Liquid Assets: The Functions Of Forgetting In Shakespeare's Second Henriad

Abstract

This dissertation examines Shakespeare's second historical tetralogy in which the playwright employs forgetfulness despite its pathologized position in early modern culture and its seeming incompatibility with history. In Richard II, the King's forgetfulness attempts self-stabilization while his sustained forgetfulness, in response to the historical sublime, results in tragic poetry. Nietzschean ideas of judicious forgetfulness and plasticity, Langerian concepts of comedy, and the Andersonian notion of a unifying national amnesia inform a comparison of the functions of forgetfulness for Henry IV, Prince Hal, and Falstaff in 1 Henry IV. In 2 Henry IV forgetfulness deploys in the figure of Rumor, who uncovers the constructed, amnesic nature of history, in nostalgia that mirrors the national amnesia, and in the rejection of Falstaff. In Henry V the forgetful official history given by the Chorus is contrasted with the play's action, forgetfulness of guilt proves essential to the King's pursuit of greatness, his amnesic rhetoric to his army functions to craft a "band of brothers," and the benefits of judicious forgetfulness are shared with Katharine by Henry V. Often using images of liquidity, Shakespeare foregrounds the beneficial role that forgetfulness plays in the negotiation of life's traumas, in the achievement of greatness, in the creation of national unity, and in historiography itself.