History And Politics In Shakespeare's Henry V

Henry V is the final play in Shakespeare’s second tetralogy of history plays and, like the others, reflects the Elizabethan interest in history and politics. As a biographical text, the play cannot be separated from history as “history is a story in itself” (Angus 2) and there are multiple historical constructs within it. Henry V is both a signifier and signified. It is a reconstruction of past events from an Elizabethan point of view (signifier) and, from a modern perspective is a consideration of the past determined by the current political and religious stage (signified) (Angus 6); a view which is tempered by portrayals of history over the last four hundred years.
Henry V is a fictional construct of history drawn from texts considered authoritative …show more content…
The Archbishops plan to direct Henry away from the mitigation of a bill that will take money from the Church, and instead turn his focus to France. Henry’s determination that the Archbishops “justly and religiously unfold” (1.2.10) why this is a just war, and share in the responsibility for the decision sustains the duality of his nature. Henry wants the war and victory but does not want to be the sole perpetrator, instead he is determined to show that the Church and King are united in this. Henry’s dedication of his victory to God can be read as an extension of this divine power, as an absolving of his ordering the death of the prisoners and acquisition of Catherine as a chattel of war. He is allowed to do these things because he is God’s …show more content…
During the 1700’s while the wars with France continued, Henry was presented as a “heroic warrior King” (Warren-Hayes). After World War 1 more sceptical readings of the play began to appear. In 1919, Gerald Gould, having returned from the same battlefields in France described the play as “a satire rather than an endorsement of imperialism, patriotism and the glories of war” (Smith). During the Second World War “it was appropriated for … propagandistic purposes” (Warren-Hayes). Churchill, who “was himself going through a theatrical reinterpretation, with his image used as propaganda, almost as much as his words” (Angus 4) employed Shakespeare’s idea of the ‘few’ when he declared that “Never, in the field of human conflict, has so much been owed by so many, to so few” (Angus 5). Henry’s ‘band of brothers’ is being alluded to yet ironically the constraints were still the same. New Zealand’s Maori Battalion found just that when they returned only to be told to go “back to the pa now boys” (Grace) Lawrence Olivier made a recording of Henry’s St Crispin Day speech to boost the troops’ morale and two years later, Churchill engaged him to film the play as further support. “Olivier intentionally left