Blog 3 - Richard II

I would like to respond to King Richard’s soliloquy in act 5, scene 5, lines 1-66.
This speech takes place in Richard’s prison cell, and seems to be his attempt to cling to sanity as his world crumbles around him. In the first part of his talk he speaks of how he wants to replicate the outside world within the confines of his stony walls. However, his world is lacking people, a dilemma he responds to by saying, “Yet I’ll hammer it out”. So, his thoughts become the people who will populate his world, and just like there are classes of people, so also are their classes of these people thoughts. According to Richard there are, “The better sort”, which are divine thoughts, but even among these divine thoughts there are doubters, and as people attend to their own ambitions so do Richard’s people thoughts, “Thoughts tending to ambition, they do plot unlikely wonders: how these vain weak nails may tear a passage through the flinty ribs of this hard world, my ragged prison walls”. Richard continues in much the same melancholy way throughout his speech.
I think this passage does a lot to really familiarize you with Richard’s current state of mind, and seeing this more human side of him really calls the audience to sympathize with the deposed king. We have gone from Richard, the divine all powerful monarch, to Richard, the common prisoner. I think creating these more sympathetic feelings toward Richard allow us to look more critically at Bolingbroke towards the end of the play, allowing us to see that there is neither character is absolutely good or absolutely bad.
The most significant metaphor I see in this passage is the likening of Richards own body to his prison cell. As his ambitious plot to break free of his body, so he also wishes to be free of his ragged prison walls. Another image in this passage is faith and divinity, which seems to be an often recurring metaphor. Finally, Richard likens himself to a clock, “For now hath time made me his numb’ ring clock. My thoughts are minutes, and with sighs they jar their watches on unto mine eyes, the outward watch”. I think this passage somewhat parallels Richard’s Great Speech, Act 3.2 Lines 140-173, at least in the way it similarly changes our perspective of Richard. He begins to look at his own death, and the actions of his past; however, he has not yet reached near the low point and complete sorrow he does in his soliloquy.
The passage I chose was written in blank verse and contains many formal literary techniques. Allegory is one of the most clearly visible examples of this. It can be seen throughout the passage first in Richard’s long metaphor likening his mind to the world, his thoughts to the people, and his body to the prison. Another example of this technique Richard’s time spent comparing himself to the clock whose time has slipped away. Anaphora was used in lines 35-37 when Richard says, “Persuades me I was better when a king. Then I am kinged again, and by and by think that I am unkinged by Bolingbroke”. Finally, there is a perfect example of internal rhyme in line 40-41, “With nothing shall be pleased till he be eased with being nothing.” I think the long allegories in this passage really help us to picture Richard’s state of mind at this time, and without them it would be lacking. I also think the blank verse really feeds into the overall melancholy tone of the piece.