Richard II

If a man represents himself as something that deviates the slightest from his true self, is that not in itself an act of manipulation? Today’s speech in regards to Module C will discuss how all representations of people and politics are undoubtedly acts of manipulation as true political agendas must be hidden behind a misleading facade. Language plays a particularly powerful role in portraying these political representations. However ambiguous the political motive may be, control is the…

identity. A similar situation occurs in the play The Tragedy of Richard II by William Shakespeare. In the play, staging is a means of claiming power by using an audience to provide acknowledgment of said power. Power comes from others but is confused for identity which comes from oneself resulting in the downfall of King…

Geoffrey Chaucer was viewed as the father of English poetry and language even though his style was satirical and usually made up of nonsense. John Gower was hired by Richard II to make English into a more popular language by using poetry and was not afraid to take shots at Richard II in his work. Margery Kempe, though mentally unstable, had the honor of making a milestone in writing by composing the first ever autobiography ever written in English. Some people may say that…

From left, Richard Goulding as Prince Harry, Tim Pigott-Smith as Charles and Tafline Steen as Jess, a love interest of Harry’s, in Mike Bartlett’s “King Charles III” at the Music Box Theater. Credit Sara Krulwich/The New York Times This proactive attitude takes the…

When Shakespeare wrote Henry IV, Part II, England faced issues of kingship, constitution, and rebellion. Shakespeare’s contemporaries, Elizabethans in the 1590s, undoubtedly had anxieties about the aging Queen Elizabeth I’s lack of an apparent heir, much like the anxieties surrounding Hal’s imminent succession to the throne. At the same time, Shakespeare presents to his audience a history play, dramatizes information, introduces fictional characters, and “mingling kings and clowns” on stage, and…

penance. Similar boundaries to redemption exist in Henry IV, Part 1, as its characters exist in the wake of the deposition and murder of Richard II. In the work, King Henry IV seeks expiation in a planned crusade, but neglects to abdicate the throne granted to him by his denial of divine right. Similarly, Hotspur seeks to atone for his rebellion against Richard…

King Richard II’s Underserved Loyalty by the Commoners Wat Tyler’s Rebellion was written after 1381 by an anonymous author to persuade the readers that King Richard II did not deserve the loyalty and devotion put forth by the commons. The author provides the reader with a chronicle of the peasant’s revolt in which he presents the commons’ reasons for revolting and how the King reacts to each interaction with the commons. The peasants are portrayed as justified in their actions, while the King…

Rabkin starts his second chapter by summarizing that Shakespeare’s art includes a world whose principles are never in doubt, but it is never as simple as one expects. Henry V is another one of Shakespeare’s controversial plays. There have been many different ways of looking at the controversy, but Rabkin argues that they are all wrong. Rabkin states that “Shakespeare created a work whose ultimate power is precisely the fact that it points in two opposite directions” and ultimately, Shakespeare…

A new era in world history can usually be marked by some event that causes great social or political upheaval. In England between 1455 and 1487, a dynastic power struggle between two houses of the Plantagenet royal family marks the beginning of the English early modern period. This contention for the throne was known as the Wars of the Roses, and was a large factor in the end of feudalism in England. While most other major powers in Europe had already begun the transition into modernity, England…

William Shakespeare’s elaborate use of characterization within the play Henry V. Proves suspicions that King Henry V did not believe the St. Crispin’s Day speech for his soldiers, but rather used it to further his own success. Shakespeare demonstrate this through the characterization of Henry. Shakespeare creates Henry to have characteristic such as, Henry’s immaturity, never to take the blame, his abuse of power through unnecessary games, and his deceiving and manipulative ways. A…