Under the Parking Lot

One cannot read and write about Richard III without mentioning the recent news concerning the discovery of his remains in the ancient Greyfriars Church, located beneath a car park in modern day Leicester City. It is a fascinating story, and by all accounts it seems that our most illustrious villain has indeed been found, and easily at that (they located the remains on the first day of digging), which is actually kind of amazing given that when they began digging they were not even sure where the church was, much less the burial site (if it even existed).

As is the way with science, the discovery of the remains was only the beginning. Since the exhumation, many, many tests have been conducted, from bone analysis to genealogy, to learn whatever we can about the guy and his times. Like I said, it is a rather interesting story (at least to me), and one that is well-timed in regards to this project in that we now have the opportunity to compare the facts with the fictions, the science with the myths. So, how do they compare? Well, for starters, check out the picture above and compare it to the grotesque figure the Bard gives us, a “foule hunch-backt toade” with “legs of an unequal size” and a body made in “disproportion…in every part.” Hunch-backt…yeah, probably. Disproportioned in every part? Not so much.

Why would Shakespeare exaggerate, you ask? As stated earlier, there was of course strong motive for Shakespeare to demonize this last King of the Yorkists. The Tudors, their regime born on the day of Richard’s death, were in power in Shakespeare’s time and they needed to be hoisted high above the dark and villainous days before their benevolent reign began. We’re so much better off now, aren't we, one would perhaps silently surmise after watching this play in Shakespeare’s time.

(18) Henry VI, Part 3

I just finished the third and final part to the Henry VI story. It was much like the other two parts (I know, surprise surprise), with even more evil machinations and scurrilous plotting by our favorite Yorkists and Lancastrians. I liked it and am looking forward to reading Richard III, the final play in this bit of Shakespearean history. These Henry VI plays really set up this Richard guy to be a real freak. It should be interesting to follow it through.

The American Shakespeare Center

Driving through the rolling, fall-foliaged hills of beautiful southwestern Virginia last weekend, I came across the American Shakespeare Center in Staunton, Virginia. A great little theater in a great little town, this place is dedicated to staging Shakespeare’s plays in a replica (the only replica, apparently) of the famous Blackfriars Theater, a singular indoor theater popular in Shakespeare’s day. Dedicated to the idea of presenting no-frills, authentic, let-the-language-stand-on-its-own type productions, they seem to be getting it right. From their flyer, graciously handed to me by the pleasant and knowledgeable girl managing the box office door:

“The idea was simple: we thought that if we could re-create some of the staging conditions for which Shakespeare wrote, then we might be able to recover some of the magic written into his plays that can get lost when you play with all the technological tricks we’ve invented over the last four hundred years.”

Seems reasonable to me. Although I was unable to attend that day’s production (All’s Well That Ends Well), I will be back for a later production, perhaps Timon of Athens in the spring?

(17) Henry VI, Part 2

The saga continues. Part two was an eventful installment, with bloodshed and high jinks galore. Act IV in this play was especially interesting. First, Suffolk is murdered dramatically, at sea, like a common pirate…and then the real action begins with the depiction of the rise of the rebel leader Jack Cade. The action unfolds quickly (there are a full ten scenes in this Act), with Cade acting as the lightning rod for all sorts of anarchy and mayhem.

Cade’s depiction was particularity interesting. Shakespeare makes him out to be nothing short of a hysterical madman with a deep hatred for all things civilized. The dude rails against everything, especially lawyers (famous quote here: “The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers”) and anyone who can write (the poor clerk Emmanuel is murdered by Cade in this Act for the heinous crime of literacy: “Away with him, I say! hang him with his pen and ink-horn about his neck”). The dude’s a real bloodthirsty freak who unsurprisingly meets a brutal end. Unsurprisingly and apropos…what do you think would happen to a character in a Shakespeare play who hates writers?

A Few Bullet Points

A few bullet points on Henry VI, Part 1:

• Why is it that when a powerful woman shows up in this play (Joan of Arc), she is automatically taken to be a scurrilous witch, but when a powerful man shows up (Talbot), he’s the greatest thing since sliced bread? Seem rather unfair, doesn’t it? Perhaps the fact the she’s also French has something to do with it (everything to do with it?)
• Speaking of witches, there’s lots of supernatural stuff going on here which I find entertaining and a good foil to the heavy, plodding (at times) plot. It works to juxtapose theses elements.
• There is something else going on here in this play, something political. Some of the commentary I have been reading suggests that by showing a destabilized, chaotic, pre-Tudor world, Shakespeare was trying to make his own monarch at the time (the Tudor Queen Elizabeth I) look good by comparison. I can believe this.
• Here’s a vivid image, one of many, given to us in this play:

“O, were mine eyeballs into bullets turn’d; That I in rage might shoot them at your faces.”

Nice, right? Conjure up that one in the mind…really captures the anger, eh?

• Shakespeare creates one heck of a cliffhanger here in the closing lines, spoken in true hand-wringing, evil-glaring fashion by the Earl of Suffolk:

“Margaret shall now be Queen, and rule the King;
But I will rule both her, the King, and Realm.”

TA DUM! (ominous music). Trouble’s a-comin.’