Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

The Bard, the Bride, and the Muse Bemused: Katherine of Valois on Film in Shakespeare’s Henry V

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
The Palgrave Handbook of Shakespeare's Queens

Part of the book series: Queenship and Power ((QAP))

Abstract

Katherine has received short shrift from historians focused on her relationship to kings, novelists who romanticize her, and in theatrical productions and filmed versions of Shakespeare’s Henry V. Scholars now recognize that she exercised considerable agency and was in some ways as remarkable as her Tudor counterparts. Yet the “received” Katherine still bears the mark of the Bard more than Clio. Onscreen she is the pawn of Charles VI and Henry V, the comic scene in which she learns English undercuts her dilemma as England’s queen-to-be, and the final “wooing” scene is often severely truncated. Though accomplished actresses have portrayed Katherine on screen, it remains difficult to give her role due weight even in an era more conscious of gender than the age of Shakespeare.

O, for a muse of fire, that would ascend the brightest heaven of invention…

William Shakespeare, Henry V

Begin thou, unforgetting Clio, for all the ages are in thy keeping and all the storied annals of the past.

Publius Papinius Statius, Thebaid

Clio, the muse of history, is as infected with lies as a street whore with syphilis.

Arthur Schopenhauer, Parerga und Paralipomena

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 259.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 329.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 329.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. 1.

    For consistency, the spelling “Katherine” is used throughout. The edition used here is William Shakespeare, King Henry V, ed. T.W. Craik, Arden 3rd Series (London: Bloomsbury, 2015).

  2. 2.

    Useful studies of Shakespeare and history that address Henry V include Lily B. Campbell, Shakespeare’s Histories: Mirrors of Elizabethan Policy (San Marino: Huntington Library, 1947), ch. 15; Nicholas Grene, Shakespeare’s Serial History Plays (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), ch. 6–8; Howard Erskine Hill, Poetry and the Realm of Politics: Shakespeare to Dryden (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996), ch. 3; Lisa Jardine, Reading Shakespeare Historically (London: Routledge, 1997), 3–14; Peter Lake, How Shakespeare Put Politics on the Stage: Power and Succession in the History Plays (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2016), Part V; Charles W.R.D. Moseley, Shakespeare’s History Plays, Richard II to Henry V: The Making of a King (London: Penguin Books, 1988), ch. 10; John Julius Norwich, Shakespeare’s Kings (London: Viking, 1999), ch. 8–10; Paola Pugliatti, Shakespeare the Historian (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 1996), 137–53; Phyllis Rackin, Stages of History: Shakespeare’s English Chronicles (New York: Routledge, 1991), 28–30, 69–72, 77–86, 98–104, 114–15, 136–42, 149–50, 164–76, 197–200, 221–29, 238–47; David Saccio, Shakespeare’s English Kings: History, Chronicle, Drama, 2nd ed. (Oxford University Press, 2000), Part IV.

  3. 3.

    Raphael Holinshed’s Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland (1577, 1587); Edward Hall, The Union of the Two Noble and Illustre Families of Lancastre and Yorke (1548, 1550); The Famous Victories of Henry the Fifth (c. 1594); Michael Jones, “Catherine (1401–1437)”, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Jan 2008 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/4890, accessed 10 December 2016] is the best short account; Mary McGrigor, The Sister Queens: Isabella and Catherine de Valois (Stroud: History Press, 2016), Lisa Hilton, Queens Consort: England’s Medieval Queens (London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2009), and Elizabeth Norton, England’s Queens: The Biography (Stroud: Amberley, 2011), add little to existing historiography; Agnes and Elisabeth Strickland, Lives of the Queens of England from the Norman Conquest (Philadelphia: Blanchard and Lea, 1852) is quite dated.

  4. 4.

    Craik, King Henry V, 69–80. Film criticism is cited as appropriate below. For an introduction to literary criticism on Henry V, see Edward Berry, “Twentieth-century Shakespeare criticism: the histories,” in The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare Studies, ed. Stanley Wells, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), 249–56; Harold Bloom and Albert Rolls, eds., Henry V (New York: Facts on File, 2010); Kevin Ewert, Henry V: A Guide to the Text and Its Theatrical Life (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006); Stephen Greenblatt, Shakespearean Negotiations: The Circulation of Social Energy in Renaissance England (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989); Russ McDonald, ed., Shakespeare: An Anthology of Theory and Criticism 1945–2000 (Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2004); Matthew Woodcock, Shakespeare—Henry V: A Reader’s Guide to Essential Criticism (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008); World Shakespeare Bibliography Online, http://www.worldshakesbib.org/; and the annual survey in Shakespeare Quarterly, http://www.folger.edu/shakespeare-quarterly. Many articles and books about Shakespeare are missing here because they mention Katherine only in passing or not at all.

  5. 5.

