Richard the Third

Because of Shakespeare's play Richard III, many people picture Richard as dark of hair (true) but with a withered arm and hunchbacked (not true)...and of course Shakespeare made Richard the most diabolical uncle of all time, having had his nephews, the little princes in the Tower smothered. He lurches around, says Shakespeare, snarling "Now is the winter of our discontent!" Richard was the personification of evil and Shakespeare's play a highly successful propaganda piece as it was essential that Richard be blamed for the murder of the Princes as Henry VII's claim to the throne was very shaky indeed. Later, during the reign of Henry VIII Thomas More grabbed the ball and ran with it making Richard appear even more odious. Life would have been a perpetual winter for this Richard, but the truth may be far removed from Shakespeare's villain. However, the perpetuation of Richard as a murderer was essential to the man who finally killed him at the battle of Bosworth in 1585, Henry VII - and whose claim to the throne was as thin and unsubstantial as a spider web strand.Paul Murray Kendall's biography is really a history book. It is very descriptive and loaded with facts and the research must have been tremendous as he will tell you not only the date on which something occurred but the day of the week. This book is probably the definitive biography of Richard III and as close to the horse's mouth as a historian can get after five hundred years. But there are so many dukes, earls, churchmen, kings and queens and other movers and shakers swirling around in the chaos that was England during the Wars of the Roses that it's hard to get them straight and I found I had to read slowly to keep the events and characters properly in perspective. Alliances and animosities shifted constantly like sand near the sea and you will find yourself a bit tossed around, too, as you try and get a grip on England and her turmoil. But this biography is worth the effort.Author Kendall talks about Richard's dark personality, not dark meaning evil but dark meaning introverted, melancholic and the famous portrait of him shows a man who looks profoundly unhappy. He had reason: he had lost both his beloved small son Edward, and his much loved wife Anne within months of each other. Kendall portrays him as a man not charismatic, not golden- tongued like his brother George, Duke of Clarence, but as a capable lieutenant, slight in stature, a contrast to the six feet four Edward IV. Richard could not have had a withered arm and have been capable of wielding a battle axe in one hand, controlling his horse with the other. He died in the thick of battle, the last English king to perish in warfare.Let me just outline a skeleton of the events swirling around Richard before we get to a discussion of the Princes in the Tower. (Richard and the Princes go together like a horse and carriage).Edward IV usurped the throne from the very incompetent, inept and probably half mad Henry VI. Edward was an excellent king both as a decision maker and a warrior and he recognized and awarded his much younger brother Richard, the Duke of Gloucester by showering him with titles and awards and grants of money and property. Richard deftly managed Edward's troops in Yorkshire where he lived and he was much loved on the moors. Down in London Edward lived a hedonistic life and like his grandson Henry VIII, (a chip off the block a bit removed), became portly and sedentary as he aged. Throughout his life Richard had served his brother valiantly and capably and when Edward knew he was going to die (he was not yet 41 years old) he appointed Richard as Protector for his Edward's young sons.The Princes. The discussion of the boys occurs in an appendix.Edward's two sons Edward V and Richard Duke of York were placed in the Tower when Edward died. This was a safety precaution, the Tower housed many royalties in luxurious circumstances. Richard moved to have his two nephews declared bastards as Edward IV had been pre-contracted or perhaps even married to Lady Eleanor Butler before he suddenly married Elizabeth Woodville and therefore was a bigamist. Richard was trying to consolidate his power but naming the boys illegitimate and killing them are of course two different things. That the boys disappeared during the summer of 1483 during Richard's reign, however, is indisputable. But, with the boys declared out of the succession, Richard had no reason to kill them and indeed their death would have, to put it mildly, ruined his reputation. Richard was legitimately named King by Parliament.The villain of the piece according to Kendall was possibly Henry Stafford, Duke of Buckingham. Buckingham had once been a close ally and friend of Richard but he thirsted for the Crown as he was related to the royal family in many different ways and his claims were as least as good as those of Henry VII. In his government capacities Buckingham had access to the Tower, and although of course he didn't sneak in and throttle the princes personally, he could have easily arranged it, planning to blame Richard and invoking a Lancastrian rebellion with only Henry Tudor as his adversary. Richard became aware of Buckingham's perfidy and had him executed but the damage was done. The rebellion was fomented, without Buckingham, and the Lancastrian Henry Tudor killed the Yorkist Richard and brought a bloody end to both the Plantagenet dynasty and the War of the Roses.Some thirty years after the publishing of Kendall's biography a manuscript was discovered in the College of Arms collection. (Wikipedia). According to this thesis, the Princes were murdered "by the vise" of the Duke of Buckingham. However, it was unclear whether "vise" meant "advice" or "devise" but it certainly seemed to finger Buckingham.At almost the same time that Kendall's book was published there appeared the marvelous "Daughter of Time" by Josephine Tey in which she turned the guilt or innocence of Richard into a charming mystery story, the innocence of the maligned king backed by a lot of evidence. So Richard lives on in fact and imagination and although the murderer of the two boys will never be established for sure, it's quite possible another manuscript will be discovered that will reveal the truth.

