Shakespeare in a Yorkist-Ruled England?

[MAC161]

Just finished The Hollow Crown, at long last; somewhat swing-and-miss at times with certain elements or casting choices, but still enjoyable, esp. the two Richards (Cumberbatch in particular was an outstanding choice) and the first Henry IV. Given that all of these, and Richard III in particular, were written with the aim of presenting the House of Lancaster in the best light (whether because of genuine belief in/loyalty to pro-Lancaster takes on history, or simple deference to the Lancastrian-descended Elizabeth I), watching the series led me to wonder the following:

*If Richard III had won at Bosworth Field and cemented Yorkist rule up to the late 16th century or beyond, how might Shakespeare (presuming he's not butterflied away) have presented him in his plays?

*Would it be safe to write the Henriad plays, even ones more favorable towards the House of York, in an England ruled by Richard III's descendants?

*Would any of Shakespeare's other works revolving around the overthrow of kings and tyrants (Macbeth, Lear, Hamlet, Caesar, and whichever others I'm missing) likely be written under a Yorkist-descended monarch, with a possible still-lingering stigma of usurpation hanging over the dynasty despite "winner's history" prevailing?

Other questions:

*Presuming his victory at Bosworth, who would be the likeliest heir to Richard III, given his son Edward of Middleham's death in 1484? I know about John de la Pole being apparently groomed for this position, but were there other contenders that Richard III might have chosen?

*What are some of the most plausible actions, domestic and foreign, that a victorious Richard III have taken in however long he realistically would live/endure on the throne?

 

[Beata Beatrix]

As, in fact, an undergraduate scholar of early modern English literature, with a particular interest in Tudor self-fashioning, a few thoughts:

I guess I don't see why drama in this England wouldn't simply valorize the Yorkist camp as mawkishly as it did the Tudors? Richard is the brilliant defender of his nephews, loved by the common man, but his sinful brother Edward IV left England in a place that only Richard could save it from, that sort of thing...

If there are no Lancastrian heirs about, then I'm not sure if you couldn't write a play about Henry V – just say that before his death he realized his great sin against the glorious Duke of York or what have you – for all his great victories, that came home to roost! Oh no! Heck, you could still probably use the death of Richard II as a historiographical catalyst for the Wars of the Roses – popular history might come to configure Richard's regime as the true and holy avengers of martyred Richard and all that. Or not.

I wonder, would usurpation really be any more of a fear in a Yorkist England that has lasted for 70 years than it was in a Tudor England ruled by a single female monarch with no clear successor in an intensely religious divided Europe? It's strange to look back, given how slick the transition in 1603 was, but public discourse had no way of knowing Salisbury's plans for the succession...

 

[zaffre]

Just finished The Hollow Crown, at long last; somewhat swing-and-miss at times with certain elements or casting choices, but still enjoyable, esp. the two Richards (Cumberbatch in particular was an outstanding choice) and the first Henry IV. Given that all of these, and Richard III in particular, were written with the aim of presenting the House of Lancaster in the best light (whether because of genuine belief in/loyalty to pro-Lancaster takes on history, or simple deference to the Lancastrian-descended Elizabeth I), watching the series led me to wonder the following:

*If Richard III had won at Bosworth Field and cemented Yorkist rule up to the late 16th century or beyond, how might Shakespeare (presuming he's not butterflied away) have presented him in his plays?

*Would it be safe to write the Henriad plays, even ones more favorable towards the House of York, in an England ruled by Richard III's descendants?

*Would any of Shakespeare's other works revolving around the overthrow of kings and tyrants (Macbeth, Lear, Hamlet, Caesar, and whichever others I'm missing) likely be written under a Yorkist-descended monarch, with a possible still-lingering stigma of usurpation hanging over the dynasty despite "winner's history" prevailing?

Other questions:

*Presuming his victory at Bosworth, who would be the likeliest heir to Richard III, given his son Edward of Middleham's death in 1484? I know about John de la Pole being apparently groomed for this position, but were there other contenders that Richard III might have chosen?

*What are some of the most plausible actions, domestic and foreign, that a victorious Richard III have taken in however long he realistically would live/endure on the throne?

The be-all and end-all question here is whether it truly is "Richard III's descendants" ruling a century after he wins at Bosworth. Considering that he died in his early 30s, while actively pursuing marriage negotiations, it's plausible that Richard has loads of little princes-not-in-the-tower who carry the Plantagenet name on. Hell, a child of his could reasonably be on the throne *when* alt-Shakespeare starts puttering around, although you'd really be pushing the edges of Renaissance life expectancy there.

In that case Richard's historical legacy is fine, of course. The Tudors are traitors, Clarence is a traitor, Lizzie Woodville is a traitor + witch, etc. etc. These Yorkists are way more legitimate than the Tudors ever were, so I don't see why they'd squirm at regime change plays especially.

