Shakespeare, Richard III-V

Of deformity and envy

In the first scene, Richard gave us an explanation as to why he is a villain and not a lover: he says that he’s deformed. But this seems to be too easy, for he is a renowned warrior, which in and of itself is an attractive feature. Perhaps Richard is not as deformed as he would have us believe; perhaps he plays up his deformity in an effort to be able to exploit his physical flaw not only with other characters in the play but even with his audience. That Richard uses his physical flaw is demonstrated by his indictment of Miss Shore.

There are fewer books that shed more light on Shakespeare’s plays than Francis Bacon’s Essays. To give one example here—his short essay “On Deformity.”