Turning point
Going back to the moment of launch for what would become a bloody war: reading Shakespeare’s play “1 Henry VI” to clarify the world today
I’m reading through Shakespeare’s plays, considering what they could illuminate in the world we live in today. I’m organizing the plays roughly by the chronology established by the Royal Shakespeare Company. That timeline would have 1 Henry VI (part 1) following what we call Parts 2 and 3 (these two plays were performed under different titles in the day). I decided to sequence the three Henry VI plays starting with part 1. The events will be easier to understand for those of us unfamiliar with 15th Century English history.
I was born only 12 years after the end of WW2, so the spectre of Hitler remained tangible during my childhood. In the schoolyard, other kids would dream about meeting a young Adolf Hitler. If they could go back in time, they claimed, they would kill Hitler in order to prevent him slaughtering millions. I wasn’t sure I could kill someone, especially a child, even if I knew his future, but I kept quiet. Thinking about having the ability to go back in time to prevent disaster held immense appeal then, and now.
Stephen King wrote a whole book about this type of wish: “11/22/63”. The story posits a wormhole in time, located in a diner’s storeroom, that can take a person back in time before JFK’s assassination. Two men separately devote their lives to returning to 1963 time and again, trying to prevent the assassination. History pushes back.
Reading 1 Henry VI brings me back to that idea of going back in time to rewrite history.
Some historical background
The play starts with the funeral of Henry V, so his life effectively frames the play. Henry V expanded England’s control into France during his reign. The English revered Henry V for his strength and leadership in war: he vanquished the French at the battle of Agincourt, against great odds (and Shakespeare’s play “Henry V” dramatizes this, memorably).
France having been conquered, an English regent in France represented English control. The French Dauphin, Charles, was the deposed French monarch. Henry V appointed English royalty to govern regions of France, such as Burgundy in the play.
Henry V died in 1422, leaving only a 9-month old son to inherit the realm. This son became Henry VI. Since he was an infant, a Lord Protector was assigned to act on his behalf.
Henry VI was crowned at age 8 in 1429. He married Margaret of Anjou (a French royal) when he was 23 in 1445.
The War of the Roses, called England’s Civil War at the time and into the Elizabethan era, started in 1455. The warring factions were two branches of the Plantagenets: the House of York and the House of Lancaster, each claiming a right to the throne. In the symbology, York was represented by the white rose; the House of Lancaster by the red rose.
The last male heir in the Lancaster line died during the war and the House of Tudor assumed the Lancaster cause. The war came to an end in 1487 with a politically-arranged marriage between a Tudor and a York. This established the Tudor dynasty that was still in power (Queen Elizabeth I) during the Elizabethan era of Shakespeare. Henry VI died during the war.
Joan of Arc (Jeanne d’Arc, or as she called herself, Jeanne la Pucelle [the maiden]) is represented by a character in the play, Joan la Pucelle. At age 17, she sought out Charles, the Dauphin. Although a peasant girl, she claimed to have received visions from the archangel Michael and several saints. These visions informed her that she was to lead France to revolt against English rule.
Charles gave her the means to lead a battle at Orléans, and she was victorious. She led the French in their campaigns to restore Charles to the throne, but several later defeats destroyed her support amongst the French. She was captured by the English in 1429, accused and convicted of heresy and blasphemy (wearing men’s clothes), and was burned at the stake. She was 19 at the time of her death.
Since Henry VIII had separated England from the Vatican’s control, Shakespeare lived in an era in which he could freely malign the pope and Catholicism. The play features a bishop named Winchester (an uncle of Henry VI) who deals only in self-interest. Given the play’s contemporaneous context, this is unremarkable.
Play synopsis
The play opens with the funeral march for Henry V in the royal court. The scene begins in peace and ends in conflict. Soon after the eulogies are spoken, discord breaks out amongst the courtiers and news of France repelling English rule reaches them. By the end of the scene, Gloucester, the Lord Protector, dispatches troops to put down the French revolt. He promises to crown the young king once the military is readied for battle.
