King Edward III

by William Shakespeare, Giorgio Melchiori (Editor)

Librarian's Note: Alternate cover for ISBN 0521596734

Genres: Shakespeare, Plays, Classics, Drama, Historical Fiction, Fiction, Poetry

219 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1592

About the author

William Shakespeare was an English playwright, poet, and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon" (or simply "the Bard"). His extant works, including collaborations, consist of some 39 plays, 154 sonnets, three long narrative poems, and a few other verses, some of uncertain authorship. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright. Shakespeare remains arguably the most influential writer in the English language, and his works continue to be studied and reinterpreted.
Shakespeare was born and raised in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire. At the age of 18, he married Anne Hathaway, with whom he had three children: Susanna, and twins Hamnet and Judith. Sometime between 1585 and 1592, he began a successful career in London as an actor, writer, and part-owner ("sharer") of a playing company called the Lord Chamberlain's Men, later known as the King's Men after the ascension of King James VI and I of Scotland to the English throne. At age 49 (around 1613), he appears to have retired to Stratford, where he died three years later. Few records of Shakespeare's private life survive; this has stimulated considerable speculation about such matters as his physical appearance, his sexuality, his religious beliefs, and even certain fringe theories as to whether the works attributed to him were written by others.
Shakespeare produced most of his known works between 1589 and 1613. His early plays were primarily comedies and histories and are regarded as some of the best works produced in these genres. He then wrote mainly tragedies until 1608, among them Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, Othello, King Lear, and Macbeth, all considered to be among the finest works in the English language. In the last phase of his life, he wrote tragicomedies (also known as romances) and collaborated with other playwrights.
Many of Shakespeare's plays were published in editions of varying quality and accuracy during his lifetime. However, in 1623, John Heminge and Henry Condell, two fellow actors and friends of Shakespeare's, published a more definitive text known as the First Folio, a posthumous collected edition of Shakespeare's dramatic works that includes 36 of his plays. Its Preface was a prescient poem by Ben Jonson, a former rival of Shakespeare, that hailed Shakespeare with the now famous epithet: "not of an age, but for all time".

Reviews

[Bill Kerwin · Rating 2 out of 5]

If this play is indeed Shakespeare--and it seems at least a part of it is--it wins the award for worst history play, beating "King John" by at least a length and a half. Like "John," it is an episodic, shambling thing, but it has nothing half as good as the bastard Falconbridge to recommend it.

Some of the verse, particularly in the Countess of Salisbury sequence, possesses a grace uncharacteristic of the play, and imagery which is felicitous if not memorable. In addition, there is a scene in which the Black Prince and the aged Lord Audley prepare to fight against daunting odds (IV.iv) that is very well constructed and deeply affecting.

Other than that, the only remarkable thing about the play is that it seems in a very rough sense to have provided many of the elements of Henry V: a discussion of Salic law, stirring speeches before battle, French jokes about the beef-eating English, British ethnic rivalry (this time Scots, not Welsh), and a king who goes a-wooing. All this is executed much more sympathetically--and more artfully--in the later play, but, still, the essential elements are here.

[Michael Finocchiaro · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great action scenes despite the many anachronisms, Edward III is still rewarding. It is the first of the great War of the Roses cycle (before Richard II, Henry IV Parts 1&2, Henry V, Henry VI Parts 1-3, and the inimitable Richard III). The authorship of this one by the Bard has long been contested, but most modern critics allow that Shakespeare wrote at least several acts himself.

Edward III takes power after his mother Isabella of France and her alleged lover Mortimer forced Edward II to step down. A succession controversy for the Frenc throne provokes the beginning of the One Hundred Years War when Edward III claims, rightly it would seem, the French throne. The French find a legendary Salic law that reserves the throne to male descendants which disqualifies Edward who was claiming the title through his mother Isabella. So, if you think Shakespeare is confusing, the real story that he is telescoping and abbreviating is far more complex!

In Shakespeare's play, the action is non-stop with battles galore. Edward III was particularly lucky to have won successively the battles of Sluys, Crécy and Poitiers against the French and thereby established a massive foothold on the continent. As explained in Norwich's Shakespeare's Kings: The Great Plays and the History of England in the Middle Ages: 1337-1485, the Bard does not respect the timeline, but he does a fairly good job of capturing the momentum of events and draws memorable portraits of the various actors. I would also highly suggest the excellent A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century for more about this tumultuous period, but seen from a more French point of view.

One of Shakespeare's greatest characterizations in this play is the godlike Edward, the Black Prince. He is Edward III's heir and an incredible warrior with a relatively realistic, but characteristically dark personality:

Audley, the arms of death embrace us round,
And comfort have we none, save that to die
We pay sower earnest for a sweeter life.
At Cressey field out Clouds of Warlike smoke
Choked up those French mouths & dissevered them;
But now their multitudes of millions hide,
Masking as twere, the beauteous burning Sun,
Leaving no hope to us, but sullen dark
And eyeless terror of all ending night.
Edward III - Act IV Scene IV

In one of the most memorable scenes in the play, the Black Prince is about to succumb to overwhelming French numbers around him and Edward III is asked several times by his advisors to send reinforcements to help him. Edward III prefers to let the Black Prince fight his way out.

ARTOIS.
Rescue, king Edward! rescue for thy son!

KING EDWARD.
Rescue, Artois? what, is he prisoner,
Or by violence fell beside his horse?

ARTOIS.
Neither, my Lord: but narrowly beset
With turning Frenchmen, whom he did pursue,
As tis impossible that he should scape,
Except your highness presently descend.

KING EDWARD.
Tut, let him fight; we gave him arms to day,
And he is laboring for a knighthood, man.

[Enter Derby.]

DARBY.
The Prince, my Lord, the Prince! oh, succour him!
He's close incompast with a world of odds!

KING EDWARD.
Then will he win a world of honor too,
If he by valour can redeem him thence;
If not, what remedy? we have more sons
Than one, to comfort our declining age.
Edward III Act 3 Scene V

The Black Prince, of course, prevails and captures King John II and in the closing scene, the English retake Calais (including the scene of the Burghers of Calais immortalized by Rodin centuries later) and seem to be poised for total domination setting the stage for the tragedy of Richard II.

This play is a fantastic read, but it does help to do one's homework to understand the historical events behind the action. It is non-stop and a great start to the long cycle.