    E.g., there is no mention of Katherine in Tina Packer, Women of Will: Following the Feminine in Shakespeare’s Plays (New York: Knopf, 2015) or Phyllis Rackin, “Women’s roles in the Elizabethan history plays,” in The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare’s History Plays, ed. Michael Hattaway (Cambridge University Press, 2002), 71–88, though for counter-examples see Katherine Eggert, Showing Like a Queen: Female Authority and Literary Experiment in Spenser, Shakespeare, and Milton (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999), Kavita Mudan Finn, The Last Plantagenet Consorts: Gender, Genre, and Historiography, 1440–1627 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), and Rackin’s collaboration with Jean Howard, Engendering A Nation: A Feminist Account of Shakespeare’s English Histories (London: Routledge, 2002).

  6. 6.

    E.g., Vanora Bennett, The Queen’s Lover (New York: William Morrow, 2010); Mari Griffith, Root of the Tudor Rose (Abercynon: Accent Press, 2015); Joanna Hickson, The Agincourt Bride (London: Harper, 2013) and The Tudor Bride (London: Harper, 2014); Rosemary Hawley Jarman, Crown in Candlelight (New York: HarperCollins, 1978); Dedwydd Jones, The Lily and the Dragon (Llanwrst: Gwasg Carreg Gwalch, 2002); Anne O’Brien, The Forbidden Queen (Ontario: MIRA, 2013); Jean Plaidy, The Queen’s Secret (New York: Putnam, 1990); Martha Rofheart, Fortune Made His Sword (New York: Putnam, 1972).

  7. 7.

    C.T. Allmand, “Henry V (1386–1422),” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004, online edn, Sept 2010 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/12952]; Henry V (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997), 66–73, 131–37, 140–45, 150–58; Michael Jones, “Catherine (1401–1437).” Jan 2008 [4890]; for more on the French court, see R.C. Famiglietti, Royal intrigue: crisis at the court of Charles VI, 1392–1420 (Brooklyn: AMS Press, 1986); on the recent rehabilitation of Isabeau, see Tracy Adams, The Life and Afterlife of Isabeau of Bavaria (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010) and Rachel Gibbons, “Isabeau of Bavaria, Queen of France (1385–1422): The Creation of An Historical Villainess,” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 6th series 6 (1996): 51–73.

  8. 8.

    R.A. Griffiths, “Henry VI (1421–1471),” Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004, online edn, May 2015 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/12953, accessed Dec. 10, 2016], The reign of King Henry VI: the exercise of royal authority, 1422–1461 (London: A&C Black Publishers Ltd, 1981), ch. 1, 3, and “Tudor, Owen (c.1400–1461),” Jan 2008 [27797]; G.L. Harriss, “Beaufort, Henry (1375?–1447),” Jan 2008 [1859], “Humphrey, duke of Gloucester (1390–1447),” May 2011 [14155], and “Beaufort, Thomas, duke of Exeter (1377?–1426),” Jan 2008 [1864]; Michael Jones, “Catherine (1401–1437),” Jan 2008 [4890]; Colin Richmond, “Beaufort, Edmund, first duke of Somerset (c.1406–1455),” Oct 2008 [1855]; Jenny Stratford, “John, duke of Bedford (1389–1435),” Sept 2011 [14844]; R. S. Thomas, “Tudor, Edmund, first earl of Richmond (c.1430–1456),” Jan 2008 [27795] and “Tudor, Jasper, duke of Bedford (c.1431–1495),” Oct 2008 [27796]; Bertram Wolffe, Henry VI (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001), ch. 1.

  9. 9.

    James C. Bulman, ed., King Henry IV, Part 2, 3rd ed. (London: Bloomsbury Arden Shakespeare, 2016), 429.

  10. 10.

    Craik, King Henry V, passim.

  11. 11.

    Allmand, Henry V, 66–73.

  12. 12.

    Craik, King Henry V, 221–24.

  13. 13.

    In modern parlance, “cunt” is a vile insult in both the United States and the United Kingdom. Its earliest use was for female genitalia, but circa 1400 an English translation of Lanfranc of Milan’s Chirurgia Magna (Science of Chirurgie, 1296) uses it as a clinical term. While risqué enough to occasion laughter in Shakespeare’s day, its earliest documented use as a term of abuse for women is in 1663 in the diary of Samuel Pepys, who—in a creepy coincidence—once kissed the lips of Katherine’s exhumed corpse. See “cunt, n.” Oxford English Dictionary Online, March 2017, Oxford University Press [http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/45874?redirected From=cunt, accessed March 15, 2017].

  14. 14.

    See, for example, Howard and Rackin, Engendering A Nation, especially ch. 1, 12.

  15. 15.

    Allmand, Henry V, 80–82.

  16. 16.

    Craik, King Henry V, 344–71.

  17. 17.

    Allmand, Henry V, ch. 7, especially 143–45.

  18. 18.

    William Shakespeare, King Henry VI, Part 1, ed. Edward Burns, Arden 3rd ed. (London: Bloomsbury, 2000), Act 1, scene 1.

  19. 19.

    For the most recent scholarship linking Essex and Henry V, see Lake, How Shakespeare Put Politics on the Stage. But even if Henry is an analogue for Essex, that does not mean modern observers must see his every action as imputable to the Earl. Henry’s barbaric threats before Harfleur might easily come from a late sixteenth-century Irishman as stereotyped by Elizabethan Englishmen. Moreover, the Irish were not the only people at war with England in around 1599. Henry at Harfleur bears a striking resemblance to Spanish soldiers as characterized (or caricatured) in the Black Legend. On the possible purposes of Katherine and other minor characters, see also Peter B. Erickson, “‘Thy Fault/My Father Made’: The Anxious Pursuit of Fame in ‘Henry V,’” Modern Language Studies 10/1 (1979–80): 10–25.

