By Sophia Lindstrom (Fall 2022)
Along with comedy and tragedy, history is one of the three main genres of western theater defined by its dramatized and often biased retelling of historical events. Henry V, which is part of a larger collection of William Shakespeare’s historiographies, follows the titular character as he assumes leadership of England and leads his nation to victory against France. Because Queen Elizabeth I was the daughter of Anne Boleyn, who was not only Henry VIII’s second wife but also executed for failing to produce a male heir, she was seen in some ways as an illegitimate child and monarch. Thus, Shakespeare’s series of plays, tracing Elizabeth’s lineage back to King John hundreds of years earlier, was a purposeful political attempt to quell these rumors of illegitimacy. This essay seeks to examine the real Henry V’s accomplishments and compare them with Shakespeare’s romanticized retelling of his life, which glorified the king’s cunning wit and ruthless nature to either intentionally or otherwise craft a nationalist narrative of war. Shakespeare’s rose-colored retelling of Henry’s invasion of France dramatizes the hero’s ascension to the strong, assured general and King of England, even comparing his victory on St. Crispin’s Day to Elizabeth’s victory over the Spanish Armada.
To fully understand Henry V and the political situation in which it was written, we must understand both the playwright behind the show and its historical context. William Shakespeare was born in Stratford-Upon-Avon, Warwickshire in 1564. Because his father John worked with animal skins and his mother Anne was descended from local nobility, he obtained the socioeconomic status required to attend the King’s New School in Warwickshire (Griffith). Shakespeare married Anne Hathaway, a rich yeoman’s daughter, in 1582 but left for London soon after to begin writing plays for the theater. This, along with joining the Lord Chamberlain’s Men acting company, proved successful, as he became a shareholder in 1595. This opportunity allowed him to use costumes, scripts, props and the Blackfriars theater for his shows. Shakespeare also began writing more plays for the Globe Theater, which was a more public venue than the secluded privacy of the Blackfriars Theater. Shakespeare wrote an average of two plays per year for twenty years under Queen Elizabeth I and King James I, during what are commonly called the Elizabethan and Jacobean eras. His background as a pupil at the King’s New School, where he would have read texts spanning from Ancient Greece and Rome to the Bible and beyond in a time where the idea of a Divine Right of Kings was still commonly supported may have fueled his support of the royals (Duignan). In fact, the Divine Right of Kings, a belief that royalty were chosen by God and thus divinely ordained to rule, was not replaced by other explanations for political rule until after the Glorious Revolution of 1688 (Duignan). Likely for these reasons, Shakespeare was known to have supported Elizabeth, the last Tudor monarch, which is most glaring in his line of historiographies spanning from King John to Henry VII, ending at Elizabeth’s rule. This decision created what was then viewed as a legitimate royal lineage despite claims that she was not a true heir.
The fact that Shakespeare’s historiographies were plays, one of the only forms of accessible entertainment at the time besides books, aids in their effectiveness as works of pro-English propaganda. Thus, it is prudent to examine Henry V’s life from a more historical perspective before unpacking the fictionalized Shakespearean narrative. On September 16th, 1387, Henry was born at Monmouth Castle to Henry, Earl of Derby, and the heiress to the Earl of Hereford Mary de Bohun. Henry became Prince of Wales, Duke of Cornwall, Earl of Chester, Duke of Aquitaine, and Duke of Lancaster at twelve when his father was crowned king (Hanson). He became an accomplished teenage royal, seeing battle against English and Welsh rebel forces by his fifteenth year and becoming a trusted advisor in his father’s government by eighteen. At this point, Henry’s confidence and powerful demeanor had gained him an ardent base of supporters, some of whom even supported his father’s abdication so that Henry V could rule in his stead. However, Henry IV did not abdicate and instead held the throne until his death on March 20th, 1413; Henry’s coronation occurred twenty-two days later at Westminster Abbey (Hanson). However, not everyone supported the young king, and in 1415, three political radicals undertook the Southampton Plot, an attempt to assassinate Henry V and replace him with Edmund Mortimer, Earl of March. However, Mortimer, who was aware of the plot, revealed these men’s intentions to Henry V, who executed the rebels in August of 1415 (Cartwright). Unlike the many kings before him, Henry was able to quickly unite many of the English barons, finally making them loyal to the crown, but faltered when negotiating with the French, resulting in a war against the country beginning on August 11th, 1415. Although the French had three times as many soldiers as the English, the French generals were not equipped for the English and Welsh’s longbows, which they operated with skill and accuracy. The French were defeated at the Battle of Agincourt on October 25th, 1415 (Hanson). Despite Shakespeare’s assertion that the English lost only twenty-five soldiers, the true number was closer to 500 in comparison to France’s 7,000 (Cartwright). Henry V died on August 21st, 1422, thus losing all the territory he gained through force in France. With a grasp on the historical and political lives of the figures most prominent in Henry V, a more analytical approach to the play can be taken to determine how accurate the historiography truly is. A comparison between the St. Crispin’s Day speech in Henry V and Queen Elizabeth’s Spanish Armada speech will dominate the discussion.