Fino's Reviews of Shakespeare and Shakespearean Criticism
Comedies
The Comedy of Errors (1592-1593
The Taming of the Shrew (1593-1594)
The Two Gentlemen of Verona (1594-1595)
Love's Labour's Lost (1594-1595)
A Midsummer Night's Dream (1595-1596)
The Merchant of Venice (1596-1597)
Much Ado About Nothing (1598-1599)
As You Like It (1599-1600)
Twelfth Night (1599-1600)
The Merry Wives of Windsor (1600-1601)
All's Well That Ends Well (1602-1603)
Measure for Measure (1604-1605)
Cymbeline (1609-1610)
A Winter's Tale (1610-1611)
The Tempest (1611-1612)
Two Noble Kinsmen (1612-1613)

Histories
Henry VI Part I (1589-1590)
Henry VI Part II (1590-1591)
Henry VI Part III (1590-1591)
Richard III (1593-1594)
Richard II (1595-1596)
King John (1596-1597)
Edward III (1596-1597)
Henry IV Part I (1597-1598)
Henry IV Part II (1597-1598)
Henry V (1598-1599)
Henry VIII (1612-1612)

Tragedies
Titus Andronicus (1592-1593)
Romeo and Juliet (1594-1595)
Julius Caesar (1599-1600)
Hamlet (1600-1601)
Troilus and Cressida (1601-1602)
Othello (1604-1605)
King Lear (1605-1606)
Macbeth (1605-1606)
Anthony and Cleopatra (1606-1607)
Coriolanus (1607-1608)
Timon of Athens (1607-1608)
Pericles (1608-1609)

Shakespearean Criticism
The Wheel of Fire by Wilson Knight
A Natural Perspective by Northrop Frye
Shakespeare After All by Marjorie Garber
Shakespeare's Roman Plays and Their Background by M W MacCallum
Shakespearean Criticism 1919-1935 compiled by Anne Ridler
Shakespearean Tragedy by A.C. Bradley
Shakespeare's Sexual Comedy by Hugh M. Richmond
Shakespeare: The Comedies by R.P. Draper
Tyrant: Shakespeare on Politics by Stephen Greenblatt
1599: A Year in the Life of William Shakespeare by James Shapiro

Collections of Shakespeare
Venus and Adonis, the Rape of Lucrece and Other Poems
Shakespeare's Sonnets and a Lover's Complaint
The Complete Oxford Shakespeare

[max theodore · Rating 2 out of 5]

am i missing something or is this just boring as hell. shoutout to the countess and the minor amounts of homoeroticism in the latter acts

[Tori Samar · Rating 2 out of 5]

Has moments of depth but suffers from a weak overall structure. No sense of anything holding the whole thing together.

(Lit Life Patreon SIAY 2023-2024)

[Melora · Rating 2 out of 5]

Wow. In its own way this is worse than Titus Andronicus. Less gruesome, and, unlike "Titus," the characters have plausible motivations, but this is so stunningly incoherent that it deserves some sort of special recognition. Oh, and an "English king" play where we are cheering for the French? Edward III, much like Titus, has enough sons that he regards them as utterly disposable -- never an attractive characteristic in a father.

[Bernie Gourley · Rating 5 out of 5]

This play, one of the histories attributed to Shakespeare, is among those that have only in recent decades come to be included in The Bard’s canon. While the current consensus among Shakespeare experts seems to be that this play was authored or co-authored by Shakespeare, it remains possible that it wasn’t or that it was only partially written by him. [Fun fact: Shakespeare was known to collaborate, even though only experts know anything about any of his collaborators -- and even then it largely seems to be educated guesswork.]

This is not among the most narratively satisfying of Shakespeare’s plays, but histories inherently face the issue of following the events as they happened – at least in some degree. Even kings don’t necessarily live drama-shaped lives. The play addresses two major events in Edward’s life. The first is his unsuccessful wooing of a beautiful Countess after the King’s forces drive back a Scottish attack on the Earl of Salisbury’s castle. This part follows the common dramatic theme of the mere presence of a beautiful woman draining men of both virtue and smarts. For a time, the Countess simply rebuffs Edward’s advances, but when that doesn’t work, she tells him that the only way they can be together is if each one murders their current spouse. The Countess only says this to snap Edward out of it, but when he agrees to take her up on the bargain, she changes tack. She tells Edward that if he doesn’t quit his pursuit of her, she will end her own life. This does snap Edward out of his horn-dog induced insanity.

The second story line involves King Edward’s fight to claim the crown in France. While many will find this the more gripping part of the play, it’s not King Edward III, but rather his son Prince Edward, who is really the hero of this fight. It’s Prince Edward who is engaged in the most savage fighting and who narrowly ekes out a victory.

While this may not be as engaging and gripping as Shakespeare’s tragedies or comedies, it is an interesting way to glimpse history. I have little knowledge of British history, and can’t really say how accurate the depiction of events is, but Shakespeare generally follows the basic contours of events as accurately as was probably known at the time. I highly recommend all of Shakespeare’s works, but if you don’t have time for them all, this is probably one you’ll set aside for the time being.

[Paul Frandano · Rating 4 out of 5]

Better than you might expect, a virtual template, with the young Black Prince Edward, for Henry V, and wirh the inimitable, Immortal Bard unmistakably writing the entire second act and ostensibly touching up a lot else that had been written by...who? Best guess, Kit Marlowe. Others? George Steele? Thomas Dekker? Thomas Kyd? The New Cambridge Shakespeare edition sparkles with information on the history of the play, probably written in 1592-1594 time frame, its principal sources and how the authors used them, its liberal departures from the true history and participants, both English and French, in the campaign of 1346-1347, performance history, speculation on why Heminges and Condell might have left King Edward III out of the First Folio, play criticism, more. In short, a solid scholarly edition, nicely annotated, with an extensive bibliography (c. 1998). Probably for Bardolators only, but more enjoyable - for me, anyway - than The Two Noble Kinsmen.

But the highest compliment I can pay this lovely volume is that it's as good an Arden Shakespeare in its clarity, annotations, commentary, and general completeness (although I do prefer the compact Ardens for the way they fit in my hand and line up on the shelf). Thst said, I've struck the Arden Edward III off my wish list. No need here for a redundant text: I'm no scholar, merely a recreational Bardolator.

