On Hating Shakespeare’s “Richard III”
Shakespeare is one of England's Great Writers. That's what we've been told since grade school. For too long, however, Shakespeare's prominence in literature class has spilled over into history class, and history is the lesser for it.
Shakespeare wrote entertainment, not scholarship. His ambition was to make money for the box office, not to produce accurate history. It is incredible that a historian such as James Gairdner would proclaim at the turn of the 20th century that Shakespeare's portrait of Richard III was a close representation of the historical Richard. Here was someone whom Shakespeare describes as coveting the throne from the age of 8, whose deformed body housed a deformed soul (as if the two went together!). Shakespeare presents us with a caricature of a human being, and such a description is counted as history. What makes a Great Writer an authority on history simply because he is a Great Writer? Shakespeare never had any business in History class.
The play Richard III chronologically follows Shakespeare's less successful play Henry VI, Part 3, leaping over Edward IV's successful second reign and only snatching the unpleasant parts as a prelude to Richard's actions following Edward's death. Yes, we all know how boring prosperity and success are! And we all know that emphasizing Edward's success would not prompt our collective sigh of relief when the "glorious" Tudor dynasty replaces the Yorkist dynasty! Shakespeare's presenting Edward IV's successful second reign as an afterthought and prelude to the greater drama of what occurred after is truly an insult to Edward's accomplishments.
But presenting Richard as an evil and deformed villain and Edward IV's reign as merely a prelude to Richard's usurpation are not the only reasons to hate Shakespeare's play. Shakespeare makes Richard larger than life; he eclipses the other characters in the play, and, thus, Richard is given an importance that no individual can have. Whether one hates Richard or loves him, Shakespeare's larger-than-life parody has made it tempting to interpret every action by every other person by the light of how it affected Richard.
In reality, Richard was not the center of the 15th century world, and he wasn't the center of every 15th century mind.
The magnification of Richard's importance also tempts us to define Richard's behavior with superlatives, when none are needed. Thus at the turn of the 20th century, we have Gairdner and Clement Markham shouting at each other from either side of an abyss that neither can cross; one considers him a villain reveling in his villainy, while the other considers him a white knight and the flower of English virtue. What nonsense both these superlatives are! One can't begin to understand anyone, historical or otherwise, unless one is willing to think of him as a human being with flaws, as well as virtues.
This is the absurdity of those Ricardians who, knowing of my admiration for Edward IV, attempt to rationalize Richard's actions by comparing his bad behavior to Edward's, assuming that my admiration extends to all Edward's actions. But I won't defend a person's bad actions, even if I do admire him, which is why I can't brook justifications for what Richard did.
Shakespeare's play, with its shallow black/white portraits of Richard III and Henry VII, is historically useless and good for nothing outside of literature. Much more interesting were the other plays that preceded it. Those plays, however, have their faults. Ricardus Tertius, unfortunately, was written in Latin. However, in this play, Richard is wavering and indecisive, and much more human. In the other play, The True Tragedy, Richard reasons that, "being released from the yoke of my brother, (shall I) become subject to his son?" Once again, this is a more human reaction than wanting "to prove a villain."
I doubt very much if anyone sets out to see how evil he can be. It has been shown that the criminal mind is more inclined to see himself as right and everyone else as wrong. I believe that Richard sincerely wanted to be a popular, beloved, and good King. I don't believe that he was a monster. However, he greatly misjudged reaction to his actions, leading up to and including his usurpation, and, once down the road, he chose not, or was unable, to undo his error in judgment. He continued to compound his error with more errors in judgement, which led him to defeat on Bosworth field.
Hey. really loved this article and this website. I’m American, we Americans know nothing of the Wars of the Roses. I started studying this when I was studying the Tudor dynasty. Some of us have heard of Henry VIII (due to all the wives he had) and a lot of us are familiar with Elizabeth I due to her bringing ‘the Golden Age.’ But most of us have never even heard of Richard III.
I know that seems a little out there, I also know some people are going holler “but Shakespeare!” To be honest, I had never heard of that play until a few years ago when I started studying the Tudor dynasty. At first I thought it was just me, but then I started asking people around if they had heard of that play and they all said “no.” I don’t know what goes on in the U.K, but it seems here in the U.S.A a lot of people have never heard of Shakespeare’s ‘Richard III.’ A lot of us Americans are familiar with Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet and Macbeth, but not Richard III. It looks to me like the only Americans have at least heard of that play, are those who majored in theater and performing arts in university. Though I can’t speak for large cities like New York who have a lot of Broadway plays.
I came to the conclusion that Richard III was the most likely guilty suspect, for the disappearance of the ‘Princes in the Tower’, after doing my homework. And I did so without watching or being influenced by Shakespeare. Whenever some of us Americans try to tell Ricardians, that we have never heard of that play until studying the Tudors and the Wars of the Roses. They get mad, upset and accuse us of being liars.
A lot of people here, have never heard of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York either. But the ones who have only know them as Henry VIII’s parents. I know a lot of people in the U.K may not believe me, but it’s true. Though like I said before, I can’t speak for cities like New York and L.A. Don’t take my word for it, go anywhere else in the United States and ask people around, they will tell you they never heard of that play. So if anyone needs a blank slate mind, to test the theory about rather or not if people think Richard III was a bad guy, without the so-called “Tudor propaganda.” The U.S is a good place to start.
