{"id":10136,"date":"2025-09-15T18:16:37","date_gmt":"2025-09-16T01:16:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/?page_id=10136"},"modified":"2025-10-03T18:25:24","modified_gmt":"2025-10-04T01:25:24","slug":"introduction-to-history","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/introduction-to-history\/","title":{"rendered":"Introduction to Shakespeare’s History Plays"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Commentaries on Shakespeare’s Genres: History<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
\n
HOME<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
OLLI<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
QUESTIONS<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
COMMENTARIES<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
AUDIO<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
GUIDES<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
LINKS<\/div><\/a><\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Of Interest:<\/strong> 1623 First Folio<\/em> (Folger Library)<\/a> | Shakespeare\u2019s Holinshed: Chronicle & Plays Compared<\/a> <\/em>| Raphael Holinshed\u2019s Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland<\/em><\/a> | John Stow\u2019s The annales<\/em> \u2026<\/a> | Edward Hall\u2019s The union of the two noble and illustre famelies of Lancastre and Yorke<\/a><\/em> | Sam. Daniel\u2019s The ciuile wars betweene \u2026 Lancaster and Yorke<\/a><\/em>\u00a0| Famous Victories of Henry the Fifth<\/em>\u00a0(1598)<\/a> |\u00a0A Mirror for Magistrates<\/em><\/a> | More\u2019s\u00a0Richard III<\/em><\/a>\u00a0| Foxe\u2019s Acts and Monuments<\/em> (1583)<\/a> | English Monarchy Timeline<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0Edward III\u2019s Family Tree<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0Hundred Years\u2019 War (1337-1453, Britannica)<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0Hundred Years\u2019 War (WHE)<\/a>\u00a0| Wars of the Roses<\/a>\u00a0| Kings & Queens of England<\/a> | Tudor Society Sources<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0H. B. Tree\u2019s\u00a0Court of Henry VIII<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What are history plays?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

What are history plays in the Shakespearean context? Well, they\u2019re just plays grounded in some version of English history but whose prime directive is to entertain, which justifies quite a lot of changing and rearranging of events and recastings of character for dramatic purposes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why wouldn\u2019t, say, Macbeth <\/em>be classified this way? Probably because it isn\u2019t about \u201cScottish history\u201d in any deep sense. Macbeth <\/em>fits into the tragic genre so well that we would feel strange calling it anything but a tragedy. In a true history play with all its events and pageantry, there just wouldn\u2019t be mental or emotional \u201croom\u201d for a character like Macbeth, with his second-guessings, deep inwardness, and so forth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shakespeare didn\u2019t invent the dramatic genre we call \u201chistory plays.\u201d It was a phenomenon of the 1580s-90s. Christopher Marlowe\u2019s Edward II<\/em> is one fine example, and others are The True Tragedy of Richard III, The Troublesome Reign of King John, <\/em>and The Famous Victories of Henry V. <\/em>These latter three plays were performed by the Queen\u2019s Men acting company (1583-1591).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, there wasn\u2019t a long tradition to draw from. A growing sentiment of nationalism in Early Modern England led to the flourishing of this genre\u2014the English apparently wanted to see their history reflected back to them, and Shakespeare was happy to oblige. [1]<\/a> While Shakespeare didn\u2019t invent the history play, English history retains its fascination for us moderns in large part because certain lucky kings and queens had a great dramatist to help them strut their stuff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As Scott MacMillin and Sally-Beth Maclean point out in their 2006 Cambridge UP book The Queens Men and Their Plays, <\/em>[2]<\/a> nobody has thus far heard a whisper about the next Queen\u2019s Men Drama Festival. But Shakespeare\u2019s efforts? That\u2019s another and more memorable story. As Cassius asks his fellow conspirators in Julius Caesar,<\/em> \u201cHow many ages hence \/ Shall this our lofty scene be acted over \/ In states unborn and accents yet unknown!\u201d [3]<\/a>  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Consider a modern example: while JFK was a complex, intelligent man whose presidency was already consequential by November 1963, does anybody think he would exercise the continuing fascination that he does without the Arthurian \u201cCamelot\u201d legend woven around him by his family, his advisors, and above all by his wife Jackie? She is the one who made her husband\u2019s funeral an unforgettable symbolic event\u2014something for the ages. Even a lifetime on, there is something of the doomed hero-king about him in our collective cultural memory. [4]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In an older context, Abraham Lincoln was remarkable enough to have been remembered no matter what, but Walt Whitman cemented our sixteenth president\u2019s status as an American symbol with his moving elegy, \u201cWhen Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom\u2019d.\u201d [5]<\/a> That is the sort of thing that Shakespeare has done for English history\u2014Great Britain is a sophisticated little island country now, not a great power like America, but to this day they cast a huge shadow. If you\u2019re interested in using Shakespeare to meditate on modern politics, by the way, Eliot A. Cohen\u2019s The Hollow Crown: Shakespeare on How Leaders Rise, Rule, and Fall <\/em>(Basic Books, 2023) is a good bet. [6]<\/a>  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Are Shakespeare\u2019s history plays history in the sense of \u201ctrue, objective narration\u201d? Well, as I suggested earlier, no. While they have a factual basis and render the grand sweep of English history faithfully enough, the playwright does a great deal of rearranging and telescoping of events, and the sources from which he drew (Raphael Holinshed\u2019s Chronicles<\/em> chief among them) were not objective in the first place. [7]<\/a> To some extent, they read like what Winston Churchill called history as it ought<\/em> to have been, not as it happened down to the last detail. [8]<\/a> Shakespeare didn\u2019t whitewash <\/em>English history, but he did <\/em>adapt it to his dramatic purposes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For example, there\u2019s no proof that Richard III really ordered those famous lads in the Tower killed, but it\u2019s logical to assume that either he or his high-ranking follower Buckingham were responsible since both had means and motive to want Edward IV\u2019s heirs out of the way. Shakespeare\u2019s play, in accordance with the Tudor bias against the Yorkist Richard III, casts this conviction as a moral imperative, an \u201cought,\u201d so the wicked king ends up chortling that the Princes \u201csleep in Abraham\u2019s bosom.\u201d [9]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aristotle lays down the premise in his Poetics <\/em>that historians are at a disadvantage with respect to poets because they, unlike poets, are bound to represent the ugly and sometimes chaotic scenes of actual history. [10]<\/a> We know that sometimes the bad guys win and the good guys lose: things don\u2019t often happen in an ethically satisfying or even coherent manner. History is the record of life, and it\u2019s often a mess because life is a mess.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aristotle writes that the historian and the poet differ in that \u201cthe former relates things that have happened, the latter things that may happen.\u201d For that reason, he suggests, \u201cPoetry \u2026 is a more philosophical and a higher thing than history; for poetry tends to express the universal, history the particular\u201d (1451b). [11]<\/a> If we like that line of thinking, poets are free to give us an intelligible and morally satisfying representation of historical events and people. They are at liberty to construct recognizable scenes from chaotic events, and to derive ethical and intellectual clarity from the welter of motivations that have driven the great men and women of history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To be fair, though, modern historians would point out that they, too, are weavers of plots that follow the ways of fictional narratives. See, for example, Hayden White\u2019s groundbreaking 1973 Johns Hopkins University book Metahistory.<\/em> [12]<\/a> There is no simple, unified truth when we are dealing with complicated, murky events.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

