Villain or Anti-Hero? Richard III

The Shakespeare Readers will next take on the Bard's second-longest work, Richard III, on April 15. (See full schedule here.)

Wikipedia isn't necessarily my favorite go-to resource for research, but the post on Richard III makes an interesting point about Richard, one of Shakespeare's leading villains, as an "anti-hero": Even while behaving villainously and admitting his intentions, "Richard immediately establishes a connection with the audience with his opening monologue. In the soliloquy he admits his amorality to the audience but at the same time treats them as if they were co-conspirators in his plotting."

While he is shown to be evil, Richard is not reduced to the kind of conveniently plot-moving villain that we get, for instance, from Don John in Much Ado.Even Iago's hatred of Othello is taken for granted, and his psychoanalysis left to future generations of scholars. (If Shakespeare needed us to understand Iago, he would have named the play after him, right?)

With Richard, we follow his thoughts into actions. It makes his behavior no less repugnant, but we see the humanity beneath "that bottled spider, ... that poisonous bunchback'd toad" so reviled by Queen Margaret.

In real life, those whom most of society perceive as villains never perceive themselves as villains. They justify, they rationalize, they blame. And empathy is right out. So it is (or should be) in drama. Richard is not an antagonist, working against a focal hero. But he is protagonist only in the sense that he is the focus of the play; a villain, only in the sense of his evil behavior.

Still, I'm not completely satisfied with the Wikipedia description of Richard as "anti-hero." To me, anti-heroes are like Huck Finn and Holden Caulfield--characters whose moral compasses may be calibrated in ways that society does not accept. There is nothing acceptable in Richard's murderous path across the stage.

So we are left with Richard as villain--evil, vile, vicious. Whether he was simply reviled for his deformity or became deformed by depravity--again, something for the modern psychoanalysts to ponder.

"Now is the winter of our discontent" speech (Act I, scene 1) performed by Sir Ian McKellen

What
Richard III: Read the full play aloud with a few of your fellow Shakespeare fans! Please bring your own copy of the play.

When
Sunday, April 15, 2012 - 1 to 4 p.m.

Where
Washington, D.C.: American University's Bender Library, Room 306

Links
Richard III full text (MIT Shakespeare project)

Shakespeare Readers 2011-2012 Season schedule (first post of this blog)

American University directions and campus map

RSVP Cindy Wagner: hosaajoy 'at' gmail.com