53 pages • 1 hour read
William ShakespeareHenry V
Fiction | Play | Adult | Published in 1599A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
War and Conquest
The plot of Henry V concerns the English invasion of France in 1414-1420. The narrative is driven by war, while success in war vindicates the rise of Henry as a King and as a man. The warring nobles, especially the feud between Henry and the Dauphin, drive the war-themed narrative arc of the play, but characters such as Fluellen, Pistol, and Katherine provide nuanced perspectives on the realities of war. These scenes are essential in portraying the war on stage, where the actual battles can only be suggested. They also show that William Shakespeare’s play focuses on human interest: War in the play is not an exercise in historical or tactical fact but an exploration of human difference, identity, collaboration, and reconciliation.
Henry’s war is a war of national and personal conquest, a way of putting his reckless youth behind him and showing the world that he (and his country) demand to be taken seriously. Henry’s feud with the Dauphin makes explicit the linking of his personal and kingly honor: The conquest of France is the test of Henry’s new mature character and his fitness to be king. Through war, he is able to define himself and his reign. In contrast to his father’s chaotic rule over a warring England (portrayed in Shakespeare’s earlier history plays), the once irresponsible Henry uses war as a tool to establish his identity, and that of England.
Through conquest, Henry gives purpose and identity to himself and his country and Henry embodies an idealized version of English identity that encompasses his soldiers. Henry’s inspirational speeches about glory, honor, and victory are so successful because they paint a picture of Englishness that his men (and Shakespeare’s audience) want to believe (even when they starkly contrast with the nefarious reality of characters such as Bardolph and Pistol). When Henry speaks about brotherhood and honor, he acknowledges the “vileness” of some of his soldiers, who will nevertheless be his brother-in-arms. In this way, Shakespeare acknowledges the paradox of the soldier who must be heroized in the play but also represent the common man. The officers such as Gower and Fluellen make adopt Henry’s suggestions about honor and brotherhood, but the common soldiers such as Pistol and Bardolph do not act honorably. Shakespeare’s play acknowledges the sordid side of war: the “legs and arms and heads // chopped off” (4.1.134-35), the pageboy killed by the French, and Henry’s former friend Bardolph hanged for looting. Even the fate of Pistol—who, poor, fatigued, friendless, and far from home, feels himself abandoned by the loyalty system that has brought him to France—has pathos. Shakespeare’s treatment demonstrates that the common man reckons with war in a very different way to the kings and nobles, as Henry’s discussion with Williams makes explicit. The play grapples closely with difficult moral and philosophical ideas around war, playing closely into the theme of kingship. While the Kings of France and England battle for control and vast riches, the common soldiers are soaked in mud and blood. Henry’s brotherhood with his men and his evident concern for them makes him a sympathetic king, even though his role means he must cause many of them to die. In refusing to be ransomed, he shows that he is prepared to die in his own cause.
Henry’s attitude toward war is directly contrasted with that of the French: Shakespeare’s use of conflict as a means of establishing identity is especially effective because it presents the perspectives of the English versus the French, juxtaposing and highlighting the differences. The French nobles are arrogant and display little or no concern for their own men, concentrating instead on the trappings of war as a sign of their own status.
The Nature of Kingship
Henry V uses a mythologized version of the historical King Henry V to explore the nature of kingship. Henry encounters numerous problems and situations, each of which allows him to demonstrate a certain dimension of what it means to be a king. Henry is an absolute monarch: His decisions shape history, such as when the Dauphin’s provocative message seals his decision to invade France. Rather than an emotional decision, however, Henry has demonstrated the responsibility of being King by weighing up the argument; Shakespeare clearly presents him deciding to invade based on its merits and not following the Dauphin’s provocation. Henry is also portrayed as reasonable and moral when he deals with his friends the traitors, when he is shown inclining toward mercy until they show themselves to be hypocrites when others have broken the law. By allowing the force of the law to execute them as traitors, as when his old friend Bardolph is guilty of looting, Henry is shown to be consistent and just in his application of the law. In this way, Henry emerges as a measured and reasonable man, which the play presents as necessary qualities for a good king.
