Shakespeare's Kings (50 page)

1
. No credence should be given to the portrait of Henry that hangs in the National Portrait Gallery in London. When, at the end of the sixteenth century, it was thought desirable that there should be a complete run of portraits of all British sovereigns since William the Conqueror, this one was hastily adapted from a wood engraving of Charles VI of France. The adapter placed the red rose of Lancaster in his right hand in place of Charles's falcon, and gave him a beard and moustache; but he left him the
fleur-de-lys
sceptre.

was
that
when,
after
the
death
of
Northumberland
in
1408
and
the collapse
of
Glendower
two
years
later,
he
might
at
last
have
achieved his
frustrated
ambitions
-
including,
perhaps,
even
his
long-promised Crusade
—
disease
should
have
reduced
him,
while
still
in
his
early forties,
to
virtual
incapacity.
His
father
had
lived
to
be
fifty-nine,
his grandfather
to
sixty-four:
given
another
fifteen
years
of
health
and vigour,
he
might
have
proved
himself
one
of
the
greatest
of
our
medieval kings.
Instead,
he
died
a
broken
and
pathetic
figure,
lacking
alike
the tragedy
of
his
predecessor
and
the
dazzle
of
his
son.

And
what
does
Shakespeare
make
of
him?
Not,
perhaps,
as
much
as
he might
have;
not,
certainly,
as
much
as
he
made
of
Richard.
The
fault, of
course,
lies
with
Falstaff.
In
King Henry IV Part I
the
swaggering
old ruffian
plays
a
prominent
role;
in
Part II—
written
very
soon
afterwards, probably
in
the
summer
of
1598
—
he
comes
dangerously
near
to
taking over
the
play,
with
the
result
that
the
stri
ctly
historical
element
is reduced
to
only
eight
scenes,
all
fairly
loosely
connected
one
with another.
It
could
be
argued
—
indeed
it
freque
ntly
has
been
-
that
this is
no
disadvantage:
that
the
rollicking
old
knight
is
a
greater
character than
the
dying
king,
and
that
through
him
we
are
given
a
unique
vision of
Elizabethan
England,
an
England
which
is
no
longer
confined
to monarchs
and
magnates
but
which
embraces
the
publicans,
the
tapsters and
the
whores
of
Eastcheap
as
well
as
the
country
squires
and
peasantry of
Gloucestershire.
All
this
is
perfectly
true;
but
the
pathos
of
the
final rejection
of
Falstaff-
who
obviously
deserves
all
he
gets
—
by
the
newly crowned
King
is
surely
nothing
when
compared
with
the
tragedy
of Henry
Bolingbroke
dying,
after
a
brilliant
youth,
disappointed
and disillusioned,
at
forty-five
already
an
old
man.
Again
and
again
in
Part II,
we
feel
we
are
watching,
not
as
in
Part I
a
play
with
a
sub-plot,
but two
quite
different
dramas;
and
it
leaves
us
at
the
end,
like
its
royal protagonist,
with
a
clear
impression
of
promise
unfulfilled.

But
this
is
not
a
book
of
literary
criticism.
We
are
concerned
here less
with
the
artistic
quality
of
Shakespeare's
history
plays
than
with their
historical
accuracy,
and
the
very
construction
of
King Henry IV Part II—
the
need
to
compress
the
business
of
a
whole
decade
into
those eight
short
scenes
-
makes
strict
accuracy
impossible.
Shakespeare
does not
falsify
the
facts
to
any
great
extent;
but
he
is
repeatedly
obliged
to compress
the
time
scale,
telescoping
events
together
as
the
need
arises and
sometimes
even
taking
them
back
to
the
previous
play.
Thus
it
is already
in
the
closing
lines
of
Part I
that
we
see
the
King
bidding
his son
accompany
him
to
Wales
immediately
after
the
battle
of
Shrewsbury, and
in
the
first
act
of
Part II we
have
a
clear
indication
that
the
Prince actually
did
so.
¹
In
fact,
the
chroniclers
leave
no
doubt
that
he
remained in
the
north-west
of
England
for
several
weeks,
dealing
with
the
rebels and
recovering
from
his
wound;
and
when
the
King
returned
from
his expedition
to
the
north
to
receive
the
submission
of
Northumberland and
marched
against
Glendower
towards
the
end
of
September,
his eldest
son
was
not
with
him.
On
the
other
hand
the
years
immediately following
saw
the
Prince
in
command
of
the
army
on
the
Welsh
border, and
it
is
presumably
his
later
service
in
Wales
that
Shakespeare
had
in mind.

The
account
of
the
rebellions
by
Northumberland
and
Archbishop Scrope
is
even
more
dramatically
compressed.
According
to
Holinshed— still
Shakespeare's
principal
authority
-
Northumberland
first
considered rebellion
immediately
after
the
battle
of
Shrewsbury,
but
this
came
to nothing.
He
then
hatched
a
conspiracy
jointly
with
the
Archbishop
in 1405,
but
gave
up
as
soon
as
he
heard
of
the
fate
of
Scrope
and
Thomas Mowbray,
the
Earl
Marshal.
Finally
in
1408
he
led
a
new
rising,
which ended
with
his
death
on
Bramham
Moor.
In
the
plays,
all
three
separate movements
are
telescoped
together.
Again,
the
story
begins
in
the
last scene
of
Part I,
when
the
King
sends
his
son
John
of
Lancaster
with
the Earl
of
Westmorland