Shakespeare's Kings (119 page)

The
curious
little
scene
v
which
brings
the
act
to
an
end
-
and
in which
Lord
Stanley
explains
that
he
cannot
actively
support
Richmond while
Richard
holds
his
son
as
a
hostage
—
might
more
appropriately be
transposed
with
its
successor,
V.i:
it
belongs
quite
clearly
to
August 1485,
when
Richmond
had
made
his
landing.
(He
did
so,
incidentally, not
at
Haverfordwest
or
Pembroke
as
Sir
Christopher
Urswick
maintains,
but
at
Milford
Haven.)
With
Act
V
we
briefly
return
to
1483
and Buckingham's
execution
after
the
botched
rebellion;
then,
with
scene ii,
we
are
back
again
in
1485
—
Shakespeare
having
passed
over
the events
of
1484
in
silence
—
where
we
remain
to
the
end
of
the
play. This
short
scene
with
Richmond
and
his
principal
followers,
somewhere on
the
road
towards
Bosworth,
is
a
precursor
to
the
fight.
The
three scenes
which
follow,
iii
to
v,
are
all
set
on
the
field
of
battle;
and
it
is on
this,
after
Richard's
death
and
a
suitable
concluding
speech
by Richmond
—
now
King
Henry
VII
—
that
the
final
curtain
falls.

Of
the
three,
scene
iii
is
by
far
the
longest
and
the
most
important, inescapably
reminiscent
of
the
finest
scene
(IV.i)
of
King Henry V,
the night
before
Agincourt.
In
the
early
part
at
least,
the
two
enemy
camps share
the
stage
as
Richard
and
Richmond
make
their
dispensations
for the
morrow.
Both
show
their
concern
for
Stanley,
uncertain
as
they are
both
of
his
precise
position
and
of
his
intentions;
but
it
is
to

Richmond
that
Stanley
presents
himself
under
cover
of
night,
to
explain for
the
second
time
how
the
King's
possession
of
his
own
son
as
hostage makes
it
impossible
for
him
to
side
openly
with
his
stepson
as
he
would otherwise
have
done.
(The
visit
is
obviously
unhistorical;
it
should
be noted
too
that
-
perhaps
to
simplify
the
story,
or
even
to
economize in
casting
-
Shakespeare
presents
us
with
one
Stanley
only;
he
makes no
mention
of
Sir
William,
whose
last-minute
intervention
was
to decide
the
battle.)
It
is
at
this
point
that
the
ghosts
appear
-
eleven
of them,
each
speaking
first
to
Richard,
cursing
him,
and
then
passing
on to
the
sleeping
Richmond,
to
whom
they
wish
victory.
Then
Richmond and
Richard
deliver
their
orations
to
their
men,
and
the
battle
begins.

Scene
v,
apart
from
containing
the
most
famous
line
in
the
play
¹
-twice
delivered
-
serves
to
emphasize
the
King's
valour
in
battle
as
he determinedly
seeks
out
Richmond
to
engage
him
in
single
combat.
It also
suggests
that
the
latter
protected
himself
by
dressing
a
number
of others
in
similar
armour:

I
think
there
be
six
Richmond's
in
the
field:

Five
have
I
slain
today
instead
of
him.

This
appears
to
be
an
invention
of
Shakespeare's.
The
use
of
doubles was
a
well-known
trick
of
medieval
warfare,
²
but
there
is
no
suggestion of
it
at
Bosworth,
where
Richard
is
known
to
have
worn
the
regal circlet
on
his
helmet.
Hall
claims
on
the
contrary
that
Richmond 'perceyved
wel
the
kyng
furiusly
commyng
towarde
him,
and
by
cause the
hole
hope
of
his
welth
and
purpose
was
to
be
determined
by
battaill, he
gladlye
proferred
to
encountre
with
hym
body
to
body
and
man
to man'.
But
the
encounter
takes
place
at
last,
at
the
beginning
of
scene v,
and
Richard
is
killed.
We
shall
never
know
at
whose
hands
he
met his
death;
we
can
be
confident
they
were
not
those
of
Richmond,
since if
he
had
personally
struck
the
fatal
blow
the
fact
would
almost
certainly have
been
recorded.
Here
of
all
places,
however,
a
little
dramatic
licence can
surely
be
forgiven.

The
story
of
the
presentation
of
the
crown
by
one
of
the
Stanleys
to the
victorious
Richmond
on
the
field
of
Bosworth
was
a
venerable

tradition
long
before
Shakespeare's
day.
In
the
circumstances
it
can
only have
been
Sir
William,
since
his
brother
had
refused
to
engage
himself or
his
men
in
the
Battle
.
Richmond's
closing
speech
is
unhistoric
but unexceptionable
-
unless
we
take
issue
with
his
description
of
himself and
Elizabeth
as
'the
true
succeeders
of
each
royal
house'.
Elizabeth, whom
he
was
shortly
to
marry,
was
indeed
the
heir
to
the
house
of York,
although
after
the
death
of
Richard's
only
son
in
1484
(unmen
tioned
by
Shakespeare)
he
had
in
fact
adopted
his
nephew
John
de
la Pole
as
his
heir;
but
to
that
of
Lancaster
-
even
of
what
was
left
of
it
-Henry's
claim
was
legally
a
good
deal
more
questionable.
No
matter: in
the
immediate
aftermath
of
Bosworth
there
would
have
been
few men
in
all
England
who
would
not
have
knelt
before
Henry
Tudor
as their
rightful
King.