Where the Bad Guy's the Star of the Show

Richard III by SparkNotes
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I'm almost through reading Shakespeare's history plays, and my consistent experience has been that they're pretty entertaining, more than I expected. Same with Richard III.

It still presents challenges in a light reading. This isn't study; I'm not taking notes or re-reading parts or drawing diagrams of who's who. (Maybe a little, sometimes.) Mostly, I'm just reading, so some of it gets confusing. Too many damn Edwards over a few generations. Too many people known by their titles when titles are passed to their descendants. I get them mixed up. But it's not crucial to keeping up with the action, and there's pretty good action.

"My kingdom for a horse" is in here. I've been waiting to read that line. And we have the murder of the princes in the tower--that's pretty famous stuff. Still sad all these years later. And old Queen Margaret, throwing out real curses at Richard and everyone still supporting him. That's bound to be awesome to see performed. She was pretty nasty, in a great way.

The ending is most fun, of course. (No spoilers to worry about 400 years after publishing.) The ghosts visiting Richard and then Richmond, cursing the former and blessing the latter, are pretty fun. I would have liked to ask how that was staged, with both tents visible at the same time even though they were in different camps, but it's okay; I figure it out, sorta. Then the fighting stuff is always fun. Though the final battle between them is all stage directions and no dialogue, and it's pretty terse: "Alarum. Enter Richard and Richmond. They fight. Richard is slain." That might look good on stage, but it's subpar reading.

I'd also like to see the bit where Richard woos Anne not long after killing her husband, convincing her to marry him. She curses him and spits at him for pages, then gives in. It's hard to believe, so my hope is that good acting makes it make sense. And convincing the mother of the dead princes--Queen Elizabeth, Edward IV's wife--that he should marry one of her daughters to make right all the wrongs he had done them... Well, that's just nuts. Unless they're all Machiavellian schemers with no human feeling whatsoever. But maybe a good bunch of actors could make it work. I dunno.

Lots to think about. Interesting to read. English history is crazy. Good play, though, so this is recommended to anyone left who hasn't read it or watched it. :)

Just Henry VIII yet to go. It's in the mail, so I've gotta wait.

View all my reviews