  20. 20.

    Other films and television shows feature Henry without including Katherine: England’s Warrior King (1915); Regal Cavalcade (1935); The Gordon Honor 2.1: The Prisoner’s Candlestick (1956); The Life and Death of Sir John Falstaff (1959); The Worker 1.5: A Democratic Democratism (1965); Whatever Next? 2:3 (1970); Connections 1.3: Distant Voices (1978); Renaissance Man aka By the Book (1994); Great Performances 26.2: Henry V at Shakespeare’s Globe (1997); The Nearly Complete and Utter History of Everything (1999); The Complete Walk: Henry V (2016). Some small-screen adaptations that included her do not survive: England’s Shakespeare (BBC, 1937) with Yvonne Arnaud; BBC Sunday Night Theatre: The Life of King Henry V (1951) with Varvara Pitoëff; Henry V (BBC, 1953) with Kay Hammond; BBC Television World Theatre: The Life of Henry V (1957), with Patricia Cree exists in an imperfect copy at the British Film Institute; apparently not extant is the fourth episode of Associated Television’s Conflict (1967) with Rowena Cooper; Henry V (2014) is a six-minute comic American short with Roxanne Sinclair as Katherine but locating a copy has proved impossible. See http://www.imdb.com/character/ch0116941/; British Film Institute National Archive, http://www.screenonline.org.uk/tv/id/1048671/.

  21. 21.

    Henry V aka The Chronicle History of King Henry the Fifth with His Battell Fought at Agincourt in France (1944), DVD: Sony 2010; http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0036910/; Anthony Davies, “Shakespeare on Film and Television: A Retrospect,” in Shakespeare and the Moving Image: The Plays on Film and Television, eds. Davies and Stanley Wells (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 3. Because Oliver’s film is the oldest filmic production of Henry V, the body of criticism is large and diverse, e.g., James Agee and Bosley Crowther’s comments in Charles W. Eckert, ed., Focus on Shakespearean Films (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1972), 54–63; Michael Anderegg, Cinematic Shakespeare (New York: Rowman and Littlefield, 2004), 34–41; Judith Buchanan, Shakespeare on Film (New York: Routledge, 2005), ch. 7; Lorne Michael Buchman, Still in Movement: Shakespeare on Screen (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991); John Collick, Shakespeare, Cinema, and Society (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1989), 47–51; Davies, Filming Shakespeare’s Plays: The Adaptations of Laurence Olivier, Orson Welles, Peter Brook, and Akira Kurosawa (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), ch. 2, and “The Shakespeare films of Laurence Olivier,” in The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare on Film, ed. Russell Jackson (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 164–70; Peter Donaldson, Shakespearean Films/Shakespearean Directors (Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1990), 1–30; Maurice Hindle, Studying Shakespeare on Film (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), 140–47; Russell Jackson, Shakespeare Films in the Making: Vision, Production, and Reception (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), ch. 2; Jack Jorgens, Shakespeare on Film (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1977), ch. 8; Robert Manvell, Shakespeare and the Film (New York: A. S. Barnes and Company, 1979), 37–40; Ace G. Pilkington, Screening Shakespeare from Richard II to Henry V (Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1991), ch. 6; Kenneth S. Rothwell, A History of Shakespeare on Screen: A Century of Film and Television, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 52–56; Dale Silviria, Laurence Olivier and the Art of Filmmaking (Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1985), 131–41.

  22. 22.

    An Age of Kings (1960), DVD: BBC 2009; http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0239157/. On this series, see Emma Smith, “Shakespeare serialized: An Age of Kings,” in The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare and Popular Culture, ed. Robert Shaughnessy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 134–49.

  23. 23.

    The Life of Henry Fift (1979), DVD: The Shakespeare Collection, BBC 2003; http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079289/; Ace Pilkington, Screening Shakespeare from Richard II to Henry V, ch. 5 (quote page 99). Unfortunately, Susan Willis, The BBC Shakespeare Plays: Making the Televised Canon (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1991), does not address Boisseau as Katherine; however, see also “Shakespeare on the Big Screen, the Small Box, and In Between,” The Yearbook of English Studies 20 (1990): 65–81.

  24. 24.