[Illiterate · Rating 3 out of 5]

A study of kingship. The first part contrasts public role and personal desire. The rest focuses on the public role: oaths, honor, leadership, courage, war.

[Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

A new Shakespeare play? This is my Shakespeare group’s August play, but it is not in my old Complete Shakespeare college textbook. Apparently Shakespearean scholarly research finding that Shakespeare was very likely a significant coauthor of this play led to it being added to The New Cambridge Shakespeare series more recently, legitimizing its inclusion in the Shakespeare canon. It was rendered obscure by not being included in the First Folio. It may also have been retired and quietly disappeared because it was written before Scottish James Stuart succeeded Elizabeth I to the throne and it includes the English defeat of an unfavorably characterized Scottish king and populace.

It is an odd play, almost like two different plays, because on his way to France to take back the French crown from King John (the beginning of the Hundred Years’ War), Edward first goes to Scotland to put down a rebellion, and while there takes an extended frolic wooing a countess with whom he falls in lust at first sight. He spends half the play trying to convince or coerce her to submit to him (though they are both married to others), but she is another of Shakespeare’s plucky clever women who verbally outmaneuvers the King threatening her, winning her own battle over control of her own domain. Having won his political but not amorous battles in Scotland, King Edward spends the second half of the play taking France (with valuable help from his son and the husband of the aforementioned countess) from King John, which includes taking the Burghers of Calais (as in the famous Rodin sculpture) prisoner. I thoroughly enjoyed this play. The poetry, metaphors, double meanings, and all those literary balletics were wonderful and the story was so much less gory than the Wars of the Roses and Titus Andronicus plays of the last few months. And though the story was largely about a rape that almost happened and a war (in which unfortunately many people were killed, but all off-stage and none of them characters we we met), there was so much comic relief that the play often felt like lighter fare. A theme that features heavily throughout the play is Chivalric honor requiring one to keep oaths and vows. We learn about these as the doltish King Edward has to be continually instructed in them by everyone around him. Sometimes the arguments over which vows and oaths have precedence when they conflict veer into comical extremes. Are you always bound to your word—even when it was given under false pretenses or under duress to your enemy in war? Another theme is that God will be on the side of the the most honorable king, that Edward triumphs over John because he is the most “honorable”, but we see that King Edward has no honorable instincts and is only kept on the “honorable” path by those around him, most notably the countess, his son, and his wife, none of whom he treats well. I can’t quite pinpoint why I enjoyed this play as much as I did. Also, all the notes and critical and historical additional information in this Arden edition enriched my experience reading this play.

[Ian · Rating 3 out of 5]

An anonymous play, increasingly believed to be a collaborative work of Shakespeare and another playwright, perhaps Kyd, Marlowe, Drayton, Nashe or Peele. I can see Shakespeare, based on the style. In fact, I see more of Shakespeare in Edward III than I did in Pericles, which I also read this month. Not sure why Marlowe is a contender; he writes interesting stories, but in a morbidly boring style that I didn't recognize in this play. I'm not familiar enough with the works of the others to have an opinion.

As for the story here, it's not particularly interesting, but the style tends toward engaging. I struggled to find a connection between Edward's attempted seduction of the Countess of Salisbury and the invasion of France. He was not welcomed by either? He had no right to either? The latter would be strange given that there is considerable pro-invasion propaganda, unless intended ironically (which would be even more odd).

[Jennifer · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found this one more difficult, in part because I could not do my regular reading habit. Normally I read a Folger's copy with the notes and listen to an Arkangel recording at the same time. This one is non-canonical and is probably only partially written by Shakespeare, so there was no recording and no Folgers. I did my best without those tools, but I felt it.
Another history play. More conflict between England and France, a very common theme.

[Anna-Marie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nothing special? Not even all of it was Shakespeare

[Hal · Rating 2 out of 5]

good lord the second half of this draggged on too long

[Phil · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the Bard's apocrypha - the plays that didn't make the cut for the Folio, for whatever reason, and weren't captured in the early additions (as plays like Pericles and Two Noble Kinsmen were). Although now widely thought to be partly by Shakespeare, there's division of opinion about how much.

I find Shakespeare authorship arguments hard to fathom sometimes, because when you get past the not-always-reliable text analysis, it usually boils down to "if it's not great, let's say it's not by Shakespeare", which is like saying that because 'Ebony and Ivory' isn't as good as 'Back Seat of My Car', 'Maybe I'm Amazed' or 'Yesterday' it must have been written by somebody other than Paul McCartney.

I'm reading the plays of Shakespeare in something approximating writing order and I can see absolutely nothing in this play that suggest that it wasn't written by the same hands that wrote the Henry VI trilogy, Titus Andronicus, Venus and Adonis or Taming of the Shrew.

Probably written during the period when London theatres were closed for plague, Shakespeare had to survive by writing poetry but he also spend several years working up in the North West for Lord Derby - whose ancestor appears susiciously prominently in this text.

Apart from Lord Derby's praises other things that point to Shakespeare writing it are the quotes that will later appear in the published sonnets - a long sequence comparing Lady Salisbury to a Summer's day is particular interesting and I absolutely don't accept that the writing in this play is substandard - the only weak spot are the opening two scenes where Edward 3 sets the scene about his battles on all fronts and the Scots looking ridiculous and cowardly on Lady Salisbury's castle doorstep, once Edward III arrives at the castle and falls head over heels for her, the poetry of love, seduction, war and chivalry matches the very best in the Henry VI plays and a lot of his later work too. I wondered sometimes if I was reading a different play from that which the critics are so sniffingly dismissive - and weaknesses could easily be explained by the fact that this play never went through the First Folio editing, refining process.

One train of thought as to why this play wasn't included in the Folio (it was definitely known about at that time) is that it's so dismissive and insulting of the Scots and the kingdom now had a Scottish (and pretty dour, humourless and easily rancoured) King in James VI (or James I in English money). So in the same way Shakespeare might have mocked the Scots to please Elizabeth I, the editors left it out to please James I. It's not due to the Quarto being anonymous, because plenty of others included were also anonymous.