If Richard doesn't have kids and either John de la Pole or Capon Boy end up succeeding, the Yorkists remain in power but Richard's historical legacy is probably toast. Like sure, IOTL the Tudors exaggerated his hunchback and stuff, sad, but the lede here is that Richard obviously imprisoned and murdered his own nephews. Unless the royal claim directly flows through him, I can't imagine any king with, er, younger brothers wanting Richard's reputation to be anything other than dirt.

 

[Charles EP M.]

If a victorious Richard means no James I and VII, that probably knocks out Macbeth - Shakespeare doesn't have a Scottish patron whose ancestor bumped off Macbeth - but Will could have some of the same ideas for a play about someone else. "Hail Henry, who shall be seventh king hereafter"?

 

[Beata Beatrix]

If a victorious Richard means no James I and VII, that probably knocks out Macbeth - Shakespeare doesn't have a Scottish patron whose ancestor bumped off Macbeth - but Will could have some of the same ideas for a play about someone else. "Hail Henry, who shall be seventh king hereafter"?

I mean there are plenty of Elizabethan-era plays about Scots monarchs - Greene’s raunchy James IV comes to mind, but obviously there are more, some lost - and so I do think a story about vaulting ambition is perfectly possible, just perhaps with Fleance and Banquo de-emphasized…

 

[frustrated progressive]

After reading this thread and @Yokai Man's excellent list, I wonder what Shakespeare would have been like in the ATL below...

He Who Lives by the Sword,Dies by the Sword

1483-1485 Richard III (House of York)

1485-1504 Thomas I (House of Stanley)

1504-1508 -disputed between William Stanley and Thomas Stanley the Second-

1508-1547 Francis I (House of Orléans)

1547-160x Henry VII (House of Boleyn)


The War of the Roses didn’t end the way the Yorkists,the Lancastrians or the Tudors wanted but the way they deserved. After decades of war and pointless bloodshed and betrayals,the two sides destroyed themselves at Bosworth by pure accident. In a desperate lunge to take down Henry Tudor,Richard III managed to kill him only to die seconds later. The battle after that devolved in chaos,to put it lightly. Both its leaders were dead and no one really knew who was in charge or what they should do.

Leaving the door right open for anyone to swop in and take the price.

The Stanleys were born to backstab,steal,lie and kill for power. They were the best at it. The only reason Thomas Stanley hadn’t betrayed Richard immediately after the Tudors landed on British solid was because he had his son George held hostage. And even then Stanley hesitated during the battle over who to support. As luck would have it,he didn’t even need to bother making a choice. Both Richard and Henry dying made that moot. After getting his son back and killing some fools,he rushed back to London with a desire to profit from the chaos and crown himself King.

After all,why shouldn’t he? He had the army and the money needed to back him and crush any opposition. No one else was available to stop him (well,that fool De la Pole tried but he killed him and what remained of core Richard supports in less than a hour-barely even constituted a battle really,more akin to a wolf slaughter at best) and everyone just wanted to survive and live another day. Legitimacy be damned,that shit didn’t matter compared to money and weapons-and Thomas had plenty of both.

The reign of King Thomas was…mixed,if you will. On one hand he killed the Woodvilles,the Ricardian stalwarts,a large majority of Welsh people and too many others to boot and made his family rich and powerful at the expense of the people,not to mention allying himself with the French and carving up Burgundy.On the other hand,he didn’t really rock the boat or did anything really bad compared to other kings at the time. Most of the executions he ordered were out of misunderstandings and he didn’t really like being that bloodthirsty. And besides,nothing he did was out of the ordinary for rulers at the time. Only after George’s assassination did he really start to lose it. After 18 years of plots against him,Thomas wasn’t the fox he used to be. He came tired,paranoid and a lot more harsher. George’s death was the spark that lit the fuse.

No one to this day really knows who killed George Stanley. Thomas started suspecting everyone,ordering a series of executions of supposed people behind the plot,including even his wife Margaret and his third son Edward. By the time of his death next year,he left the Court in a state of disarray like in 1485,having killed anyone important but his brother and adopted son,who started debating over who should be King now. Thomas unfortunately didn’t name a successor due to being more preoccupied to fake plots so no one knew who was the rightful King.

It didn’t matter. The Stanleys had shown the illusion of royal legitimacy and smashed it. All you needed anymore to be King of England was just more money and armed men than the other guy. Now left to their own devices,the remaining Stanleys fought over the crown in a new bitter manner,openly only caring about power. The First English Civil War left the country in chaos once more. The French and the Scots got involved.

And in a very ironic manner,it ended the same way as the last war.

Francis I became King solely by default of both uncle and nephew dying at the battle of Durham. No one could really object to the French unofficially taking over England because,well,most of the nobility was dead because of the actions of the House of Stanley. Thus Francis had done what no French ruler before or after him could-take over England and rule over those bastard rosbifs.All things considered though,Francis didn’t actually rule with an iron fit. Sure,he was a mixed bag like Thomas (more so if you ask some sources) and the remaining English nobility resented him for ordering them around and giving favors to the Boleyns but he let England self govern itself at times due to having too much on his plate. As such,the decades of French rule were something of a odd thing,where not even the biggest French hater can remember anything relevant from this era.

