This royal throne of kings, this sceptered isle… (2.1.40-49) #KingedUnKinged

GAUNT           This royal throne of kings, this sceptered isle,

This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,

This other Eden, demi-paradise,

This fortress built by Nature for herself

Against infection and the hand of war,

This happy breed of men, this little world,

This precious stone set in the silver sea,

Which serves it in the office of a wall

Or as a moat defensive to a house

Against the envy of less happier lands… (2.1.40-49)

 

Like so many of the Famous Bits (and this is only the beginning, and I’m not doing justice to it) this gets weirder the more one looks at it. And not least because it’s a single incredibly long sentence, with (as yet) no main verb, and no clearly defined subject… It’s ritual, incantatory; this is Gaunt as prophet. But what’s he talking about? the repeated this, this suggests specificity, but it keeps shifting. This royal throne of kings could be an actual throne, a reference to the King, the Crown—then it’s this sceptered isle, this earth of majesty, this seat of Mars, the near-parallel structure (royal/sceptered/majesty/Mars; throne/isle/earth/seat) keeping the conceit tight but also mobile and dynamic, because it’s not precise. You have to keep recalibrating, as throne becomes isle, then earth, then seat (which is both a throne, and more than a throne, a seat of power, a territory). Mars, the first rumble of war—but first, the speech is going to leap, via the classical god of war, from earthly power to heavenly, as the references shift, briefly, from the royal to the divine, this other Eden, demi-Paradise. Not Eden itself, and not quite Paradise, but rather a mixture of the earthly and the divine—but already, it’s a pile-up of resonant, mystical words, in just the first three lines. No verbs yet. (And Eden and Paradise are always already lost…)

A brief relaxation of sorts, as the syntax stretches, a clause expanding over two lines rather than the half-line unit: this fortress built by Nature for herself against infection and the hand of war. That’s one of the main notes of the speech, enclosure, separateness—and defensiveness. (Actually, the sense of enclosure would have been more apparent to an early modern audience, accustomed to thinking of the garden of Eden, and Paradise, as walled.) Infection (ah yes) and the hand of war can be held at bay in this place. (It’s really difficult not to read ahead, or to read, hear without remembering what comes next. Spoiler: is it apparent, yet, that this is an island? That it’s England?) A brief glimpse of people, this happy breed of men (happy meaning fortunate, blessed, more than contented), suggesting a distinctive identity, in this little world, again separate, discrete, entire of itself—and then a zoom, from the little world (which is still a world) to this precious stone set in the silver sea, a brooch, a ring, a jewel. But as soon as we’ve pictured that, gleaming and sparkling, the sea becomes much more akin to actual sea, a defensive wall (and we might imagine mighty sea walls, as well as tossing waves—this is less than a decade after the defeat of the Spanish Armada). This movement ends, or at least pauses, with another version of the earlier device of short clauses followed by a more extended, enjambed formulation: which serves it in the office of a wall or as a moat defensive to a house against the envy of less happier lands. The sea acts like a wall, or—changing scale again—a moat defensive to a house. (An Englishman’s house is his castle.) And so the sense of being under attack, or under siege, of separateness, and exceptionalism. Everyone wants what we’ve got, don’t they? Those less happier lands, they’re less blessed, less fortunate; they’re just jealous.

Much more to say about this (and this) as it continues. But a few thoughts along the way. First, its lack of specificity: it’s a mood-board, not a manifesto, this cascade of resonant, often quite abstract terms gilded (literally) with the specifics of silverstone, moat, house. The repeated, incantatory this, which will continue, and gives the effect of ritual, which seems to promise specificity, a clear referent, but withholds it. (The stage is almost certainly static; all we have to do is focus on the words.) And those shifting conceits, which are vivid and clearly related one to another, give us a particular kind of interpretative work to do. It’s not as baroquely dizzying as Mercutio’s Queen Mab speech in Romeo and Juliet, in its cognitive effects (picture this! now picture this!)—but a spell is being cast, not ‘just’ in language, but in syntax and grammar.

 

View 4 comments on “This royal throne of kings, this sceptered isle… (2.1.40-49) #KingedUnKinged

  1. The reference to a fortress against infection obviously raises a snort in the current circumstances, but it surely also clearly flags up that Gaunt is being eulogistic to the point of delusion. England was ravaged by the Black Death throughout the second half of the C14th, with its victims including Richard’s first wife, Anne of Bohemia. Our reaction to Gaunt’s claim would likely have been shared by the play’s first audiences, who had recently endured the closure of London theatres for 14 months due to the plague.

    1. Yes, indeed – I’m really interested in this, the how of the delusion. It sounds great, even as in part of our brains (and, as you point out, the brains of the audience) we go, well, really? does it really work like that? He’s idealising, of course, and reimagining a past which was never like that in the first place. (I’ve written about this in much more detail in my recent essay on nostalgia.)

  2. People always misunderstand this speech because only the first half is ever quoted so that it finishes on the apparently triumphalist ‘This earth, this realm, this England!’ But this is not the end of the speech: it is neither delusional nor nostalgic but a rant by John of Gaunt on his death-bed. He points out all that the country has got going for it – and then goes on angrily to say that the king’s excesses have brought about its downfall. This England…..

    ‘Is now leased out, I die pronouncing it,
    Like to a tenement or pelting farm:
    ….bound in with shame,
    With inky blots and rotten parchment bonds:
    That England, that was wont to conquer others,
    Hath made a shameful conquest of itself.’

    He can only hope that, after his death, something will happen to this rotten government and that England can be diverted from its path of self-destruction. Gaunt is not delusional: he eulogises the wonders of the country only to make his anger in the second half of his speech have all the more impact.

    PS Something does happen after his death: Henry Bolingbroke arrives with an army and seizes the throne from Richard.

    1. Indeed. Although it takes a good while yet for Richard to be deposed! I think, too, that Gaunt’s eulogising something that’s never really existed in the first place, rather than mourning something that has been lost? (It’s a great speech, but one that has so often been hijacked and misinterpreted, as you say!)

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