thus, he is bound to the law: with the sign of the Magna Charta the aristocrats have forced the King to recognize the legal limit to his power. The play opens with a trial, performed in a very static, excessively serious way, so that this type of beginning would have led the audience to abandon the theater. However, the author is perfectly aware of the boredom of his incipit, yet he decided to keep it. The reason is strictly connected to the essence of every legal system: its legitimacy and authority are achieved by following formalities and patterns that make the law predictable. Doing so, the people can have the …show more content…
This depends on the fact that the power and the authority of the law are entirely a result of the observance of form. When Richard proclaims “impartial are our eyes and ears” (R2, 1.1.115), he speaks in an iconic way and the aesthetics of the legal system reaches its highest point: the most important justification of its authority is, indeed, the impartiality. The image of the blind justice is something that has been always vivid throughout the centuries, but it had had two different meanings. Before the Middle Age, the goodness of justice was blindfolded by a fool, symbolizing the judges’ incapacity to take distance from the social environment and the corruption deriving from it. However, in the 15th century, with the centralization of the power, the blind fold became a symbol of impartiality (Tarantino,