Reading the play, it's a little dual-personalitied, the opening two acts deal with a love-struck king wanting to seduce Lady Salisbury (both being married) and when he doesn't manage to persuade her with his own words, gets her Dad to pimp her to him on his behalf - when she refuses him, he sees the error of his ways and rushes off to conquer France with his son, whom he leaves to his own devices to almost die in a battle against hard odds in order to teach him the life lesson that he won't always be rescued from scrapes, but then he wins so everything's alright.

The theme of the play, however, is about oaths, promises and keeping one's word. This crops up right through - starting with the seduction, which makes perfect sense in this context: Edward want to break the marriage vows he'd made in front of God and Lady Salisbury refuses upon threat of her death. By not breaking the marriage vows he is able to go to France and win victory, because King John is an oath-breaker and thus divine judgement rules against him and the English win despite being outnumbered 10 to 1.

So - in summation, don't take the critics' word at face value for this play; they mostly hate it, but I can tell you that it's actually rather good: especially Acts II and IV.

[Mike · Rating 3 out of 5]

Edward III is an odd little play that feels disjointed but definitely not bad. It has been partly attributed to William Shakespeare, perhaps as much as 50% and as either revisionist of an original script or a true co-written work. In either part, Shakespeare is part of Edward III and so I read on.

My reading and enjoyment of the play was probably aided by watching at production of it a few months back at The Shakespeare Tavern. I anticipated a performance I'd sit through in order to scratch it from my Cannon list but ended up enjoying the show. I found the same experience when I read it. The writing is okay and the story line is bumpy but it's not bad. The first third of the play doesn't seem to mesh with the later parts. The lusty Edward struggles to jive with the warrior Edward. None-the-less, I'm glad I read (and watched) the apocryphal play.

Favorite quotes:
"To die is all as common as to live / The one in choice the other holds in chase; / For from the instant we begin to live / We do pursue and hunt the time to die."

[Ilia · Rating 3 out of 5]

The strongest part of the play is the bits purportedly by Shakespeare – the scenes in which a King demands that a countess sleep with him, and how the countess manages to navigate the conflicting allegiances to her husband and her sovereign. The drama of the scenario is all the more effective for the bits of absurd situational comedy that peep through, like Edward switching from writing love poetry to pretending to study maps and military manoeuvres when someone walks in. That moment effectively collapses the pull between human desires and political duties.

The countess escapes the King’s clutches with a bit of legalese about the precedence of oaths – a theme that is picked up in the rest of the play, where kings give orders that overrule the commitments they and their officials make, and have to be talked back into respecting the rules. Everyone ultimately does what they are supposed to do, which is why Marlowe’s Edward II and Shakespeare’s Richard II are more interesting histories, as these Kings push the system past breaking point and lose their lives as a result.

[Richard Seltzer · Rating 2 out of 5]

I read this as research for my novel the Shakespeare Twins.

[Keith Taylor · Rating 5 out of 5]

The star system doesn't work with this book! Probably only partially Shakespeare, and even that is not very good Shakespeare. Do we put it beside "Lear" and say bad? That doesn't reflect the pleasure I took in reading it. Do we put it beside books that I felt more deeply engaged with, and say it doesn't measure up? That doesn't seem useful. Do we talk about the editing and say it's thorough, smart and witty? Well, maybe, because it is. But really I read it because I want to have read all of Shakespeare, and I didn't know that this play had been accepted into the canon. In fact, I'd never heard of it! The "Complete Shakespeare" in the Cambridge Edition that I used in 1970 - 72, the years I spent the most time with Shakespeare, has no mention of this.

The scenes of the attempted infidelity seem particularly Shakespearean and are fun to read, even though they seem to come from way outside the play and don't lead in any particular direction (other than toward the theme of oaths kept and broken). The battles reported in lengthy iambic pentameter descriptions are not unique to Shakespeare; they reflect a convention of the time. But I loved them!

So is it a great play? Probably not. I don't really have any interest in seeing it on stage -- unless someone came up with a very unexpected way of staging it. But I loved sitting down with it, reading the play and all the critical apparati that came with it. If anyone shares my nonprofessional's interest in Shakespeare, I feel pretty confident they will feel the same way.

[Nicholas · Rating 3 out of 5]

Inoffensively ok; the play was fairly readable but nothing special. Act 2 is a weird sideplot where the king has a crush on the married daughter of one of his nobles; he tries to pursue an adulterous affair with her to the point of proposing the murders of his Queen and the woman's husband. After this it returns to the main action of war between the English and French armies and the Countess is never mentioned again. A major theme in the play is honour, reflected in this Countess who maintains her honour and that of the King, the Queen who persuades him to act honourably in victory, Prince Edward who seeks to defend the honour of England and the crown, and Charles who stops his father, King of France, from dishonouring himself. It is conveyed that victory is achieved by those with superior honour

[Ginger Stephens · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a most confusing play. It may help to see it live, but reading it, or listening to it, is difficult. It reminds me of King John, which I also found confusing with a muddled plot. Edward III is also hard to follow and it is difficult to keep the characters straight.

I know that Shakespeare only wrote part of it, or rewrote the work of another playwright. I suspect that the speeches that Edward makes about the Countess of Salisbury were written by Shakespeare. They sound like some of the soliloquy’s from Romeo and Juliet. Like a Romeo and Juliet, those are the best parts.

This was a very early work and Shakespeare got much better at his craft. We can always be thankful for that.

[Jason Anger · Rating 4 out of 5]

Though written with others, and despite what I perceive to be a general dislike of this play, I thought it quite good, actually. King Edward is at times a perfect cad, but the interaction between he, his son, and his wife as they achieve their destiny of rule at the expense of the king of France is very entertaining.

Of special interest to myself is the scene wherein we get a glimpse into how the war is affecting the peasantry of France, an effect very common to Shakespeare.

Even if not one of his principal masterpieces, it shows a maturing playwright and contains beautiful language and intricate plot.

Next up, Richard II!

[Rebecca Fell · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a bit of a mixed bag of a play. From an academic perspective it was great for gender and sovereignty analysis, comparing really well with plays like “Pericles”, “The Tempest” and “Titus Andronicus”. However, from a pure enjoyment perspective it was a bit boring; the battle scenes were incredibly repetitive and the first part- which was honestly the best part- of the play felt like a completely different play to the second part of the play. I know that it’s supposed to reflect how chivalric honour acts as salvation of sin but I think the play would have been a lot more enjoyable if the Duchess of Salisbury plot line was revisited.