    Henry V (1989), DVD: MGM 2000; http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097499/. It is no surprise that Olivier and Branagh have attracted the most critical commentary. For further and equally diverse discussion of Branagh’s Henry V, see Pascale Aebischer, “Shakespeare, Sex, and Violence: Negotiating Masculinities in Branagh’s Henry V and Taymor’s Titus,” in A Concise Companion to Shakespeare on Screen, ed. Diana E. Henderson (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell, 2007), 112–32. Michael Anderegg, Cinematic Shakespeare (New York: Rowman and Littlefield, 2004), 119–24; Judith Buchanan, Shakespeare on Film (New York: Routledge, 2005), ch. 7; Mark Thornton Burnett, “‘We Are the Makers of Manners’: The Branagh Phenomenon,” in Shakespeare After Mass Media, ed. Richard Burt (New York: Palgrave, 2002), 83–87; Samuel Crowl, The Films of Kenneth Branagh (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2006), ch. 2, “Flamboyant Realist: Kenneth Branagh,” Jackson, The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare on Film, ch. 13, and Shakespeare at the Cineplex (Athens: Ohio University Press) ch. 1–2, Shakespeare Observed: Studies in Performance on Stage and Screen (Athens: Ohio University Press, 1992), ch. 10; Douglas E. Green, “Shakespeare, Branagh, and the ‘Queer Traitor’: Close Encounters in the Shakespearean Classroom,” in The Reel Shakespeare: Alternative Cinema and Theory, eds. Courtney Lehmann and Lisa Starks (Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson Press, 2002), 191–211; Donald K. Hedrick, “War is Mud: Branagh’s Dirty Harry V and the Types of Political Ambiguity,” in Shakespeare, the Movie II: Popularizing the Plays on Film, TV, and Video, eds. Richard Burt and Lynda E. Boose (New York: Routledge, 2003), 213–30; Hindle, Studying Shakespeare on Film, 147–52; Courtney Lehmann, Shakespeare Remains: Theater to Film, Early Modern to Postmodern (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2002), ch. 6; Rothwell, A History of Shakespeare on Screen: A Century of Film and Television, 246–50.

  25. 25.

    The Wars of the Roses 1.4: Henry V (Films Media Group, 1990), fod.infobase.com/PortalPlaylists.aspx?wID=239572&xtid=2773, accessed March 13, 2017. For more on the series, see Michael Bogdanov and Michael Pennington, The English Shakespeare Company: The Story of the Wars of the Roses (London: Nick Hern Books, 1990); David Carnegie, “So the Falklands. So Agincourt. ‘Fuck the Frogs’: Michael Bogdanov’s English Shakespeare Company’s Wars of the Roses,” in Shakespeare and War, eds. Ros King and Paul J. C.M. Franssen (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), 213–25; Crowl, Shakespeare Observed, ch. 9.

  26. 26.

    William Shakespeare’s Henry V (2007), https://www.amazon.com/William-Shakespeares-Henry-Peter-Babakitis/dp/B001HE1RJG; http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1261975/; “The Making of Henry V,” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZKYBwqznw8 and following segments; Sarah Hatchuel, “‘Into a Thousand Parts Divide One Man’: Dehumanised Metafiction and Fragmented Documentary in Peter Babakitis’ Henry V,” in Screening Shakespeare in the Twenty-First Century, eds. Mark Thornton and Ramona Ray (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2006), 146–62, and “The Rewriting of a Medieval Battle in Elizabethan Drama and on Film: The Battle of Agincourt in William Shakespeare’s, Laurence Olivier’s, Kenneth Branagh’s, and Peter Babakitis’s Henry V,” in Images of War and War of Images, eds. Gérard Hugues and Karine Hildenbrand (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2008), 3–16.

  27. 27.

    The Hollow Crown 1.4: Henry V (2012), DVD: Universal Studios Home Entertainment 2013.; http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2262456/. Criticism has yet to catch up with the most recent productions; however, reviews are abundant, e.g., Neil Genzingler in the New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/20/arts/television/hollow-crown-serves-up-shakespeare-and-royal-contrasts.html?mcubz=0; Ben Lawrence in The Telegraph, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/9415849/The-Hollow-Crown-Henry-V-BBC-Two-review.html; Mark Lawson in The Guardian, https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/tvandradioblog/2012/jun/29/the-hollow-crown-shakespeare-bbc2; and others.

  28. 28.

    Shakespeare’s Globe: Henry V (2012), DVD: Bayview Entertainment 2015; http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3900116/. Reviews of the stage production include Dominic Cavendish in The Telegraph, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/theatre/theatre-reviews/9329868/Henry-V-Shakespeares-Globe-review.html; Lyn Gardner in The Guardian, https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2012/jun/14/henry-v-review; Paul Taylor in The Independent, http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/theatre-dance/reviews/henry-v-shakespeares-globe-london-7854958.html; and others.

  29. 29.

    Shakespeare: King and Country 1.4: Henry V, DVD: Opus Arte (2016). Reviews of the stage production include Domenic Cavendish in The Telegraph, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/theatre/what-to-see/henry-v-royal-shakespeare-company-review/; Susannah Clapp in The Guardian, https://www.theguardian.com/stage/2015/nov/22/henry-v-barbican-review-rsc-oliver-ford-davies-steals-show; Paul Taylor in The Independent, http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/theatre-dance/reviews/henry-v-royal-shakespeare-theatre-stratford-upon-avon-review-a-production-of-huge-flair-and-bite-a6670251.html; and others.

  30. 30.

    Based on comparison of the nine adaptations with the text in Craik, King Henry V, 221–24.

  31. 31.