At the start of Henry V, the political relations between England and France are fraught, as the former has just emerged from a series of civil wars and the latter is determined to secure its sovereignty from England. Additionally, the English monarchy has just undergone a momentous change; Henry VI, the king who was deemed incompetent in his later years, has just been replaced by his son, the far younger King Henry V. The new king is first described as one with an addiction to vanity: “His companies unlettered, rude, and shallow/His hours filled up with riots, banquets, sports/And never noted in him any study/Any retirement, any sequestration/From open haunts and popularity” (1.1.58-62). With these unfavorable vices clouding his already-poor reputation as a boy-king, Henry V seeks to prove his worth; an opportunity for this is immediately presented to him in the form of a great battle. Henry V’s closest confidants convince him that certain specific regions of France are his based on a loose, unfounded interpretation of ancient property laws, called Salic Law. This struggle is a near-perfect parallel to the life of Queen Elizabeth I, who was born on September 7th, 1533, to Anne Boleyn and her husband and King of England, Henry VIII. Because Anne Boleyn was Henry VIII’s second husband, Elizabeth I was viewed by the public as an illegitimate monarch; furthermore, her half-brother Edward was born in 1537, further limiting opportunities for the throne (Berry). Despite this, after her half-sister died in November of 1588, Elizabeth succeeded to the throne where she too was presented with a similar opportunity to prove her strength as a monarch, that being the invasion of the Spanish Armada in 1588. Like Elizabeth, Henry, greedy for success and eager for battle, declares war as soon as the Dauphin of France insults him by gifting a chest filled with tennis balls. Upon realizing that the validity of his leadership has been questioned, Henry states, “When we have matched our rackets to these balls/We will in France, by God’s grace, play a set/Shall strike his father’s crown into the hazard” (1.2.272-274). The tennis balls represent the fact that Henry is still young; he is plagued by dissenters and traitors who believe he is unfit for such a powerful leadership position. This is evidenced by the Southampton Plot, where Henry learns that he has been betrayed by three trusted nobles who were secretly working for France. This shocks Henry, who deemed them to be “religious” and “free from gross passion or mirth or anger” (2.2.133-134). Although Henry first asks that they be arrested and judged by God, he quickly relents and, out of fury, declares that they are to be executed before the army’s departure for France. This moment is a watershed for Henry, who has now twice learned to address his issues with violence; as king, Henry can handle situations with force and is now beginning to do so. Although the real Henry was already an accomplished political leader and soldier before assuming the throne, Shakespeare posits that Henry only begins his transition from an immature boy to a worthy king when times become desperate, thus dramatizing his tale.
