Introduction / Thesis
The play “Richard III” has been traditionally referred to as one of Shakespeare’s most controversial dramaturgic works, due to the fact that, even though play’s main character Richard Gloucester is being clearly presented to readers as villain, his commitment to evil has an undeniable aesthetic quality. Just as the character of Hannibal Lecter in movie “Silence of the Lambs”, Richard inspires both: contempt but also a certain respect, simply because his mastery of evil appears as being unsurpassed, which in its turn, explains the fact that, even though Richard did exist in reality, general public tends to think of him as rather one of particularly memorable literary characters of all times then strictly a historical figure.
At the same time, it would be wrong to suggest that Richard’s wickedness can be thought of as “thing it itself’, as many literary critics do, because then, the reading of this Shakespeare’s play could hardly result in sparking much of a controversy. Apparently, there is so much more to the character of Richard III then his clearly defined existential nihilism alone. This is the reason why in this paper, we will aim at analyzing him as three dimensional personality figure, rather then simply an individual whose ultimate demise has been brought about by his irrational lust for power and by his refusal to observe the norms of conventional morality, while dealing with life’s challenges.
Main part
In his article “Honeyed Toads: Sinister Aesthetics in Shakespeare’s Richard III”, Joel Elliot Slotkin provides us with the insight onto the fact that popularity of “Richard III” can be explained by this play’s “appeal to subconsciousness”. In other words, play’s motifs correspond to psychological anxieties, on the part of an audience: “Richard Ill treats the appeal of evil in two ways: as a problem of knowledge and a problem of desire.
Richard’s character symbolizes in paradoxical form Renaissance debates about the epistemological value of appearances for determining moral truths. In his deformity, which the other characters take as a sign of his hellish nature, Richard epitomizes the union of outer appearances and inner truths” (Slotkin 6).
Even though that today it represents a crime against the spirit of political correctness to suggest that individual’s appears has anything to do with his or her tendency to act in one way or another, it does not make such suggestion less valid. It has been known for centuries that those marked by physical deformities or those who bear clearly atavistic anthropological features are much more likely to indulge in anti-social behavior. This is the reason why even today’s Medias tend to refer to particularly gruesome crimes as “savage”, “beastly” and “inhuman”.
Apparently, those who commit such crimes cannot be considered as human, in full sense of this word – while appearing humans, on outside, such people remain animals, on inside. In her article “Richard III’s Animalistic Criminal Body”, Greta Olson makes a perfectly good point, while suggesting that play’s other characters’ tendency to compare Richard with animals has a metaphysically deep meaning: “Several types of animal images are used in Richard III to characterize the protagonist: canine and porcine ones as well as those of small poisonous animals…
These figures serve as leitmotifs for Richard’s character; the recurrent symbolization of Richard as a dog, a boar, and a spider by those who describe his evil-doings” (Olson 310). In its turn, this explains the utter realism of Shakespeare’s play – Richard’s physical appearance validates the authenticity of his act. Even by play’s very beginning, Richard comes up with a monologue that is meant to justify his evil intentions in his own eyes:
“I am curtail’d of this fair proportion,
Cheated of feature by dissembling nature,
Deform’d, unfinish’d, sent before my time
Into this breathing world scarce half made up” (Act 1, Scene 1)
In other words, Richard points out to the fact that he was doomed to lead a life of miserable physical and mental wreck from the time he was born. Nowadays, Christian fundamentalists argue that scientists should not be allowed to experiment with human cloning, because such their practice would result in birth of physically deformed “mutants”, simply because of scientists’ willingness to “meddle in God’s affairs”, without realizing that God himself likes to play cruel jokes with people’s lives, while allowing the birth of physically inadequate children, thus dooming them to represent a “burden to society” for the rest of their lives.
Moreover, no matter how physically or mentally deformed a particular individual might be, Christians still expect him to remain thankful towards “creator” because of God’s “gift of life”. Therefore, Richard’s decision to have its behavior matching his ugly appearance can be referred to as anything but unnatural, even though in play’s last act, Richard will grow to feel sorry over what he had done. Just as character of Devil in Milton’s “Paradise Lost”, Richard rebels against what he perceives as God’s hypocrisy.
It is namely the “omnipotent” but “never present” God, who imposes the rules of morality upon people, while having absolutely no moral right to do it in the first place. Thus, even though Richard decides to become an evil-doer, such a decision, on his part, appears to be morally justified, which in its turn creates a certain paradox – despite the fact that we despise Richard’s pure evilness, we nevertheless cannot deny him being honest with himself and with society. What differ him from his victims is the fact that he never tried to rationalize his murderous ways.