    Cartmell, Interpreting Shakespeare on Film 102, takes a more favorable view of Olivier’s handling of the scene than Branagh’s: “Renee Asherson […] like a damsel in distress, is liberated […] Emma Thompson’s Katherine opens the door to discover […] her careworn father.” Howard and Rackin, Engendering a Nation, ch. 1, are similarly critical of Branagh.

  32. 32.

    Based on comparison of the nine adaptations with the text in Craik, King Henry V, 344–64.

  33. 33.

    Hatchuel, “‘Into a Thousand Parts Divide One Man,’” 146–62.

  34. 34.

    On the prisoners, see Allmand, Henry V, 93–9; Anne Curry, Agincourt: A New History (Stroud: The History Press, 2010), 291–7; John Sutherland and Cedric Watts, Henry V: War Criminal? and Other Shakespeare Puzzles (Oxford University Press, 2000), 108–16. Arguably Henry’s treatment of John Oldcastle was worse than any of his offenses in the play.

  35. 35.

    Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (New York: Verso, 1983); Jonathan Baldo, “Wars of Memory in Henry V,” Shakespeare Quarterly 47/2 (1996): 132–59.

  36. 36.

    Aebischer, “Shakespeare, Sex, and Violence,” 116–17; Joel B. Altman, “‘Vile Participation’: The Amplification of Violence in the Theater of Henry V,” Shakespeare Quarterly, 42/1 (1991), especially 19, 33; Donaldson, Shakespearean Films/Shakespearean Directors, 14–15; Michael Manheim, “The English history plays on screen,” in Davies and Wells, eds., Shakespeare and the Moving Image, 121, 126; Carol Chillington Rutter, “Looking at Shakespeare’s women on film,” in Jackson, The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare on Film, ch. 14. Lance Wilcox, “Katharine of France as Victim and Bride,” Shakespeare Studies 17 (1985): 61–76; Marilyn Williamson, “The Courtship of Katherine and the Second Tetralogy,” Criticism: A Quarterly for Literature and Arts 17 (1975): 326–34.

  37. 37.

    Cartmell, Interpreting Shakespeare on Film, 98.

  38. 38.

    Katherine Eggert, “Nostalgia and the Not Yet Late Queen: Refusing Female Rule in Henry V,” ELH, 61/3 (1994): 523–50. Suggesting (p. 532) that Katherine’s beginning her list with “hand” relates to the “bloody hand” earlier in the text seems a bit much. Though the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries were obsessed with symbols, e.g. Elizabeth I’s armada portrait or the livery worn by noble retainers, they were quite open about it. Regarding body parts, the first things this writer sees when looking down are his hands, fingers, and nails, followed by his arm and elbow.

  39. 39.

    Anderegg, Cinematic Shakespeare, 122; Sarah Hatchuel, Shakespeare: From Stage to Screen (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), 176; Donald Hedrick, “Affect, History, ‘Henry V,’” PMLA, 118/3 (2003): 470–87; Rothwell, A History of Shakespeare on Screen), 249–50.

  40. 40.

    On rape, Caroline Dunn, Stolen Women in Medieval England: Rape, Abduction, and Adultery, 1100–1500 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013); Jeremy Goldberg, Communal Discord, Child Abduction, and Rape in the Later Middle Ages (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007); Sean McGlynn, “Violence and the Law in Medieval England,” History Today 58/4 (2008): 53–59; Corinne Saunders, Rape and Ravishment in the Literature of Medieval England (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2001).

  41. 41.

    A Google search of “Henry V” shows how often reviewers ignore or downplay Katherine. Norman Rabkin, “Rabbits, Ducks, and Henry V,” Shakespeare Quarterly, 28/3 (1977): 279–96; Grene, Shakespeare’s Serial History Plays, 238–45, reads Henry’s contradictions as irony.

Bibliography

  • Aebischer, Pascale. 2007. “Shakespeare, Sex, and Violence: Negotiating Masculinities in Branagh’s Henry V and Taymor’s Titus.” In A Concise Companion to Shakespeare on Screen, ed. Diana E. Henderson, 112–132. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell.

    Google Scholar 

  • Agee, James, and Bosley Crowther. 1972. “Henry V.” In Focus on Shakespearean Films, ed. Charles W. Eckert, 54–63. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall.

    Google Scholar 

  • Allmand, C.T. 1997. Henry V. New Haven: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2004. “Henry V (1386–1422).” In Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Online ed. Sept 2010 http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/12952.

  • Altieri, Joanne. 1981. “Romance in Henry V.” Studies in English Literature, 1500–1900 21 (2): 223–240.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Altman, Joel B. 1991. “‘Vile Participation’”: The Amplification of Violence in the Theater of Henry V. Shakespeare Quarterly 42 (1): 1–32.

    Google Scholar 

  • Anderegg, Michael. 2004. Cinematic Shakespeare. New York: Rowman and Littlefield.

    Google Scholar 

  • Anderson, Benedict. 1983. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. New York: Verso.

    Google Scholar 

  • Anon. 1598. The Famous Victories of Henry the Fifth: Containing the Honourable Battell of Agin-court: As it was Plaide by the Queenes Maiesties Players. London: Thomas Creede.

