Henry, Prince of Wales, better known as Hal amongst his friends, or sometimes Harry, had arrived at a great resolution. Within this very hour Hotspur would die-Hotspur, his mortal enemy, his tragic...poseur! It was maddening; it was an unbearable affront beyond any describing; that he, Hal, Henry soon-to-be-the-Fifth, the Prince of Fucking Wales for fuck's sake, should live and breathe to see the excellent Hotspur shining before him. Not for another minute could he stand the thought that he should live, and that he should also. Sweet Jesus, no! He must die, or else I; he hummed this in tune, grandly like an epic, as he tripped along across the battlefield.
His father had set this in motion. If Hal should look back on the (fairly short) trail of bitterness fomenting behind him, he would discern the single man, the crown of all insults, the breaker of dromedarian backs: cank'red Bolingbroke, as the Foe once put it so zestily. Sir Walter Blunt, a good man, had brought the evil slander to Hal's ears. Being sincerely devoted to both the king and his son, Blunt had hoped, bless his well-meaning soul, that repeating the king's words would spur the errant prince to mend his wasteful ways. And in the long run, who's to say? the good man may have been perfectly right. But at that immediate moment of hearing such a condemnation, and for a good while afterwards too, Hal recognized only indignation and hate. It is likely that he did not admit even shame, or repentance, until some time later. Later, as in maybe his deathbed. Truth be told, the foul would-have-been of his character was not something he liked to ponder, and when he did ponder it, he vehemently told himself that this would-have-been surely never could have been. With or without Hotspur.
God forbid.
The sweet manly mistress of the tavern implied something otherwise. "My lord," she had said that evening following Hal's serious conference with Blunt, "don't pin your anger on poor Harry Percy. Your father was in the wrong. To say such a thing about his own son! But Percy is a worthy man and an excellent soldier, though too hard-minded at times. A young prince like yourself could do well to learn from him."
Hal sullenly gulped his mug of ale. "Ah, Mistress Quickly. So you are in agreement with my father. I am worthless. Hotspur is the superior specimen."
"Sir, you misread me. Of course I think more of a fine, jolly, drinking-whoring-thieving manly lad like yourself! As for Hotspur-why, he consorts with his wife, by'r lady! A cold clod like him knows nothing of the warm pleasures in life. Only fighting, and conquest, and...snooty lords! with their power games, and...and cousin-marriages. Scuttling about in their cold cellars, drinking 2%-alcohol-by-volume wine-"
"My good hostess," Hal interrupted, laughing, "you outdo yourself. There! I will buy a round of drinks for the whole tavern. As much percent-alcohol-by-volume as can possibly hold, because that is the sort of men we are."
In spite of the hostess' motherly/entrepreneurial? excess, Hal could not help but feel mollified by her words, and convinced, deep-down, about their truth. Hotspur was indeed a ninny, in all things not related to war. What would happen to Jolly England if Hotspur became king, as Hal's curse of a father so wistfully imagined? England would fall apart! It was clear as day how little prissy Percy would act. He'd probably stamp his little foot, and purse his little lips, and declare, "My way or the highway!" to a room full of volatile lords who were simply a political revolution waiting to happen. Now Hal-Hal was savvy. Hal had street smarts. Anyways, what made everyone so sure that Hal couldn't also be like Hotspur if he wanted to? When the time was right, he'd be like Hotspur. Easily. Shimmy Richelieu-like into the other Harry's overrated war paraphernalia and win laurels and laurels of respect, except he'd do it without being a prick. Hotspur, all he ever had on Hal was renown on the battlefield; which, if you think about it, is nothing that a prince with the best military education money can buy couldn't do for himself, if he should so choose. And as king, Hal could make his people happy; indeed! fully prosperous and content. A king was more than these lofty, bug-in-the-ass notions about nobility and pride, or...or morality, even. Ruling a kingdom meant getting your hands dirty, sacrificing your own druthers for the greater happiness of the many. But was Hotspur ready to make that sacrifice? Hal didn't think so.
But his fool father, what had he said? Something about how Yea, there thou mak'st me sad, and mak'st me sin / In envy that my Lord Northumberland / Should be the father of so blest a son: / A son who is the theme of honor's tongue, / Amongst a grove the very straightest plant; / Who is sweet fortune's minion and her pride / Whilst I, by looking on the praise of him / See riot and dishonor stain the brow / Of my young Harry. O that it could be proved / That some night-tripping fairy had exchanged / In cradle clothes our children as they lay, / And called mine Percy, his Plantagenet! / Then I would have his Harry, and he mine."
