King Richard Iii- Seduction of Lady Anne

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In Richard the III by William Shakespeare, the historical circumstances of the play are dominated by male characters, and women characters are downgraded to minor roles. However in Act 1 scene 2, Lady Anne, portraying a female character, manage to achieve verbal power as she and Richard dominate this scene. This scene starts off with a funeral procession as the dead body of King Henry VI is carried through the streets of London, getting ready for reburial. The audiences of the newer generation would obviously find this scene weird, if not, odd, but audiences during Shakespeare’s time would not have depict this as a strange event. This scene was set up in such a way, in dramatic terms, is so the audiences could focus on Lady Anne’s brutal curses towards Richard and his well-being, even though Richard had not enter this part of the scene yet. She also utilizes imagery to emphasize and exaggerate her pleas. The language Lady Anne uses is appropriate for this scene which is set during the funeral process of King Henry VI. The end-stopped lines slows down her speech and this emphasizes how in pain and agony she is over the death of the king. The quote where Lady Anne states “If ever he have wife, let her be made. More miserable by the life of him. Than I am made by my young lord and thee!” is rather ironic because in the end it is she who becomes Richard’s wife. Richard then enters, or rather bursts into this scene with a verbal onslaught and starts his intention on seducing Lady Anne. In the BBC version of this scene, the priests surrounding Lady Anne cowers at the presence of Richard. Even though Richard is not physically appealing, he is, however attractive as a character as he is so outrages and enjoys playing the game of manipulation. There are obvious signs of manipulation going on throughout this scene as Richards acts differently towards the different

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