Shakespeare's Kings (73 page)

His
two
principal
sources
are
once
again
Raphael
Holinshed
and Edward
Hall;
but
since
in
the
Henry VI
plays
his
subject
is
above
all
the Wars
of
the
Roses
and
the
events
which
led
up
to
them,
it
is
hardly surprising
that
Hall's
Chronicle of the Union of the Two Noble and Il
lustre Famelies of Lancastre and Yorke
should
make
a
rather
larger
contribution here
than
it
does
to
the
plays
covering
the
earlier
period.
For
Shakespeare as
for
Hall,
the
underlying
theme
is
always
retribution:
the
price
that the
House
of
Lancaster
must
continue
to
pay
for
the
original
sin
of Henry
IV
in
usurping
the
throne.
His
son
Henry
V,
by
a
combination of
personal
glamour,
high
intelligence
and
astonishingly
good
luck, succeeded
in
almost
all
he
set
out
to
do;
his
grandson
Henry
VI,
who possessed
none
of
these
attributes,
was
to
prove
a
catastrophe.

It
is
hardly
surprising
that
an
English
play
about
the
Hundred
Years War
should
reflect
a
degree
of
anti-French
feeling:

How
are
we
park'd
and
bounded
in
a
pale

-A
little
herd
of
England's
timorous
deer,

Maz'd
with
a
yelping
kennel
of
French
curs!

Such
feeling
was,
however,
particularly
strong
in
1589,
when
the
three parts
of
King Henry VI
were
being
written.
The
Spaniards,
smarting from
the
defeat
of
their
Armada
only
a
year
before,
were
already

planning
a
new
invasion
of
England,
this
time
using
Brittany
as
a springboard.
Meanwhile
the
Protestant
Henry
of
Navarre
was
struggling —
with
the
help
of
English
arms
and
money
—
against
the
Catholic League
in
his
ultimately
successful
attempt
to
gain
the
French
throne. At
this
of
all
moments,
Catholic
France
was
fair
game
—
it
even
offered a
witch
like
Joan
of
Arc
-
and
Shakespeare
was
not
one
to
miss
such an
opportunity.

The
very
first
scene
of
Henry VI Part I
seems
to
contain
the
whole play
in
miniature.
It
is
set
in
Westminster
Abbey,
against
a
background of
the
funeral
procession
of
Henry
V;
but
the
dead
King's
body
is scarcely
cold
before
the
two
most
powerful
men
in
the
realm
are
at loggerheads,
with
the
Duke
of
Gloucester
hurling
insults
at
Bishop Beaufort
-
a
quarrel
which
will
all
too
soon
be
paralleled
by
that
between York
and
Somerset
and
their
two
champions,
Vernon
and
Basset. Bedford
tries
to
calm
them,
but
is
almost
immediately
interrupted
by the
first
of
the
three
messengers
who
successively
bring
news
of
a
whole series
of
military
disasters
across
the
Channel.
Thus
the
three
principal themes
of
the
play
-
the
inadequacy
of
the
young
King,
with
the consequent
dissension
among
the
nobles
and
ultimately
the
loss
of France
-
are
all
introduced
within
the
first
sixty
lines.
At
the
same
time we
are
given
a
particularly
striking
example
of
Shakespeare's
technique of
telescoping
events.
The
first
messenger
announces
the
loss
ofGuyenne, Compiegne
(which
he
confusingly
calls
'Champaigne'),
Rheims, Rouen,
Orleans,
Paris,
Gisors
and
Poitiers
-
towns
which
in
fact
fell
to the
French
at
various
times
between
1427
and
1450;
at
the
time
of
Henry V's
funeral
in
November
1422
all
of
them
were
still
firmly
in
English hands.
With
the
second
messenger
comes
the
news
of
the
Dauphin's coronation
at
Rheims,
which
occurred
on
17
July
1429,
just
a
month after
the
capture
of
Talbot
('Retiring
from
the
siege
of
Orleans')
at
the
Battle
of
Patay
on
18
June
-
not,
as
Shakespeare
has
it,
1
o
August
-
which is
the
subject
of
the
third
messenger's
report.
None
of
this
of
course
would trouble
the
average
audience,
whether
in
the
sixteenth
century
or
the twentieth;
some
of
us,
on
the
other
hand,
may
be
a
little
bewildered
to find
Talbot,
three
scenes
later,
fighting
on
the
walls
of
Orleans
and
very much
at
liberty.

Another
source
of
surprise
is
the
third
messenger's
report
of
the cowardice
of
Sir
John
Falstaff,
an
affecting
account
of
whose
death
in 1415
is
given
by
Mistress
Quickly
in
the
second
act
of
Henry V.
We have
already
seen
in
Chapter
6
¹
how
Shakespeare
borrowed
the
name of
this
unfortunate
knight
in
the
two
parts
of
Henry IV
and
in
Henry V,
when
he
found
that
he
could
no
longer
call
him
Old
castle
;
it
is nevertheless
worth
repeating
here
that
in
fact
Fastolf-Falstaff
had
an unusually
distinguished
mili
tary
career
covering
some
forty
years,
during which
he
occupied
many
important
posts
and
was
awarded
a
number of
honours-which
included,
in
February
1426,
the
Order
of
the
Garter. At
Patay
too
he
had
displayed
his
usual
gallantry;
he
was
unfortunate, however,
in
that
one
of
his
tactical
manoeuvres
was
misunderstood
by his
own
men,
who
panicked
and
fled
the
field.
According
to
Jean
de Wavrin,
an
eyewitness,
he
himself
continued
to
fight
bravely
on, retreating
only
when
the
day
was
seen
to
be
irretrievably
lost;
the accusation
of
cowardice
is
made
only
by
the
chronicler
Enguerrand
de Monstrelet,
who
is
also
our
sole
authority
for
the
story
of
his
being stripped
of
his
Garter.
Even
if,
as
seems
possible,
Bedford
did
order
an inquiry
into
his
conduct
in
the
battle,
Fastolf
emerged
from
it
fully vindicated;
the
offices
in
which
he
was
later
employed
-
Lieutenant
of Caen,
English
ambassador
to
the
Council
of
Basle,
one
of
the
chief negotiators
of
the
Peace
of
Arras
-
were
every
bit
as
distinguished
as those
he
had
held
before
it.
He
certainly
did
nothing
to
deserve
the character
of
a
drunken
poltroon
which
Shakespeare
was
so
unfairly
to foist
upon
him.