The Life and Death of King Richard the Second (1595), also Richard II, is a Shakespearean history play about the lifetime and reign of King Richard II of England (r. 1377–1399). As a dramatised period history of the English monarchy, Richard II chronicles the machinations of the noblemen of the royal court who conspire, precipitate, and realise the downfall and death of the King of England.
As the first work in the Henriad tetralogy of English history plays, the political narrative of Richard II is thematically followed throughout the stories of Henry IV, Part 1, Henry IV, Part 2, and Henry V, which also are histories of the reigns of his royal successors to the Throne of England. Although the First Folio (1623) classifies The Life and Death of Richard the Second as an English history play, the earlier Quarto edition (1597) classifies Richard II as a tragedy, under the title The Tragedie of King Richard the Second.
Characters
King Richard II John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster – Richard's uncle Duke of York – Richard's uncle Duke of Aumerle – York's son Thomas Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk Queen – Richard's wife (an unnamed composite of his first wife, Anne of Bohemia, and his second, Isabella of Valois, who was still a child at the time of his death) Duchess of York – York's wife (an unnamed composite of York's first wife, Isabella of Castile, and his second, Joan Holland) Duchess of Gloucester – widow of Thomas of Woodstock, Duke of Gloucester, uncle to the king
Rebels Henry Bolingbroke, Duke of Hereford — son of John of Gaunt Earl of Northumberland Henry 'Hotspur' Percy – Northumberland's son Lord Ross Lord Willoughby Lord Fitzwater Sir Piers Exton
Richard's allies Duke of Surrey Earl of Salisbury Lord Berkeley Bushy – favourite of Richard Bagot – favourite of Richard Green – favourite of Richard Bishop of Carlisle Abbot of Westminster Sir Stephen Scroop
Others Lord Marshal (post held in 1399 by Duke of Surrey, though this is not recognised in the play) Welsh captain Two heralds Gardener Gardener's man Queen's ladies Keeper – jailer at Pomfret prison Groom Attendants, lords, soldiers, messengers, etc.
Synopsis
The play spans only the last two years of Richard's life, from 1398 to 1400. It begins with King Richard sitting majestically on his throne in full state, having been requested to arbitrate a dispute between the nobles Thomas Mowbray and Richard's cousin, Henry Bolingbroke, who has accused Mowbray of high treason for stealing money that had been raised for the English army and of murdering Bolingbroke's uncle, the Duke of Gloucester. Bolingbroke's father, John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster, meanwhile, believes Richard himself was responsible for his brother's murder. After several attempts to calm both men, Richard acquiesces and it is determined that the matter be resolved in the established method of trial by battle between Bolingbroke and Mowbray, despite Gaunt's objections.
The tournament scene is very formal, with a long, ceremonial introduction, but as the combatants are about to fight, Richard interrupts and sentences both men to banishment from England. Bolingbroke is originally sentenced to ten years' banishment, but Richard reduces this to six years upon seeing John of Gaunt's grieving face. Mowbray is banished permanently. The king's decision can be seen as the first mistake in a series leading eventually to his overthrow and death, since the error highlights many of his character flaws, including indecisiveness (in terms of whether to allow the duel to go ahead), abruptness (Richard waits until the last possible moment to cancel the duel), and arbitrariness (there is no apparent reason Bolingbroke should be allowed to return and Mowbray not). In addition, the decision fails to dispel the suspicions surrounding Richard's involvement in the death of the Duke of Gloucester—in fact, by handling the situation in such a cavalier and arbitrary manner, Richard only appears more guilty. Mowbray correctly predicts that the king will sooner or later fall at the hands of Bolingbroke.
After an impassioned invective against the visiting king from his sick-bed, John of Gaunt dies and Richard seizes all his land and money. This angers the nobility, who accuse Richard of wasting England's money, of illegally depriving John's heir Bolingbroke of his rightful inheritance to fund war in Ireland, of imposing unjust taxes on the commoners, and of enriching himself by fining the nobles for crimes their ancestors committed. The conspirators help Bolingbroke return secretly to England, with a plan to overthrow Richard. There remain, however, subjects loyal to the king. Among them are the courtiers Bushy, Bagot, and Green, as well as the Duke of Aumerle (son of the Duke of York), cousin of both Richard and Bolingbroke. When Richard leaves England to attend to the war in Ireland, Bolingbroke seizes the opportunity to assemble an army and invades the north coast of England. Executing both Bushy and Green, Bolingbroke wins over the Duke of York, whom Richard has left in charge of his government in his absence.