Although he’s referred to as an infant early in the play, Henry VI appears in later scenes as a young man with lines to speak and agency to make decisions (such as the choice of his wife by the end of the play). The timeline of the play is therefore decades, not days, of historical events. However, it’s a play, and Shakespeare has taken artistic licence with timelines.
In a scene staged in a rose garden, two factions declare themselves: the white roses backing Richard Plantagenet, who later becomes Duke of York; and the red roses (Somerset, Suffolk, Warwick). Richard argues his right to the throne: Henry V had killed his father to prevent his family’s claim. Now Henry V is dead and he sees an opening for his bid. In subsequent scenes at court, the players wear white or red roses to signify the house that they support. In one of those scenes, Henry diffidently plucks a red rose for himself. He has no stomach for the discord that’s cleaving his country, which is the heart of the problem.
The play depicts the French as weak and effeminate, using a woman, Joan la Pucelle, to lead their successful battles. The Joan character is variously called a witch and a whore throughout the play, and at the end of the play she’s depicted as literally demonic and claiming to be pregnant (blaming several different men in turn) to prevent her execution.
The French, under Joan’s military leadership, win back several cities only to lose them again to the English (due to valor and strength), then to win them again (due to the English in-fighting). York and Winchester, the Bishop, grasp for the opportunities yielded from a throne that has been enfeebled by an immature king. Winchester, at odds with Henry’s court from the beginning of the play, is elevated to Cardinal: the play intimates that Winchester has bribed the pope to obtain it. York pleads loyalty to Henry to obtain his new title, bending his knee to the king, even as he dismisses that loyalty in an aside.
By the end of the play, Joan has been executed, which leaves Charles with only his weak cohort and having lost the decisive battle of Burgundy. A peace is brokered, with the only term being that Charles will be subservient to Henry. Charles accepts this term after receiving counsel that he can always go on to fight another day.
At the same time, another contract is being negotiated. Henry has agreed that he should make a marriage to help secure his political strength in France. Henry’s advisor Gloucester recommends he marry the daughter of an earl who is a kinsman of Charles. Opposing that, Suffolk wants Henry to marry Margaret of Anjou: Suffolk (who is married) is smitten with her. He schemes to marry her to Henry so that he can take her as his mistress, assuming that the weak Henry can easily be cuckolded. Although the woman presented by Gloucester is closer to the French seat of power and would be a better choice, Suffolk is able to manipulate Henry into accepting Margaret as a paragon of beauty.
The play ends ominously. Henry has made the decision to wed Margaret of Anjou, and the effort of that decision has tired him. He despairs in grief over the conflict he witnesses amongst his court. This should be a joyous event for him: he’s won peace over France and will marry a woman said to be beautiful. And yet, he’s worn out and wants to go to bed. Gloucester notes that the play began and ends in grief. Suffolk has the last lines, and he’s full of optimism for his own prospects.
King Henry … And so conduct me where from company I may revolve and ruminate my grief. Exit Gloucester Ay, grief, I fear me, both at first and last. Exit Suffolk Thus Suffolk hath prevailed, and thus he goes As did the youthful Paris once to Greece, With hope to find the like event in love, But prosper better than the Trojan did. Margaret shall now be queen and rule the King; But I will rule both her, the King, and realm. Exit
The events of the play having occurred only a century earlier, Shakespeare’s audience would be well aware of the history. Suffolk not only wouldn’t prevent another Trojan War, but the peace brokered in this last scene in fact would be broken by his own murder.
Thoughts on the play
The play explores how divisiveness and self-interest make countries weak. A country divided not only can’t govern itself, its division marks it as prey for other countries. It’s a cautionary tale for those who act only out of self-interest: although Suffolk seems to win by the end of the play, the play signals that he won’t enjoy success for long.
Margaret’s scene with Suffolk has her portraying an innocent maiden. They each interrupt their dialogue with asides (spoken to the audience rather than the other player), rendering the sense that neither one of them is to be trusted. The Elizabethan audience would know that Margaret became a force behind the weak reign of Henry VI, not the humble, innocent maiden she purports to be (a vision that Suffolk sells to Henry to gain his agreement).