And say what you want about Francis but he did something no one other French king in his position would have done: he let the English go free.

Oh sure,he made his son of his English mistress as heir and he only did it both as a favor and as a way to get rid of a problem after his death,but still,despite objections England was its own master again,and like in 1485 and 1509 it happened by accident. Henry‘s reign was initially met with skepticism and resentment but he managed to oddly charm his critics and be a quite good king,willing to compromise when needed and letting others make decisions for him. The Boleyn Era,while not perfect,was a good time for the nation. Arts were thriving and under the protection of the King. Religious freedom was mostly widespread,especially after the events in France of the Mad King Charles IX. Foreign affairs? Bah,as long as he got long with Mary of the Scots,he didn’t need to care.

Let the Irish do their weird tanistry and Charlie the Nutter lay waste to Europe. As long as they left England be,it was all alright with the world.

 

[heraclius]

The main impending military confrontation between England (whoever ruled it at the time) and France - the latter having backed and sent troops with Henry Tudor's invasion - as of 1485 was the question of the autonomous French duchy of Brittany's independence. When duke Francis II, who had been ailing and lacking in control of his court for some years so Richard III tried to bribe his chief minister Pierre Landois to arrest and extradite Henry to England in 1484 (HT found out in time thanks to spies in England and fled over the border into France), died in 1488 his daughter and heiress Anne was seized by pro-French agents and married off to king Charles VIII of France (born 1470, acceded 1483) and Brittany was annexed to France; Henry Tudor, embarrassed as a former French ally, chose to support Breton resistance and sent a small and unsuccessful expedition to help rebels vs France, commanded by his wife's uncle Sir Edward Woodville.

Richard III, who had strongly opposed Edward IV's surprise calling off his invasion of France and signing a peace-treaty wth Louis XI instead in 1475, was more likely as a surviving king (and aware that France had tried to remove him in 1485) to have used the Breton crisis as an excuse to rally national unity in England by invading France in a full war and to have led it in person, and/or have sent a bigger expedition to Brittany to secure its independence and seized Anne for an English candidate as its new Duke Consort - perhaps his nephew and heir John de la Pole if his own son Edward had died as in OTL 1484. (The English had used Breton autonomy as a means of undermining France by limited aid to this vs the French king's own candidate as Duke in the early 1340s and early 1350s; this was long-established practice.) If Richard was a widower as in OTL and had not married the rumoured Portuguese bride planned for him as of 1485, probably Juana , he could have married Anne himself and created a new Anglo-Breton dynasty for their second son, with the oldest son having England. (If an older son was born to this marriage c. 1492, when Richard was still only 40, then he would probably have succeeded Richard as king around the time of H VIII's OTL succession, as an adult, assuming that R's health did not decline due to his scoliosis or some Tudor or duke of Buckingham family ally murder him.) We could easily have a cynical Richard and his son continuing long-term meddling in France to cement English national unity and brush aside questions over what had happened to Edward V and his brother, plus a French long-term aim of backing a surviving Henry T or some other exiled English noble (a Beaufort as the next Lancastrian heir, or a sidelined but escaped earl Edward of Warwick, b 1475, as Clarence' s heir ?) as a pretender to invade England with or without Scots aid from James IV. (Or would Richard invade Scotland to force J to surrender and become a dependant ally as husband to his planned 1480s bride, Edward IV's daughter Cecily?)

Plenty of drama and warfare for a series of 1480s - 1510s dramatic plays by Shakespeare a century later, quite apart from butterflies to the history of Europe from Charles VIII not having the freedom from English attack to invade Italy in 1494 (eg the Sforza survive in Milan and the Spanish do not fight France over Naples but it becomes annexed by Ferdinand of Aragon). And King Richard III, with his sister dowager duchess Margaret of Burgundy linking him to Emperor Maximilian as an ally (in OTL M and Maximilian were backing Warbeck vs HT), marries off his son and heir, born c. 1490, to Maximilian's grand-daughter Eleanor of Habsburg - or does he ('Edward VI', acceded c. 1510) or his next brother get Catherine of Aragon in a Richard-Spain link-up vs France? So could we get a Shakespearian psych-drama about a Warbeck-style French-backed pretender claiming to be Edward V or his brother and fighting an ageing and ailing Richard, with the latter paranoid about plots from the heirs of the people he had murdered and as insecure as Macbeth, or a propaganda whitewash of Richard if the latter's heirs as King (or Queen) still insist on this line from all public publications as of the 1590s? So Shakespeare has to go back into history and dredge up safer plots about long-dead Norman and Saxon kings for his gripping stories, or does her follow up official anti-French lines ordered by his sovereign (King Richard IV, R III's great-grandson?) and use plots about the 'unsavoury' French royal court intrigues at the courts of medieval monarchs to show that the Plantagenet royals of his England are far more honest and moral people ?