Richard III by William Shakespeare (good novels to read txt) 📕

Richard III

By William Shakespeare.

Table of Contents Titlepage Imprint Dramatis Personae Richard III Act I Scene I Scene II Scene III Scene IV Act II Scene I Scene II Scene III Scene IV Act III Scene I Scene II Scene III Scene IV Scene V Scene VI Scene VII Act IV Scene I Scene II Scene III Scene IV Scene V Act V Scene I Scene II Scene III Scene IV Scene V Colophon Uncopyright Imprint

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Dramatis Personae

King Edward the Fourth

Edward, Prince of Wales, afterwards King Edward V, son to the King

Richard, Duke of York, son to the King

George, Duke of Clarence, brother to the King

Richard, Duke of Gloucester, afterwards King Richard III, brother to the King

A young son of Clarence

Henry, Earl of Richmond, afterwards King Henry VII

Cardinal Bourchier, Archbishop of Canterbury

Thomas Rotherham, Archbishop of York

John Morton, Bishop of Ely

Duke of Buckingham

Duke of Norfolk

Earl of Surrey, his son

Earl Rivers, brother to Elizabeth

Marquis of Dorset and Lord Grey, sons to Elizabeth

Earl of Oxford

Lord Hastings

Lord Stanley, called also Earl of Derby

Lord Lovel

Sir Thomas Vaughan

Sir Richard Ratcliff

Sir William Catesby

Sir James Tyrrel

Sir James Blount

Sir Walter Herbert

Sir Robert Brakenbury, Lieutenant of the Tower

Christopher Urswick, priest

Another priest

Tressel and Berkeley, gentlemen attending on the Lady Anne

Lord Mayor of London. Sheriff of Wiltshire

Elizabeth, queen to King Edward IV

Margaret, widow of King Henry VI

Duchess of York, mother to King Edward IV

Lady Anne, widow of Edward Prince of Wales, son to King Henry VI; afterwards married to Richard

A young daughter of Clarence (Margaret Plantagenet)

Ghosts of those murdered by Richard III, lords and other attendants; a pursuivant, scrivener, citizens, murderers, messengers, soldiers, etc.

Scene: England.

Richard III Act I Scene I

London. A street.

Enter Richard, Duke of Gloucester, solus. Gloucester

Now is the winter of our discontent
Made glorious summer by this sun of York;
And all the clouds that lour’d upon our house
In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.
Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths;
Our bruised arms hung up for monuments;
Our stern alarums changed to merry meetings,
Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.
Grim-visaged war hath smooth’d his wrinkled front;
And now, instead of mounting barbed steeds
To fright the souls of fearful adversaries,
He capers nimbly in a lady’s chamber
To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.
But I, that am not shaped for sportive tricks,
Nor made to court an amorous looking-glass;
I, that am rudely stamp’d, and want love’s majesty
To strut before a wanton ambling nymph;
I, that am curtail’d of this fair proportion,
Cheated of feature by dissembling nature,
Deform’d, unfinish’d, sent before my time
Into this breathing world, scarce half made up,
And that so lamely and unfashionable
That dogs bark at me as I halt by them;
Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace,
Have no delight to pass away the time,
Unless to spy my shadow in the sun
And descant on mine own deformity:
And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover,
To entertain these fair well-spoken days,
I am determined to prove a villain
And hate the idle pleasures of these days.
Plots have I laid, inductions dangerous,
By drunken prophecies, libels and dreams,
To set my brother Clarence and the king
In deadly hate the one against the other:
And if King Edward be as true and just
As I am subtle, false and treacherous,
This day should Clarence closely be mew’d up,
About a prophecy, which says that g
Of Edward’s heirs the murderer shall be.
Dive, thoughts, down to my soul: here Clarence comes.

Enter Clarence, guarded, and Brakenbury.

Brother, good day: what means this armed guard
That waits upon your grace?

Clarence

His majesty,
Tendering my person’s safety, hath appointed
This conduct to convey me to the Tower.

Gloucester Upon what cause? Clarence Because my name is George. Gloucester

Alack, my lord, that fault is none of yours;
He should, for that, commit your godfathers:
O, belike his majesty hath some intent
That you shall be new-christen’d in the Tower.
But what’s the matter, Clarence? may I know?

Clarence

Yea, Richard, when I know; for I protest
As yet I do not: but, as I can learn,
He hearkens after prophecies and dreams;
And from the cross-row plucks the letter g,
And says a wizard told him that by g
His issue disinherited should be;
And, for my name of George begins with g,
It follows in his thought that I am he.
These, as I learn, and such like toys as these
Have moved his highness to commit me now.

Gloucester

Why, this it is, when men are ruled by women:
’Tis not the king that sends you to the Tower;
My Lady Grey his wife, Clarence, ’tis she
That tempers him to this extremity.
Was it not she and that good man of worship,
Anthony Woodville, her brother there,
That made him send Lord Hastings to the Tower,
From whence this present day he is deliver’d?
We are not safe, Clarence; we are not safe.

Clarence

By heaven, I think there’s