The effect of this play is to jump back through history to examine what opportunities existed to prevent a tragedy. The play’s perspective is that allowing unity to disintegrate is fatal. Leadership strength is essential to bind men in unity even though they disagree. Every royal court is a stage for intrigue, but not every court succumbs to civil war.
In the play, the French come together when united by someone who is herself forceful and who vows allegiance to Charles. Under her leadership they win battles despite the French court being insipid, cowardly, and weak. The play establishes that her power comes from (demonic) other-worldly support; once that support departs, she’s weakened, is captured, and is killed.
The English are weakened by their in-fighting. In the play’s final battle at Burgundy, the heroic Talbot and his son lose their lives because of a tiff between the opposing English rivals, Richard and Somerset. Henry instructed the rivals to work together to support Talbot’s taking back Burgundy: York is to go to Burgundy as regent, and Somerset is to provide military support. York claims that Somerset failed to send the support required. Somerset claims that York never asked, even while admitting that he doesn’t want to support York in acquiring Burgundy. While they’re bickering, Talbot and his son are killed in battle. Eventually the support arrives and the English win back Burgundy.
The play postulates that strong leadership is necessary to bring to heel the divisiveness that comes with power struggles within a court. Henry V, in Shakespeare’s telling of his story, is a strong leader who won the battle of Agincourt against great odds, and who took decisive (bloody) action to put down anyone who wasn’t loyal to him. Court intrigue in the 16th century, when this play was written, was no less fraught than it was in the century before. That peace arrives at the end of the play thanks to vanquishing a teenage girl and arranging marriage with a French noble woman speaks to the inherent weakness in the court of Henry VI, a weakness that bodes ill for the future.
A note on relevance
At any time, a country is accorded the opportunity to take actions that will secure ongoing strength and progress, or to take actions that could prove destructive for years to come. Using the lens of this play, weak leadership permits the growth of conflicting interests and power grabs. Ultimately, seething conflict unleashes destructive forces that can take decades or a century to overcome.
The English Civil War would have been fresher in English memory at the time this play was written than the US Civil War is today. In the US, it wasn’t possible for the states invested in slavery to find common cause with abolitionists. If there existed a moment for the Civil War to be averted it would have had to have occurred at the founding of the country, not in the 19th century. The confederate states were enabled by a series of compromises; the union was weakened by failing to address a fundamental division.
But after the war, there was an opportunity to secure equality for all, unequivocally, and not limit itself to extending circumscribed rights. Instead, the victors retreated from the fight, and yielded back power to the vanquished. It was a missed opportunity to prevent the ongoing war of suppression and oppression, which cleaves the nation today.
Strong leadership in this context isn’t authoritarian rule as we understand it today. Monarchies are by nature authoritarian. Even though the rather routine murder of political rivals in the 15th and 16th centuries is appalling today, Shakespeare doesn’t treat the imprisonment and execution of political rivals as an act outside the rights of the king. The mark of Henry VI’s weakness isn’t in his lack of blood lust, it’s in his unwillingness to see the true characters of people and his willingness to accept their assurances at face value. He treats the color of the signifying roses lightly. He’s easily duped and potentially cuckolded. Due to his youth, it might not have been possible for him to be wise, but he didn’t learn from the wisdom of his advisors and he wasn’t savvy himself. He retires from aggression rather than girding himself to face conflict head on.
Every age has a moment that will prove decisive. Assume that moment is now. What do you do with the opportunity?
Ellie’s Corner
It was raining lightly as we returned from our walk. I walked past our place to pick up the mail. Ellie insisted on turning back to go home. She’s strong and I could barely move forward against her pulling in the opposite direction. She kept it up until she finally realized, my errand finished, we were returning to the house and her afternoon meal.
She would be perfectly cast as Kate, in The Taming of the Shrew. I’m no Petruchio.
Thanks for reading,