[Shannon · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found this one a bit all over in terms of the story, and felt like there were a few things that were set up, but never came back to like Edward's interest in the Countess .

I think I need to get a bit of a chronological overview to more fully appreciate historical. I've read enough now to know a few things from a few periods, but not what connect or what is before/after each other. That's more a note on my reading than the actual play!

[Ben Truong · Rating 3 out of 5]

King Edward III is an Elizabethan play printed anonymously in 1596, and partly written by William Shakespeare, having now become accepted as part of Shakespeare's canon of plays.

Prince Edward (The Black Prince) broods on the morality of war before achieving victory in the Battle of Poitiers against seemingly insurmountable odds. He captures the French king. In Calais the citizens realize they will have to surrender to King Edward.

King Edward III is written mediocrity well, which is rather odd attributing to Shakespeare. King Edward III is informed by the Count of Artois that he, Edward, was the true heir to the previous king of France. A French ambassador arrives to insist that Edward do homage to the new French king for his lands in Guyenne. Edward defies him, insisting he will invade to enforce his rights. Themes of National Pride and Forbidden Love abounds.

This Cambridge University Press edition of the play has an introductory essay written Giorgio Melchiori from the Università degli Studi Roma Tre, textual notes and analysis, two appendices, and an additional reading list.

All in all, King Edward III is a good play that is loosely based on events during the reign of Edward III.

[Gordan Karlic · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not much to say about this one.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent scholarly edition of an interesting work by Shakespeare and collaborators. Read in Kindle edition. Awarding four rather than five stars because the Kindle format had blue links on phrases glossed, making the text of the play anything but pleasant to read.

[Elizabeth · Rating 2 out of 5]

Eh it was fine? It felt like two completely different plays, the first half being a romantic farce, the second a war drama. Each half was fine, but combined they became less than the sum of their parts.

[Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

Edward III: Provenance and Canon, Rhetoric and Imagery

Provenance and Canon

The provenance of King Edward III and its attribution to Shakespeare by the Arden Third Series editors, Nicola Bennett and Richard Proudfoot, has been debated for 150 years, and through all the considerations presented by them, they conclude that it is clearly co-authored and that Shakespeare probably wrote only scenes 2 and 3 and probably heavily revised scene 12, out of 18; but that still represents over a third of the play. It is constructed of 18 scenes, with the nominated [Act.Scene] assignments by Capell.

The play appears in two quartos printed 1596 and 1599 (xvi), but does not appear in the first Folio of 1623, nor the three thereafter (1632, 1663/4, 1685). The principal reasons given as to why King Edward III was omitted from the Folio are that the rights to the play lay with another stationer outside the combine which printed the first Folio, and that to include him for this one play would radically reduce their individual profits. That it did not appear in the three subsequent versions of the Folio is for the same reasons, as the rights were handed on from one stationer to another, not of the combine. Other reasons are generic to the period: playwrights did not own copyright of their plays (stationers did from 1710, authors not until 1814) and the practice of printing only became common practice from 1593, and not to prevent copyright infringement. Copies were made for licensing with the Master of Revels and for performance reasons, and for sale to the public. Most quartos of the 19 that existed for the 36 plays included in the first Folio may not have accurately reflected the playwright's actual draft anyway, hence the lingering term 'bad quarto' in the history of the texts.
Another, political, reason for perhaps not including the work in the first Folio is that of the succession issue around Elizabeth I. At the time of the play's appearance (1589-90?; revised by Shakespeare 1592-4?), this issue was in abeyance and uncertain. By the time of the first Folio (1623), James I, James VI of Scotland, had been on the throne for twenty years, and the diminution of Scotland in the play signalled an antipathy towards the Scottish, and so, by implication, any Scottish succession, that would have been far from popular with the king.

For these, and many more reasons delivered by Bennett and Proudfoot in their Arden introduction, they generally conclude an estimated 32% original contribution to the play by Shakespeare (Scs. 2 and 3), which comprise the amatory sections of a play not wholly integrated in the otherwise military thematic, a probable wholesale rewrite of scene 12, and evidence of partial rewrites of other scenes based on phrasal comparisons (n-grams) and the incidence of feminine endings, a style characteristically and predominantly deployed by Shakespeare in his early plays of the period and less used by other playwrights like Kyd and Marlowe, and not at all by some. Other stylistic considerations are discussed, including rhetoric and imagery mirrored in several sonnets (written around 1592-4 to 1603, printed 1609) and the poems Venus and Adonis (1593) and The Rape Of Lucrece (1594), in several notes in the commentary, and a similarity to language found in Henry VI (1591-2). Thus the correspondences with Shakespeare’s proven work.

The count of references to all of Shakespeare’s works and the contemporary plays and poems of this period—omitting the odd reference to pamphlets and novels—reveals a simple conclusion: that the play was co-authored with either Kyd or Marlowe, probably both. The majority of correspondences are to Kyd’s The Spanish Tragedy (1586), which may indicate that Kyd had the leading hand, though there are marginally more references to the combined works of Marlowe, and particularly to Marlowe’s Edward II of 1593, a year after the latest possible writing date of King Edward III, all three of which correspondences support the assessed co-authorship.

The comparison with Shakespeare’s early works (determined by the correspondences up to the date of the contemporary works, 1599), shows two clear indicators:

1. which we would expect, is a correspondence between King Edward III and the other histories;
2. similar phrases between the poetry of the period, the sonnets (1593-1603), and the two long poems, Venus and Adonis (1593) and The Rape of Lucrece (1594)—which we also would expect, being amatory.

The correlation between The Rape of Lucrece and the amatory scenes of King Edward III are significant, because of the corrupt nature of both very similar storylines (which mercifully end differently). While we would expect a significant correlation with the language of the three Henry VI plays and with Richard III, all written around this date (1589-94), the correlation with the later Henry V (1599) could be due to the combination of military and amatory scenes they share, and both being set in France in similar campaigns, though the latter link is perhaps ostensibly tenuous. However, if Shakespeare did write the scenes attributed, both amatory and military—and Bennett and Proudfoot’s evidence is convincing—then when coming to Henry V, he already had a model. Comparisons are clear: each play opens with a discussion of the English right to France (salic law); the English campaigns in France are staged in tranches; in both, France had the overwhelming forces, yet the English won against all odds; both have amatory scenes of a king wooing a lady—though here the comparison departs, because Edward’s was unsanctioned and immoral on four counts (in opposition to lady, father, King and God) and tainted, Henry’s sanctioned (by lady, father and regal due, under God)—and fun.