Upon Richard's return, Bolingbroke reclaims his lands and lays claim to the English throne; Richard's Welsh allies desert him and he is taken captive. After a dramatic public ceremony where Bolingbroke has the captive king publicly renounce his crown, he crowns himself King Henry IV, and has Richard imprisoned in the castle of Pomfret. Aumerle orchestrates an uprising against the new king, only to be thwarted by his father, York. The King executes every conspirator except Aumerle, who is spared after the Duchess of York intervenes on his behalf. The ambitious Sir Piers Exton takes King Henry's words "Have I no friend will rid me of this living fear?" as a request to kill the still-living Richard. Exton murders Richard in his cell to gain Henry's favour. While admitting that he "did wish [Richard] dead", King Henry is appalled by the murder, dismisses Exton from his court, and vows a pilgrimage to Jerusalem to cleanse himself of his part in Richard's death. In his final lines, Henry completes the tragic structure of the play by mourning over Richard's coffin.
Sources
The Chroniques of Jean Froissart, a fourteenth-century account of the Hundred Years' War translated into English by John Bouchier in , includes a sympathetic account of the deposition of King Richard. It is likely that this was one of Shakespeare's sources for the play. Shakespeare's primary source for Richard II, as for most of his chronicle histories, was Raphael Holinshed's Chronicles of England, Scotlande, and Irelande; the publication of the second edition in 1587 provides a terminus post quem for the play.Gurr (1990: 55) Edward Hall's The Union of the Two Illustrious Families of Lancaster and York appears also to have been consulted, and scholars have also supposed Shakespeare familiar with Samuel Daniel's poem on the civil wars.
A somewhat more complicated case is presented by the anonymous play sometimes known as The First Part of Richard II. This play, which exists in one incomplete manuscript copy (at the British Museum), is subtitled Thomas of Woodstock, and scholars since F. S. Boas have usually called it by that name. This play treats the events leading up to the start of Shakespeare's play (though the two texts do not have identical characters). This closeness, along with the manuscript's anonymity, have led certain scholars to attribute all or part of the play to Shakespeare, though many critics view it as a secondary influence on Shakespeare, not as his work.Shapiro, I. A. "Richard II or Richard III or..." Shakespeare Quarterly 9 (1958): 206
Shakespeare may have drawn from his contemporary Christopher Marlowe's historical play Edward II for Richard II. The two plays have similar structures, and critics have drawn parallels between particular passages and themes, such as the contradiction between the king's theoretical absolute power and the actual restraints placed on him by his subjects. Charles Lamb opined that "The reluctant pangs of abdicating Royalty in Edward furnished hints which Shakespeare scarce improved in his Richard the Second".
Date and text
The earliest recorded performance of Richard II was a private one, in Canon Row, the house of Edward Hoby, on 9 December 1595.Richard II, John Dover Wilson, Cambridge University Press, 1951 The play was entered into the Register of the Stationers Company on 29 August 1597 by the bookseller Andrew Wise; he published the first quarto later that year, printed by Valentine Simmes. The second and third quartos followed in 1598—the only time a Shakespeare play was printed in three editions in two years. Q4 followed in 1608 and Q5 in 1615. The play was next published in the First Folio in 1623.
Richard II exists in a number of variations. The quartos vary to some degree, and the folio presents further differences. The first three quartos (printed in 1597 and 1598, commonly assumed to have been prepared from Shakespeare's holograph) lack the deposition scene. The fourth, published in 1608, includes a version of the scene shorter than the one later printed, presumably from a prompt-book, in the First Folio. The scant evidence makes explaining these differences largely conjectural. Traditionally, it has been supposed that the quartos lack the deposition scene because of censorship, by either the playhouse or the Master of the Revels Edmund Tylney, and that the Folio version may better reflect Shakespeare's original intentions. But there is no external evidence for this hypothesis, and the title page of the 1608 quarto claims to be presented "as it hath been publicly acted" (although, again, this could be due to earlier censorship that was later relaxed).
Analysis and criticism Structure and language The play is divided into five acts and its structure is as formal as its language. It has a double complementary plot describing Richard II's fall and the rise of Bolingbroke, later known as Henry IV.The Riverside Shakespeare: Second Edition. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1997, 845. Critic John R. Elliott Jr. notes that this play can be distinguished from the other history plays because it has an ulterior political purpose. Shakespearean tragedy's normal structure is modified to portray a central political theme: the rise of Bolingbroke to the throne and the conflict between Richard and Bolingbroke over the kingship. In Acts IV and V, Shakespeare includes incidents irrelevant to Richard's fate that are resolved in the future plays of the Richard II–Henry V tetralogy.
The literary critic Hugh M. Richmond notes that Richard's beliefs about the divine right of kings tend to fall more in line with the medieval view of the throne. Bolingbroke, on the other hand, represents a more modern view of statecraft, arguing that not only bloodline but also intellect and political skill qualify a king. Richard believes that as king he is chosen and guided by God: not subject to human frailty, he is entitled to absolute authority over his subjects. Elliott argues that this conceited notion of his role ultimately leads to Richard's failure, adding that Bolingbroke's ability to relate and speak with the middle and lower classes allows him to take the throne.Elliott 253–267.