Figure 1.-- At the opening of Part 2, Queen Margaret arrives in England to take up her position as Henry's consort. Suffolk has already arranged for a marriage by proxy. The image here is from a production at the Old Vic Theatre in London (1953) with Jack May as the teenage king and Rosalind Boxall as Queen Margaret. This is a group scene where the royal pair are surrounded by court attendants. Jack May (as the teenage king) was probably in his 20s when he played the part, but, appropriately, he had the slender figure and unbearded face of a boy king. The coronation of Edward IV is not staged. We merely see the crowned king after his coronation with the queen and the baby. Sorry for the confusion here.

Henry VI was the Lancastrian king and the son of the great warrior king Henry V (whose victory at Agincourt was to be the subject of a later Shakespeare play) came to the throne as a child of only 9 months. "Henry VI, Part 1" is the first play in the FIRST tetralogy. The first tetralogy includes three "Henry VI" plays (Parts 1, 2, and 3). If you combine the three parts of "Henry VI" with "Richard III" you have the four plays of the first tetralogy. It's a bit confusing because the FIRST TETRALOGY treats the later kings in the sequence (beginning with Henry VI) whereas the SECOND TETRALOGY treats the earlier kings (beginning with Richard the Second). Another character is Joan of Arc as well as Charles, the Dauphin. Here of course Shakespeare was under no political constraints. He depicts La Pucelle very unfavorably from an anti-French perspective. Dauphin) In "Henry VI, Part 3" (Edward IV at the end of the play crowned his young son, the future Edward V, present at the ceremony. At the end of "Henry VI, Part 3, we see Edward IV as a freshly crowned king; he is present with his wife, Queen Elizabeth, and his first born son, the future Edward V, carried in his mother's arms. Shakespeare takes quite a few liberties with the childhood and youth of Henry VI in the first two plays of the series.

King Henry VI (1421-71)

Henry VI was the Lancastrian king and the son of the great warrior king Henry V (whose victory at Agincourt was to be the subject of a later Shakespeare play) came to the throne as a child of only 9 months. He was born in 1421 and died in 1471. According to Shakespeare in Part III of "Henry VI", he was murdered in the Tower of London (where he was imprisoned) by the Duke of Gloucester, who became Richard III. But the murder may be fictional because the circumstances of Henry VI's death remain mysterious to historians. Henry VI had a long reign, but it was interrupted by civil war (the Wars of the Roses). He was actually on the throne from 1422-61, when he was deposed and replaced by Edward IV; but he briefly regained his throne and reigned again between 1470- 71 up until his death. He was then succeeded by his Yorkist rival, Edward IV, once more. Shakespeare's plays, especially "Henry VI, Part 3" dramatize this see-saw between the two warring houses of the Plantagenet family--The Red Rose of Lancaster (with Henry VI as its titular head) and The White Rose of York (with Edward IV as its claimant to the throne). The conflict didn't end until Richard III, Edward IV's brother, had been defeated at Bosworth Field in 1475, at which point the first Tudor king, Henry VII, came to the throne and united the Red and White roses because he had Lancastrian blood on his mother's side and because he married Elizabeth of York, the daughter of Edward IV, and so could claim to have reconciled the long-standing feud by incorporating both hereditary claims in a single person.

Historical Accuracy

Shakespeare takes quite a few liberties with the childhood and youth of Henry VI in the first two plays of the series. Although Part 1 begins a year after Henry VI's birth when the king was still a babe in arms, Shakespeare treats the character for reasons of dramatic effectiveness as a boy of about 11 or 12. By the end of Part 1, Henry VI has already contracted an ill-advised marriage to Margaret of Anjou, and at the beginning of Part 2 Henry is already a teenager of about 18 or 19 seen welcoming his new queen to London. So there is much unhistorical compression of time, which is often the case in Shakespeare's history plays.

Individual Plays

Shakespeare's Henry VI plays were done in three parts, each a separate play.

Henry VI, Part 1

The play depicts England's surrender of its French possessions as the English lose out to the Dauphin Charles under the influence of La Pucelle, Joan of Arc. Shakespeare characterizes Joan as a whorish impostor and hypocrite who is controlled by "fiends" (infernal forces from Hell) and who, in order to save herself from being burned at the stake after she is captured, pretends to be pregnant. This obviously contradicts her claim to virginity. The treatment is very biased and very anti-French, but this is what Shakespeare knew would appeal to English Protestant audiences in 1590 or 1591 when the play was written and staged. Early in the play we hear news of the Dauphin's coronation at Rheims (the scene depicted in an existing HBC image with Joan of Arc standing by). But while the English have sporadic victories and losses in France (they do capture Joan and have her executed), the situation at home is almost as chaotic because the country is riven by division and bitter political factionalism. Shakespeare's theme is that divided loyalties within the realm of England become the cause of disastrous events abroad. The chief quarrelling adults are Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester (Lord Protector over Henry VI) and Cardinal Beaufort (the Bishop of Winchester). The chief English military hero is Lord Talbot, who becomes Earl of Shrewsbury and is tragically killed in battle in France. Henry the Sixth is ultimately crowned in Paris as a child king, but controlled by the ambitious and unscrupulous Duke of Suffolk who persuades him to break off a politically suitable marriage already contracted and marry instead Margaret of Anjou (who becomes adulterously involved with Suffolk). There is a famous scene in the Temple Garden at one of the Inns of Court in London in which nobles with Lancastrian and Yorkist sympathies meet to pluck roses (red and white), the symbols of the civil war to come. This is the emblematic beginning of the wars of the roses in the play.

Henry VI, Part 2

Gloucester has removed from his position as Lord Protector because of pressure from the Lancastrian party, the argument being that Henry VI is now old enough to rule on his own. But he is clearly too young and too inept to govern with any authority. The hatred between Gloucester and Cardinal Beaufort continues to smolder. The Queen and Suffolk poison the mind of the king against Gloucester, his uncle, and a plot develops to strangle Duke Humphrey of Gloucester in his bed. Gloucester is duly slain and the murderous Cardinal Beaufort dies tormented by his conscience. The Jack Cade rebellion is staged--a group of rabble peasants who symbolize anarchy but who are really the tools of the grasping Duke of York, who is ambitious to unseat Henry VI and make the Yorkists supreme with himself as king. Suffolk, the Queen's lover (on a foreign mission) is waylaid by pirates and beheaded off the coast of Kent. We later see Margaret lamenting over Suffolk and cradling his severed head because they have been sexual partners. York is now up in arms against Henry VI, backed by Jack Cade and the rabble, but Cade is finally captured and killed by an idealized Englishman called Alexander Iden. By the end of the play civil war is in full career with the Lancastrian forces supporting Henry and the Yorkist forces supporting the Duke of York (the father of the future Edward IV). The Yorkists have a temporary triumph, and York hastens to London to call Parliament together so that he can be proclaimed king. At this point King Henry and Queen Margaret are in flight.

Henry VI, Part 3

Part 3 begins with a quarrel in London. York is already seated on the throne in Parliament (though not officially crowned) when Henry arrives with weak forces and begs to be allowed to wear the crown during his lifetime, agreeing to make York his heir. Queen Margaret, who has now become the dominant force in the marriage, is disgusted by her husband's weakness and disinheriting of their princeling son; she vows to raise and lead an army against the usurpers. From this point onward Margaret becomes a military figure--a fierce warrior wearing armor who contrasts with her pacific and weakly submissive husband. The battle of Wakefield follows in which Margaret is victorious. York is captured and cruelly tortured and slain, his head being set up over the gates of the city of York after having been mockingly crowned with a paper crown. The York cause is now taken up by the sons of the dead York (Edward and Richard--the future Edward IV and Richard III). At the battle of Towton, the King is driven from the battle by his wife because of his ineffectiveness in battle and gives a long pastoral soliloquy on the virtues of sheep-keeping as opposed to the bloodiness of warfare. But Margaret's forces are defeated, and Edward of York is declared King Edward IV. Meanwhile Henry VI, deposed from his throne, hides in Scotland, where he is recognized by a gamekeeper, taken prisoner, and sent to London as a prisoner in the Tower.

Hundered Years War

Important background information helpful in understanding these plays is some understanding of the Hundred Years War. This was the entended series of battles between England and France. The Shakesperian plays play loosely with history, but have established thd character of the paricipants in the popular mind, except perhaps for Joan of Arc.

Created: May 24, 2004
Last updated: May 25, 2004