FURTHER READING AND VIEWING
CRITICAL APPROACHES
Barber, C. L., “Rule and Misrule in Henry IV,” in his Shakespeare’s Festive Comedy (1959). Superb linking to the “festive” world.
Bloom, Harold, ed., Modern Critical Interpretations: William Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part 1 (1987). Extracts from strong twentieth-century critical approaches.
Bristol, Michael D., Carnival and Theater: Plebeian Culture and the Structure of Authority in Renaissance England (1985). Provocative Marxist reading.
Bulman, James, “Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2,” in The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare’s History Plays, ed. Michael Hattaway (2002), pp. 158–76. Sensible overview.
Greenblatt, Stephen, “Invisible Bullets: Renaissance Authority and Its Subversion, Henry IV and Henry V,” in Political Shakespeare: Essays in Cultural Materialism, ed. Jonathan Dollimore and Alan Sinfield (1985), pp. 18–47. Hugely influential “new historicist” reading. Reprinted in Greenblatt’s Shakespearean Negotiations (1988).
Hodgdon, Barbara, The End Crowns All: Closure and Contradiction in Shakespeare’s History (1991). Strong on structure.
Hunter, G. K., ed., Shakespeare: Henry IV Parts I and II, Macmillan Casebook series (1970). Invaluable selection of earlier criticism.
Kastan, David Scott, “‘The King Hath Many Marching in His Coats,’ or, What Did You Do in the War, Daddy?,” in Shakespeare Left and Right, ed. Ivo Kamps (1991), pp. 241–58. Good focus on politics, duplicity, and kingship.
McAlindon, Tom, Shakespeare’s Tudor History: A Study of Henry IV Parts 1 and 2 (2000). Excellent account of critical history and cultural context, with good close reading.
McLoughlin, Cathleen T., Shakespeare, Rabelais, and the Comical-Historical (2000). Fascinating intertextual reading of Henry IV plays with Rabelais’ Gargantua and Pantagruel.
Morgann, Maurice, An Essay on the Dramatic Character of Sir John Falstaff (1777, repr. 2004). Gloriously humane character criticism from the eighteenth century. Also freely available online, e.g., at www.19.5degs.com/ebook/essay-the-dramatic-character-of-sir-john-falstaff/466/read#list
Patterson, Annabel, Shakespeare and the Popular Voice (1989) and Reading Holinshed’s Chronicles (1994). Two books that should be read as a pair.
Rackin, Phyllis, Stages of History: Shakespeare’s English Chronicles (1990). Attentive to women and social inferiors as well as kings and nobles.
Rossiter, A. P., “Ambivalence: The Dialectic of the History Plays,” in his Angel with Horns: Fifteen Lectures on Shakespeare (1961). Still one of the best things written on the play.
Saccio, Peter, Shakespeare’s English Kings (1977). The best practical guide to the relationship between actual historical events in the Middle Ages, the Tudor chronicles, and Shakespeare’s dramatic reshaping of history.
Wood, Nigel, ed., Henry IV Parts One and Two (1995). Sophisticated collection of theoretically informed essays—not for beginners.
THE PLAY IN PERFORMANCE
Bogdanov, Michael, and Michael Pennington, The English Shakespeare Company: the Story of the Wars of the Roses, 1986–1989 (1990). Insiders’ account.
Callow, Simon, Actors on Shakespeare: Henry IV Part 1 (2002). Takes the reader through the play “from the point of view of the practitioner”—lucid, intelligent, readable account.
McMillin, Scott, Shakespeare in Performance: Henry IV Part One (1991). Discussion of five important modern productions, up to English Shakespeare Company, plus films.
Merlin, Bella, With the Rogue’s Company: Henry IV at the National Theatre (2005). Detailed account of Nicholas Hytner’s production.
Parsons, Keith, and Pamela Mason, eds., Shakespeare in Performance (1995). Includes a useful essay on both parts of Henry IV by Janet Clare— luxuriously illustrated.
Smallwood, Robert, ed., Players of Shakespeare 6 (2004). Includes illuminating discussions by David Troughton on playing Bullingbrook/Henry IV and Desmond Barrit on Falstaff.
Wharton, T. F., Text and Performance: Henry the Fourth Parts 1 & 2 (1983). A good basic introduction to the play and detailed discussions of three RSC productions and the BBC television version.
AVAILABLE ON DVD
Chimes at Midnight, directed by Orson Welles (1965, DVD 2000). Condenses all the Falstaff material from both parts of Henry IV plus Henry V and The Merry Wives of Windsor. Multi-award nominated, with a star- studded cast, as eccentric and brilliant as Welles’ own performance as Falstaff. One of the all-time classic Shakespeare films.
Henry the Fourth Parts 1 and 2, directed by David Giles (1979, DVD 2005). Somewhat pedestrian account for the BBC series. Anthony Quayle’s Falstaff stands out.
Henry V, directed by Kenneth Branagh (1989, DVD 2002). Incorporated some flashback scenes from Henry IV with Robbie Coltrane as Falstaff.
My Own Private Idaho, directed by Gus Van Sant (1991, DVD 2005). Loosely based on the Hal–Falstaff relationship. Stars River Phoenix and Keanu Reeves as a pair of gay hustlers.
The Wars of the Roses, directed by Michael Bogdanov (1989, DVD 2005). Recording of English Shakespeare Company’s eclectic and highly political stage production.