Richard the iii soliloquies

RICHARD III – SOLILOQUY PRESENTATION
1. GENERAL INTRODUCTION
a. RICHARD, THE CHARACTER.
b. RICHARD’S MONOLOGUES (General aspects).
2. ACT I, SCENE I
c. CONTEXTUALIZATION.
d. ABOUT THE SOLILOQUY.
e. THE SOLILOQUY. RECITATION.
f. ANALISYS.
3. ACT V, SCENE III
g. CONTEXTUALIZATION.
h. ABOUT THE SOLILOQUY.
i. THE SOLILOQUY.RECITATION.
j. ANALYSIS.
4. CONTRASTING THE SOLILOQUES
5. SCAR VS RICHARD III
6. CONCLUSION/SUMMARY

1. GENERAL INTRODUCTION
I’m going to examine two very contrastive soliloquy of Richard iii, the first one with which the play opens and the last one just before the loss of the reign and his own life. In the first one Richard is just Duke of Gloucester and in the secondRichard is the king of England in decay. I would like to compare the states of mind of the character in both soliloquies and the way he speaks in each one as well as the reader’s impression created.
Although we all know about the story, I would like to start contextualizing the historical context:
As we know the play starts after the Wars of the Roses. The Lancaster house is over and now, the houseof York is reigning and leaded by King Edward IV (who is Richard’s brother) after the Wars of the Roses, the civil war that faced the two families for the throne of England. An atmosphere of happiness and glory is present in England; everyone is bliss with happiness except Richard (Duke of Gloucester in that moment).
a. RICHARD, THE CHARACTER.
He is isolated because of his own jealousy anddeformity. Richard fought in the War of the Roses and loved being a soldier but now, with the war finished, he is looking for power and instability within the apparently happiness. Richard is suffering of being a man of war in a time of peace.
Richard has no true relationship with anyone because he only knows how to use and abuse people around him. He uses his superior wit and inferiordeformity against others in order to satisfy his ambitious desire for powerful.
The audience is likely to sympathize with Richard because of his deformity from the very beginning of the play. He simply uses his deformity as a tool to gain the sympathy of others (within the play with other characters as well as the audience) and, his witty use of words helps him to achieve his aim. With these features inhis personality, he will be able to get the thrown of England.
As we all know, Richard is the main character of the play but also, he plays the two more important roles at the same time: the protagonist and the villain.
Shakespeare explores the psychology of evil through Richard’s mind. However, Richard is also highly self-reflective and complicated as we will realize in the last scenes of theplay.
b. RICHARD’S SOLILOQUIES.
His soliloquies are long and always fascinating thanks to his wit. They are central to the audience’s experience of Richard. Shakespeare uses these monologues brilliantly to control the audience’s impression of Richard because, as we will realize, the reader’s impression of Richard will change from attraction to repulsion.
In his monologues we can findblank verse accompanied by the typical iambic pentameter in almost the majority of the lines with some exceptions (For example, in the first soliloquy, the lines 9 and 14 start with a ‘spondee’ and in the line 13 with a ‘pyrrhic’).

2. ACT I, SCENE I
c. CONTEXTUALIZATION.
The Wars of the Roses has recently ended and now the House of York is in the thrown with Edward the IV. A period ofpeace and love is apparently settled in England but Richard, misses to be a soldier and longs to be king himself, not just the brother of the king. He is by himself speaking or explaining the context and his forethought to the audience.
d. ABOUT THE SOLILOQUY.
* Richard is telling the audience everything they need to know to understand what’s going to happen in the next five acts....