    Google Scholar 

  • Baldo, Jonathan. 1996. “Wars of Memory in Henry V.” Shakespeare Quarterly 47 (2): 132–159.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Beauchamp, Gorman. 1978. “‘Henry V’: Myth, Movie, Play.” College Literature 5 (3): 228–238.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bellis, Joanna. 2016. The Hundred Years War in Literature, 1337–1600. Woodbridge: D. S. Brewer.

    Google Scholar 

  • Berry, Edward. 1986. “Twentieth-Century Shakespeare Criticism: The Histories.” In The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare Studies, ed. Stanley Wells, 249–256. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bloom, Harold, and Albert Rolls, eds. 2010. Henry V. New York: Facts on File.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bogdanov, Michael, and Michael Pennington. 1990. The English Shakespeare Company: The Story of the Wars of the Roses. London: Nick Hern Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Buchman, Lorne Michael. 1991. Still in Movement: Shakespeare on Screen. New York: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Buchanan, Judith. 2005. Shakespeare on Film. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Buhler, Stephen W. 1995. “Text, Eyes, and Videotape: Screening Shakespeare Scripts.” Shakespeare Quarterly 46 (2): 236–244.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Burnett, Mark Thornton. 2002. “‘We are the Makers of Manners’: The Branagh Phenomenon.” In Shakespeare After Mass Media, ed. Richard Burt, 83–105. New York: Palgrave.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Camp, Gerald M. 1969. “Shakespeare on Film.” The Journal of Aesthetic Education 3 (1): 107–120.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Campbell, Lily B. 1947. Shakespeare’s Histories: Mirrors of Elizabethan Policy. San Marino: Huntington Library.

    Google Scholar 

  • Carnegie, David. 2008. “So the Falklands. So Agincourt. ‘Fuck the Frogs’: Michael Bogdanov’s English Shakespeare Company’s Wars of the Roses.” In Shakespeare and War, ed. Ros King and Paul J.C.M. Franssen, 213–225. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Cartmell, Deborah. 2000. Interpreting Shakespeare on Film. New York: St. Martin’s.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Cochran, Peter. 2013. Small Screen Shakespeare. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Collick, John. 1989. Shakespeare, Cinema, and Society. Manchester: Manchester University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Crowl, Samuel. 1992. Shakespeare Observed: Studies in Performance on Stage and Screen. Athens: Ohio University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2005. Shakespeare at the Cineplex: The Kenneth Branagh Era. Athens: Ohio University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2006. The Films of Kenneth Branagh. Westport: Praeger.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2007. “Flamboyant Realist: Kenneth Branagh.” In The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare on Film, ed. Russell Jackson, 226–242. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Crunelle-Vanrigh, Anny. 2007. Henry V as Royal Entry. Studies in English Literature, 1500–1900 47 (2): 355–377.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Curry, Anne. 2010. Agincourt: A New History. Stroud: The History Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2015. Henry V: From Playboy Prince to Warrior King. London: Penguin.

    Google Scholar 

  • Davies, Anthony. 1990. Filming Shakespeare’s Plays: The Adaptations of Laurence Olivier, Orson Welles, Peter Brook, and Akira Kurosawa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 1994. “Shakespeare on Film and Television: A Retrospect.” In Shakespeare and the Moving Image: The Plays on Film and Television, ed. Anthony Davies and Stanley Wells, 1–17. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2007. “The Shakespeare Films of Laurence Olivier.” In The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare on Film, ed. Russell Jackson, 167–186. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Donaldson, Peter. 1990. “Claiming from the Female:’ Gender and Representation in Laurence Olivier’s Henry V.” In Shakespearean Films/Shakespearean Directors, 1–30. Boston: Unwin Hyman.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dunn, Caroline. 2013. Stolen Women in Medieval England: Rape, Abduction, and Adultery, 1100–1500. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Eggert, Katherine. 1994. “Nostalgia and the Not Yet Late Queen: Refusing Female Rule in Henry V.” English Literary History 61 (3): 523–550.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Erickson, Peter B. 1979–80. “‘Thy Fault/My Father Made’: The Anxious Pursuit of Fame in ‘Henry V’.” Modern Language Studies 10 (1): 10–25.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ewert, Kevin. 2006. Henry V: A Guide to the Text and Its Theatrical Life. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Famiglietti, R.C. 1986. Royal Intrigue: Crisis at the Court of Charles VI, 1392–1420. Brooklyn: AMS Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fuzier, Jean. 1981. “‘Le Quand Sur le Possession de Fraunce’: A French Crux in Henry V Solved?” Shakespeare Quarterly 32 (1): 97–100.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Goldberg, Jeremy. 2007. Communal Discord, Child Abduction, and Rape in the Later Middle Ages. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Green, Douglas E. 2002. “Shakespeare, Branagh, and the ‘Queer Traitor’: Close Encounters in the Shakespearean Classroom.” In The Reel Shakespeare: Alternative Cinema and Theory, ed. Courtney Lehmann and Lisa Starks, 191–211. Madison: Fairleigh Dickinson Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Greenblatt, Stephen. 1989. Shakespearean Negotiations: The Circulation of Social Energy in Renaissance England. Berkeley: University of California Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Grene, Nicholas. 2002. Shakespeare’s Serial History Plays. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Griffiths, R.A. 1981. The Reign of King Henry VI: The Exercise of Royal Authority, 1422–1461. London: A&C Black.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2008. Tudor, Owen (c.1400–1461). Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. January 2008. http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/27797.