As Henry V continues its trajectory, Henry gains both personal confidence and political support and loyalty in his efforts to conquer France; he has transitioned into an established monarch whose motives are not to be questioned. After using force to both execute those who attempted to assassinate him and charge rashly into battle, Henry becomes more confident in his role, leading his loyal army to defeat the town of Harfleur, France. Henry’s army succeeds with little struggle: “I will not leave the half-achieved Harfleur/till in her ashes she lie buried/the gates of mercy shall be all shut up” (3.3.8-10). This first victory causes Henry to become arrogant, believing he does not have to send many men into battle to defeat the entire nation of France at Agincourt. In fact, he suggests that his sick and wounded men are superior to the healthy French: “My people are with sickness much enfeebled/my numbers lessened, and those few I have/almost no better than so many French/who when they were in health” (3.6.150-154). This also positions the British soldiers as the underdogs; they are outnumbered and likely to lose in the enemy’s territory, generating sympathy from the viewer and alerting them to the British’s cause. When the royal messenger Montjoy asks Henry if they should continue the invasion of France despite the English army’s disadvantages, Henry is appalled. He orders Montjoy not to question his judgment: “Go bid thy master well advise himself/if we may pass, we will; if we be hindered/we shall your tawny ground with your red blood/discolor” (3.6.164-167). Henry is beginning his transition from boy to king; while he has succeeded in defeating the town of Harfleur, he remains haughty and overconfident in his abilities. As Henry’s victories become more prominent, however, he grows in his maturity and becomes further prepared to lead the British to victory against the French. Although the British are outnumbered five to one, Henry’s inspiring St. Crispin’s Day speech rallies his troops to success in the town of Agincourt. Henry’s speech quickly transforms from a speech about war to one about masculinity: “For he today that sheds his blood with me/Shall be my brother…/And gentlemen in England now abed/Shall think themselves accursed they were not here/And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks” (4.3.62-68). In this speech, Henry suggests that war is a man’s responsibility and that those who did not choose to fight are cowardly and thus emasculated. War, he asserts, creates a brotherly bond between the bravest men, a title that those who remained in England cannot claim for themselves. Thus, this rare opportunity to participate in the mass slaughter of the French is something to be envied by all men, present and future. Similarly, Elizabeth I’s speech before the attack of the Spanish Armada contains similar rhetoric. She says that although she is female and has the body of a “feeble woman,” she has the “heart and stomach of a king” (Harley). Elizabeth also reserved battle and war for the masculine, making her speech even more inspiring for young soldiers aching to prove themselves in war. Thus, Shakespeare has deliberately drawn a parallel between Henry V and a more recent speech that would have been fresh in the memories of the British, placing it in a collective national consciousness.
In addition to this parallel, the St. Crispin’s Day speech also creates a nationalist narrative in which being a true citizen is equated with doing battle against France and emerging victorious, securing England as one of the most powerful nations in Europe. Henry states, “Familiar in his mouth as household words/Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter/Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester/Be in their flowing cups freshly remembered…And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by/From this day to the ending of the world” (4.3.54-60). In this line, Henry suggests that this battle will become a historical event remembered in the future as a victory, giving the soldiers a legacy to fight for. This can be compared to Elizabeth I’s then-recent generalship during the battle against the Spanish Armada in 1588. In this speech, Elizabeth said, “But by your obedience to my general…and your valor in the field, we shall shortly have a famous victory over those enemies of my God, of my kingdom, and of my people” (Harley). In this famous speech, Elizabeth I also references the soldiers’ reputations following what is seen as an inevitable victory. In both the St. Crispin’s Day speech and Elizabeth’s Spanish Armada speech, the same promise is given: if the soldiers promise to lay down their lives in defense of England, eternal fame will follow. This play, therefore, compares the battle of St. Crispin’s Day in Henry V to an example that was more modern at the time, connecting Elizabeth I to a long lineage of victory over foreigners, creating a nationalist political narrative of British superiority for viewers to relate themselves to. Henry’s speech proves successful; hundreds of French soldiers are killed in exchange for only twenty-five English fighters. This exaggeration is another artistic liberty that Shakespeare takes in writing this historiography. The invasion, horrific odds, inspirational speech, leadership by the king, and subsequent victory at the Battle of Agincourt create a narrative of superiority for England over the French. Similarly, Elizabeth was known for her “shrewd and divisive” leadership, just as Henry V was centuries before. Elizabeth I defeated the Spanish Armada, reaching other accomplishments such as establishing a Church of England and creating a compromise in an intense nationwide debate between Catholicism and Protestantism (Berry). Thus, in Shakespeare’s attempt to legitimize her rule to the public, he used Henry V as a parallel; both, at least in his narrative, were successful leaders with great intention to prove themselves in a world that deemed them unfit for the throne.
Henry V was written at a time when literacy was limited and the theater was one of the only accessible forms of entertainment; thus, this exaggerated, nationalist retelling of the king’s victory over France was the sole narrative most people had of their former monarch’s life. While the modern perspective allows for a more all-encompassing biography of Henry V’s life to be crafted and for the ability to see the artistic liberties Shakespeare took in the writing of his plays, we also have more venues for similar types of more relevant propaganda. Namely, social media is a platform through which inaccurate or inflated information can be rapidly spread between individuals. It is vital for us to not be complacent and remain vigilant when consuming these forms of media; otherwise, we may fall victim to similar attempts at spreading propaganda. While fictional retellings of historical events such as historiographies are not inherently flawed, it is up to the audience to determine what is truth and what is nothing more than an artist’s liberty to stretch the truth.
Works Cited
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Edited by Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, William Shakespeare Biography, https://www.shakespeare.org.uk/explore-shakespeare/shakespedia/william-shakespeare/william-shakespeare-biography/.
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