From what we know about the so-called “War of Roses”, during the course of which the events described in “Richard III” take place, play’s other important characters, such as Edward IV, Duke of Buckingham, Duke of Clarence and Lord Hastings, had participated in it with a homicidal zeal, closely matching the one of Richard. However, unlike Richard, they were not bold enough to refer to their misdeeds as deriving out of their naked lust for power. This is the reason why Shakespeare subtly prompts readers to consider Richard’s reign of terror as being “divinely inspired”, while making numerous references to “bad omens”, experienced by Richard’s rivals, before they had parted with their lives. For example, Clarence’s bad dream of drowning has ominously prophetic overtones:
“Methought that Gloucester stumbled, and in falling
Struck me, that thought to stay him, overboard
Into the tumbling billows of the main” (Act 1, Scene 4)
Thus, even though that Richard actively violates the notions of conventional morality, by conspiring against his closest relatives and friends, it is namely Richard victims’ apparent inability to recognize him for what he really is, which strikes us as being particularly odd. Apparently, it never occurred to them what Richard was capable of, simply because they never took him seriously. While formally thinking of Richard as one of them, because of his noble bloodline, play’s other important characters were unwilling to recognize even a remote possibility for Richard to be able to challenge them in any way, whatsoever.
However, the future Lord Protector and consequentially King of England had proven them wrong, simply because on his way to power, Richard he was able to step over moral prejudices, which held his rivals back, while being apparently aware of a saying that would become famous in latter centuries – victors are always right. Friedrich Nietzsche once said: “If you look into abyss long enough, the abyss begins to look back at you”.
The fact that Richard was able to break emotional ties with his relatives, whom he perceived as standing on his way to power, qualifies him rather well to be referred to as “Nietzschean character” – a person, whose strive for power endows him with super-human strength and even turns such person’s existential disadvantages into his assets. In his article “Determined to Prove a Villain: Criticism, Pedagogy, and Richard III”, Martine van Elk says: “Shakespeare shows that deformity itself is not necessarily only limiting. It may, and does, in fact prove to be somewhat of an asset to Richard, as we see when he justifies his attack on Hastings by exposing his withered hand and attributing his deformity to witchcraft” (van Elk 10).
Therefore, it will not be an exaggeration, on our part, to consider Richard as one of Shakespearian tragic heroes, who was being forced by circumstances to act as a villain, simply because only through being a villain he could realize his full potential as individual. In the eyes of history, it is only one’s existential brilliance, which matters, because it is only such people’s quality that allows them to leave a mark in history, regardless of whether their contemporaries thought of these people as being good or evil. True intellectual can never adjust its behaviour to the notions of conventional morality, because he or she stands so much above these notions. In its turn, this explains why Richard was able to pose as someone he definitely was not with such an amazing ease:
“But then I sigh and, with a piece of Scripture,
Tell them that God bids us do good for evil.
And thus I clothe my naked villainy
With odd old ends stol’n forth of holy writ,
And seem a saint when most I play the devil” (Act 1, Scene 3)
Apparently, Richard the Third was one of those rare individuals, who are able to overcome their physical limitations by utilising their extraordinarily strong willpower and their superior ability to recognize and exploit people’s weaknesses to its own advantage. The close reading of “Richard III” reveals the existence of many similarities between Richard and Hitler, which in its turn, points out to the fact that both individuals belonged to essentially the same psychological type.
Regardless of what our attitude towards Hitler might, it remains an undeniable fact that he had inflicted a mortal wound on International Communism, from which the latter was never able to recover. Therefore, Hitler did benefit the humanity, even though he never ceased to remain the embodiment of evil. The same can be said about Richard the Third – if he had not physically eliminated the potential contenders for British throne, the “War of Roses” would have lasted for another century or two, which means that that Britain would probably never rise to the position of geopolitical prominence, while remaining deeply divided from within.
It is not simply a coincidence that after the death of Richard the Third, Britain enjoyed the era of peace and stability for almost 250 years – whatever the improbable it might sound, it was namely Richard’s wickedness which had brought up a great deal of good to his country. Therefore, we cannot refer to Richard’s taste for evoking the notion of “peace”, during the course of his dialogues with his future victims, as simply another indication of protagonist’s excellence in the field of psychological manipulation. For example, while trying to convince Mayor that Hastings needed to be promptly executed, Richard pointed out that this had to be done for the sake of assuring England’s well-being:
“Proceed thus rashly in the villain’s death
But that the extreme peril of the case,
The peace of England and our persons’ safety,
Enforc’d us to this execution” (Act 3, Scene 5)
There can be little doubt, of course, that it was Richard, who benefited from Hastings’ death the most; however, given the essentially parasitic existence of “nobles” in just about any country, it would quite safe, on our part, to suggest that England did not suffer a whole lot, as a result of Hastings’ head being chopped off.