In the tavern deep in thought, Hal was interrupted by an argument in the next room. It was Falstaff and Mistress Quickly. "Ye lie, hostess," Falstaff's voice could be heard booming. "Bardolph was shaved and lost many a hair, and I'll be sworn my pocket was picked. Go to, you are a woman, go!"
"Who, I?" the hostess retorted. "No; I defy thee! I was never called so in mine own house before!"
Jesus, thought Hal. At least wax off that five o'clock shadow when you say that.
But was it envy? Hal earnestly asked himself this as he roamed the battlefield in search of Hotspur. No, certainly not. Envy was too simple a word. And this-this was hate. If the feeling were merely of envy, that terrible bile in his innards would be cooled over by showers of something similar to...love. Yes! A strange and uneasy sort of love no doubt; seething in salts, and acids, and even, tritely, the color green. But nevertheless the sentiment would have some pure adoration to it, something as silvery and as elevated as a dream of
...oh, of Perseus!
Because Hotspur was, it must be allowed, rather excellent. And such was the nature of envy. Even as Hal's central consciousness stood loudly protesting his hate, a very shy faction within him acknowledged that the killing of Excellent Hotspur would bring as much pain as it would pleasure. In much the same way as (the voice argued [perhaps diplomatically; or not] to an indifferent Hal) malignant tumors, kidney stones, etc.: nice to get rid of, but undoubtedly painful. Or, it could be like the Sex Pistols.
What?
"...punk rock was an aesthetic and political revolt based in a mass of contradictions that sustained it aesthetically and doomed it politically. /their chief theorist and propagandist, Sixties art student and anarchist provocateur/ /London boutique owner/ Malcolm McLaren1 understood that rock & roll was the most important, perhaps the only kind of culture the young truly cared about...and that therefore rock & roll was not just the necessary first principle of any youth revolt, but that revolt's necessary first target.
"In the past, rock & roll in the context of youth revolt had always been seen by its fans merely as a weapon, or more deeply, as an end in itself, as self-justifying-which was self-defeating, because it meant that when all was said and done, rock & roll did not open up questions of justice, identity, blabbity blah...but made them disappear. Thus the Sex Pistols damned rock & roll as a rotting corpse /denounced their forebearers as farts and fools/ and yet, because they had no other weapons and because they were fans in spite of themselves, the Sex Pistols played rock & roll...
"'I don't understand it,' says Rotten with his winning blend of mockery and innocence. 'All we're trying to do is destroy everything. 2' -John Rockwell, the New York Times, August 1977.
"Formed in late 1975, they released their first single, 'Anarchy in the U.K.,' on November 19th, 1976, and had ceased to exist as much more than an asset in a court fight by January 14th, 1978."
A real tragoidia, what a shame. Even polished with a delicious zing! of authentic Aristotelian irony. The Sex Pistols saw in rock n' roll an archetype of the looming, monstrous Other,3 to which they responded with the appropriate antagonism. But their denouement was congenital.4 Rock had posed, circa a generation earlier, a different kind of youth rebellion from punk; in that rock was founded, fundamentally, on certain aesthetic principles: derived from gospel and blues, etc. Punk,5 on the other hand, was made to sound-what's the word-ah yes, fugly. It offered no "literal" pluses to its manifold coup-spirited minuses. Only nihilism. That, arguably, was punk's6 signature piece, its "Stairway to Heaven," if you will. But-astoundingly-it was marvelous; truly. As Heidegger might say, it was an originary violence-doing, the way that all beginnings are violent; a rare moment of real phusis, in the sense that-
Hal spieth Falstaff on the ground. He started with mild surprise, then chuckled inwardly. It was just like Falstaff to plop his fat self down in the middle of nowhere, and lie there marinating in his epicurean digestions. Hal had an insult upon his lips-something about how lazy it was even for Falstaff to lounge around sleeping in the midst of a fucking war-but then he stopped himself. Zounds, he breathed, that's right! This is a war. And this, after all, is Falstaff. Falstaff whose portly body was never built for stiff intangibles such as valor or prowess or honor or whatnot. Whose tofu-like arm could more ably wield a mutton chop than a sword. Hal gasped in sudden horror and threw himself on the ground by the side of his motionless friend.
"What, old acquaintance?" he cried. "Could not all this flesh / Keep in a little life? Poor Jack, farewell! / I could have better spared a better man. / O, I should have a heavy miss of thee / If I were much in love with vanity. / Death hath not struck so fat a deer today, / Though many dearer, in this bloody fray. / Emboweled will I see thee by-and-by..."
Falstaff riseth up. "Emboweled? If you embowel me today I'll give you leave to powder me and eat me too tomorrow. 'Sblood, 'twas time to counterfeit-"
"Hush," Hal choked sotto voce, pushing Falstaff down and laying a finger across his astonished, mid-sentence mouth. "Shhh.....go to sleep." He grasped Falstaff's hand and wept disconsolately, his head laden with mourning. Hal held a great resolution in his heart; and here, nothing less than his bereaved sorrow could have kept it there. "Jack," he spoke between pressed sobs. "Let me remember...this! Jolly brother-my better half!...goodbye."
And then. And then Hal got up, walked away, and killed Hotspur.
(Falstaff watched him go, baffled and amazed.)
It made me quite sad, the first time I realized that the young Prince Henry and I were in the throes of a heated competition. I saw at once that our rivalry was of that deadly kind which, in the end, takes no prisoners. There are some competitions that are healthy, build character, and encourage progress; in these, everyone is a winner. The conflict between myself and the prince was of the opposite character; the kind that obliterates human justice and consumes into itself all that is good. In these, there is one victor and one loser. The victor sweeps up everything, while the loser-the loser is erased.
I was not aware that this rivalry existed between myself and Prince Henry, until I received a letter from Sir Walter Blunt recounting what the prince had vowed before his father the king. The prince, wrote Sir Walter, announced a very pointed resolve to kill me-me in particular: "I will redeem all this on Percy's head," was what the prince declared, "And, in the closing of some glorious day, / Be bold to tell you that I am your son, / When I will wear a garment all of blood, / And stain my favors in a bloody mask, / Which, washed away, shall scour my shame with it."
I think Sir Walter is an instigator.
It is true that Sir Walter's news made me sad, but it is not because I was afraid. I knew one thing for certain, that I was as good a warrior as any there ever was. I had proven myself in battle. Only recently, at Holmedon-this was when the king had not yet spurned my fealty-I conquered Mordake, Earl of Fife and eldest son / To beaten Douglas, and the Earl of Athol, / Of Murray, Angus, and Menteith. The cank'red king himself admitted, is this not an honorable spoil? / A gallant prize? I cannot pretend modesty where there is none; for it was a gallant prize, a medal to my good name. In combat, I am prepared to overcome anyone. But this, this is my secret: I fight not out of a virgin, uncomplicated zeal, as many people think. I fight for something greater. I am sincere with all my faith when I say that I am not a violent man-in my heart I am not! I am not in love with death. A lunatic is in love with death.
"That he shall render every glory up / Yea, even the slightest worship of his time, / Or I will tear the reckoning from his heart."
Brave Achilles spends the better part of Homer's poem sulking in his ship, rather than fighting. Agamemnon had injured his honor, and as revenge, Achilles withholds his mighty force from the side of the poor Achaean host. A host so in need that Patroclus dies in pity of them (objective genitive only). When at last Achilles emerges to fight, he does so knowing that he will die. He knows that in this death, a death of love, he will become immortal, the voices of poets will make him immortal, they will bathe his name in glory forever. Beautiful ephebe, forever.
"Percy is but my factor, good my lord, / To engross up glorious deeds on my behalf..."
It is the lot of men to die. Even if Achilles had chosen not to fight-if he had chosen to go home, back to his father's land, and lived to see a happy, healthy, prosperous old age-still this Achilles would have died someday. But golden honor: in this death Achilles becomes a god. Deeds of men.
"This in the name of God I promise here; / The which if he be pleased I shall perform, / I do beseech your Majesty will salve / The long-grown wounds of my intemperance."
What is a man forgotten, a man who lives and dies, and ho-hums away all the time in between? He is accidental. He is like an empty sack flapping in the Arizona wind, a nameless-faceless accessory to another man's dream.
Strange that Prince Henry should choose to make an accessory of me. I did not think the prince cared enough about me to engage me as he did in his hate.
But something happened which he saw, and desired. I believe that the prince came to hate me because I was a wave of invisible air that, through some miracle of devotion, learned to carve my name into the rocks. A monument fit for a king I always knew I was no king Henry wanted to be that king. Henry was drunken and crazed by too much potential. Unfortunate lad! That was my hamartia.
I saw a man like me. "If I mistake not, thou art Henry Monmouth," I said.
He answered, "Thou speak'st as if I would deny my name."
"My name is Harry Percy."
