When the bad and the ugly defeat the good

Thoughts on Henry VI Part 3, and the tolls of war

Aug 28, 2023

Drawing of rose, black and white — Image by rawpixel.com

I’m reading my way through Shakespeare’s plays, (mostly) following the chronological sequence established by the Royal Shakespeare Company. This week’s play finishes the trilogy that cover the War of the Roses, or the English Civil War. Next week we move on to a comedy, “Two Gentlemen of Verona”. This civil war has been bloody and hellish; I for one am ready for a break.

Last week’s post on the previous play (2 Henry VI) ended with a cliffhanger. King Henry’s reign is being challenged by Richard, Duke of York. The king, queen, and supporters flee to evade York’s advancing army, and York seems poised to take over the realm.

This play, dubbed “3 Henry VI” (or, “Henry VI Part 3”) was originally published as “The True Tragedy of Richard Duke of York and the Good King Henry the Sixth”. Despite the ‘tragedy’ in the title, it’s considered a history play. Shakespeare’s tragedies end with death; this does not. (Comedies end with a wedding.) Nonetheless, the play does depict tragedy and a ‘good’ King Henry VI, which may be surprising given that the first two parts position Henry’s essentially weak character as the instigator of tragic consequences.

A brief note on character names

Even though I’m only focusing on a fraction of the play’s characters, some of the names are used for multiple characters and it can be confusing. I made some choices to keep it simple:

York = Richard, Duke of York
Richard = Third son of the Duke of York; given Gloucester by Edward
Edward = First son of the Duke of York and later King
Clarence = Second son of the Duke of York, named George; given Clarence by Edward
Prince Edward = Son of Henry VI and Queen Margaret

War recap

The War of the Roses was a battle between two royal families: the House of York and the House of Lancaster. The first part of Henry VI dramatized the origin of the rose symbology by setting a scene in a rose garden: the York faction picked white roses and their opposition picked red roses. The characters wore their roses to signify allegiances onstage in that play.

In this play, the warring factions are York and his sons against King Henry VI and his family. At stake is the English crown.

Summary

How Shakespeare frames a play is always noteworthy, and this play begins with the Duke of York perching on a throne not yet his. He has won the battle that concluded the prior play, and now he sits, smug and content in his victory, literally usurping the throne.

King Henry enters the scene, and he debates with York which of them has the right to the crown. They reach an agreement: Henry shall remain king as long as York leaves him in peace. In return, the crown will pass to York upon Henry’s death, leaving Henry’s son and future descendants out of the line of succession. This agreement angers everyone except Henry and York.

This peace brokered by discussion lasts no time at all. York’s son Richard (the so-called hunchback who will later become Richard III) convinces York to break the deal. Clifford (who wants to revenge the killing of his father in part 2) kills York’s youngest son. Queen Margaret takes matters into her own hands to secure her son’s place in succession. She gathers a large army and takes them to war against York. Her forces win decisively. Margaret and Clifford kill York, and she orders his head impaled on the gates of York.

York’s sons receive news of their father’s death, and their responses mark their characters: Edward, the oldest, shies away from terrible news, and bloodthirsty Richard wants all the details. They challenge the King to battle. Henry is urged by his own side to stay home, using the argument that they fight better without him, while the Queen leads their forces into battle.

Ultimately, Edward (York’s oldest son and heir) wins the battle and assumes the crown. He sends Warwick to France to arrange his marriage to King Louis’ sister-in-law, in order to secure an alliance with France. The Duke of York’s head is taken from the gate and replaced by Clifford’s. Edward gives his brothers titles: Gloucester to Richard and Clarence to George. They receive news that Henry has been captured; Edward orders Henry imprisoned in the Tower of London.

While Warwick is abroad, Edward becomes enamored of a woman at court, Lady Gray. She parries his amorous advances, so he offers her marriage instead, despite having just sent Warwick to arrange for a French bride. Lady Gray consents; how could she refuse?

News of Edward’s marriage to Lady Gray reaches Warwick while he’s at the French Court with King Louis, his sister-in-law Lady Bona, and former Queen Margaret (who is also French; she’s there seeking support to challenge Edward). Warwick has just proposed a union between Lady Bona and Edward when the news arrives from England. Warwick feels betrayed by Edward; the betrayal convinces him to switch sides and to join Margaret to fight against Edward.

Louis, Warwick, Bona, and Margaret all send their ill wishes back to Edward via Post, a courier. Margaret and Warwick plan their attack against Edward. Warwick pledges his oldest daughter to Margaret’s son, Prince Edward. Warwick is now fully aligned with Henry.

When Post delivers the messages to King Edward, the House of York prepares for battle. But Edward’s brother Clarence has something else on his mind: he wants a wife for himself. He decides to switch loyalties along with Warwick, in hopes Warwick will allow him to marry the second daughter of Warwick (the first is betrothed to Henry’s son). Edward has now lost the support of his once-trusted Warwick and his fickle brother Clarence.

Warwick captures King Edward at night and sends him to his brother the Archbishop of York to be kept under guard. Having taken the crown from Edward’s head, Warwick sends the crown to London with orders to release Henry and have Henry resume his reign.

Richard easily liberates his brother Edward from the grounds of the Archbishop of York. With aid from Burgundy (another relative), they go to Belgium to obtain soldiers for their army. They return with their army of ‘Hollanders’ and find the gates of York closed. The mayor of York doesn’t allow Edward and Richard to pass, but one by one supporters of King Henry arrive and are allowed inside the gates. Clarence arrives and asks to be let in, but Edward, standing outside the gates, convinces him to rejoin his family’s cause. The York family now reunited, Edward sends word he’ll fight the Queen’s army in the morning.

