SOURCE: “The Dark Comedy of the Henry VI Plays,” in Thalia, Vol. 1, No. 2, Autumn, 1978, pp. 11-21.

In the essay below, Watson traces the farcical, sardonic, and grotesque patterns of Henry VI, Parts 1, 2, and 3.

Although the three parts of Henry VI have always offered more than their fair share of grist for the mills of historical scholarship, only recently have they attracted much appreciation or critical interest as plays. After several fine productions and interpretive essays, it no longer seems necessary to excuse them as the products of composite authorship, an inchoate genre, or a young playwright's apprenticeship. This essay will explore their theatricality, concentrating upon those scenes which are essentially comic or whose ironic, macabre, or grotesque tone places them very near the comic. As the comedy in the first tetralogy progressively darkens from the laughter of derision in Part 1 to the macabre violence of Richard III, its...