A comparison with all works by Shakespeare does not essentially change this picture, with the exception of a prominence of correspondences with Love's Labour's Lost (1595), Hamlet (1600-1) and Measure for Measure (1604). The Two Gentlemen of Verona (1591-2) and Romeo and Juliet (1594-5) are both amatory, and close enough in terms of writing date not to surprise or disrupt this pattern.

The correlation with Love's Labour's Lost (1595) might be because a large part of that comedy is amatory, and demonstrates a high incidence of clever rhetoric akin with Shakespeare’s parts of King Edward III (distinctio, gradatio, sententiae, truncated sonnets, chiasmus, rhyming couplets and so on); perhaps these aspects might explain the correspondence. Those with Hamlet might be explained by Hamlet’s soliloquies on death against that of Audley and Prince Edward in Sc.12, attributed to Shakespeare. Those with Measure for Measure may be accounted for by the similarity whereby both plays include scenes about the corruption of desire, as King Edward’s for the Countess (2, 3) and those of Angelo for Isabella (X.x).

Otherwise, it is unsurprising that an author will reuse certain phrases throughout his other works, right through his writing career. When presented graphically, the pattern of correspondences is visually telling.

It seems, then, that King Edward III was an extant anonymous play probably written by Thomas Kyd and/or Christopher Marlowe, partially rewritten by Shakespeare, to which he contributed the amatory scenes 1 and 2 and rewrote scene 12 and perhaps revised parts of the remainder. While it links historically with the reigns of Marlowe's Edward II (1593) and Shakespeare's Richard II (1595-6), it does not form a part of the two tetralogies (historically) from Richard II (1595-6) to Richard III (1592-1594); and while references from these and some of the later plays look back to Edward III, it is essentially a standalone history.

King Edward III has not been universally accepted into the Shakespeare canon in this century for various reasons, and was not fully performed at the RSC until 2002. And yet, a play such as Pericles, co-authored by Shakespeare with George Wilkins, who wrote the first 2 acts, about 47%, Shakespeare the last 3 acts, about 53%, which was not included in the First Folio (1623), was later included in the second impression of the Third Folio (1663; second impression 1664; along with 6 other plays since generally excluded from Shakespeare’s works). The editors' assessment is that the original play also had possible structural input from Nashe. But a third-part authorship by Shakespeare of those original scenes of a quality standing out in the overall military chronicle, makes it worthwhile exploring whether or not the play should be considered as part of the Shakespeare canon.

That depends, I believe, on whether those two scenes seem to be of the quality of Shakespearean verse, structure and rhetoric evident in other plays around this time, and whether those two scenes enhance or improve on the remainder of what is mostly a military chronicle (despite its unhistoric moments and anachronisms). Considering that Shakespeare's extant plays of this period are the three parts of Henry VI (1591-2) (all probably co-authored to varying degrees), The Taming Of The Shrew (1589-1592), Two Gentlemen Of Verona (1591-1592), and Titus Andronicus (1591-1592), the standard for comparison within his significant portfolio is not of the highest. That Edward III is almost entirely in verse fits with these early plays.

It remains to determine if those amatory scenes by Shakespeare significantly improve what would otherwise be a purely military chronicle akin to much of the action of the Henry VI plays, dissimilar in substance (as a trilogy) to the depiction of Edward III (r. 1327-77) as a victorious king in France, which ties in with similar themes of the history of Britain hailing from Cymbeline (around the time of Christ) to Henry V (r. 1413-22), VII (r. 1485-1509) and VIII (r. 1509-47)—although by the latter's time much of France was lost—and that in the reign of Henry VI.

Whilst deferring to the considerable amount of scholarship that has gone into producing King Edward III for us, one proceeds with both 'an auspicious and a dropping eye', and looks for touches—structural, rhetorical, expressive, emotive, balanced, characterful—that are even present in the early romantic comedies like Two Gentlemen Of Verona (1591-1592), which, while not one of the more edifying, has its moments—such as its balcony scene being a rehearsal for the real thing only two or three years later in Romeo and Juliet (1594-5). Those are the aspects I sought when analysing this play.

‘Winning Oratory?’

Examination of the language of the amatory scenes (2 and 3) of King Edward III, written by Shakespeare according to the attribution of the Arden editors, reveals a move into rhyming couplets as the King becomes infatuated with the Countess of Salisbury, ‘whose beauty tyrants fear’ (2.95, Warwick). It is signalled by the first couplet picked up by the Countess as she commences her imploration for the King to stay a while at the castle, within the ‘duty’ (2.107) and ‘obedience’ (2.109) beholden of her to her King, rhyming her ‘stay’ (2.119, 138, 441), repeated several times during this encounter, with the King’s determination to be ‘away’ (2.118, 137, 442), for reasons outlined below. This is preceded by a series of asides by the King expounding on that beauty:

KING EDWARD [aside]:
What strange enchantment lurked in those her eyes
When they excelled this excellence they have,
That now her dim decline hath power to draw
My subject eyes from piercing majesty
To gaze on her with doting admiration? King Edward II, 2.103-6

The rhetorical figure of ‘excelled this excellence’, which recurs four times in some form thereafter in the play—all within the scenes the editors deem are wholly written by Shakespeare or heavily revised by him (2, 3, 12)—is a simple use of conduplicatio, the repetition or doubling of words or phrases; also of parachesis, the repetition of the same sound in several words in close succession; and an example of polyptoton, the repeated use of the same word or word pattern, an effective rhetorical device of emphasis and exaggeration; and also an instance of epimone, the repetition of the same word or phrase to emphasize what has been said (‘excel’). But its worth is in the use of ploce, repetition to gain special emphasis or extend meaning. The King, in a phrase, shows himself to be tipping over into excessive infatuation.
He duly tries to rein himself in, wishing to be ‘away’, but the Countess persists in prosecuting her urges for him to ‘stay’. The motif of eyes is transparent, and the capturing of the King’s by her ‘strange enchantment’ initiates a series of suggestions of those eyes piercing both his armour and initiating his amour, while reversing their roles: her beauty is the majesty, he now subject to her beauty. This implicit chiasmus, a crossing of two words, images, figures or ideas, is also a catachresis, an implied metaphor, where eyes or beauty pierce armour.