Fate hasn’t favored Margaret and her army on their journey from France. Despite having lost half their force, Margaret remains undeterred and rouses her troops on to war. That battle is decisive for the House of York. Warwick is killed. Prince Edward (Henry and Margaret’s son) is killed. Margaret, having lost her son and her purpose in life, pleads to be killed. Instead, she’s taken into custody and sent back to France. Richard steals away to London, where he murders Henry.

The play concludes with the end of the civil war, and the birth of a son to Edward. Richard remains on stage, a counterpoint to Edward’s welcome to a reign of peace.

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Thoughts

This is a play about family loyalty, which is understandable since its subject is a war that divided England in a battle between two family lines of succession. It’s a tale of broken loyalties, in which characters betray their families. A king agrees to pass the crown upon his death to another line, bypassing his son’s right to the throne. A brother ditches his own family to seek a wife from the opposing side. Another brother says he has no father and no brothers: his self-interests are supreme. His fierce declarations leave a pall over the peaceful resolution of the last act.

Character traits

This play portrays Henry’s pacifism and thoughtfulness in a positive light. In parts 1 and 2 of the plays bearing his name, Henry was depicted as indecisive, weak, cowardly. This play turns each of these coins: indecisiveness becomes thoughtfulness; cowardice becomes a loving and forgiving nature. The metaphors in his speeches are of the natural world (shepherds in the field) or from classical literature: he’s philosophical rather than rash and unthinking. When he’s liberated from the Tower (briefly), he thanks his jailer and forgives him for incarcerating him. He can appreciate an enemy’s point of view, even if he doesn’t always concede it.

When Margaret and Clifford go to battle against Edward and tell Henry to stay behind, he goes to the countryside. He’s found by two gamekeepers out hunting deer. They realize who he is, and he’s captured to be brought to Edward. Henry says to the gamekeepers:

My crown is called content-
A crown it is that seldom kings enjoy.

The Henry VI in this play is a king by accident, happening upon the crown at only 9 months of age. He would have lived a happy life away from court, its politics, its battles. He wants to live a simple life of solitude, but history has denied him.

Margaret is the warrior to his philosopher, and her son Prince Edward has inherited her take-no-prisoners aggression. She’s fearsome and confident. She seeks a single purpose: to ensure her son inherits the crown. Once he’s murdered, she begs to be killed also. Although several characters deride her for wearing the armor in the family, her speeches are uplifting and powerful. She is a character to be respected as a just warrior, as Henry is to be respected as a gentle, loving philosopher-king.

All of York’s sons have one inherent weakness that defines them: lust—for power (Richard) or women (Edward and Clarence). The play makes clear that even though the York family wins the crown, and will keep it for some time, these characters are deeply flawed. Sometimes outcomes are not just. The House of York won the final battle not because they were better, but because the fates were unkind to the opposing forces.

After Richard murders Henry in the last scene, he has this to say as he prepares to carry away the corpse of the man once king:

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“I that have neither pity, love, nor fear.
Indeed, ‘tis true that Henry told me of,
For I have often heard my mother say
I came into the world with my legs forward.
Had I not reason, think ye, to make haste,
And seek their ruin that usurped our right?
The midwife wondered and women cried
‘O, Jesus bless us, he is born with teeth!’—
And so I was, which plainly signified
That I should snarl and bite and play the dog.
Then, since the heavens have shaped my body so,
Let hell make crooked my mind to answer it.
I had no father, I am like no father;
I have no brother, I am like no brother; 
And this word, ‘love’, which greybeards call divine,
Be resident in men like one another
And not in me—I am myself alone.
Clarence, beware; thou kept’st me from the light—
But I will sort a pitchy day for thee.
For I will buzz abroad such prophecies
That Edward shall be fearful of his life,
And then, to purge his fear, I’ll be thy death.
Henry and his son are gone; thou, Clarence, art next;
And by one and one I will dispatch the rest,
Counting myself but bad till I be best.
I’ll throw thy body in another room
And triumph, Henry, in thy day of doom.”
-Act 5 Scene 6

The resolution of war

The play demonstrates that in war, there are no winners. One tragic and moving scene is set on a battlefield, as Henry watches from the side. A soldier drags a vanquished body onto the scene, removes the helmet of the soldier he just killed, only to discover that he has killed his father. This happens again, but the next soldier realizes he has killed his son. Whatever sense of honor drove these soldiers into battle evaporates once they’re confronted with the brutality of their actions. An even greater tragedy, they each realize they’ve sacrificed their own families in service to another’s.

A Russian president uses the pretense of a stolen land to invade it by force, to ‘reunite’ it with Russia. He sends to battle men who might be kin to the people they’re told to fight, people who are defending their land from invasion. Whatever the official rationale, this war of destruction is waged to slake the lust for ever more power. It devastates families and an entire nation all for one man’s insistence on his historical ascendancy. He doesn’t wear the physical deformities of a Richard III, but the character flaws fit him well.

While he pursues his goals, he sees traitors in his court on every side. Disagreement with him becomes, in his mind, treason. He dispatches them one by one. He takes care to make their deaths, seemingly by misadventure, public and cruel displays of the price of disloyalty. An airplane crashing to earth or a head impaled on a gate: the message needs no translation. His inner circle diminishes with each act of retribution; the leader becomes increasingly isolated.

Western culture prefers storytelling arcs that resolve conflict with the ascendancy of good over evil. We want a ‘good’ outcome. We wish for an end to the Russian war against Ukraine that ensures peace and Ukrainian sovereignty.

This play manifests the tragedy inherent to resolving conflict with war. Regardless the outcome, the end of a war will not be ‘good’. Peace, when it is won, will have to acknowledge the terrible price that the war has exacted. Peace may be just, but it will not be good.

And, it will not be a lasting peace as long as Richard is still onstage.