  • ———. 2015. Henry VI (1421–1471). Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. May 2015. http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/12953.

  • Hall, Edward. 1548. The Union of the Two Noble and Illustre Families of Lancastre and Yorke. London: Richard Grafton.

    Google Scholar 

  • Harriss, G.L. 2004a. Beaufort, Henry (1375?–1447). Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Online ed. January 2008. http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/1859.

  • ———. 2004b. Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester (1390–1447). Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Online ed. May 2011. http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/14155.

  • ———. 2004c. Beaufort, Thomas, Duke of Exeter (1377?–1426). Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004. Online ed. January 2008. http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/1864.

  • Hatchuel, Sarah. 2004. Shakespeare: From Stage to Screen. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2006. “‘Into a Thousand Parts Divide One Man’: Dehumanised Metafiction and Fragmented Documentary in Peter Babakitis’ Henry V.” In Screening Shakespeare in the Twenty-First Century, ed. Mark Thornton and Ramona Ray, 146–162. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2008. “The Rewriting of a Medieval Battle in Elizabethan Drama and on Film: The Battle of Agincourt in William Shakespeare’s, Laurence Olivier’s, Kenneth Branagh’s, and Peter Babakitis’s Henry V.” In Images of War and War of Images, ed. Gérard Hugues and Karine Hildenbrand, 3–16. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hedrick, Donald K. 2003a. “Affect History, ‘Henry V.” PMLA 118 (3): 470–487.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2003b. “War is Mud: Branagh’s Dirty Harry V and the Types of Political Ambiguity.” In Shakespeare, the Movie II: Popularizing the Plays on Film, TV, and Video, ed. Richard Burt and Lynda E. Boose, 213–230. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hill, Howard Erskine. 1996. Poetry and the Realm of Politics: Shakespeare to Dryden. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Hilton, Lisa. 2009. Queens Consort: England’s Medieval Queens. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hindle, Maurice. 2007. Studying Shakespeare on Film. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Holinshed, Raphael. 1577. The Laste Volume of the Chronicles of England, Scotlande, and Irelande, with their descriptions. London: Imprinted for Lucas Harison.

    Google Scholar 

  • Howard, Jean, and Phyllis Rackin. 2002. Engendering A Nation: A Feminist Account of Shakespeare’s English Histories. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Howlett, Kathy M. 2000. Framing Shakespeare on Film: How the Frame Reveals Meaning. Athens: Ohio University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jackson, Russell. 2007. Shakespeare Films in the Making: Vision, Production, and Reception. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Jardine, Lisa. 1997. Reading Shakespeare Historically. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jones, Michael. 2004. Catherine (1401–1437). Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. Online ed. January 2008. http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/4890.

  • Jorgens, Jack. 1977. Shakespeare on Film. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lake, Peter. 2016. How Shakespeare Put Politics on the Stage: Power and Succession in the History Plays. New Haven: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lane, Robert. 1994. “‘When Blood is Their Argument’: Class, Character, and Historymaking in Shakespeare’s and Branagh’s Henry V.” English Literary History 61 (1): 27–52.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lehmann, Courtney. 2002. Shakespeare Remains: Theater to Film, Early Modern to Postmodern. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Manheim, Michael. 1994. “The English History Plays on Screen.” In Shakespeare and the Moving Image: The Plays on Film and Television, ed. Anthony Davies and Stanley Wells, 121–145. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Manvell, Robert. 1979. Shakespeare and the Film. New York: A. S. Barnes and Company.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mason, Pamela. 2002. “Henry V: ‘The Quick Forge and the Working House of Thought’.” In The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare’s History Plays, ed. Michael Hattaway, 177–192. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • McDonald, Russ, ed. 2004. Shakespeare: An Anthology of Theory and Criticism 1945–2000. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell.

    Google Scholar 

  • McEachern, Claire. 1994. “Henry V and the Paradox of the Body Politic.” Shakespeare Quarterly 45 (1): 33–56.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McGlynn, Sean. 2008. “Violence and the Law in Medieval England.” History Today 58 (4): 53.

    Google Scholar 

  • McGrigor, Mary. 2016. The Sister Queens: Isabella and Catherine de Valois. Stroud: History Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mebane, John S. 2007. “‘Impious War’: Religion and the Ideology of Warfare in ‘Henry V.” Studies in Philology 104 (2): 250–266.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Moseley, Charles W.R.D. 1988. Shakespeare’s History Plays, Richard II to Henry V: The Making of a King. London: Penguin Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Norton, Elizabeth. 2011. England’s Queens: The Biography. Stroud: Amberley.

    Google Scholar 

  • Norwich, John Julius. 1999. Shakespeare’s Kings. London: Viking.

