Henry VI, King, Parts 1, 2

Henry VI, King, Parts 1, 2 and 3, sections of a historical tetralogy (completed by Richard III) by Shakespeare written between 1590 and 1592. Part 1 was first published in the First folio (1623), but Part 2 was published anonymously in 1594 under the title ‘The First part of the Contention betwixt the two famous Houses of Yorke and Lancaster…’, and Part 3 in 1595 as ‘The true Tragedie of Richard Duke of Yorke, and the death of good King Henrie the Sixt’. Shakespeare's authorship of the play was doubted throughout the 18th and 19th cents. In the 20th cent. scholars have made increasingly confident claims for his sole authorship. Reference to ‘an upstart Crow’ in Greenes Groats-Worth of Witte used to be taken as evidence of plagiarism, but is now generally read as merely the malice of a rival dramatist. The plays' chief sources are the chronicles of Hall and Holinshed.

Pt 1, opening with the funeral of Henry V, deals with wars in France in which the gallant Talbot is a powerful leader on the English side, and the witch-like Joan of Arc, ‘La Pucelle’, on the French. After a series of encounters Talbot, together with his valiant son John Talbot, are killed near Bordeaux (iv, vii). A crucial scene (ii. iv) is that in the Temple garden, in which the plucking of red and white roses establishes the opposition of Plantagenet and York in the subsequent wars. In the fifth act the earl of Suffolk arranges a marriage between the young Henry VI and Margaret of Anjou, daughter of the king of Naples, vowing ominously to rule both king, queen, and kingdom.

Pt 2 presents the marriage of Henry to Margaret of Anjou, the intrigues of the Yorkist faction, and other chief historical events, including Jack Cade's rebellion. The final act concerns the battle of St Albans (1455), in which Somerset is killed, a victory for the Yorkists.

Pt 3 opens with Henry's attempt to buy peace by making the duke of York his heir, thus disinheriting his son by Margaret. She, enraged and eloquent, instigates the murder of the boy Rutland, York's youngest son, by Clifford, and the mock-coronation and murder of York himself. Clifford is killed at the battle of Towton. Henry VI is captured and Edward (IV) declared king; he marries the dowerless widow Elizabeth Grey, though previously promised to Bona, the French king's sister. Richard, duke of Gloucester (later Richard III), emerges as an ambitious Machiavelli. Warwick, a powerful contriver on the Lancastrian side, is killed at Barnet by King Edward; the battle of Tewkesbury is a decisive victory for Edward, and Margaret's young son (also an Edward) is killed in cold blood by Edward, Richard, duke of Gloucester, and George, duke of Clarence. King Henry, imprisoned in the Tower, is murdered by Richard.