So far, this is identifiable Shakespeare, with multiple uses of basic rhetoric supported by suggestive imagery used to imply other rhetorical devices and deeper meaning. But it is also transparent that the speech lacks a certain flow, is made clunky by the use of the word ‘lurked’, implying the undercurrent of the King’s suspicions. It expresses infatuation (‘doting admiration’) rather than love by its denial of rhyme, yet does not shine even via its use of eyes and the male gaze (implicit in a word), or the suggested brilliance, the implicit piercing light through the implied shining armour. It is tarnished by the ‘dim decline’ of her beauty, referred to earlier by Warwick as lessened from her usual wont, because of having been assaulted in her castle by the Scots, just fled upon the King’s approach. It expresses the base metal of infatuation compared to the precious ones of love (the silver of the moon, the gold of the sun, those implied metaphors for Elizabeth I), but is not enhanced by any striking imagery but that which lies in implied metaphor.

However, it is not long before the King finds himself in deeper, and Shakespeare uses the imagery and versification of something approaching love, and his comparison of the blinding beauty of the Countess’s eyes, riffing on light, foresees Berowne’s later, and more sophisticated disquisition on light in Love’s Labour’s Lost (1595):

KING EDWARD [aside]:
No farther off than her conspiring eye,
Which shoots infected poison in my heart
Beyond repulse of wit or cure or art.
Now in the sun alone it doth not lie
With light to take light from a mortal eye,
For here two day-stars that mine eyes would see
More than the sun steals mine own light from me.
King Edward II, 2.128-134

This aside is much more in line with the amatory theme, being in rhymed verse—yet of a Petrarchan form: ABBA-ACC, a quatrain and tercet. It does not yet comply with the recognised Shakespearean form of the later sonnets, Quatrain-Quatrain-Quatrain-Couplet, with a typical rhyme scheme of ABAB-CDCD-EFEF-GG—while a truncated form with a crude message in its rhyme comes later (2.180-9). It is but a parcel of another’s form, signifying the earlier sonnets of 1592-4, but more aptly, in its partial state, the beginnings of love, as yet at the phase of infatuation. It uses the metaphor of the ‘sun’ as eyes, but clumsily in the ‘two day-stars’, yet despite the multiple references to light, figures them as icons, the objects of great attention and devotion, with the connotations of the idol of worship. This passage of the speech is also somewhat occluded in meaning, and needs unpacking against the notes to fully understand—but that can also be a measure of Shakespeare at his best; consider Macbeth, where, it might be argued, the darkness of the play is often shrouded in the obfuscation of its language; and the fact that, often, where image compounds image everywhere it arises in his works, there is often little time for the mind to absorb the one before it is superseded by another, especially in performance.

But the speech also is sullied by the King’s impression of himself being ‘stolen’ by her ‘looks’ as equating to a ‘conspiracy’ against his royal person, a form of treachery punishable by death, as well as an ‘infection’ by ‘poison’, not the welcome appreciation of great beauty. Even while he is thus struck in adoration, he sees the typically wondrous experience as a poison which infects the royal person, and thus, by implication the state. The blinding brilliance of the Countess’s eyes ‘steals’ his own charismatic light as King from him. Already, within two asides, the King is not primarily concerned with being infatuated with love, or especially of the wonder of great beauty, but of being subsumed by a conspirator and enemy. The amatory wooing we would expect from such a start does not bode well; and it does not go well: ‘An evil deed done by authority / Is sin and subornation.’ (2.609-10).

While these amatory scenes develop both the action and the mood and emotion through increasingly sophisticated rhetorical tricks, this is evidently reflective of an early Shakespearean use of language, rhetoric and imagery. The versification and imagery develop as the scenes progress, but they do not blaze with the poetry of Romeo and Juliet, but one to five years later (dependent upon a more precise date for the authorship/revision of E3), where we can compare such infatuation as with a stampede of wild horses, the brilliance of the moon as well as sun, the nightingale and the intrusion of the dawn—the tempestuous power, music and colouration of love’s domain—and the equality of feeling. The theme of these scenes in King Edward III is best equated with the poem The Rape of Lucrece (1594), of around the same time, where the object of assault, Lucrece, does indeed kill herself, as the Countess threatens at the end of these amatory scenes, to save her and her absent husband’s honour, and thus prevents the King from ‘perjuring’ himself, against his Queen, himself, and God—and killing an innocent victim of his own ‘folly’ (3.205). This correspondence is one of many noted by the Arden editors, Bennett and Proudfoot.

In conclusion, I was glad I read Edward III because of the various issues it threw out, including rhetoric, co-authorship, and its fit into the Shakespeare canon. I am convinced it should be part of it. Most interest came in those scenes that Shakespeare probably wrote. That said, the play as a whole is of a quality with the very early works, which really only interest about 30% compared to the great tragedies and romances. But it has been a worthwhile study.

[Emily D. · Rating 3 out of 5]

In the first part of this play, King Edward III basically needs to take a cold shower. He is so stupidly distracted by the Countess, and they are both married, and he's got war things to do, so it's quite the hang up. Then the Countess finally convinces him to leave her alone, and he finally feels sheepish and goes and does the warry things.

[Jim · Rating 5 out of 5]

Shakespeare will always be 5 stars for me, even if I don't necessarily love the particular play I am reviewing. There are few writers who have mastered the use of language in the ways that he did, and I am consistently amazed and delighted when I read any of his works for the first, second, and third times.
I enjoy the Pelican Shakespeare editions quite a lot, though I will say I have not read the Oxford, Arden or any other versions, and they may be superior, whatever that means to you. Until I wind my way through all the Pelicans*, I will avoid other versions to maintain a translation consistency. I love that each edition has information about the Theatre, the Texts of Shakespeare, and how the particular play I am reading was seen in a historical context. They also provide footnotes to the text, defining words that may have different meanings than currently, or for words quite foreign to the current linguistic usage.
I know enough about Shakespeare scholarship to understand the different editions all have their proponents and naysayers. I confess to not being overly concerned, though, as true scholars know there aren't any authentic Shakespeare plays, since anything we are reading has been edited so heavily throughout history so even attributing a specific number of lines to a play is impossible. And rather unnecessary I would say.
I have found it is best for me to read the play without reading any of the footnotes first, or referring to them sparingly while reading. I will say that often leads to a slightly confused first look at things depending on the play at hand. But I then follow quickly with a second reading, using the footnotes (sometimes I read all the footnotes on a page first, other times I read them as they
are needed in the text, it just depends). When possible, I will read a third time in succession, by this time I have memorized/remembered all the footnoted words, and this begins my full enjoyment of the play as it is presented.
I will leave it to others to critique each play on its merits, or lack of them, as they see fit to do. I enjoy Shakespeare too much to bother quibbling about details, or assuming in any way the play could have been better done and that readers should consider discussing how that could be accomplished.