    Google Scholar 

  • Packer, Tina. 2015. Women of Will: Following the Feminine in Shakespeare’s Plays. New York: Knopf.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pilkington, Ace G. 1990. “Shakespeare on the Big Screen, the Small Box, and in Between.” The Yearbook of English Studies 20: 65–81.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 1991. Screening Shakespeare from Richard II to Henry V. Newark: University of Delaware Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Pugliatti, Paola. 1993. “The Strange Tongues of ‘Henry V’.” The Yearbook of English Studies 23: 235–253.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 1996. Shakespeare the Historian. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Rabkin, Norman. 1977. “Rabbits, Ducks, and Henry V.” Shakespeare Quarterly 28 (3): 279–296.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Rackin, Phyllis. 1991. Stages of History: Shakespeare’s English Chronicles. New York: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2002. “Women’s Roles in the Elizabethan History Plays.” In The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare’s History Plays, ed. Michael Hattaway, 71–88. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Richmond, Colin. 2004. Beaufort, Edmund, First Duke of Somerset (c.1406–1455). Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. Online ed. October 2008. http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/1855.

  • Rothwell, Kenneth S. 2004. A History of Shakespeare on Screen: A Century of Film and Television. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rutter, Carol Chillington. 2007. “Looking at Shakespeare’s Women on Film.” In The Cambridge Companion to Shakespeare on Film, ed. Russell Jackson, 245–266. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Saccio, David. 2000. Shakespeare’s English Kings: History, Chronicle, Drama. 2nd ed. New York: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Saunders, Corrine. 2001. Rape and Ravishment in the Literature of Medieval England. Cambridge: D.S. Brewer.

    Google Scholar 

  • Shakespeare, William. 2015. “King Henry V.” In Arden 3rd Series, ed. T.W. Craik. London: Bloomsbury.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2016. “King Henry IV, Part 2.” In Arden 3rd Series, ed. J.C. Bulman. London: Bloomsbury.

    Google Scholar 

  • Silviria, Dale. 1985. Laurence Olivier and the Art of Filmmaking. Madison: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Spencer, Janet M. 1996. “Princes, Pirates, and Pigs: Criminalizing War in Henry V.” Shakespeare Quarterly 47 (2): 160–177.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Stratford, Jenny. 2011. John, Duke of Bedford (1389–1435). Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. Online ed. September 2011. http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/14844.

  • Strickland, Agnes, and Elizabeth. 1851. Lives of the Queens of England from the Norman Conquest. Vol. 2. London: Colburn.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sutherland, John, and Cedric Watts. 2000. Henry V: War Criminal? and Other Shakespeare Puzzles. Oxford/Toronto: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Tebbetts, Terrell L. 1990. “Shakespeare’s Henry V: Politics and the Family.” South Central Review 7 (1): 8–19.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Thomas, R.S. 2004a. Tudor, Edmund, First Earl of Richmond (c.1430–1456). Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. Online ed. January 2008. http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/27795.

  • ———. 2004b. Tudor, Jasper, Duke of Bedford (c.1431–1495). Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press. Online ed. October 2008. http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/27796.

  • Wilcox, Lance. 1985. “Katharine of France as Victim and Bride.” Shakespeare Studies 17: 61–76.

    Google Scholar 

  • Williamson, Marilyn. 1975. “The Courtship of Katherine and the Second Tetralogy.” Criticism: A Quarterly for Literature and Arts 17: 326–334.

    Google Scholar 

  • Willis, Susan. 1991. The BBC Shakespeare Plays: Making the Televised Canon. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wolffe, Bertram. 2001. Henry VI. New Haven: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Woodcock, Matthew. 2008. Shakespeare—Henry V: A Reader’s Guide to Essential Criticism. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Google Scholar 

Films

Novels

  • Bennett, Vanora. 2010. The Queen’s Lover. New York: William Morrow.

    Google Scholar 

  • Griffith, Mari. 2015. Root of the Tudor Rose. Abercynon: Accent Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hickson, Joanna. 2013. The Agincourt Bride. London: Harper.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2014. The Tudor Bride. London: Harper.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jarman, Rosemary Hawley. 1978. Crown in Candlelight. New York: HarperCollins.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jones, Dedwydd. 2002. The Lily and the Dragon. Llanwrst: Gwasg Carreg Gwalch.

    Google Scholar 

  • O’Brien, Anne. 2013. The Forbidden Queen. Ontario: MIRA.

    Google Scholar 

  • Plaidy, Jean. 1990. The Queen’s Secret. New York: Putnam.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rofheart, Martha. 1972. Fortune Made His Sword. New York: Putnam.

    Google Scholar 

Online

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of History and Political Science, Southeastern Louisiana University, Hammond, LA, USA

    William B. Robison

Authors
  1. William B. Robison
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to William B. Robison .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Independent Scholar, Manchester, NH, USA

    Kavita Mudan Finn

  2. Independent Scholar, Beaver Falls, PA, USA

    Valerie Schutte

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2018 The Author(s)

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Robison, W.B. (2018). The Bard, the Bride, and the Muse Bemused: Katherine of Valois on Film in Shakespeare’s Henry V. In: Finn, K., Schutte, V. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Shakespeare's Queens. Queenship and Power. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74518-3_25

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74518-3_25

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-74517-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-74518-3

  • eBook Packages: HistoryHistory (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation