The Stage Craft of Disability: A Review of Shakespeare's Richard III

Though rooted in historical fact, William Shakespeare’s depiction of King Richard III is an example of the playwright’s keen stagecraft which allowed the bard to explore a multiplicity of meaning and explore conventional (to his time) social conceptions of disability. According to documentation, the historical figure upon whom the character is based did not suffer from the disability or deformity which is emphasized as a key component of the character. The character of a disabled Richard is rather an example of an amalgamation of Shakespeare’s political expediency, literary tool and raree show to delight audiences.

Historical documentation indicates that Richard III did not suffer from the physical characteristics or limitations described throughout the play, such as references to his hunched back or withered arm. Shakespeare’s likely motivation for portraying Richard as a “demonic cripple” was to support and perpetuate the negative view of Richard and the Plantagenet line which was held by the current monarch, Queen Elizabeth I. The first historical descriptions characterizing Richard in such a manner may be attributed to Elizabethan devotee Sir Thomas More in 1513.

The image of Richard as a being who was not physically able and normal in appearance would have carried great significance for a Renaissance audience who believed in the idea that the outward appearance offered a reflection of a person’s inward character or morality. Shakespeare chose to take advantage of this set of beliefs by presenting Richard as physically broken as a symbol of and motivation for the character’s evil nature. This imagery also capitalized on the notion of the disabled or physically imperfect as dangerous beings. Richard was described as “not just a person with a hunchback, but a treacherous one whose most heinous act was his alleged murder of his two child nephews…” he is “…also credited with the murders of his wife Anne Neville, Brother George, King Henry VI, and his son Edward” (Covey 172).

Shakespeare, ever aware of the live performance aspect of his plays, would have anticipated the entertainment value of embodying evil in a monstrous and grotesque character. Richard’s infirmities would have served as a visual cue for the audience to beware of the danger and evil of the freakish character. Stage productions have depicted Richard in varying degrees of impairment since the play was first produced around 1633. Some productions have chosen to downplay the aspects of disability allowing the impairments to take on a more subtle effect. Author Leonard Kriegel wrote of the powerful impact an obviously disabled Richard (performed by actor Anthony Sher) could have even on a modern audience (who do not share the Renaissance ideas intermingling disability and evil). He describes how Richard “…advances menacingly on the audience, swinging on two crutches that propel his body forward as if it were being hurled at the audience. He bounds like some threatening animal across the stage. Throughout the performance the crutches emerge as a statement of Richard’s presence, both a prop for Sher and a weapon with which he seems to flail away at the audience’s sense of well being” (Kriegel 31). Richard’s impact however was not limited to visual effect. Shakespeare’s masterful development of this character and its portrayal of disability similarly challenges the audience.

Frequently in literature, “the cripple is the creature who has been deprived of his ability to create a self”(Kriegel 34). In the opening soliloquy the audience is granted access to Richard’s personal thoughts, a true reflection of his self perception. This initial articulation reveals that Richard does not envision himself as weak or lacking, but rather as a personification of control and ability. He views himself as a politician and a warrior first. Richard bemoans his difficulty in adjusting to the transition of war and instability to peace, as though without war and turmoil he has no purpose. In describing himself he references his disability secondly, and this self characterization is mostly marked by how his disability interferes with his ability to assimilate. But he does not allow the disability to define how he sees himself. It seems as though Richard has deceived himself of his true condition when during wartime he is able to contribute on the battlefield – immersing himself in the action and forgetting his form. There are a few lines in the play which infer that he is only reminded of it when confronted with his own image or shadow., when he does not have the warriors sense of purpose and distraction. In his opening soliloquy he states that without battle he has “no delight to pass away the time,/ unless to see my shadow in the sun/and descant my own deformity” (1.125-27). Richard is not internally limited by his condition and he proves masterful at creating images and personas for his advantage. In the opening of the play, he complains that “Why, I , in this weak piping time of peace,/Have no delight to pass away the time” (Richard, 1.1.24-25) Richard proclaims that he will create his own excitement, stating “To entertain these fair well-spoken days,/ I am determined to prove a villain” (Richard, 1.1.29-30). His constructed image allows him to maintain a vantage from which he can cause chaos, without being recognized as the source. He states that his image that he portrays allows him this power. He enjoys the contrariness of his feigned existence stating “And thus I clothe my naked villany/With odd old ends stol’n forth of holy writ/ And seem a saint, when most I play the devil” (Richard, 1.3.335-338).

Though there are several scenes in which Richard choreographs the events to suit his purpose and help reinforce the constructed images he has created for himself, one of the most significant may be found in Act 3, Scene 7. In this scene Richard devises a plan to take the throne, while seemingly not affected by the desire for power. He presents an image of himself as a pious prince, more concerned in the council of the bishops whom he has arranged as props. He celebrates the hypocrisy of his pretended piety when he states “For God doth know, and you may partly see/How far I am from the desire of this” (Richard, 3.7.234-235). This ability to convince people of virtues and characteristics which were not sincere to the individual was an idea that was promoted in Machiavelli’s The Prince, and was described as a necessary tool of power and skill, we can see in this passage how Richard’s seeming piety and disinterest in the power of the throne helps him to appear an ideal leader, while allowing Richard to obtain his true objectives.

