Henry VI, Part II The Oxford Shakespeare

by Shakespeare, William; Warren, Roger

• ISBN13: 9780198130000
• ISBN10: 0198130007
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2003-02-27
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

Shakespeare's Henry VI plays have come fully into their own in the modern theatre. They dramatize contemporary as much as Elizabethan issues: the struggle for power, the manoeuvres of politicians, social unrest, civil war - no wonder they have struck a chord with modern audiences. Roger Warrendraws on his experience of Henry VI, Part Two in rehearsal as well as in performance to focus both the theatricality and the enduring contemporary relevance of the play, both in a wide-ranging Introduction and a detailed Commentary, which also provides a thorough explanation of the play's vividlanguage. The Textual Introduction offers a complete reconsideration of the complex relation between the two original texts.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations	ix
A Note on Titles	x
Introduction	1	(1)
Three Plays or a Trilogy?	1	(5)
Theatricality and Modernity	6	(21)
Origins	27	(5)
History and Pseudo-history	32	(4)
The Fall of Duke Humphrey	36	(4)
Dramatic Style: Henry and Margaret	40	(4)
Suffolk and Margaret	44	(6)
Jack Cade's Rebellion	50	(7)
The Outbreak of War	57	(3)
Date and Chronology	60	(15)
Textual Introduction	75	(26)
Q as a reported text	78	(9)
Revision in the Folio text	87	(11)
The Folio text and this edition	98	(3)
Editorial Procedures	101	(4)
Abbreviations and References	102	(3)
HENRY VI, PART TWO	105	(184)
Appendix A Passages from the Quarto Text	289	(6)
Appendix B Chronicle Sources	295	(12)
Appendix C Alterations to Lineation	307	(4)
Index	311