Paul Kendall's Richard III can do little wrong. At first I thought this was a great weakness of the book until I perused a few other biographies of Richard. Historians either love this man or hate him. The Tudor historians hated him and ever since then historians have either agreed with them or tried to set the record straight by making Richard look like a fundamentally good man caught in terrible circuimstances. Kendall says several times that Richard did have two weaknesses. One was a tendency to be taken in by councillors who were eloquent and forceful - Buckingham being the best example. The other is his inability to merge his humane and forthright conscience into the requirements of what it took to be king. Richard could not "sink the man in the king." Thus, when he did get power, he was not ruthless enough to keep it - something that Kendall says Henry VII was not afraid to do. But these weaknesses, especially the second, come across as due to the fundamental goodness of a man who may not have been cut out to be a king in the vicious arena of medieval politics. But other biographies see a VERY different man. Richard's motives can be interpreted as selfish, paranoid and the result of intense insecurity and what Kendall sees as the political weakness of a good man whose conscience kept getting in the way is seen by others as flaws in character consistent with a man who cowardly took the throne away from young Edward V. After seeing these other views of Richard, I cannot blame Kendall much for being so one-sided. I doubt if there ever has been a king whose actions were so important yet whose motives were so completely mysterious and capable of being understood in so many ways. Kendall makes his best case for Richard by talking about how he governed the North and how much the people of York liked the man. This is a good point with consistent evidence to support it. Anyone who was as cruel or treacherous as some other historians say would have a hard time being genuinely liked by people who knew him best. But in other places the book reads like an apologetic for Richard in which Kendall thinks he knows what Richard is thinking and what Richard is thinking is always the morally better option. It's amazing how different historians interpret the same acts.Despite my misgivings, this book is not a hagiography of Richard and it is superb in certain ways. Kendall's ability to describe scenes is unparalleled. He has an entire chapter on London in 1483 that is brilliant. I have not read a writer on medieval times who can get the reader to imagine a scene better than Kendall does. His description of a joust or of a battle is consistently excellent. You are THERE when you read the book. Kendall takes what to other historians might be dry background material and turns it into live images for the reader. Maps for particular events are well-placed in the text. There is a map of England at the very beginning which is invaluable for all the events that happen in the book. I referred to it constantly to follow the action. There is also an excellent appendix on what happened to the Princes in the Tower. Though Kendall here argues that the evidence against Richard is inconclusive, this appendix is very fair. Kendall concludes that the "plain and massive fact that the Princes disappeared from view after he (Richard) assumed the throne and were never again reported to be seen alive...weighs heavily against the indications of his innocence." I admire Kendall's survey of the evidence here and his discussion of the different options. If Richard did do away with the Princes, it seems to run counter to Kendall's claims of character earlier in the text. In any case, the appendix is a valuable addition to the book.The book is clearly biased in Richard's favor. But Richard III and the events of his life comprise an area where the historian seems to be unable to take a neutral stance if any biography is going to be other than a a bare chronology. The book has so many other strengths and all the reader has to do is remember that this is not the only view of Richard. The book is well worth reading. There is not a biography out there that does a better job of making medieval England a living panorama for the reader.

This book contains a wealth of information and analysis of Richard's rise to power and of his short reign. Too much to take in at a single reading. Quite possibly the best work ever written about him. It digs out masses of information that contradicts the negative image of Richard that has been passed down the centuries, mainly because of Tudor propaganda, and presents a stunning picture of Richard and other figures who make up the complex tapestry of what happened during these contentious years. Altogether excellent.

I am interested in the Wars of the Roses period and its aftermath and in my reading frequently came across references to this book. Often they were somewhat sneery. I decided that the best thing to do was actually read the book for myself. There are moments of purple prose, but this actually helps to make it a very enjoyable read. There are moments when you think that Kendall is putting thoughts into peoples heads and you cry out 'Where is the evidence for this?'. However, there is lots of very thought provoking material in this book. I thought it was especially good on Warwick and Clarence. It makes you think about Clarence rather than just holding him in utter contempt as a traitor. It goes into serious and fascinating detail about Richards legislative programme and the conservative motives behind his radical, by medieval standards, reforms. Read this. Even if you do not agree with all of it, it is time well and enjoyably spent.

I remember this book from when I first read it, back in the 70s. It strikes me now, as then, as a beautifully written, very readable and well researched book. Having said that, one must also admit that it is a little too biased to serve as an objective historical work. I would recommend it very strongly, but would also say don't let this be the only book you read on Richard III.

You can only love have Richard the third after reading this account.. A true King of England.....I have been enlightened.

The Most informative Biography of Richard III