Getting the Shakespearean Part Right
Getting the Shakespearean Part Right
At his rally before the invasion of the Capitol, Trump said to his minions:
And after this, we’re going to walk down and I’ll be there with you. We’re going to walk down–
We’re going to walk down. Anyone you want, but I think right here, we’re going to walk down to the Capitol.
But then he ducked back into the White House to watch the whole thing on TV. That’s how you know he’s Richard III and not Henry V.
“…you know he’s Richard III and not Henry V.”
[I knew that Donald Trump was a Dick long before he ran for POTUS. Problem is that we cling to first past the post voting in a time that tech could easily enable ranked voting. So, in 2016 the voters were forced to choose between the two most polarizing and despised candidates that our two party system could shit out of its ass. Even then only the perversely dubious electoral college system, which like the US Senate was designed to put regional divisions ahead of the will of the people, was able to settle on the ogre Trump.]
[Of course, Ol’ Willie Shakespeare never let reality get in the way of a good story. So, would Shakespeare have been a liberal or a conservative? Well, it is hard to say.]
https://www.historyextra.com/period/medieval/richard-iii-was-a-great-king-who-achieved-more-than-the-elizabeths-and-henry-v/
Richard III was a “great king” who achieved more than the Elizabeths and Henry V
The perception of Richard III as a nasty villain who murdered his nephews is “one of the greatest injustices of history” according to Philippa Langley, a screenwriter who led the search for the remains of the former king
Appearing on BBC Radio 4’s Great Lives, Langley said Richard III was “most certainly” a great king who wanted to “make life fairer and more bearable” for ordinary people.
Speaking to presenter Matthew Parris alongside Richard III biographer Annette Carson, Langley said: “History is written by the winners. When Richard died on the field of Bosworth [in 1485] a new dynasty was born, and that dynasty had to legitimise itself. And by doing that it had to denigrate Richard, in a sense, because it had to show them as being the new choice…
“He’s been trashed I think, definitely, and then Shakespeare of course comes along in the Tudor era, so we have the popular perception of Richard as the archetypal evil villain. [We have] plays based on [the work of] Thomas More [chancellor in the reign of Henry VIII, who in around 1515 wrote The History of Richard III, which established Richard’s reputation as a tyrant], and then many of the subsequent writers and historians believe that Thomas More is a credible source and a credible witness…
Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey is a novelization of the bum deal Richard III got. I enjoyed it a lot many years ago – no idea how it stands up today!
Richard III was a great villain (at least in the play), but he was not a coward. Trump is a coward. He reminds me more of Caligula then any tyrant or villain in English, Irish, Scots, & American history.