None of this is to say that Shakespeare gives us a dumbed-down version of history. If you read widely in his histories, you\u2019ll find that the playwright manages to do two things at once: 1) pay tribute to the contingency <\/em>of many of history\u2019s events and to the complexity of historical agents; and 2) give us a sense that history adds up to something, that there are lessons to be learned about ethics and power from this crazy pageant of people and deeds. That accomplishment is apparent in the plays we will be examining.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In terms of making sense of history, Shakespeare\u2019s history genre is at base teleological:<\/em> it leads us to the rightness of Queen Elizabeth I\u2019s Tudor reign: all roads lead to Gloriana, the real-life Faery Queen celebrated by Edmund Spenser. Among the histories, only Henry VIII <\/em>was written after the death of Queen Elizabeth I.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSo close, and yet so far\u201d:<\/strong> the environment at court and family relations<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The environment in medieval courtly systems was treacherous even before the time of royal absolutism and the centralized court. [13]<\/a> There was great danger in personal, intimate proximity to power. A person so highly placed was always close not only to power but also to chaos<\/em>\u2014he or she was dancing in an incredibly small circle illuminated by the brightest torchlight. Intense aristocratic competition was a daily reality, even though the great aristocrats were privilegedin ways that the common folk\u2014who suffered from a great deal of want and injustice\u2014could scarcely imagine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We might ask ourselves as a little thought experiment, if the king were our eldest sibling and we were first in line after him, would we loyally maintain his image and authority, or \u2026 not? There is a vast distinction in status between a king and his next sibling, though both are royals. Consider the strangeness<\/em> of this: the sense of intimacy and proximity smashing right up alongside the reality of seemingly infinite<\/em> distance. So close to absolute, sole power, and yet so far!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Such circumstances could easily warp people\u2019s minds, causing them to lose their moral bearings and make a play for the top position occupied by their brother or sister, or cousin or other relative. That\u2019s probably why monarchs and dictators never seem to sleep well. How could they?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Seething resentments may develop from this near\/far distinction, and we might say that the problem comes of treating a human being like a god. Biographers say Richard of Gloucester admired his older brother Edward and that Edward trusted him, but the record shows that when it came time to make his decision to take the crown for himself, Richard sided with himself, not with his brother Edward through his children. [14]<\/a> Gloucester took the throne because he could.<\/em> The haughty Athenians said to the people of Melos: \u201cthe strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.\u201d [15]<\/a> Predators generally feel no need to explain or justify what they do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So we should keep in mind that fierce human energies were always roiling barely under the graceful surface presented by the royal families and the great lords nearest them. This comes from building a system grounded in bloodlines, or as we would say, \u201cgenes.\u201d The justification would be, perhaps, that such an emphasis lends stability to the primal chaos that might otherwise hold sway in human societies. But we could also say that it brings into play a special chaos all its own.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps the worst problem that arises from the infighting of royal elitists is their tendency, in unleashing the worst in themselves in their struggle against one another, to precipitate a society-wide race to the bottom in terms of the lowest, most \u201craw\u201d dimension of human nature. They may drive the entire society they govern to be as cruel, unreasoning, greedy, and chaotic as they themselves are. Who wants to live in that kind of society? Shakespeare sometimes forces his audiences to behold the worst in humanity, but he doesn\u2019t seem pleased to make us dwell there for long\u2014it isn\u2019t healthy, and honestly, we already have a pretty good sense of what\u2019s there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It seems to have been Shakespeare\u2019s view that, like \u201cthe head that wears a crown\u201d (Henry IV\u2019s famous phrase), social and political stability is always uneasy.<\/em> It\u2019s a matter of temporary balancings and arrangements of strong desires in powerful individuals and groups. There is a baseline conservatism <\/em>to such a view: don\u2019t tear down or tear apart what you can\u2019t easily rebuild.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The people\u2019s relation to their government\u2014an enduring issue in political philosophy<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Shakespeare\u2019s history plays, we are not dealing with societies wherein there is an equilibrium or even a genuine reciprocity between the people and their government. Average people, if we may borrow that modern construction, had some <\/em>rights, but they could easily fall victim to a brutal justice system that often resorted to torture, or get conscripted into some violent, tortuous conflict, or be subjected to ruinous taxation or patently corrupt governmental policies, with little or no practical recourse. England even in Shakespeare\u2019s time did not have a fully developed modern government, and even though English law has been sophisticated stuff for a long <\/em>time [16]<\/a> , ensuring that all citizens should be treated equitably wasn\u2019t the operative principle of government.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Did monarchs such as Elizabeth I or James I think of their subjects as adults, much less equals? No. They thought of their subjects as children<\/em> who needed to be tended to, with the caveat that Elizabethan notions about child-rearing were nowhere near as tender as our ideas on the same subject today. These monarchs expected to be treated with the utmost respect by their \u201csubjects.\u201d We will sometimes see Shakespeare offering a nod to his fellow commoners, but on the whole, he seems to be uninterested in undermining the claims of the royals and the nobility to rule by right, so long as their rule is not more than commonly abusive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That said, Shakespeare doesn\u2019t hesitate to point out when his \u201cbetters\u201d do <\/em>behave abusively. Neither is he shy about positing consequences for such abuse. James I thought that if a king misbehaves\u2014even very badly\u2014only God can judge him, not his subjects, who must remain loyal and long-suffering. [17]<\/a> While Shakespeare doesn\u2019t outright deride such formulations, he is never enthusiastic about them. His bad kings tend to get destroyed, if only because they make themselves vulnerable to some disaster or coup by their disorderly and cruel conduct.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the truth is that people can only take so much abuse, and rebellions will occur from time to time. Shakespeare, of course, knows that. He is never sanguine about the outcomes of rebellions like those made by, say, Wat Tyler in 1381 [18]<\/a> or Jack Cade in 1450, [19]<\/a> but he recognizes why such events sometimes occur. In the end, as Shakespeare\u2019s King Henry V says, \u201ca king is but a man,\u201d [20]<\/a>  and as such he should respect the common limitations he faces as a suffering, striving human being among others. Failing to maintain this connection with common humanity may be one of a monarch\u2019s worst possible mistakes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

*Note: In the audio version, this is the end of Part 1.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Genre in the History Plays<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNo matter where; of comfort no man speak\u201d: <\/strong>How should we think of Shakespeare\u2019s history plays in terms of their relation to other genres?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shakespeare no doubt appreciated his audience\u2019s passionate responses as they watched the rise and fall of monarchs and great noblemen from their own past. It\u2019s emotionally compelling stuff, and he must have felt relatively free to present such exalted figures\u2019 triumphs and sufferings as fully as his art and skill allowed. In his history plays, one person\u2019s tragedy may play out even as another\u2019s comedy proceeds on its merry, significant way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alongside of or mixed in with the \u201chistory\u201d in Shakespeare\u2019s history plays, then, there is always some comedy and some tragedy to be found\u2014it\u2019s an inherently composite sub-genre because life <\/em>is composite in that way. The comedies and tragedies labeled as such are closer to experiments in pure modality, though they, too, contain a mixture of happy and sad events. Think of King Lear, <\/em>for example\u2014it\u2019s an incredibly bleak tragic play, but there\u2019s plenty in it to laugh at, and even a scene (Act 4, Scene 6) in which Gloucester mock-falls over the Cliffs of Dover, that might be described as fully absurdist in its effect. [21]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s customary to say that the comic spirit consistently asserts itself in Shakespeare\u2019s history plays \u2013 even, to some extent, in the ones sometimes labeled \u201ctragedies\u201d like Richard II, Richard III,<\/em> and 3 Henry VI.<\/em> That may be because in the future lies the teleological endpoint of Elizabeth\u2019s Tudor reign and the Stuart line of James I, the two rulers during whose time Shakespeare lived.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All of the events the playwright covers, we might say, were necessary to make the mostly felicitous present possible, and all of the rulers and the great nobles were in that sense actors in a pageant larger than they could have comprehended. In this scheme, their individual tragedies may be viewed as sacrifices towards the greater comic pattern, which starts with turmoil and ends in felicity. This is of course to superimpose a \u201cgrand narrative\u201d on the past to make it justify the present, but until modern times, historians (and artists like Shakespeare) didn\u2019t have a problem with performing such an operation on \u201cbare events.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, none of this is to dismiss the tragic mode of experience in the history plays\u2014far from it. Classical Greek tragedy would lead us to suggest that deep tragedy is only possible when the universe crumbles around characters who fall to their ruin, and that same universe is shown to be fundamentally indifferent or even hostile to human aspirations. That would be a defensible description of what happens in a number of ancient Greek tragedies, though not all. [22]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Still, Greek tragedy isn\u2019t mainly what the Elizabethan playwrights modeled their own tragedies on, and their audiences would hardly have required such bleakness and chaos in their tragedies or their histories. Every culture has its own notions about what is or is not \u201ctragic.\u201d For the English and large parts of Europe, Giovanni Boccaccio\u2019s 1350s De casibus virorum illustrium <\/em>( \u201cOf the fates [or falls] of famous men\u201d) provided some backing: if an exalted person is at the top of Dame Fortune\u2019s Wheel, look for that person at the bottom before his or her end. [23]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shakespeare\u2019s histories are written within the Christian tradition, of course, so the simple idea that fallen humanity\u2019s life-pattern should follow Christ\u2019s path\u2014life as an imitatio Christi,<\/em> [24]<\/a> an \u201cimitation of Christ\u201d\u2014would also underlie Shakespeare\u2019s tragedies and histories. When, in Act 4, Scene 1 of Shakespeare\u2019s Richard II, <\/em>Richard prepares to surrender his crown to Henry Bolingbroke, he directly compares himself to Jesus Christ: \u201cDid they not sometime cry \u2018All hail\u2019 to me? \/ So Judas did to Christ, but He in twelve \/ Found truth in all but one; I, in twelve thousand, \/ none.\u201d [25]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Christian art, tragedy thrives within the gap between human and divine understanding, and dwells upon the difficulty of aligning the human will with the divine will. In this sense, there is an abundance of the tragic dimension in Shakespeare\u2019s history plays. Richard II can hardly be claimed to have followed in simple faith \u201cthe path of Christ,\u201d but that doesn\u2019t keep him from experiencing his own downfall as a tragic series of betrayals, or his sad present as having something about it of \u201cthe passion of the Christ.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To add to this idea that there\u2019s a dark side to Shakespearean history to supplement and challenge its \u201ccomic\u201d dimension, let\u2019s posit that Shakespeare most likely read Thomas Malory\u2019s 1485 Le Morte d\u2019Arthur <\/em>(The Death of Arthur<\/em>) because practically everyone else did. [26]<\/a> In the West, printing dates back to Johannes Gutenberg in the 1450s and the Englishman William Caxton, [27]<\/a> whose first print-job in 1475 was a French romance compilation based on the legend of Troy: Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye.<\/em> In 1485, he also printed the Morte d\u2019Arthur, <\/em>which popularized the Arthurian tales as central to English lore.