"Why, then I see a very valiant rebel of the name. / I am the Prince of Wales, and think not, Percy, / To share with me in glory any more. / Two stars keep not their motion in one sphere, / Nor can one England brook a double reign / Of Harry Percy and the Prince of Wales."
"Nor shall it, Harry, for the hour is come / To end the one of us; and would to God / Thy name in arms were now as great as mine!"
"I'll make it greater ere I part from thee, / And all the budding honors on thy crest / I'll crop to make a garland for my head."
"I can no longer brook thy vanities."
They fight. The Prince killeth Percy.
"Coda, This Episode is Not Relevant"
[Act 3 Scene I. Wales. A room.
[Enter Glendower. The room is bare; there is only a television set on the floor, and a barstool in center. The television set is on, playing the nightly news of mundane content: local robberies, weather reports, diet pill investigations. Etc. etc.
[In a far upstage corner, a man sleeps on the floor, snoring audibly. A kitten plays at his feet, batting a ball of string.
[Glendower sits on the barstool.]
GLENDOWER:
I cannot blame him. At my nativity
The front of heaven was full of fiery shapes
Of burning cressets, and at my birth
The frame and huge foundation of the earth
Shaked like a coward.
[The audience murmurs an ambivalent response. It is a mixture of disbelief, amusement, and contempt, as if to say, "Is this guy for real?" And then someone says aloud, "Is this guy for real?"]
GLENDOWER:
I say the earth did shake when I was born.
[The audience groans impatiently. One person stands up an yells, "You suck." Another boos in agreement and adds, "Go home." Yet a third joins in with a: "We want a pitch-er not a belly itch-er." Whereupon this third fellow's friend elbows him in the ribs, shushes him, and calls him Dumbass.
[The audience begins to get up and leave as Glendower continues to declaim onstage.]
GLENDOWER [somewhat injured, emotionally]:
The heavens were all on fire, the earth did
Tremble.
[The audience's exit is clamorous, and Glendower waits (embarrassed and offended) until the din leaves the room. A calm prevails. There remains a soft, unobtrusive noise from the television's droning, the man's snoring, and the kitten's purring.]
GLENDOWER:
Cousin.
Of many men
I do not bear these crossings. Give me leave
To tell you once again that at my birth
The front of heaven was full of fiery shapes
The goats ran from the mountains-
[Glendower is interrupted by the kitten mewing at him and rubbing its cheek against his socks. This is too much for Glendower. With an obsessive-compulsive rage, he unleashes a girlish scream, seizes the kitten, and hurls the kitten into the wings. Then, self-conscious, he turns toward the "audience" and re-dignifies himself with a macho grunt.]
GLENDOWER [resuming]:
The goats ran from the mountains and the herds
Were strangely clamorous to the frighted fields.
These signs have marked me extraordinary,
[Here, the sleeping man begins to snore more loudly. Glendower cringes a little, plainly irritated, but he pretends not to notice and continues to speak with increased volume and enunciation.
[While he is doing this, a Chap enters and nudges the sleeping man awake. We hear him whisper: "Peace, cousin Percy; you will make him mad." Cousin Percy gives a startled, "Wha-?", mumbles a post-sleep whimper about something or other, and shuffles offstage with the Chap.]
GLENDOWER:
And all the courses of my life do show
I am not in the roll with common men.
Where is he living, clipped in with the sea
That chides the banks of England, Scotland, Wales,
Which calls me pupil or hath read to me?
And bring him out that is but woman's son
Can trace me in the tedious ways of art
And hold me pace in deep experiments.
[He pauses. The television drones on quietly.]
GLENDOWER [suddenly forlorn in an existential way; he heaves a small, hollow sigh]:
I can call spirits from the vasty deep.
[The television sputters and dies. The lights dim, first from the outer edges of the stage and moving gradually toward the center, until the only light remaining is a single bright beam bearing down on the seated Glendower. Then we hear a fingers' snap offstage, and the light goes off.]
FINIS
1 "Punk was fake culture, product of McLaren's fashion sense..."; in other words, a vulgar promotional gig for his clothing store (called, conveniently, Sex), the consumer base of which was the youth-anarchist/youth-anarchist-wannabe demographic.a
a Perhaps an over-simplification; but nonetheless an important consideration.
2 On Johnny Rotten: "After the Sex Pistols broke up, he demolished his persona, rebaptized himself John Lydon...and gave interviews denouncing rock generally and punk specifically.
3 Call it Oedipalism (i.e. re: Laius), if that helps.
4 Pun: Sex Pistols, congenital... Tee hee.
5 that is, Sex Pistols-brand punk
6 Ibid.