In her article, “Enabling Richard: The Rhetoric of Disability in Richard III”, Katherine Schapp Williams argues that Richard actually uses the condition of his body as a form of persuasion and point of distraction against his interlocutors. She argues that Richard employs his broken body as a “full blown narrative device that accrues force for his own machinations” (Williams 3). Richard, though politically shrewd, is discounted as he performs ministrations toward his ultimate goal of usurping the throne. Though the tradition of outer form reflecting inner evil perpetuates the concept that the disabled are dangerous and wicked, Richard’s true malevolent intent is actually masked by the physical abnormalities which characterize him and upon which the other characters are fixated. He manipulates others perceptions of himself by using their own assumptions of his disability against them. He reinforces their incorrect notions by stating “ Because I cannot flatter and look fair/ Smile in men’s faces, smooth deceive and cog” (1.3.47-48) he is ill suited to the politics of the royal court. Other characters in the play are focused instead on his deformity, again by Richard himself. In his pretended resistance of the throne, Richard points to his physicality as a factor which should eliminate him from consideration. He states “So mighty and many are my defects,/That I would rather hide me from my greatness” (3.7.160-161). Later in the same scene he again protests, “I am unfit for state and majesty” (3.7.205). Just as other characters created by Shakespeare such as Henry V, Julia from The Two Gentlemen of Verona and Edgar from King Lear have used masks to move stealthily gathering information and manipulating situations, so Richard uses his disability to move as an undetected threat, so much so that Williams argues that his “bodily difference may actually be enabling” (Williams 2).

Shakespeare also portrays Richard’s awareness that he is able to manipulate others, despite his appearance. In wooing Anne, Richard overcomes not only their tumultuous personal history caused by his murderous deeds, but also his physical abnormalities which Anne references frequently. She calls him a “foul lump of deformity” (1.2.57). She also refers to him in inhuman by calling him a hedgehog. After he has successfully won her, he crows that he has used his “foul” form to win her, with nought but “the plain devil and dissembling looks” (1.2.236).

Shakespeare also employs Richard’s physical condition to explore the idea of isolation. Richard’s physical condition as compared with other characters is visually distinctive offering a clear demarcation of normality and abnormality. Socially too, Richard is clearly isolated as he offers in his first soliloquy, confiding that “But I, am not shaped for sportive tricks/Nor made to court an amorous looking glass….And that so lamely and unfashionable/That dogs bark at me as I halt by them” (Richard III 1.1.15-16 and 23-24) This separation from society is described by Richard as having forced upon him by his physical condition, and implies that it is a consequence over which he has no control. He adds that even animals are alarmed as he passes emphasizing the monstrous nature of his appearance as markedly inhuman. This is also important because it implies that he is unable to form solidarity or companionship with any creature – human or otherwise. This theme is reemphasized in the wooing scene between Richard and Anne when she declares “Villain, thou knowst’ not law of God nor man./No beast so fierce but knows some touch of pity.” Several times in the play Richard is described in animalistic terms, as a hedgehog, and a toad. But the assertion that Richard is not even on the level of an animal, but rather is spurned even by animals, and does not even have the endearing qualities of an animal demonstrates how completely ostracized Richard has become. The sense of separation or not belonging is palpable “for Shakespeare’s characters with disabilities or deformities…they were separated with an added dimension from other characters not lacking disabilities.”

This social isolation to which he has been relegated by fate defines our reading of Richard and his motivations. His lack of personal relations and interconnectedness is an important feature of his identity. Shakespeare frequently explored issues of identity and humanity in his plays like King Lear and The Tempest, in which characters like Lear and Prospero withdrew socially, only to be redeemed by their relations with others. He does not offer that remedy for the character of Richard. Richard is keenly aware of his separation from others, and this is especially clear in Act 5, Scene 3 when he is visited by the Ghost of his wife Anne. He bemoans this lack of fellowship and communion crying out “I shall despair. There is no creature loves me;/And if I die, no soul will pity me” (5.3.201-202) He states simply that there is no one to whom he feels allegiance or love for but himself, stating, “Richard loves Richard; that is, I and I” (5.3.184).

Perhaps one of the most intriguing components of the character of Richard is the paradoxical configuration of self determination and predetermination. Shakespeare creates a fictionalized account of a historical event, which requires a predefined conclusion, one that must take into account the preferences of the current power structure (Queen Elizabeth I). Shakespeare also recognized the need to provide an ending in which misdeeds were punished and injustices rectified. He also needed to create a character and resolution for that character which was supported by cultural beliefs. However in creating the character of Richard III, Shakespeare challenged notions of control over one’s one fate. He created in the character of Richard a disabled figure who refused to have his actions or identity defined solely by his physicality. A character who though disabled demonstrated remarkable strength and ability both in the political arena, and also on the battlefield, stirs emotions audiences which are unsettling. As Kriegel pointed out, the visual aspect of the character can be impactful, but the emotional and social aspects of Richard are equally disturbing. Richard’s paradoxical nature as both disabled and deformed, while extremely strong and able in battle and political maneuvering challenges the audience (both modern and early) to question our ideas of body image and disability. Many have argued that this play helped perpetuate the ideas of disability and evil being intertwined, but I would argue that a more sophisticated reading would focus on Shakespeare’s twofold emphasis on the paradox of disability/ability as well as on the devastating effect that the isolation caused by his disability had upon Richard.


Works Cited

Covey, Herbert. “Shakespeare on Old Age and Disability.” International Journal on Aging and Human Development. Vol. 50. 169-183. 2000
Kriegel, Leonard. “The Cripple in Literature.” Images of the Disabled, Disabling Images. Eds. Alan Gartner and Tom Joe. Praeger: New York. 1987. 31-46
Shakespeare, William. The Tragedy of King Richard the Third. The Complete Pelican Shakespeare. Eds. Orgel, Stephen and A. R. Bruanmuller. New York: Penguin, 2002. 910-957.
Williams, Katherine Schapp. “Enabling Richard: The Rhetoric of Disability in Richard III.” Disability Studies Quarterly, Vol 29, No 4. 2009. http://www.dsq-sds.org/article/view/997.