GAUNT           Landlord of England art thou now, not king,

Thy state of law is bondslave to the law,

And thou—

RICHARD                                —a lunatic, lean-witted fool,

Presuming on an ague’s privilege,

Dar’st with thy frozen admonition

Make pale our cheek, chasing the royal blood

With fury from his native residence.

Now, by my seat’s right royal majesty,

Wert thou not brother to great Edward’s son

This tongue that runs so roundly in thy head

Should run thy head from thy unreverent shoulders. (2.1.113-123)

Gaunt is here endorsing a vision of kingship which is, ironically, similar to Richard’s own, except he sees Richard as having abandoned it: the king should be exceptional, not compromised and corrupted; he should be much more than merely a landlord, handing over possession of his lands to others in all but name. He should be the arbiter of law, and his realm a place of law-abiding peace, but instead England is now a bondslave to the law (property and contract law, implicitly), and Richard himself is a subject, not a monarch. Gaunt’s speech of direct accusation to Richard has to be seen in light of the mystical, transcendent elegy for England which he has only just spoken: how are the mighty fallen, is his central theme and reproach.

Richard can control himself no longer: no more witty, albeit icy, stichomythia, but a furious interruption: how very dare you! you lunatic, lean-witted fool, tedious, mad old man (glancing back at his earlier quibbling on gaunt). You’re presuming on an ague’s privilege, you think you’ll get away with this because you’ve got a chill and a fever (also, here, insulting Gaunt by downplaying his illness, suggesting that he’s just got a bit of a cold, rather than that he’s dying). How dare you,with thy frozen admonition (frozen suggesting chilly, hostile; perhaps contrasting with the fever of the ague, or arising out of its chill) enrage us, make our cheek pale with anger, so furious that the royal blood (after all, Gaunt has been telling Richard that he’s letting the family down, that he’s betraying his bloodline, his dynasty) vanishes from its native residence, Richard’s face. Richard is white-faced with anger. (Richard is no fool, and his rhetoric is complex and barbed; he picks up Gaunt’s terms, twists them, uses them to attack; he has certainly been listening, and Gaunt’s accusations have hit home.)

If you weren’t my uncle, my father’s brother, King Edward’s son, you’d have talked yourself out of a head by now. And that’s the sign that Gaunt has really got to Richard, a furious threat, no more Mr Nice King (or Mr Polite Nephew, even): I can have you killed, you know. Show some respect!