Dusty:

The words “Now is the winter of our discontent . . .” seem appropriate for our own time (not just the end of Daylight Savings, but Trump Time) but of course they only represent the subject of the sentence. When you get the rest of the verb, “[is] made glorious summer,” you have quite a different meaning. But of course Richard himself is very discontented, and ready to do something about it. Although Richard III was apparently written soon after 3 Henry VI, it’s remarkable how different and more mature it sounds.

Michael:

Yes, both language and the subtlety of characterization seem a real advance on the previous plays. Also perhaps, the plotting of scenes. The first act is quite long and quite rich. The opening speech brilliantly characterizes Richard in terms of motive. Those famous opening lines — famous also because we hear Olivier speak them? — set up Richard’s constant irony. The winter of discontent may seem to suggest Richard’s dark mind, but he immediately effaces that with what will prove his positive take on the political world. So he celebrates what for the next dozen lines can only be ironic in view of what follows of his self-description. And that self-description will also in turn prove deeply ironic, or will be ironically disproven, in the following scene with Lady Anne. Interestingly, we have a brief snippet of Richard’s method in his apparent temptation of Brackenbury. He gives a mildly suggestive picture of Mistress Shore, the king’s mistress, in particular in relation to the queen, who he says is “well struck in years.” Brackenbury parries it. But then Richard jokes about having “naught” to do with Jane Shore, and tries to draw B’s into the matter of the king’s affair. But then he turns it around by pretending he meant the “naught” to refer to Mr. Shore, the husband, and accuses B. of trying to betray him. Some quick wit. Then he pretends sympathy for Clarence. At the end of the scene Richard discloses that he wants Clarence packed off before the king dies. His time-line becomes clear, first Clarence, then Edward will be dispatched. And the wonderful “I’ll marry Warwick’s youngest daughter, What though I killed her husband and her father.” And this sets up the next scene, the wooing of Lady Anne, who moves from unalloyed hatred of Richard to apparent acceptance of him within the next 200+ lines. Richard proves extraordinarily adept at ingratiating himself against all expectation. And at the end of the scene he preens, or jokingly seems to, about his abilities and his attractiveness. The ironic edge to it all makes this speech a response to his opening speech.

In 1.3 Richard quarrels with the two queens. Margaret in reality had returned to the continent, but she becomes here a chorus-like figure to curse Richard. And we get more of Richard’s hypocritical plans at the end of the scene, just as he meets with two hired murderers. Clarence, in the Tower, recounts his nightmare dream to Brackenbury in 1.4, which becomes his visionary journey to the underworld where his misdeeds are recounted, including his role in killing Prince Edward, Henry VI’s son. This leads to the wonderful scene in which the two murderers lead up to Clarence’s death with a discussion of conscience. The second murderer has qualms that come of the word “judgement” and “conscience.” They argue between themselves, then with Clarence and about his own guilt for the death of the prince. Clarence seems almost successful in this, but then the first murderer comes at him from behind, while the second murderer seems to warn Clarence. The first murders him and takes his body off to the butt of malmsey wine. The second murderer is repentant and sorry he was unable to save Clarence. Very Shakespearean moment to double the murderers, then have them dispute the deed between them.

Dusty:

But some things about the play seem quite traditional, including the formal rhetoric, the stichomythia, and the way in which Richard seems to be a Vice figure. He is given a number of soliloquies, including the famous one at the beginning of the first scene and another at the end of the scene. Then one more in 1.2 and 1.3. He is so self-consciously devoted to himself, and to doing what he recognizes as evil, that I wonder if the audience found themselves reacting to what seems like a morality play. In Elizabethan productions, would the actor playing Richard have addressed himself directly to the audience? But there is something new about Richard too: he compels your attention, and engages you, just as he engages and apparently persuades Lady Anne. So he’s more of an Iago or an Edgar than a Macbeth.

