a lesson in the importance of assumed audience and the perils of second-person

[angevin2]

The preface to Gordon McMullan's Norton Critical Edition of 1 Henry IV begins thus:

You recognize Henry VIII and Elizabeth I when you see them in portraits, I'm sure. Of all the other English kings and queens, I imagine you have slightly more of a sense of Henry V than of the rest -- assuming, that is, that you have seen one or the other of the

Comments

[fajrdrako]

Aside from Kenneth Branagh, is there a reason to think students woudl know more about Henry V than Henry IV? I don't recall either of them having been covered when I was in high school, or that either was given any preference over the other. We never studied any of Shakespeare's history plays. Are they studied more in the US school system, or was he addressing a British audience?

[gillo]

Even in Britain, the sort of history that teaches Agincourt as a high point of the Onward March of the English People Towards their Rightful Place of World Domination has been dead a good half-century or more. Self-flagellation has been the historical fashion most of my lifetime.

I live in Kenilworth. I know about the same about each of them, but rather more on the whole about John of Gaunt.

[fajrdrako]

Self-flagellation has been the historical fashion most of my lifetime.

Heh. Canadians aren't into self-flagellation (how kinky!) but if it isn't boring, diplomatic, and focussed on Canada/some-place-else relations, I don't think it made it to my high school text book. Except World War II. We had lots and lots and lots about World War II. That probably just reflects when I was in school - mostly through the 1960s. Agincourt? Not so much. The only French/English battle we covered was the Battle of the Plains of Abraham.

Now, I happen to know all sorts of odds and ends about Henry IV, Henry V and John of Gaunt, but that's because I love historical novels and Shakespeare. I wouldn't expect undergraduates to have a clue.

[gillo]

Presumably Vimy Ridge was the only significant location of World War One too?

I recall reading pretty illustrated history books for children with heroic General Wolfe dying at the moment of his victory. (Montcalm, was it?) but absolutely no context otherwise - it took me forty years to get that. Agincourt wasn't taught as such but was in similar books.

We're so used to being told the Empire was a Bad Thing that we just start out with the guilt these days. Currently it's all breast-beating about the Triangular Trade. Which I personally disapprove of and didn't take part in, so can I just say "sorry" and move on, please?

[angriest]

It does read as pretty condescending to me.

[tempestsarekind]

Hee. My reaction was the opposite--any time anyone says "You know [subject X], I'm sure," or tells me that I will "surely" know something, I automatically want to go "Nuh-uh!" and then kick that person in the shins and run away. Even though, yes, in fact, I *do* recognize Henry VIII and Elizabeth I from portraits.

[liadan_m]

1) most of my classes wouldn't know Henry VIII's portrait other than as an old dead guy. Elizabeth they might. The other Henrys? no way in hell. The other english kings they might know are William of Normandy and/or Richard Lionheart. (possibly John Lackland, but both Richard and John are because of Robin Hood)

[poliphilo]

You'd think he could have found a way of saying it that was a little less patronising.