A Study of King Richard III : Richard's Evil Dominates the Play

This paper is one attempt to analyse the structure of Shakespeare's History Richard III and to consider Richard's evilness and the process of his obtaining the English crown and the way of his falling from it. There are many thematic and historical connections between the Henry VI trilogy and this play. This play is usually classified as a History. But this classification is still ambiguous because there are many phases of this play. This play has an ambivalent element between the tragedy and the history. This play is described as a rigid Tudor scheme of retributive justice and a straightforward dramatisation of the Tudor myth. The course of events is guided by a simple process of divine justice, dispensing rewards and punishment on earth. On the other hand, it is described as a comic history or tragic history, in which cruel and relentless things prevail. The reason is that excessive cruelty becomes comic. And some critics take Richard for a tragic hero. This play could be classified as a tragedy. This is because Richard has a complicated character and a tragic element while other characters may appear as flat characters which E. M. Foster described in his Aspects of the Novels. Saintly Richmond is a good example of it. He acts as England's saviour who destroys Richard's evilness, brings the end of the War of Roses and makes England peaceful.