In 1.1 Richard rejects the idea that he could be a lover (following up on his soliloquy at the end of 3H6). So it is then surprising that in 1.2 he plays the lover. (Sometimes I imagined that he was playing the part of the lover in a sonnet, addressing his cruel mistress.) Maybe that’s the point: he just plays the part, and does so very skillfully. He’s not really in love with Lady Anne, or with anybody except himself. And after she apparently softens and exits, he expresses his contempt of her for yielding. It’s not clear why he wants to woo her. Maybe it’s a kind of challenge, a way to test and demonstrate his powers. Maybe it’s his determination to do evil. Maybe by seeking to marry the leading widow from the House of Lancaster he is grotesquely parodying the grand alliance between York and Lancaster, brewing in the play, that results in
Richmond’s marriage.

In 1.3 two more women, both queens, one of them a Yorkist (Elizabeth, the wife of Edward IV) and one a Lancastrian (Margaret, the widow of Henry VI and the mother of Prince Edward), are at odds with Richard. Is this another preview of an alliance between York and Lancaster? Margaret curses Richard much as her daughter-in-law, Lady Anne, did. Why do we need Margaret in the scene? In 1.4 Clarence excuses the murders he committed just as Richard excused his own — he did them for “love.” I think you are right to draw attention to the discussion of conscience by the two murderers. Clarence too has a guilty conscience. A conscience is precisely what Richard lacks.

Act 1 establishes the major characters and launches the plot, Richard’s plot, to gain the throne by removing everybody who stands in his way. We know where the play is going. Act 2 is considerably shorter than Act 1. It begins with Edward IV arranging a reconciliation of minor enemies within the House of York. But he seems to ignore the major conflicts within his own house, with his two brothers, and his own instruction to have Clarence killed. So Edward, though he may in one sense be Richard’s opposite, in another is Richard’s double, does not emerge as a model king. And when he hears that Clarence has been killed, he blames his courtiers for not advising him against it, thereby losing any respect that the audience might have still held for him.

Yes, both language and the subtlety of characterization seem a real advance on the previous plays. Also perhaps, the plotting of scenes. The first act is quite long and quite rich. The opening speech brilliantly characterizes Richard in terms of motive. Those famous opening lines — famous also because we hear Olivier speak them? — set up Richard’s constant irony. The winter of discontent may seem to suggest Richard’s dark mind, but he immediately effaces that with what will prove his positive take on the political world. So he celebrates what for the next dozen lines can only be ironic in view of what follows of his self-description. And that self-description will also in turn prove deeply ironic, or will be ironically disproven, in the following scene with Lady Anne. Interestingly, we have a brief snippet of Richard’s method in his apparent temptation of Brackenbury. He gives a mildly suggestive picture of Mistress Shore, the king’s mistress, in particular in relation to the queen, who he says is “well struck in years.” Brackenbury parries it. But then Richard jokes about having “naught” to do with Jane Shore, and tries to draw B’s into the matter of the king’s affair. But then he turns it around by pretending he meant the “naught” to refer to Mr. Shore, the husband, and accuses B. of trying to betray him. Some quick wit. Then he pretends sympathy for Clarence. At the end of the scene Richard discloses that he wants Clarence packed off before the king dies. His time-line becomes clear, first Clarence, then Edward will be dispatched. And the wonderful “I’ll marry Warwick’s youngest daughter, What though I killed her husband and her father.” And this sets up the next scene, the wooing of Lady Anne, who moves from unalloyed hatred of Richard to apparent acceptance of him within the next 200+ lines. Richard proves extraordinarily adept at ingratiating himself against all expectation. And at the end of the scene he preens, or jokingly seems to, about his abilities and his attractiveness. The ironic edge to it all makes this speech a response to his opening speech.

In 1.3 Richard quarrels with the two queens. Margaret in reality had returned to the continent, but she becomes here a chorus-like figure to curse Richard. And we get more of Richard’s hypocritical plans at the end of the scene, just as he meets with two hired murderers. Clarence, in the Tower, recounts his nightmare dream to Brackenbury in 1.4, which becomes his visionary journey to the underworld where his misdeeds are recounted, including his role in killing Prince Edward, Henry VI’s son. This leads to the wonderful scene in which the two murderers lead up to Clarence’s death with a discussion of conscience. The second murderer has qualms that come of the word “judgement” and “conscience.” They argue between themselves, then with Clarence and about his own guilt for the death of the prince. Clarence seems almost successful in this, but then the first murderer comes at him from behind, while the second murderer seems to warn Clarence. The first murders him and takes his body off to the butt of malmsey wine. The second murderer is repentant and sorry he was unable to save Clarence. Very Shakespearean moment to double the murderers, then have them dispute the deed between them.

Dusty:

But some things about the play seem quite traditional, including the formal rhetoric, the stichomythia, and the way in which Richard seems to be a Vice figure. He is given a number of soliloquies, including the famous one at the beginning of the first scene and another at the end of the scene. Then one more in 1.2 and 1.3. He is so self-consciously devoted to himself, and to doing what he recognizes as evil, that I wonder if the audience found themselves reacting to what seems like a morality play. In Elizabethan productions, would the actor playing Richard have addressed himself directly to the audience? But there is something new about Richard too: he compels your attention, and engages you, just as he engages and apparently persuades Lady Anne. So he’s more of an Iago or an Edgar than a Macbeth.

In 1.1 Richard rejects the idea that he could be a lover (following up on his soliloquy at the end of 3H6). So it is then surprising that in 1.2 he plays the lover. (Sometimes I imagined that he was playing the part of the lover in a sonnet, addressing his cruel mistress.) Maybe that’s the point: he just plays the part, and does so very skillfully. He’s not really in love with Lady Anne, or with anybody except himself. And after she apparently softens and exits, he expresses his contempt of her for yielding. It’s not clear why he wants to woo her. Maybe it’s a kind of challenge, a way to test and demonstrate his powers. Maybe it’s his determination to do evil. Maybe by seeking to marry the leading widow from the House of Lancaster he is grotesquely parodying the grand alliance between York and Lancaster, brewing in the play, that results in
Richmond’s marriage.

In 1.3 two more women, both queens, one of them a Yorkist (Elizabeth, the wife of Edward IV) and one a Lancastrian (Margaret, the widow of Henry VI and the mother of Prince Edward), are at odds with Richard. Is this another preview of an alliance between York and Lancaster? Margaret curses Richard much as her daughter-in-law, Lady Anne, did. Why do we need Margaret in the scene? In 1.4 Clarence excuses the murders he committed just as Richard excused his own — he did them for “love.” I think you are right to draw attention to the discussion of conscience by the two murderers. Clarence too has a guilty conscience. A conscience is precisely what Richard lacks.

Act 1 establishes the major characters and launches the plot, Richard’s plot, to gain the throne by removing everybody who stands in his way. We know where the play is going. Act 2 is considerably shorter than Act 1. It begins with Edward IV arranging a reconciliation of minor enemies within the House of York. But he seems to ignore the major conflicts within his own house, with his two brothers, and his own instruction to have Clarence killed. So Edward, though he may in one sense be Richard’s opposite, in another is Richard’s double, does not emerge as a model king. And when he hears that Clarence has been killed, he blames his courtiers for not advising him against it, thereby losing any respect that the audience might have still held for him.

Dusty:

Act 2 is considerably shorter than Act 1. It begins with Edward IV arranging a reconciliation of minor enemies within the House of York. But he seems to ignore the major conflicts within his own house, with his two brothers, and his own instruction to have Clarence killed. So Edward, though he may in one sense be Richard’s opposite, in another is Richard’s double, does not emerge as a model king. And when he hears that Clarence has been killed, he blames his courtiers for not advising him against it, thereby losing any respect that the audience might have still held for him.

In 2.2. we get yet another woman to denounce Richard — his mother! She has now turned her maternal attentions to Clarence’s children (her grandchildren). Maybe they serve as a preview of two of her other grandchildren, Edward IV’s two boys, who will be killed before long. More doubling? Edward’s queen enters, with news of King Edward’s death, so now we get a kind of three-part madrigal, in which Elizabeth weeps for Edward, the children weep for Clarence, and the Duchess for both Edward and Clarence. But the Yorkists still have one hope, and look forward to the crowning of Edward IV’s son, Prince Edward.

2.3 is a typical Shakespearean scene in which “citizens” comment on their betters, but it struck me that they sound a lot like their betters. 2.4 is another scene dominated by women, this time just Edward IV’s widow (Elizabeth) and her mother-in-law, the Duchess of York. We also have one of the young princes. It’s interesting that it’s not the elder, Prince Edward, heir to the throne, but the younger, Richard, Duke of York. My note says Edward was in fact 13 and Richard 11. The innocent chatter about who’s taller, and who is growing faster, makes this a kind of quiet interlude before more murderous violence. But we are reminded again about “uncle” Richard, who reportedly grew “so fast/ That he could gnaw a crust at two hours old.” Having come into the world with sharp teeth, he is about to use them again.

Michael:

Edward’s speech in 2.2 expresses a brotherly regard, after Clarence’s death, for what Clarence has been to him, even to the point of blaming the court that no one encouraged him to spare Clarence. The duchess of York provides a mother’s sense of the tragedy of Clarence’s death and the nefas of Richard’s mockery of her as well as his guilt over Clarence. Women seem to provide a ground against which we understand the evil of Richard and Buckingham.

Michael:

The irony of 3.1 where Prince Edward notices the lack of uncles to protect him. The maternal uncles are missing as well as Clarence. And the remaining uncle, Richard, is his greatest danger. The breaking of sanctuary, encouraged by Buckingham, follows the prince’s being sent to the Tower, which he fears. And fears rightly of course. What do we make of the prince’s sense of the significance of Julius Caesar’s beginning of the Tower — and its fame of his building, even beyond documentation, lasting to the last judgment? It seems a curse. And the curse will be enacted for the prince and his brother. When that brother, young York, enters, he appears like many of Shakespeare’s children characters, precocious and clever. And he too seems apprehensive about the Tower. Edward says he fears no uncles dead, and Richard tries to except also uncles living, even as he is leading him to the Tower. The coming treachery toward them responds to Catesby’s treachery to Hastings. The scene at Pomfret seems to double that at the Tower; there the queen’s relatives are being led to death. Rivers recalls that it was the spot of origin of all the following treachery in the death of Richard II.

As preparations for the Prince’s coronation are supposedly going forward, Richard inquires of the strawberries in the Bishop of Ely’s garden. Is this a feint to avoid Ely? When Ely returns, Hastings remarks on Richard’s even temper and cheerfulness. But his put-on anger at Edward’s queen interrupts that; it seems to be a way to trap Hastings, who has seemed to doubt Richard’s accusation of Edward’s queen. Hastings leaves with a prophecy of disaster under Richard.

3.5 consolidates Richard’s power and claims to the throne. The prop head is now Hastings’, brought on by Catesby. Richard and Buckingham pretend pity and express disbelief at Hastings’ supposed treachery. It’s all to take in the lord mayor of London, which happens. And Buckingham is dispatched to doubt the legitimacy of Edward’s sons as well as his own. This is followed up by Buckingham’s report of his sowing doubt about Edward and his incitement of the London crowd to proclaim Richard’s kingship. But this requires encouragement, it seems, and the staging of his scene of pious reflection with two divines or two bishops. Buckingham enforces the contrast with Edward’s lasciviousness. Richard pretends a Caesar-like indifference to the crown, as Catesby and Buckingham stage manage the encouragement of kingship for Richard. Richard’s pretended reticence echoes his performance in the wooing of Lady Anne. Buckingham trowels it on in his pretense of Richard’s virtue, so that all seem eager to acclaim Richard as king at the end of the scene.

I think part of the appeal of these scenes is Richard’s actor-like presence; the actor is playing a Richard who is playing a role. I think Richard Burbage played Richard, and Burbage must have been a part of the inspiration.

Dusty:

When the young prince says he wants more uncles, he presumably means those on his father’s and his mother’s side, e.g., Clarence and Rivers, the latter now a prisoner at Pomfret. But the poor prince has more uncles than are good for him. There’s blatant irony in Richard’s words about “false friends.” (Much of the irony in the play is quite obvious. Richard is utterly shameless in his fair speech. And I guess he knows it. He explicitly compares himself to Iniquity in the old morality plays.) Do the princes “taunt and scorn” their uncle, or are they merely joking?

I don’t know what to make of the reference to Caesar. (He comes back in 4.4 when Richard says that Queen Elizabeth’s daughter will be “Caesar’s Caesar.”) Your suggestion about the request for strawberries makes sense. I had thought it just a deceptive make-nice gesture on Richard’s part.

In 3.1 the prince prepares for his coronation, and I kept expecting it to take place, but Shakespeare keeps to the historical record here: Prince Edward did indeed become Edward V but was never crowned.

In 3.4 Richard charges Hastings with “devilish plots” against his life. I think this is the first time Hastings — and the audience — has heard of them. And it’s a sign that Richard will turn on his friends.

In 3.7 Buckingham tries to persuade the citizens that Edward IV’s two children are bastards, but the citizens don’t buy it. He and Richard then put on a little play in which Buckingham calls on Richard to take the crown, and he modestly refuses, while B. insists. Why do citizens not object?

Dusty:

Act IV is a very long act. In 4.1 four women go to the Tower: Elizabeth (widow of Edward IV), the Duchess of York (mother of Richard and Clarence), the Duchess of Gloucester (Lady Anne, Richard’s wife, formerly the wife of the son of Henry VI), along with a woman we have not yet met, Clarence’s daughter. This is the first time we have seen Lady Anne since the big wooing scene in 1.2. Why have we not seen or heard of her since then? Now she regrets her marriage, blames her “woman’s heart” for yielding to Richard, and curses herself. Given all these women on stage, it’s odd that there is as yet no mention of Elizabeth’s daughter, whom Richard will soon seek to wed. Why not? Maybe we have enough trouble keeping four women separate in our minds. We also meet Dorset (a son to Queen Elizabeth), who will be important later, when he joins Richmond.

In 4.2 Buckingham arranges to have the princes killed, but doesn’t do it himself. This is the first sign that there is a limit to his villainy, and of his incipient parting from Richard. We again hear of the old prophecy that Richmond will be king. Richard doesn’t care to hear it. He then refuses to honor his promise to Buckingham, the next step in Buckingham’s departure. For a cunning politician, Richard seems oddly clueless here. It’s unclear whether Buckingham withdraws primarily because he was appalled at the murder of the princes or because Richard refused to honor his promise. Both?

In 4.3 Tyrrel, the assassin, in soliloquy indicates that he and the two men he hired had some conscience, were not hardened killers after all. (This separates them from Richard, who is the only one in the play without a conscience.) Maybe that’s why he doesn’t simply enter and inform Richard that the deed was done. Richard then previews his plan to get rid of his wife and become a “wooer” again and marry Elizabeth’s daughter. Is that so we will be prepared for his astounding proposal (to Elizabeth) in the next scene?

4.4 is the biggest scene in the play, 538 lines. It opens with a soliloquy from old Queen Margaret, announcing that she has been lurking in order to get her revenge, in some sense ‘answering’ Richard’s soliloquy back in 1.1. The other major women come on stage — Elizabeth the Yorkist queen and the Duchess of York. Elizabeth has lost her husband and two sons, as well as her brother and brother-in-law. The Duchess of York has lost two sons. Margaret, who hangs back and mutters dark cursing asides, exulting in the pain of the Queen and Duchess, has lost her husband and her son. But when she sits down with the other women I expected that she might sympathize with them, but no, she continues to “scorn” them. All the women agree, however, in cursing Richard, “a hellhound that doth hunt all to death.” It’s quite shocking to hear a mother formally curse her own son. But this is only the beginning to the scene’s shocks. Richard enters, prepared for war against Buckingham, and Richard now tells Elizabeth that he wants to marry her daughter, who happens also to be his niece, presumably because the marriage with Lady Anne did not work out — she hates him. It raises again the question of why Richard wanted to marry Lady Anne: maybe it was just to prove that he could. Marriages in these history plays are usually designed for political purposes, i.e., to cement an alliance. But Richard wants to marry the daughter of Elizabeth only to prevent her from marrying Richmond (which would strengthen his claim to the throne).

In a very long seduction speech, Richard explains that he killed the brothers of his intended for love of her, recalling his claim to Lady Anne in 1.2 that he killed her husband for love of her. This is even more shocking than a mother cursing her son. The scene goes on and on, falling into rapid-fire exchange of one-liners (but not stichomythia), and Elizabeth — here’s the third shock — yields! I think this would present a challenge to an actress: how you get from continuing bitterness at line 396 to agreement at line 428? (She realizes that she is being “tempted by the devil,” and she yields, as did Lady Anne back in 1.1. Do we perhaps agree with Richard, who says, after she leaves, that she is a “Relenting fool, and shallow, changing woman”?)

In the remainder of the scene Richard is rattled by news of Richmond and Buckingham, and speaks abusingly to his friends, especially Stanley. Again, he seems much less in control of his impulses than he did at the beginning of the play.) A series of messengers bring good news and bad, and then in the brief 4.5 we get the expected scene of Stanley preparing to leave Richard.

Michael:

Act 4 seems to the center on the women of the play, first the four women at the Tower, all of whom have grievances against Richard of course. Queen Elizabeth’s parting address to the stones of the Tower, which are about to immure her two “babies,” becomes a prophetic curse of Richard. Buckingham’s withdrawal from Richard’s side seems to hinge on Richard’s treatment of him, but it is murky; Richard certainly denies him favor, and Buckingham responds by leaving him. 4.3 confirms Tyrrell’s killing the princes, with the detail of the pity of the actual murderers, which contrasts with the unfeeling reception of the news by Richard. Richard speaks of Anne’s death, but it’s unclear in the play when this happens. (In historical fact she did die before Richard, so his proxy wooing of his niece, Elizabeth, has some possibility, even if not
historical.) And as you note, this sets up that proxy wooing of the next scene.

And that scene does seem a center of the play, encompassing as it does the old queen Margaret as well as the duchess of York and Queen Elizabeth. It’s a striking reprise of his earlier wooing of Anne and positions Richard against the force of these royal women. His “relenting fool, and shallow, changing woman” may seem apt in the circumstance, but feeble in the combined force of what the group of them represent. The messengers that arrive forecast something of what’s coming.

Michael:

At 5.1 Buckingham’s acceptance of the fittingness, almost the symmetry, of his execution seem to stand as a contrast to what Richard has become. And he allies himself with Margaret’s prophecies. Beginning in 5.2 Richmond’s language has a clarity and piety that also contrasts with Richard’s. In the ensuing scenes, his engagement with his followers is also evident. When Richard speaks of Bosworth field at the beginning of 5.3, we’re aware that the end is in sight.

The parallel sleeping and dreaming of Richard and Richmond becomes a recapitulation of Richard’s bloody career: first, Prince Edward, then King Henry, Clarence, Rivers and Gray and Vaughan, the “little princes in the Tower,” Hastings, Anne (it’s not mentioned that at least he didn’t kill her), and Buckingham. When Richard starts up and imagines himself in the battle, he confronts what he is, and the “Richard loves Richard, I am I” seems to accept his guilt, even admitting his identity as murderer. His final acceptance of what he is and his self-accusation might seem almost a repentance, but in fact it isn’t, and his “I shall despair” appears to signify his damnation. And this contrasts with Richmond’s “sweetest sleep and fairest boding dreams” and leads to his speech to his troops that expresses the necessity of Richard’s defeat. The earlier scene about conscience is alluded to in Richard’s declaration that conscience is but a word that cowards use, and that his conscience is his sword and arms. And his speech to his troops consists in abuse of Richmond and his army.

5.7 and 5.8 are the end of Richard’s kingship, including his pleading for a horse, and the conclusion is taking the crown from Richard’s head and Stanley’s setting it on Richmond’s head; Richmond is now Henry VII in the text and his speech signals the end to the York/Lancaster war. Do we see in Richard III the achievement of history play writing? Much depends on the unity of Richard’s character in the play. And several big scenes, e.g., the two wooing scenes, allow the characterization of hypocrisy and evil with a rhetorical cleverness that an audience can enjoy.

Dusty:
I am a little puzzled about the “psychology” of the series of ghosts that appear to Richard and Richmond in 5.3. I can understand why Richmond might confidently dream of victory on the morrow, but why should he dream of those whom Richard killed? Maybe we are not supposed to think about “psychology” here. Maybe the scene is just about symmetry and good theatre. I suppose it’s clear enough that the appearance of the victims in Richard’s dreams indicates that he in fact has a guilty conscience, even though he dismisses “conscience” as something only cowards have. (Does the word here mean “conscience” in our sense, or “consciousness,” as it may mean in Hamlet’s “thus conscience doth make cowards of us all”? If he does have a guilty conscience, then should we think less ill of him, because at least, and for the first time, he feels bad about what he has done?

But his speech at 5.3.178-206 is strangely full of questions. He appears to be engaged in a dialogue with himself. “What do I fear?” seems to really mean “Why should I be afraid?” “Is there a murtherer here?” maybe means “Is there anybody in my tent about to murder me?” and the answer is “No.” But then he acknowledges that yes, there is a murderer here: he himself is a murtherer, though I don’t think he really feels guilty about it. Does he hate himself or love himself? Does he think he is a villain, or not? Does he think he is guilty, or not? I was surprised to hear him say “I shall despair.” Since when did he care what
anybody else thought about him? I think he is perhaps afraid not for what he has done but for what will happen to him the next day, on Bosworth Field.

It’s odd that he says he will become an eavesdropper at the tents of his men, but we then hear nothing more about it. (It’s a kind of reverse/reprise of Henry 5 at Agincourt.) The audience is invited to compare the speeches to their men by, first, Richmond, and then Richard. Both appeal to St. George. Both make patriotic appeals to their countrymen. But Richmond appeals repeatedly to God and Richard never mentions him. Still, Richard’s confidence seems to have been restored and his fears suppressed. Does that make the audience admire his courage?

In 5.4 Richard apparently fights valiantly, even after losing his horse. It’s not made clear how Richmond, with a smaller force, managed to win. I gather that historians have tried to explain it. But Shakespeare departs from history by having Richmond (who is not supposed to be an experienced soldier) kill Richard in single combat in 5.5. (Shakespeare also changes history in his treatment of Stanley, who, according to historians, apparently held back not to save his son but to make sure he sided with the winner.) The brief remainder of 5.5 is all about the reuniting of the red rose and the white. Interesting that the play does not end with line 34 — a prayer for “smiling plenty, and fair prosperous days!” — but with an imagined (feared?) bloody future, when England might again “weep in streams of blood.”