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[the-alchemist.livejournal.com]

Why did [Shakespeare's] Richard III want to be king anyway? What it to fulfil some inner need, or just because everyone like power and so he wanted what everyone else wanted?

Do we believe him when he says (in 3HVI) that it's just because he can't get a shag? Why would someone see murdering one's way to the throne as an alternative to lots of hot nookie? What's wrong with masturbation, hiring a prostitute, or making friends with Jane Shore* just like everyone else?

Sorry, angevin2 for messing up your lovely community with my strange and obscene speculations. Anyone who suggests 'inner needs' that have nothing to do with sex will be adored and admired.



* I made Richard/Jane fanfiction once. I bet you wanted to know that. And come to think of it, why didn't he just accumulate some fangirls? But I don't want to go down the well-worn, 'look at the Lady Anne thing - actually he clearly didn't have any trouble with women at all path'... Actually I've made fanfiction that explains that one too. But that's all beside the point. 'Inner needs'. If you want to know why I want to know, I waffle about it here.

Comments

[a-t-rain.livejournal.com]

Well, as a dedicated Mistress Shore fan, I'm not sure she would have him. At least, Thomas Heywood's Jane wouldn't, since she's a very moral person apart from a spot of adultery, and the much-shallower Mistress Shore of the Elizabethan popular ballads would have insisted on a king who was pretty. I don't know which mental image of her Shakespeare was working with, but I'd assume it was one or the other of the above.

I think it's about the power and the challenge, more than anything. With a hefty dose of "they crowned Daddy Dearest with paper and stuck his severed head up on Micklegate Bar, and I'm going to make sure that NEVER HAPPENS TO ME." And, of course, in Henry VI-world the only reliable way to make sure it wouldn't happen to you was to do it to everybody else first.

[kerrypolka.livejournal.com]

If I were to point to a single line/speech that exemplified Richard's supermotivation in 3 Henry VI and Richard III, it would be the following:

I cannot weep, for all my body's moisture
Scarce serves to quench my furnace-burning heart;
Nor can my tongue unload my heart's great burthen,
For selfsame wind that I should speak withal
Is kindling coals that fires all my breast
And burns me up with flames that tears would quench.
To weep is to make less the depth of grief;
Tears, then, for babes, blows and revenge for me!--
Richard, I bear thy name; I'll venge thy death,
Or die renowned by attempting it.

Once Richard Sr. (who Richard Jr. idolized) died, Richard Jr. became wholly focused on getting the York faction permanently into power. I think he sees how easily Edward gets women to fall for him, and when that (the ease in acquisition) doesn't happen for him, he writes it off as impossible.

So Richard Jr. supports Edward because they're all Yorks, and Richard is all about York York York rah rah rah! Until Edward actually takes the throne, and blows it completely (in Richard's mind) with his boozing, whoring, and marrying Woodvilles.

The transition from "rah rah York!" to "rah rah self!" is a tricky one for me to get a handle on, but I think it's because he wants to do right by Richard Sr., and he doesn't think Edward is getting the job done. So he says, "All right, I want to get it done, I have to do it myself," and starts to hack his way into power.

I think all his references to his inability to score with women spring from his comparing himself with Edward -- I love Richard-in-the-OSF-production-Jamie-Newcomb's theory that Richard is a little bit in love with Elizabeth Woodvilel -- and sort of saying "Edward may be really accomplished with women, but it makes him a terrible king; I'm not accomplished at all, but that just means I'll be a better king than he, so nyah nyah nyah *stab*."

In short, it's all about Daddy. :)

[angevin2.livejournal.com]

Sorry, angevin2 for messing up your lovely community with my strange and obscene speculations.

Are you kidding? Strange and obscene speculations are what I do! You should read my serious scholarly work! ;)

Or the margins of my class notes. My LJ doesn't really convey that I frequently have imaginations as foul as Vulcan's stithy.

I'm thoroughly knackered after a long week so haven't got a whole lot to contribute at the moment, but it seems too like the whole point that once he actually gets the crown he hasn't the first idea what to do with it (other than, you know, keep on killing people, which had heretofore worked for him) ties in. In the sense that what people really desire is desire itself, so that when Richard actually achieves what he's after the game falls apart (or, to be deconstructionist about it, the entire narrative becomes untenable)...

[roguetailkinker.livejournal.com]

Is your fanfiction online? I have a weakness for Shakespeare!Richard fic. ;)

And may I say, this entire thread is awesome.