Essay on Honor in Richard II -- Richard II Richard III Essays

The Importance of Honor in Richard II The tension-charged exchange betwixt Bolingbroke and Mowbray in the first scenes of Richard II provides exciting action for the audience, and gives a coup doeil into trial by combat and the importance of comply in Shakespe atomic number 18s plays. political campaign by combat, or a judicial duel was a tralatitious way to settle disputes in England and Europe for many generations. People dueled to comprise their own remark, and to prove personal claims against the honor of others. Honor. Honor is the accumulation of saturated deeds that instills a respect in others and in you. Possessing, seeking, and defending the debatable trait of honor are crucial elements of Richard II. The concept of honor has various meanings to individual members of a modern audience, just as it did to an Elizabethan audience. What is adept? What makes someone honorable? Aristotle thought there is no true honor in the world but that which commeth from vertue . Vertue seeks no greater or ampler dramatic guile to shew her selfe in, then her owne conscience. The higher the Sunne is the lesse shadow it makes, and the greater a mans vertue is the lesse glorie it seekes. (qtd. in Council 28) So, by Aristotles rationale, those people who seek honor are in item not honorable because they are deliberately seeking honor, which is a vice. Council sums Aristotles assertion very well, virtue consists in action the reward of that action is honor to stick with more honor than virtuous action warrants or to pursue honor for its own sake is a vice (19). Honor is in like manner eloquently described by Rabelaiss definition of honor to the Thelemites, because men that are free, well-born, and well-bred, and conversant in honest companies, have natu... ...mon. New York W W Norton, 1994. 12. Seldon, John. Table-Talk. 1689. Ed. Edward Arber. London Alex, Murray & Son, 1868. 13. Shakespeare, W. The Tragedy of King Richard the Second. The Complete 1 4. Signet Classic Shakespeare. Toronto Harcourt Brace Johanovich, Publishers, 1972. You whitethorn wish to begin your essay with the quotes below Bolingbroke My body shall make comfortably upon this earth, Or my divine soul answer it in heaven. Thou art a traitor and a miscreant. (Richard II, 1.1.37-39) Mowbray I take it up and by that sword I swear, Which gently laid my knighthood on my shoulder, Ill answer thee in any fair degree Or chivalrous design of mediaeval trial And when I mount, alive may I not light, If I be traitor or unjustly fight. (Richard II, 1.1.78-83)