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Monday
As yesterday was both Shakespeare’s birthday (we think) and his death day, my post today is about a perspective I have acquired on one of his greatest villains. Yesterday, my Coventry cousins took us to the Richard III Center in Leicester, and I saw the extent to which the Bard had unfairly slimed the last of the Plantagenet kings.
Richard’s bones were famously discovered under a Leicester parking lot ten years ago, and a small museum has now been erected at the spot. From the wall displays, I learned that Richard was a reformer who did not (contra Shakespeare) murder Henry VI, his own brother Clarence, or his own wife Anne and who may not even have murdered his nephews, the two princes in the tower (although the jury is still out on this one). Nor was he an ugly hunchback who would have voiced the sentiments that Shakespeare puts in his mouth, such as
And thus I clothe my naked villany
With old odd ends stolen out of holy writ;
And seem a saint, when most I play the devil.
Or:
And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover,
To entertain these fair well-spoken days,
I am determined to prove a villain
And hate the idle pleasures of these days.
Shakespeare drew for his information on works designed to support the Tudors—starting with Henry Tudor (Henry VII), who had defeated and killed Richard. These included Holinshed’s Chronicles and Thomas More’s History of Richard III, and Shakespeare further distorted the record through freely embellishing.
It took everything I had to keep an open mind about Richard as I went through the exhibit, given the Shakespearean version of him I have always carried around in my head. When propaganda is able enlist a great artist in its cause, truth can take a beating.
But even if Shakespeare has problems with accuracy, his understanding of evil is unmatched. If you ever want insight into how political leaders will sacrifice everything we hold sacred for the sake of power, Richard III is the play for you.