Thanks for your comments. I, too, am an American, but I always marched to a different drummer. I’ve been intereted in Edward V since I was 12, and I spent the past 60 years studying this time period. My opinions have changed through the years.
I like your contention that an American audience, influenced by neither side, would be an effective blank slate regarding Richard’s reputation. Once a person learned anything about Richard, he comes to this history with a bias. For some people, that’s the end of the argument. It would be an interesting experiment to present the facts as starkly as possible to an impartial audience and get their reactions.
Because I was interested in this period quite young, I stumbled upon Shakespeare’s play early. I agree that the history plays have esoteric interest to the American public. However, they are still performed in America, mostly likely for audiences who are afficionados of the theater, literature, history, or of the Bard himself.
Shakespeare wrote an amazing number of English history plays: King John, Edward III, Henry IV parts 1, 2, and 3, Henry V, Henry VI parts 1, 2, and 3, Richard III, and Henry VIII. I suppose, to Shakespeare’s audiences, they were the action movies of their time — with plenty of violence, fighting, and killing. But we have more entertainment options than they.
I embraced Ricardianism in my late teens and then rejected it when the cracks started to show. Like you, I believe Richard had Edward V and Richard, Duke of York, assassinated. He was responsible for their safety. They were killed during his watch, and he had the motive and opportunity to do it. His men were in control of the Tower and of the boys.
The actions of the Yorkist loyalists following Richard’s usurpation (see “Richard’s Rebels” on this website) lead me to think that the Princes were dead by mid-September. That was about the time that Buckingham, Richard’s right-hand man, joined Richard’s opposition. Afterwards, the Yorkist loyalists no longer had the objective of reinstating Edward, but of supporting the candidacy of Henry Tudor. Only assurances that the Princes were dead could have stopped Richard’s opposition in their tracks like that. I’m sure Henry’s conniving mother had a lot to do with offering her son as a candidate, as Henry was a bachelor and Edward V had a lot of sisters. Perfect marriage partners now that Edward IV’s male progeny were believed to be dead.
The Ricardians believe that saving Richard from the ignominy of killing the Princes will redeem his reputation and reign, but his 26-month reign went on a downward spiral as opposition to his administration grew. There were more reasons for this than the death of the Princes or the violence with which Richard had taken the throne.
Thank you for your reply, Pamela Horter-Moore. Nice to see a fellow American who has knowledge of this. You’re right, Ricardians attempt to convince everyone, of Richard’s supposed innocence in the murder of his nephews. Is not going to redeem him in the eyes of many. He broke Magna Carta! He executed William Hastings, without charges and a trial. How something like this can fly over the heads of so many today, I have no idea.
My question is. How did the Ricardian movement go from, “let’s take another look at Richard III rather than the caricature he is in Shakespeare” to “Richard III was a saint who never did anything wrong in his life”? And how did this movement grow in such large numbers in the U.K? It seems blogs like yours are a rarity. Because even if I find a website or blog that is even the least bit neutral, it’s full of Ricardians yelling and screaming. When I first started studying about the Wars of the Roses, I was just wanting to look at the facts. It was very difficult to find information that wasn’t biased, around almost literally worshiping Richard III. The whole thing is just weird to me.
Thanks for your insightful comments. Richard did have a handful of defenders after the Tudors, but things really didn’t change until Clement Markham published his biography at the turn of the 20th century. He excused Richard of all of his crimes, put the murder of the Princes on Henry VII’s shoulders, and declared Richard to be a flower of English valor and virtue. That started it, and the Society was founded around 1924, I believe. From my perspective, the Ricardians have never intended to treat this history objectively. Their objective is to rescue Richard III’s reputation. The academic historians, for the most part, have resisted Ricardianism. The Ricardian Jeremy Potter called it “revisionism,” but it’s revisionism of the worst kind. Richard is the object of a cult of personality. He is not the only individual to receive unwarranted adoration from people who would be otherwise disgusted if anyone else exhibited the same behavior. The Ricardians think “proving” Richard innocent of murdering the Princes will save his reputation, so they search high and low for evidence. I’ve had Ricardians argue that “there are no bodies” when there are remains in Westminster Abbey in an urn with their names on it. So far, the authorities have not given their permission for their re-examination, although they were examined on a couple of occasions during the 20th century, and then only under limitations. Perhaps that’s a good thing. The deaths of Hastings, Rivers, Grey, and Vaughan are dismissed, even though they were murdered without due process. Richard committed more wrongs than these in his usurpation. The Ricardians also insist that Richard was popular. He divided his own party by deposing the incumbent of that party. A look at the background of those who turned against Richard to support Henry Tudor informs a person that the Yorkist establishment turned against him. I have a partial list of names under “Richard’s Rebels” on this website. As John Locke says, “The actions of men are the best interpreters of their thoughts.” The Ricardians might get a lot of publicity by making a lot of noise while more objective and/or informed opinions are silent, but that doesn’t make them right.