"O that my tongue were in the thunder's mouth! Then with a passion would I shake the world..."
Shakespeare returns to history plays with “King John,” a minor work which offers major insight into Shakespeare’s growth as a writer. As usual, he tinkers with form and structure, arranging time and events to fit his story. But while earlier history
plays concerned themselves with the cost of social chaos, here he explores the cause and cost of personal chaos. The grey areas of politics and personal responsibility provide the action of the play. There are no subplots to offer contrast or counterpoint to his theme. Instead, he makes one major point and, along the way, creates his first original character.
In contemporary terms, “Commodity” refers to goods and service bought and sold for personal gain. The commodities bought and sold here are Honor, Loyalty and the Law. None, not royally purple or Cardinal red, stand immune to commodity. King John pillages the Church to fund his campaigns, and, then submits to it in order to keep the crown. Pandolf incites war (just as John incites Hubert to murder Arthur), but can’t control Lewis once he is shown his path to the English throne. Lords see what they want before they know what is. When Pembroke and Salisbury discover Arthur’s dead body, they quickly conclude that Hubert murdered him at John’s behest. Elinor and Constance, the powers behind those who would be king, each have self-interest at heart in arguing the point of legitimacy, though Constance probably fails to realize the reason the French are willing to support her claim. Observation needs proof, but “commodity” determines how they see things.
Seemingly absent in the play is the presence of commoners in minor roles, a technique often used for comic effect. But Shakespeare has made a point throughout the early works of taking minor characters from one play and adding layers to create more fully developed roles in later plays. In “King John,” he promotes them to major characters in the roles of the Bastard and Hubert.
Partially royal by blood, raised in the gentry (but a bastard nonetheless) Richard Falconbridge straddles all ranks. Fiercely loyal, quick with both wit and sword, he possesses enough self-awareness to observe and learn. His education is not only how his character develops, but also the plays message: watch and learn.
Most importantly, his language is the language of the common Englishman, acting and commenting on the action. Richard I addressed the audience, but did so as royalty. To the audience, the Bastard is one of them. Anyone who’s ever daydreamed can relate to the Bastard’s reaction to being knighted (“Well, I can make any Joan a lady”), how he imagines he will be treated, and how he will treat others.
As anxious as the Bastard often is to pick or provoke a fight, Hubert prefers to avoid them. He can admire and appreciate battlefield exploits, but withholds his loyalty until events force him to make a choice. Once he does commit to King John, he is forced to choose between supporting a cause and committing murder for it.
Between them, the Bastard and Hubert represent two sides of the English citizenry, those who stand to gain little but lose so much in the event of civil war. The Bastard defends John without question, urging him to act like a King, lead like a King, and fight like a King. He is determined to control events. Hubert lacks any political commitments. He is loyal to whoever wears the crown. Because of his lack of commitment, events control him and his spends and he spends the latter part of the play defending his own personal honor and much as his country. Shakespeare, as always, doesn’t take sides between to two paths chosen. But he makes a point of giving the Bastard the last word.
Learning Notes:
Sometimes, the most important notes are the ones you don’t play:
One of Shakespeare’s most effective pieces of writing in the play comes at the end of Act III, Scene 2. King John take Hubert aside to thank him for his loyalty. But in that, “Thank You,” there is a hidden request. “I had a thing to say, but let it go,” he says. Is there a better way to get a person’s attention that to hold off telling him something? To lure the listener into parsing the speaker’s words for clues? John sprinkles them throughout the speech, candy colored hints, only to offer again, “I had a thing to say, but I will fit it for with some better time.” Leading Hubert to John’s true wishes, Shakespeare takes a single line of verse, stretching a taut over five lines of dialog:
King John: Death.
Hubert: My lord.
King John: A Grave.
Hubert: He shall not live.
All of the conflict is expressed in silence. There is enough space there, whether on the page or on the stage, to let the reader/audience see what in the minds and hearts of John and Hubert. And in their own, as well.
Women and Children Second:
For the most part, most Shakespeare scholars believe that Constance’s character has her roots in Margaret (from the Henry VI plays) due her rantings and hysterics. They believe this, for the most part, because most Shakespeare scholars are men. In fact, like Margaret, it is Elinor who is a warrior. It is Elinor, like Margaret, who manipulates her King. And it is Elinor who is referred to as an “Ait.” Constance may not always be in control of her emotions, but at least she has them. Her pain is real, and in learning how to express that pain, Shakespeare is getting closer to portraying women as more than objects in the duller minds of men.
He also does a better job of portraying children. Arthur is an innocent pawn in this play, who like Henry VI, would prefer to be a shepherd. His reaction to his position is both understandable and believable, as are his entreaties to Hubert and his fatal attempt to escape the prison. Arthur is still as precocious as one might expect from royal bloodlines, but gone is the Latin spouting of young Rutland.
Marlowe’s Ghost:
Christopher Marlowe didn’t invent blank verse, but he did raise it to a state of grand vigor. Characters, such as Tamberlaine, Faust, and Barabas dominate his most famous plays with bombast; they are humans portrayed as mythic heroes who have every intention of raising their status to deity. To be fair, his later plays show Marlowe was quite capable of developing more nuanced characters. He died in 1593; "King John" was written about two years later.
Still under Marlowe’s influence, vigorous declamations by the nobles are contrasted by the Bastard’s observations and Constance’s emotional fluctuations. Marlowe grandly announces each players cards. Shakespeare shows how each player plans to play them.
Yet there is something else of Marlowe that lingers in this play. The feistiness and wit of the Bastard (why that name, one wonders) is typical of what we know about Christopher Marlowe. Like Falconbridge he was raised in the gentry, hob-nobbed with royalty, and was generally thought to be quite the bastard. The politics of personal interest Falconbridge observes is exactly the kind of shenanigans Marlowe would have witnessed first hand in his service to the Queen. And the repeated taunts “And hang a calfskin on those recreant limbs” is exactly the kind of insult one should avoid repeating once too often at, say, a reckoning.
Next: Richard II
