This Virtual Reading Group Extra with Dr. Sarah Skwire takes a farewell glance over the shoulder, hair in the wind, longing-look at William Shakespeare’s King Henry V. It is the fourth and final play in the Henry Tetralogy. France is conquered. Henry gets the crown and the princess.
Skwire discusses Shakespeare’s and the play’s interest in the changes Henry makes on England and the nations around him, the pleasure of seeing Hal’s ambitions become his life, and why the Churchmen coming to advise Henry at the beginning of the play is, “240 lines of hot uncensored public choice action.” They also discuss why Hal, Falstaff, and Fluellen are especially interesting characters from a liberty-focused perspective.
You can read the whole play here: oll.libertyfund.org/title/cra...
Key moments from the play discussed include the following:
The Churchmen advise King Henry V. Act I, Scene 1 & 2
oll.libertyfund.org/title/cra...
“Or rather swaying more upon our part/ Than cherishing the exhibitors against us;/
For I have made an offer to his majesty,/ Upon our spiritual convocation/ And in regard of causes now in hand,/ Which I have open’d to his Grace at large,/ As touching France, to give a greater sum/ Than ever at one time the clergy yet/ Did to his predecessors part withal.”
King Henry dealing with his traitors. Act II, Scene 2
oll.libertyfund.org/title/cra...
“The mercy that was quick in us but late/ By your own counsel is suppress’d and kill’d/ You must not dare, for shame, to talk of mercy;/ For your own reasons turn into your bosoms,/ As dogs upon their masters, worrying you.”
The threats to Harfleur. Act III, Scene 3
oll.libertyfund.org/title/cra...
“If not, why, in a moment, look to see/ The blind and bloody soldier with foul hand/ Defile the locks of your shrill-shrieking daughters;/ Your fathers taken by the silver beards,/ And their most reverend heads dash’d to the walls;/ Your naked infants spitted upon pikes,/ Whiles the mad mothers with their howls confus’d/ Do break the clouds, as did the wives of Jewry/ At Herod’s bloody-hunting slaughtermen./ What say you? will you yield, and this avoid?/ Or, guilty in defense, be thus destroy’d?”
Fluellen setting the soldiers straight. Act IV, Scene 1
oll.libertyfund.org/title/cra...
“If the enemy is an ass and a fool and a prating coxcomb, is it meet, think you, that we should also, look you, be an ass and a fool and a prating coxcomb, in your own conscience now?”
The wooing of the French Princess Katharine. Act V, Scene 2
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“Fair Katharine, and most fair!/ Will you vouchsafe to teach a soldier terms,/ Such as will enter at a lady’s ear,/ And plead his love-suit to her gentle heart?”
What France has lost in war. Act 5, Scene 1
Alas! [Peace] hath from France too long been chas’d,/ And all her husbandry doth lie on heaps,/
Corrupting in its own fertility./ Her vine, the merry cheerer of the heart,/ Unpruned dies; her hedges even-pleach’d,/ Like prisoners wildly overgrown with hair,/ Put forth disorder’d twigs...Even so our houses and ourselves and children/ Have lost, or do not learn for want of time,/ The sciences that should become our country,/ But grow like savages,-as soldiers will,/ That nothing do but meditate on blood,-/To swearing and stern looks, diffus’d attire,/ And every thing that seems unnatural./ Which to reduce into our former favour/ You are assembled; and my speech entreats/ That I may know the let why gentle Peace/ Should not expel these inconveniences,/ And bless us with her former qualities.
Skwire’s other conversations on William Shakespeare’s Henry Tetralogy at the links below:
Reading Group Extra: King Richard II with Dr. Sarah Skwire
• Reading Group Extra: K...
Reading Group Extra: Shakespeare’s King Henry IV Part One and Two with Dr. Sarah Skwire
• Reading Group Extra: S...
Skwire’s writing on parts of William Shakespeare’s Henry V:
Crown, Church, and Rent-Seeking in Shakespeare's "Henry V" at FEE
fee.org/articles/crown-church...
Shakespeare’s Inner Economist at Cato Unbound
www.cato-unbound.org/2017/03/...
Sarah Skwire is a Senior Fellow at Liberty Fund as well as a Shakespeare Scholar and this conversation is, in part, inspired by a virtual reading group hosted by Liberty Fund on Richard II, Henry the IV, Part 1 & 2, and Henry V.
Thanks for watching. We hope you’ll join us at a future virtual reading group: oll.libertyfund.org/page/oll-...
17 ноя 2022