Through the difficult decisions Henry must make, from applying the law to his friends to waging war, the play deals directly with the compromises and dilemmas of the role, exploring the nature kingship as a state that combines the human, political, and divine in ways that are incompatible at times. Throughout the play, Henry shows his consciousness that being king as a heavy responsibility, and this serious approach shows him to be a moral king, motivated by what he “should’ do and not by the privileges of his status. He says that, while the title gives him fame, fortune, and power, the role of king is fundamentally alienating and means that his life is not his own. His soliloquys acknowledge him to be lonely, and this adds pathos to his incognito mingling with his soldiers on the eve of battle.
It is crucial to Shakespeare’s portrayal of kingship as a sacrifice that Henry V is a markedly different man from the reckless, wayward Prince Hal of the play Henry IV. Shakespeare created this character as quite different from the known historical character of Henry V before he became king, deliberately setting up a contrast between the Prince and the King. As a prince, Hal could indulge his impulses and act in an irresponsible manner. His actions had fewer consequences and he was not burdened with a responsibility to an entire country nor an entire people: In fact, his dissolute youth is more sympathetic because the audience knows that he will soon become king. In creating this contrast, Shakespeare creates a character who is both relatable and heroic, while also suggesting that the nature of kingship itself is so influential that it can drastically alter the life of the incumbent. The role of king is transformative: Henry becomes the king he was waiting to be. In the wrong hands, however—such as those of the Dauphin—the role of king has the capacity to exacerbate negative character traits, such as arrogance and hubris. The contrast between the Dauphin and Henry prefigures the disinheritance of the Dauphin in favor of Henry, as the correct moral successor of kingship.
Language as a Tool for Identity
As a play, Henry V explores the power and limits of language to inspire people by fostering human connections. The power of language is integral to the nature of the play, which relies on language to express the complex themes of the play and to invoke the settings and contexts of the scenes.
Henry wields language as a weapon, using his frequent speeches to inspire his men to glorious victory. The play demonstrates the importance of language to leadership: His powerful rhetoric has an evident impact on the battles, as Henry’s forces win convincingly with very few losses against overwhelming odds. By binding together his men as a band of brothers, Henry convinces the soldiers of a solidarity that is lacking in the French army. His language inspires and changes people, which in turn changes the course of history. Through powerful language, Henry is able to elevate his men to fight to their best potential and to elevate the status of his country to newfound heights. Henry is the King of England, but he also needs to incentivize those who are not English. Shakespeare’s portrayal of language variety amongst the troops shows how many different people there are in the army, while also showing the way in which Henry is able to bring them together.
Language as a tool for identity is emphasized by the play’s use of French. The scenes including French nobles are written and acted in English but include curses and exclamations in French, which help to reinforce their identity as the “other” in the play. “Frenchness” as otherness, however, is most significantly demonstrated through the presentation of Katherine’s character. Katherine is shown to not speak English and the language barrier between her and Henry is a key point in the play’s dynamic. This decision was deliberate on the part of Shakespeare: The real Henry and Katherine would have spoken the very similar languages of Middle English and Old French and would have been able to communicate. It is also likely that both of them as educated royals (and Henry in particular) would have been able to speak one another’s language well. Shakespeare therefore creates this language barrier for dramatic purposes.
The English lesson scene in which Katherine is introduced creates a comic effect but also establishes Katherine as an outsider in the play: as a woman and as French. The feminine characters, setting, and focus of the scene make it entirely different from all others in the play. By making Henry’s love interest speak a different language, Shakespeare is able to set up and explore the parallel dichotomies of the play: war and peace, enmity and love, male and female, eloquent emotion and tentative feeling. By creating a vast difference between Katherine’s limited English and Henry’s expert use of the language, Shakespeare creates tension and humor by removing Henry’s greatest weapon as a character: his rhetoric. Henry cannot inspire her to love him as he inspires his army. The language barrier here paradoxically works to enforce the characters’ humanity and their predicament as strangers obliged to be married; the scene shows them finding their way through this problem with goodwill. Henry cannot speak to Katherine in her own language but the evident humility and honor in his speech appeal to Katherine. She accepts his proposal, even though he cannot speak to her fluently. His character transcends the boundaries of language, eliciting her love by transcending the language itself. She understands Henry in spite of his words, not because of them. Throughout the play, Henry is shown to be a masterful wielder of the English language. By winning Katherine’s heart, however, he is shown that his goodness and his integrity go beyond his skill with language.
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By William Shakespeare