*This is an Arden Shakespeare, Third Series book review

King Edward III - themes, analysis, questions of authorship, points to ponder

: national pride, and glory through the battlefield
: forbidden love, and the role of women in the English monarchy
: power of words; promises, oaths, and the breaking of them; loyalty
: is it possible Brits fascination with shows like Downton Abbey has roots in their quasi-religious attention to their dynastic squabblings across time?
: oaths, lots of oaths
: Arden Shakespeare definitely makes me giddy with their information overload provided in the pages before the actual text of the play, the text of which, of course, includes more footnotes!
: a bit, OK a lot, of Scotland-bashing here
: Edward’s lines mix his military and sexual (rape) conquests
: there is a paucity of analysis of this play in comparison to other Shakespeare works


As is often the case with Shakespeare’s historical plays, time is condensed, stretched and overlaid when he requires it. The true personages of the time are also either alive, dead, reborn, or reconfigured as needed(** see below). Few would criticize the play for these dramatic flourishes, as it was, and still is, common practice to do so for the sake of the drama itself. One could argue the problem arises when readers accept drama as fact instead of researching. Yes, most find history dull, but that hardly excuses laziness. Or blind nationalism.
Though the play has lines from other works of Shakespeare, I can understand the reluctance to claim this as mostly Shakespeare-ian. The words lack the usual flourishes and linguistic playfulness. Lines are much more direct and concise, which hardly means it is not Shakespeare, but considering his other works written around the same period, it most assuredly falls short in majestic fabulousness.
-- As an aside: for me the Arden version is significantly harder to read due to its difference in footnote style (AND footnote content) from the Pelican version. Much more academic-oriented. Loved it, but it took me about 4 re-reads of each page to get the flow.
The overlaying of military and sexual conquest in Edward’s lines with the Countess are done quite admirably.
Much of the military action is embellished, condensed, or reconfigured.
Scotland - the land, its king, and its people - comes off rather poorly, which plays into the egregious propagandizing and blatant calls to nationalism in many of the plays of the period.


(King) Edward III is a conundrum of a play for me to review, so if it gets too random just don’t read it - my review, not the play! Is this extremely early Shakespeare, around his early teen years? It is almost entirely lacking in his amazingness, that is for sure. The style has little of Shakespeare's complexity with respect to the lines and their usual necessity of attentiveness for understanding meaning with respect to word placement and punctuation. The Arden edition - Pelican Shakespeare has not published an edition as of 2020 - is overflowing with footnotes, biographical/historical information, and a plethora of awesome explanations for word choices/omissions/emendments that are dizzying at times, but quite explicatory. The Arden editions are of a different textual animal than the Pelican editions, though I found the latter much easier to read due to presentation style. That could be because of this specific play - (King) Edward III - a collaborative-Shakespeare, and its underrepresentation of Shakespeare’s writing of the actual text. Regardless, I enjoyed this play less than I expected, especially considering its relation to the Tetralogies, albeit obliquely.
Froissart (The Chronicles) and Painter (The Palace of Pleasure) seem to be the constant textual references, which makes me wonder if the composers of (King) Edward III didn’t just plagiarize several sources to come up with the play. Seriously, there is a lot of borrowing going on here.
The play’s footnotes are reminders of how characters and place names in Shakespeare's plays have enormous meaning to the audience, especially with regard to national honour.
I learned, amateurishly, about linguistic (and related) terms; chiasmus, alexandrine, anaphora, hendiadys, hypermetrical, epistrophe, minim reading...
Oft-repeated words: Oath, Stay, Three
Copious use of (Aside)s throughout the play. Historically, scholars see this as Shakespeare learning the power of this mechanism for later plays. It does exhibit a powerful manipulation of the audience and the actor(s).
Interesting how words are read differently to maintain the meter of the play (“disyllabic” comes up often in footnotes for words that normally read as trisyllabic or monosyllabic).
Enter again Salic Law! Lost myself in a previous play reading up on this topic.
Wedding knives! Love it.
If there is a country that is less sure of its identity, place in history, and manner of existing than England in the 16th and 17th centuries I would like to know of it. So much grandiosity and calls to divine intervention and royal ass-wiping rights.
There just wasn’t enough “Shakespeare” in this one. The play had its moments - The Countess and Phillippe have great lines - but overall it is obvious this is co-authored. Reminds me of a comment from a Fed-Ex delivery driver I knew. One day he said: “Did you know Fed-Ex has a new motto?” Me: “Nope”. He says: “Fed-Ex. Like you could do better.”
So, yeah, this isn’t Titus Andronicus, or Hamlet, or even Troilus and Cressida, but it’s still more than good enough. Quibble with my tepid, meandering review and my 5-star rating, but you read it to the end, so there’s that. Hah!

**Edward III (not a cobbled together character, though there are plenty of “dramatic flourishes”)
King John II (the play combines him with King Charles IV and King Philip VI to make one character; the real John II is dead by dates used later in the play)
Earl of Salisbury (based on Sir Walter de Manny, real Earl dead by dates used later in the play)
Countess of Salisbury (Edward’s fascination with her is based on his likely historical interest in Salisbury’s sister-in-law, Alice of Norfolk)
Edward, the Black Prince - son of Edward III (historical locales of his participation in battles moved as needed)
Prince Charles/Duke of Normandy - son of John II
Prince Philip - youngest son of John II (not actually born at time of play’s action)
Count of Artois, Lord Mountford the Duke of Brittany - supporters of Edward III (the former dies in 1342, his appearance later in the play either dramatic or some consider the character a composite of actual persons)