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the Arthurian tales, the King and his Knights of the Round Table aim for a spiritual and material perfection that they will never achieve, no matter how they strive. Their own sinfulness will always drag them down. This accords well with the central struggle in Christianity, which is to align one\u2019s personal will with that of the Creator, rather than remain fixated upon one\u2019s own wants and needs. The Arthurian romances trade in the struggle between Christian charity or caritas, <\/em>and selfishness and greed, or cupiditas. <\/em>There is an air of doom always surrounding stories about Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table: they are Christian \u201cspeaking emblems\u201d of humanity\u2019s fallenness as they set out on their many quests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shakespeare, in his representations, wrestles with doing justice to the English monarchy, and he finds that there are few or no pure, lasting happy endings in the historical records compiled by the chroniclers Raphael Holinshed, John Stow, [28]<\/a> Edward Hall, [29]<\/a> and others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Act 2, Scene 1 of Richard II, <\/em>the dying John of Gaunt pays tribute to the little section of earth he is departing, calling it, among other fine things, \u201cThis other Eden, demi-paradise \u2026 \/ This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England<\/a> \u2026.\u201d [30]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The moments when \u201cthis England\u201d is triumphant turn out to be fleeting, not permanent or even stable. The climactic victory of King Henry V at Agincourt in 1415 probably comes closest to an idyllic moment in the history plays. [31]<\/a> But even the celebrated triumph at Agincourt is only a moment, and Henry V <\/em>was written and performed (1599-1600) at a time when everyone knew that the great Queen was nearing her end.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Henry V is like Arthur in his doom as well\u2014hanging over the play Henry V <\/em>is the Early Modern playwright\u2019s understanding that the martial glory of Henry\u2019s reign won\u2019t outlive his person. The \u201ccurse\u201d upon his usurper-father King Henry IV returns in the form of the incompetent, sometimes mad Henry VI, who throws away his father\u2019s victories and faces a miserable, powerless end in 1471, to be followed by the final phases of the \u201cWars of the Roses\u201d [32]<\/a> until Henry Tudor\u2019s victory over Richard III in 1485, and on to June 1487, when Henry crushed Yorkist diehards fronting the pretender Lambert Simnel [33]<\/a> at the Battle of Stoke Field.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We should certainly acknowledge the \u201cpro-Tudor bias\u201d in Shakespeare and in the chronicles from which he adapted his accounts. But at the same time, we shouldn\u2019t forget the Arthurian \u201cdoom\u201d that hangs over English royal history, including the Tudor line, which was a cadet branch of the Lancastrian line we are partly studying in our examination of the major tetralogy. Henry IV could almost have said, Macbeth-like, \u201cfor Banquo\u2019s issue have I filed my mind; \/ For them the gracious Duncan have I murdered.\u201d [34]<\/a> Banquo\u2019s issue, of course, being King James I, the first Stuart King of England, and Duncan being transposed to \u201cRichard II.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why the major tetralogy of Richard II,<\/em> 1-2 Henry IV,<\/em> and Henry V<\/em>?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I like the major tetralogy because the four plays comprising it are all among Shakespeare\u2019s best in the area of history, leaving aside the amazing Richard III, <\/em>which is part of the minor tetralogy along with the three Henry VI<\/em> plays.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another thing that\u2019s attractive about the major tetralogy is that it covers much of the period during the Hundred Years\u2019 War between England and France (1337-1453) when England seems to have developed what we might call a \u201cnational consciousness.\u201d [35]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before the Hundred Years\u2019 War, the English and the French had already been fighting one another for centuries, starting from the time of the Capetian dynasty [36]<\/a> and the French Normans. But with regard to this earlier series of wars, it might be more accurate to say that the French were fighting the French, not \u201cthe English.\u201d The Norman invasion of 1066 [37]<\/a> meant that Norman French aristocrats took over the territory called England, and Normanized it. Until the time of Henry IV, the language of the English monarchs, law courts, and nobility was Norman French.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As for the cause of The Hundred Years\u2019 War, the fighting started soon after there was a problem over who would succeed Charles IV as King of France. When this lastdirectlyCapetian ruler died in 1328, he had no male heirs, so the French put forth a cousin who became Philip VI. However, England\u2019s King Edward IIIput forth his own claim, which was rejected. The French King also confiscated from Edward III the very lucrative duchy of Guyenne in 1337, and this latter affront coincides with the beginning of hostilities in that year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So during the course of this long, complicated, intermittent war, England comes into its own as England.<\/em> For anyone who wants a fuller account, there\u2019s Desmond Seward\u2019s The Hundred Years\u2019 War: The English in France 1337-1453.<\/em> Penguin, 1999. [38]<\/a> There\u2019s also David Green\u2019s The Hundred Years War: A People\u2019s History.<\/em> [39]<\/a> Jonathan Sumption\u2019s magisterial 5-volume account is also available, for those who have the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some brief notes on the major tetralogy: Richard II, 1 & 2 Henry IV,<\/em> and Henry V<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Richard II<\/em> serves as a prime example of Shakespeare\u2019s interest in what happens when those at the center of English history\u2019s whirlwind of events don\u2019t know how to use the power they have.  In Shakespeare\u2019s casting, Richard II is a wicked man but also a doomed poet-king who philosophizes about and dramatizes his downfall even as it is happening to him \u201cIRL,\u201d as we would say\u2014in real life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The following passage from Act 3, Scene 2 speaks for itself as an indicator of Richard Plantagenet\u2019s mindset; Richard is in the midst of preparations for battle with Henry Bolingbroke, who has returned from the Continent with an army to claim first the rights he lost when Richard stripped him of his inheritance from John of Gaunt, and then the throne itself:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

AUMERLE. Where is the Duke my father with his power?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

KING RICHARD. No matter where\u2014of comfort no man speak.
Let\u2019s talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs;
Make dust our paper, and with rainy eyes
Write sorrow on the bosom of the earth.
\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026
For heaven\u2019s sake let us sit upon the ground
And tell sad stories of the death of kings ….<\/p>\n\n\n\n

CARLISLE. My lord, wise men ne\u2019er sit and wail their woes,
But presently prevent the ways to wail. [40]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Richard II is a master of words, but not a good ruler. As Carlisle tries to tell him, men in his position don\u2019t have the luxury of sitting around and poeticizing: their task is to act quickly and resolutely. Chairman Mao famously said that \u201cpolitical power grows from the barrel of a gun.\u201d [41]<\/a> That was largely true of the English monarchs in the period Shakespeare covers\u2014violence was never far from the throne, either in its getting or its defending. \u201cUse it or lose it\u201d is the first lesson of political power: if you are entrusted with authority and fail to use it, someone else will.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

All the English rulers had to have known that primogeniture, [42]<\/a> legitimacy, and allied concepts were partly fictions. What matters is material power and possession. We can\u2019t do better than to quote il Brutto,<\/em> Tuco Benedicto Pacifico Juan Maria Ramirez, from the 1966 Sergio Leone classic The Good, the Bad and the Ugly:<\/em> \u201cWhen you have to shoot, shoot, don’t talk.\u201d [43]<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ultimately, we can draw from Richard II<\/em> Shakespeare\u2019s interest in the pitiless dynamics of royal power; his concern for the close relationship between rhetoric and political action; and the fundamental need of rulers to understand their own people. Richard II has failed in all three regards, and so he falls to the ruthless and efficient Henry Bolingbroke.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1 and 2 Henry IV<\/em> show a sense for the redemptive disposition of time that we can see in comic plays such as Twelfth Night.<\/em> Henry Bolingbroke (King Henry IV) was a powerful and competent man, but in Shakespeare\u2019s handling, he is a guilt-ridden stage-setter for his prodigal son Prince Hal, who will in Henry V<\/em> be represented as a great warrior-king and an icon of early English nationalism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Much of the two Henry<\/em> plays is taken up with Shakespeare\u2019s interest in the playful, redemptive development of Hal from his troubled youth to maturity. The young man has time enough to run with the morally dangerous Sir John Falstaff and his set, even turning the tables on the old knight when he robs Sir John of the spoils he himself had won during an earlier robbery at Gadshill.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What Hal learns is not only who he is but who his subjects are. Unlike Richard II, he is not an alien in his own land, but the living symbol of England whose power comes from the fact that he understands the kingdom he must govern and lead to victory in war. Hal understands as well that while being a king involves game-playing or role-playing, this \u201cplay\u201d is no joke: it\u2019s done in a spirit of consequential earnestness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s hard to miss the emphasis on the burdens of kingship in the Henry IV<\/em> and Henry V<\/em> plays. In the latter play, Henry V shares his father\u2019s burden of guilt over the murder of Richard II, but he also takes upon himself the burden of making something of his great venture into France. The two things may well be connected, as the French Wars, if Henry V wins them, will help to erase the stain of his father\u2019s usurpation against Richard II.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although Shakespeare allows Henry V to outargue the soldier Michael Williams, who challenges the justice of his cause, Williams is not altogether wrong when he insists that it will be \u201ca black matter for the king\u201d if things don\u2019t go well at Agincourt. To get the result he wants, of course, the one-time \u201cPrince Hal\u201d will have to call upon every ounce of understanding that he has gained about what motivates his common subjects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A few pointers about the royal family in the major tetralogy<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

John of Gaunt, who dies early in the play Richard II, <\/em>was the third surviving son of Edward III. He is very important for the monarchy\u2019s future lineage. Henry Bolingbroke was born in wedlock to Gaunt\u2019s first wife, Blanche of Lancaster, and that son, of course, goes on to become Henry IV, from whom we get Henry V and Henry VI.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But by his mistress Katherine Swynford, John of Gaunt also had four \u201cillegitimate\u201d children (three sons and one daughter). These children we refer to as the Beaufort<\/em> line, so-named after one of John of Gaunt\u2019s inherited lands through his first wife, Blanche of Lancaster. They are<\/p>\n\n\n\n

John Beaufort, 1st Earl of Somerset<\/a> (1373\u20131410)
Henry Beaufort<\/a> (1375\u20131447), Bishop of Winchester
Thomas Beaufort, 1st Duke of Exeter<\/a> (1377\u20131426)
Joan Beaufort, Countess of Westmorland<\/a> (1379\u20131440).<\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

John of Gaunt\u2019s second wife, Constance of Castile, died in 1394, and he  married Katherine Swynford as his third wife in 1396. At that point, Pope Boniface IX legitimized the Beauforts, and King Richard II repeated the gesture by royal proclamation in 1397.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

John Beaufort, 1st Earl of Somerset (1373\u20131410) had a son named John (1st Duke of Somerset, 1404-44) and through him a granddaughter, Lady Margaret Beaufort (1443-1509), who went on to marry Edmund Tudor, Earl of Richmond (half-brother of Henry VI and son of the Welshman Owen Tudor and Henry V\u2019s widow, Catherine of Valois), from which union we have King Henry VII (\u201cHenry Tudor\u201d), and thence Henry VIII, Edward VI, Queen Mary, and Elizabeth I \u2013 the cadet \u201cTudor Line\u201d that replaced the last ruler of the Plantagenet York branch, Richard III.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This same John Beaufort, 1st Earl of Somerset (1373\u20131410) also had a daughter by his wife Margaret Holland (1385-1439, King Richard II\u2019s niece and subsequently Duchess of Clarence after John died) named Joan Beaufort (1404-45), who married the Scottish King James I and thus became Queen of Scotland.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aside:<\/strong> the Angevin Plantagenets were Henry II, Richard I (the Lionheart), and John; the main line consisted of Henry III, Edward I, Edward II, Edward III, and Richard II; the Lancaster branch consisted of Henry IV, Henry V, and Henry VI; and lastly, the York branch comprised of Edward IV, Edward V, and Richard III. All included, the Plantagenets ruled from 1154 to 1485.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The youngest of Katherine Swynford\u2019s children by Gaunt, Joan Beaufort (1379-1440, and the aunt<\/em> of the Joan Beaufort listed above), is tremendously important to the royal line and other great houses. After her first husband died, Joan married Ralph Neville, 1st Earl of Westmorland, and had 14 children by him, ten of whom survived childhood, and most of whom went on to marry into key families\/houses such as Mowbray, Woodville, Percy, Stafford, and York (i.e. through Cecily Neville\u2019s marriage to Richard Plantagenet, 3rd Duke of York, from whom we get King Edward IV and King Richard III).  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

By her children John and Joan Beaufort in particular, Kathryn Swynford is the ancestor of all <\/em>English\/British monarchs since King Edward IV. It\u2019s remarkable how tightly knit the British royal family is, and the same can be said of the great houses beyond the royal line. In their case, \u201ceverybody is related to everybody else\u201d is only a slight exaggeration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Copyright \u00a9 2025 Alfred J. Drake<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Document Timestamp: 10\/3\/2025 6:25 PM<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

*To return to exact part of the text referenced by the endnotes below, left-click on the endnote’s numbered link. By contrast, the blue scroll-up button at the bottom right of the page returns to the top of the document.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[1]<\/a> See Christopher L. Morrow\u2019s dissertation, Speaking England: Nationalism(s) in Early Modern Literature and Culture<\/a>. <\/em>Texas A&M U, 2006. Accessed 10\/3\/2025. See also Philip Schwyzer\u2019s Literature, nationalism, and memory in early modern England and Wales<\/a>. Open University. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[2]<\/a> Scott MacMillin and Sally-Beth Maclean. The Queens Men and Their Plays<\/a>. <\/em>Cambridge UP, 2006. (Amazon listing.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[3]<\/a> Shakespeare, William. The Tragedy of Julius Caesar.<\/em> In The Norton Shakespeare: Tragedies,<\/em> 3rd ed. 288-343. See 315, 3.1.112-17.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[4]<\/a> See Dallek, Robert. Camelot\u2019s Court: Inside the Kennedy White House<\/a>. <\/em>Harper, 2014. ISBN-13:\u200e<\/strong> <\/strong>978-0062065858. (Amazon listing.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[5]<\/a> Whitman, Walt. \u201cWhen Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom\u2019d<\/a>.\u201d Poetryfoundation.org. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[6]<\/a> Cohen, Eliot A. The Hollow Crown: Shakespeare on How Leaders Rise, Rule, and Fall<\/a>. <\/em>Basic Books, 2023. ISBN-13: 978-1541644861. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

[7]<\/a> See Holinshed, Raphael. Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland<\/a>. <\/em>1577, 1587 editions. Online source: The Holinshed Project. Accessed 10\/3\/2025. Also very useful is W. G. Boswell-Stone\u2019s Shakespeare’s Holinshed: the Chronicle and the Historical Plays Compared<\/a>.<\/em> Longmans, Green, and Co.: 1896. HathiTrust.org. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[8]<\/a> In his History of the English-Speaking Peoples, <\/em>Vol. 1, Winston Churchill addresses the truth status of the stories about King Arthur and his knights of the Round Table, writing, \u201cIt is all true, or it ought to be; and more and better besides.\u201d Quotation from an excerpt at Goodreads.com<\/a>. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[9]<\/a> The full quote is \u201cThe sons of Edward sleep in Abraham\u2019s bosom, \/ And Anne my wife hath bid the world goodnight\u201d (441, 4.3.38-39). Shakespeare, William. The Tragedy of King Richard the Third.<\/em> Quarto. In The Norton Shakespeare: Histories,<\/em> 3rd ed. 384-465.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[10]<\/a> Aristotle. The Poetics<\/a>. <\/em>Trans. S. H. Butcher. Project Gutenberg. Accessed 6\/1\/2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[11]<\/a> Aristotle, Ibid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[12]<\/a> White, Hayden. Metahistory: The Historical Imagination in Nineteenth-Century Europe<\/a>. <\/em>Johns Hopkins UP, 2014, 1st<\/sup> edition published in 1974. ISBN-13: 978-0801817618. (Amazon listing.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[13]<\/a> See How to Get Ahead \u2013 1. At Medieval Court<\/a> <\/em>(BBC\/YouTube). Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[14]<\/a> See, for example. Paul Murray Kendall\u2019s Richard the Third. <\/em>New York & London: W. W. Norton, 1955-56. Especially pertinent is Chapter 6, \u201cThe King\u2019s Man.\u201d 89-106.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[15]<\/a> Thucydides. The Peloponnesian War. <\/em>(Link to Paragraph 89<\/a>) London, J. M. Dent; New York, E. P. Dutton. 1910. The Athenian envoys say to the Melian commission, \u201cyou know as well as we do that right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power, while the strong do what they can and the weak suffer what they must.\u201d Perseus Digital Library<\/a>. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[16]<\/a> The two gravediggers\u2019 discussion of Hales v. Petit<\/em> in conjunction with Ophelia\u2019s death by drowning in Hamlet <\/em>would be sufficient proof of English law\u2019s sophistication, in case we needed further convincing. Shakespeare, William. The Tragical History of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark.<\/em> First Quarto. In The Norton Shakespeare: Tragedies,<\/em> 3rd ed. 451-99. See Act 5, Scene 1 for the relevant dialogue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[17]<\/a> See King James I\u2019s Basilikon Doron<\/a>. <\/em>Early English Books Online (EEBO), U of Michigan. See also his The True Law of Free Monarchy<\/a> <\/em>on the same site. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[18]<\/a> See \u201cWat Tyler and the Peasants\u2019 Revolt<\/a>.\u201d Historic-UK.com. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[19]<\/a> See \u201cJack Cade\u2019s Rebellion \u2013 1450<\/a>.\u201d Britain Express. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[20]<\/a> Shakespeare, William. The Life of Henry the Fifth.<\/em> Folio. In The Norton Shakespeare: Histories,<\/em> 3rd ed. 790-857. See 830, 4.1.98.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[21]<\/a> See Shakespeare, William. King Lear.<\/em> Folio with additions from the Quarto. In The Norton Shakespeare: Tragedies,<\/em> 3rd ed. Combined text 764-840. 821, 4.6.27.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[22]<\/a> Aristotle\u2019s master text in The Poetics <\/em>was Sophocles\u2019s Oedipus the King, <\/em>but Aeschylus\u2019s trilogy The Oresteia <\/em>follows a very different path. A good edition of the great trilogy is Robert Fagles\u2019s translation. New York: Penguin, 1984. An online edition is translator E. D. Morshead\u2019s The Oresteia<\/a>. <\/em>Gutenberg e-text, Australia. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[23]<\/a> John Lydgate\u2019s The Fall of Princes<\/a>, <\/em>adapted from Boccaccio, Giovanni. De Casibus virorum illustrium<\/em>. (Of the Fates of Famous Men<\/em>.) U of Virginia Library. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[24]<\/a> See, for example, Thomas \u00e0 Kempis\u2019s The Imitation of Christ<\/a>. <\/em>(circa 1418-27.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[25]<\/a> Shakespeare, William. The Life and Death of King Richard the Second.<\/em> Folio. In The Norton Shakespeare: Histories,<\/em> 3rd ed. 488-548. See 532, 4.1.163-65.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[26]<\/a> Malory, Thomas. Le Morte D\u2019Arthur, Vol. 1<\/a><\/em> and Vol. 2<\/a>. Project Gutenberg e-text. Accessed 10\/3\/2025. Caxton published his edition in 1485; Malory finished writing it in 1469-70.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[27]<\/a> \u201cWilliam Caxton: England\u2019s First Printer<\/a>.\u201d Reading the Past, 2023. YouTube. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[28]<\/a> John Stow (c. 1525-1605), author of The annales, or generall chronicle of England.<\/a><\/a> <\/em>HathiTrust. Accessed 10\/3\/2025. See also A Survey of London<\/a>. <\/em>HathiTrust. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[29]<\/a> Edward Hall (c. 1496-1547). Author of <\/a>The union of the two noble and illustre famelies of Lancastre and Yorke<\/em><\/a>. <\/em>EEBO\/U-Mich. Accessed 10\/3\/2025. See also Internet Archive copy<\/a>. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[30]<\/a> Shakespeare, William. The Life and Death of King Richard the Second.<\/em> Folio. In The Norton Shakespeare: Histories,<\/em> 3rd ed. 488-548. See John of Gaunt\u2019s description of England on 503, 2.1.40-60.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[31]<\/a> See \u201cThe Battle of Agincourt<\/a>.\u201d World History Encyclopedia. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[32]<\/a> See the detailed \u201c<\/a>Wars of the Roses<\/a>\u201d website at warsoftheroses.com. See also the current commentary author\u2019s brief introduction to the topic in the commentary Richard III<\/a>. <\/em>Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[33]<\/a> See \u201cLambert Simnel<\/a>\u201d on the \u201cWars of the Roses<\/a>\u201d website. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[34]<\/a> See Shakespeare, William. The Tragedy of Macbeth.<\/em> In The Norton Shakespeare: Tragedies,<\/em> 3rd ed. 917-69. See 939, 3.1.60-66.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[35]<\/a> See \u201cThe Hundred Years\u2019 War<\/a>.\u201d World History Encyclopedia. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[36]<\/a> See \u201cThe Capetian Dynasty<\/a>.\u201d Britannica.com. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[37]<\/a> See \u201cThe Battle of Hastings, 1066<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[38]<\/a> Seward, Desmond. The Hundred Years\u2019 War: The English in France 1337-1453<\/a>. <\/em>Kindle ed. Penguin, 1999. (Amazon listing.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[39]<\/a> Green, David. The Hundred Years War: A People\u2019s History<\/a>. <\/em>(Amazon listing.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[40]<\/a> Shakespeare, William. The Life and Death of King Richard the Second.<\/em> Folio. In The Norton Shakespeare: Histories,<\/em> 3rd ed. 488-548. See 520-21, 3.2.139-179.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[41]<\/a> See \u201cA Tale of Two Warlords: Republican China during the 1920s.<\/a>\u201d Association for Asian Studies. 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[42]<\/a> On primogeniture or inheritance by the firstborn child, see LII: Legal Information Institute<\/a>. Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

[43]<\/a> IMDB\u2019s page for The Good, the Bad and the Ugly<\/a>. <\/em>Accessed 10\/3\/2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Commentaries on Shakespeare’s Genres: History Of Interest: 1623 First Folio (Folger Library) | Shakespeare\u2019s Holinshed: Chronicle & Plays Compared | […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_eb_attr":"","_uag_custom_page_level_css":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"iawp_total_views":18,"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"wf_page_folders":[8],"class_list":["post-10136","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry","category-history-plays"],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":false,"thumbnail":false,"medium":false,"medium_large":false,"large":false,"1536x1536":false,"2048x2048":false},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"ajd_shxpr","author_link":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/author\/ajd_shxpr\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Commentaries on Shakespeare’s Genres: History Of Interest: 1623 First Folio (Folger Library) | Shakespeare\u2019s Holinshed: Chronicle & Plays Compared | […]","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/10136","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10136"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/10136\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10291,"href":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/10136\/revisions\/10291"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10136"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10136"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10136"},{"taxonomy":"wf_page_folders","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ajdrake.com\/shakespeare\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/wf_page_folders?post=10136"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}