SOURCE: “The First, Second, and Third Parts of King Henry the Sixth,” in William Shakespeare: The History Plays, Twayne Publishers, 1992, pp. 22-47.

In the essay below, Pearlman summarizes the action, major themes, and principal characters of Henry VI, Parts 1, 2, and 3.

The three parts of Henry the Sixth appear in consecutive order in the great 1623 folio collection of Shakespeare's works. They are placed between The Life of Henry the Fifth and The Tragedy of Richard the Third. It is generally agreed that the three plays were written during the very first years of the 1590s. There is a small body of opinion that denies exclusive authorship of these plays to Shakespeare and argues that they result from a collaborative effort in which Shakespeare played a leading role. There is even a well-developed theory that 1 Henry VI was written after Parts 2 and 3 and is therefore what has lately come to...