girl, pen: #MyPlayToday ... The First Part of Henry VI

#MyPlayToday ... The First Part of Henry VI

By Anonymous 15:24

First impression of the draw: 'Does Game of Thrones count as research?'

Had I read the play before? Yes

Had I seen the play before? No

Statistically, it was rather likely that I was to draw another history play and of that likelihood, even more likely that I should draw a Henry (there are, after all, seven of them). My draws seem to be favouring the BBC's recent adaptation releases; leading me to spend the day with the opening chronicle of Shakespeare's so-called 'Wars of the Roses' plays. How apt, then, that I should read the first acts of this play underneath York Minster. That's right, I'm declaring on the white rose side (the grudge still lives...)

For a play so populated by the historically "masculine" feats , I was happy to note that Joan La Pucelle's role is such a voluble one. However problematic her swaying not-so-virginal characterisation might be, the Bamber fan in me favours just how much she talks. However, considering the passivity of the kingly masculine ideal in the ensuing Henry VI plays, I shouldn't be surprised that Joan opens this triad's catalogue of talking women.

I was also interested to find (bearing in mind the dangers of chronological judgements) that Shakespeare voices some openly plagiarized material through Suffolk. With Titus Andronicus still running riot in my post-dissertation brain, my jaw dropped when I came across this:

'She's beautiful; and therefore to be woo'd:
She is a woman; therefore to be won.'

HVI1 5.3.78-9

'She is a woman, therefore may be woo'd,
She is a woman, therefore may be won'
TA 2.1.82-3

Heading home to see my parents, the touching and beautifully (if not overly) poeticised scenes between Talbot and his son John were a particular highlight of today's reading. I am an absolute sucker for a couplet split over two characters (I'm looking at you, Richard II 5.1.81-2 and Titus Andronicus 5.3.48-9) and to have a solid three scenes of it left me erring between saccharine queasiness and genuine enjoyment. In reading (though I have no faithful performance parallel to embody this impression), John Talbot certainly stood as a poetic paragon whose propensity for rhyming was the verbal equivalent of the lost potential his father so earnestly mourns.

'Surely, by all the glory you have won,
And if I fly, I am not Talbot's son.'
HVI1 4.6.50-1

More than this, though I had no cause to use it having spent the day in wonderful company, Henry VI 1 has been a fantastic companion today for it's sheer volume of slagging insults.

One entirely random thought/question the play inspired of me today: It's opening of 5.3 and Joan is visited by fiends. Your Dr Faustus is showing, Shakespeare.