The reason why Britain was being set on the path of rapid economic and scientific progress, during the course of Cromwell’s era, is because in early 17th century British aristocracy has been removed from position of absolute power. Therefore, even Richard’s seemingly apparent wrongdoings had both: negative and positive consequences, which in its turn, serves as another proof as to protagonist’s psychological complexity.
Therefore, we can only agree with Thomas Pendleton, who in his article “What? Price? Shakespeare?”, where he discuses cinematographic interpretations of this Shakespeare’s play, had suggested that the character of Richard does not quite fit into Shakespearian concept of villainy as “idea in itself”: “The constantly haunted Richard obviously has little to do with Shakespeare’s happy villain, who for the great bulk of the play is so at ease with his criminality that it comes as a surprise when in the fourth act, Lady Anne tells us about his “timorous dreams” (Pendleton 140).
Despite the fact that Richard had openly proclaimed his willingness to embrace evil on many occasions, he has never been quite as “bad to the bone” as he believed he was. Partially, this explains why, before the Battle of Bosworth Field, Richard becomes utterly horrified, after having realized that he in fact did act as lowly criminal:
“What do I fear? Myself? There’s none else by.
Richard loves Richard; that is, I am I.
Is there a murderer here? No-yes, I am” (Act 5, Scene 3)
Thus, we can say that, whereas the classical concept of “tragic hero” concerns the process of essentially good person succumbing to the “dark side”, the character of Richard provides us with the insight on this concept from diametrically opposite point of view – play’s protagonist is being increasingly alienated from the “dark side”, as he proceeds with his murderous deeds, which causes him to suffer. In other words, “Richard III” contains clearly Manichean motifs, because the reading of this Shakespeare’s play prompts people to consider the possibility that both: good and evil, originate from essentially the same source.
In his article “Back To The Future: Subjectivity and Anamorphosis in Richard III”, Vance Adair analyses the character of Richard the Third through the lenses of psychoanalysis, while coming up with overly sophisticate but absolutely valid idea as to the very essence of Richard’s existential identity: “In relation to Richard III’s troubled encounter with its own teleological project, it is Richard that unwittingly reveals the contingent forces involved in the construction of subjectivity.
Significantly, it is precisely when his own identity is under the most vigorous assault that he discloses the radical implications of Lacan’s (Jacques Lacan – contemporary French psychologist) thesis: ‘identity’ emerges only at a point which ‘sews’ the meaning into the signifier” (Adair 36). As we have mentioned earlier, Richard strived for nothing else then “sewing” the meaning of his physical appearance onto what he considered to be his “true calling”. Just as normal people experience a psychological discomfort, while being exposed to the sight of ugliness, Richard used to experience a discomfort, while being exposed to the sight of beauty.
This is why, while trying to justify his actions in Anne’s eyes, Richard says: “But ’twas thy beauty that provoked me” (Act 1, Scene 2). Given the semantic context of ideas, expressed earlier in this paper, there is a good reason for us to think that these Richard’s words were absolutely sincere.
Conclusion
Thus, we can conclude this paper by stating once again that Richard’s tragedy derives out of the fact that, no matter how hard he tried, play’s protagonist was never able to achieve “existential sovereignty”, because of utter dichotomy between his genetically determined behavioral bestiality and his subconscious strive to be a part of humanity, which he unsuccessfully strived to suppress within himself, by deliberately associating his personality with evil. In our opinion, this qualifies Richard to be referred to as “tragic hero”, rather then despicable villain, which he actually appears to be on outside.
Bibliography
Adair, Vance. Back to the Future: Subjectivity and Anamorphosis in Richard III. Critical Survey. (9) 3, (1997): 32-58.
Pendleton, Thomas. What? Price? Shakespeare?. Literature/Film Quarterly. (29) 2, (2001): 134-46.
Olson, Greta. Richard III’s Animalistic Criminal Body. Philological Quarterly. (82) 3, (2003): 301-24.
Slotkin, Joel Elliot. Honeyed Toads: Sinister Aesthetics in Shakespeare’s Richard III. Journal for Early Modern Cultural Studies. (7)1, (2007): 5-32.
Shakespeare, William “Richard III” [1593] 2001. Project Gutenberg Ebook. Web.
Van Elk, Martine. Determined to Prove a Villain: Criticism, Pedagogy, and Richard III. College Literature. (34) 4, (2007): 1-21.