Tongues, rumours and false news
sets the scene for this dark third play in the series of histories starting
with the abdicating of Richard II and end in the triumph of Henry V.
Information cannot be trusted. It is heard that the Battle of Shrewsbury
has gone against the king and the forces led by his son,
Prince Henry
(Prince Hal of Henry IV Part l.) This is untrue; the rebels have been
routed. Northumberland’s son Henry Percy (Hotspur) a leader of the
rebels, is dead on the sword of Prince Henry and the forces of the king
are hunting them out. This is a play about gossip, wrong words, and
events and identities not being as they are heard, seen or understood,
and Northumberland is the first sufferer as conflicting and worsening
reports are received.
Conniving rogue Sir John Falstaff, a crony of Prince Henry in his low life
exploits, is now in trouble with the law. In this play exploits have a
“sleazy” feel in comparison to joviality of Henry IV Part I, and here we see
Falstaff as the opportunist and robber that he is. Continuing the theme
of lying
tongues, he has boasted that it was he that killed Hotspur and
Prince Henry has allowed him this moment of glory. Although Falstaff
has lined his pockets over the conscription of the army, he still owes
money to Mistress Quickly of the Boar’s Head. She seeks to have him
arrested for debt, but he talks her round and has her provide him with
supper.
In this play, the prince’s practical jokes lack the enthusiasm of the
earlier play. He does catch Falstaff out, when, with Poins, he disguises
himself as a drawer in the tavern and listens to Falstaff wittily describing
both of them in unflattering terms, but this is a mild compared to that of
the Gadshill set-up in Part I. On discovering the identity of the drawers,
Falstaff carries it off brilliantly, continuing to berate the prince and
turning all to a boisterous joke, and he does, for a short while, recapture
the comaradie of the previous play.
Falstaff goes to Gloucestershire, to recruit for the army, and subsists on
the extended hospitality of Shallow, a local justice, and Silence, another.
Here he entertains his hosts with tales of how close he is to the prince,
and how he will have his new acquaintances meet with him, all the while
storing up anecdotes of their characters to share on a convivial evening
with Henry.
In the meantime, the prince hearing of the illness of his father comes to
his room, to find him as though dead. Seeing the crown, Henry puts it on
his head. The king awakes. The events in Henry IV Part I have not greatly
improved the relationship between the King and his son, and King Henry
is angry. In this play of words, Prince Henry once more listens and talks
to his father, winning him round. The King offers the prince some sound
but manipulative advice for retention of the crown: seek overseas
confrontation, to take attention away from the rebellions at home,
thereby preventing them from festering further.
King Henry IV dies and Prince Henry ascends to the throne. In the
coronation procession are Falstaff and Shallow and other hangers-on.
Falstaff hails the new king, who tells Falstaff that he is not as he was,
and Falstaff may not come within 10 miles of him. In this scene Falstaff
is genuinely shocked and shaken, the blustering falling away, and it
usual in performance for the audience to relate to a genuine fondness he
has for Henry. Falstaff takes his rejection hard. He rallies a little, saying
that he will be sent for shortly, privately. This does not happen, and he
is arrested until the new king has moved away.
Henry IV Part I foreshadowed this banishment in a playacting sequence.
Falstaff said then, that to banish Jack (meaning himself) was to banish all
the world. Prince Hal that was, had replied, in parody, “I do. I will.”
The story of tongues and lies has come full circle and with Falsstaff and
his disreputable past world banished, the new king has assumed his new
identity and moves forward to victory in the last play in this series,
Henry V. In that play Falstaff does not appear, and the audience hears of
his last sickness and death second-hand.
Nevertheless, Falstaff is resurrected in “The Merry Wives of Windsor”, a
comedy, as the result of a command (allegedly) by Queen Elizabeth I to
Shakespeare.
(Reference: play dates c.1600)