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The Chorus in act 5 of Henry Vlikens Henry's victory to that of Julius Caesar: Like to the senators of th' antique Rome / With the plebeians swarming at their heels,/Go forth and fetch their conqu'ring Caesar in." (1) To envisage a scene of national triumph for an English king, Shakespeare chose the Roman republic with all sections of the population participating in the triumph--the plebeians and the senators, who presumably included the patricians, although a substantial number of the latter were absent at Caesar's triumph. The sense of a national triumph brings to mind the idea of a matter for common rejoicing, of the common good that involved the entire body of the people. By foregrounding and bringing together the issues of war and the common good, this choric portrayal of victory tempts us to question how far such a war contributes to the general good.
Although the notion of the public good is common to most forms of government, it was the republican form that emphasized the goal. According to Aristotle, all forms of government, whether monarchy, aristocracy, or democracy, were directed toward achieving the public good. (2) Nevertheless, in course of time, the republic (res publica or public thing) came to represent what Cicero calls "the concern of a people." (3) Markku Peltonen emphasizes the notion of the "public good" as an important feature of the classical republicanism of the 1650s, which was indebted to Greek and especially Roman sources. According to Peltonen, 'It conceived of men as citizens rather than subjects; they were characterized not so much by obedience to the king as by active participation in the political life of their community through counselling and the law-making process. The citizens' participatory role was chiefly based on their virtuous characters, which enabled them to promote the public good.' (4) Peltonen emphasizes public good; J. G. A. Pocock writes in a similar vein that republics directed the "intelligence of all to the good of all." (5) Even though the objective of the common good did not feature in England as exclusively a republican notion, its association with the republican ideal would have been recognized.
The question as to how far war could contribute to the general weal could well provide an occasion for debate. Although Henry V portrays Caesar's victory at Pharsalia as an occasion for common rejoicing, in Julius Caesar, Marullus and Flavius rebuke the plebeians who grace this unholy triumph. Marullus carefully distinguishes between Caesar's war of autocracy waged against a compatriot like Pompey and wars of conquest abroad; the latter, he implies, could justify a scene of general rejoicing. Henry's war against France and Essex's unsuccessful venture in Ireland to which the chorus in Henry V refers were both wars of conquest, but their justifiability remains open to question. The analogy can be extended to Coriolanus's triumphant return after the defeat of the Volscians, a victory greeted by the entire populace. Because Henry V and Coriolanus center on the theme of war, it is legitimate to explore the relationship between war and the common good in these plays.
Significantly, soon after completing the second tetralogy with Henry V, Shakespeare turned to the Roman history plays. (6) From a political perspective, Rome could symbolize the empire as well as the republic. Yet Shakespeare's dramatization of the disintegration of the republic in Julius Caesar (7) and Antony and Cleopatra and the early days of the republic in Coriolanus suggests that he was interested in the functioning of the republican form of government, which presented an alternative to monarchy. The change from English to Roman history implies an attempt to review the objectives and ideals of government through the perspective of republican Rome. Charles and Michelle Martindale write, "the three Roman plays are best seen as developments of English histories. By switching his attention to Rome, Shakespeare was able to achieve both a greater detachment and a rather greater freedom of manoeuvre." (8)
Republican ideas had acquired currency in England, and republican writings were beginning to be familiar possibly decades before Shakespeare's time, as some critics have argued. (9) Moreover, important works popularizing republican ideas were being translated in the sixteenth century. Christopher Marlowe translated the first book of Lucan's Pharsalia, which portrayed the defeat of the republican Pompey, in 1598. Tacitus's Annals, which paid tribute to the Roman republican values, was also translated by R. Grenewey in 1598. (10) Machiavelli's writings probably familiarized classical republican ideas, perhaps in a slightly modified form, in Elizabethan and Jacobean England. Although the first translation of the Discorsi was not published until 1636, it was known and circulated both in Italian and in manuscript translations. (11)
Hadfield argues that "republicanism and republican ideas had a crucial influence on Shakespeare's work, defining the trajectory of his early career." According to him, the histories as well as the tragedies emphasize the "virtue of the individual and ability to rule, not simply inherited rights." (12) Emphasis on individual ability would suggest a preference for a relatively meritocratic and democratic social order rather than an endorsement of monarchy as a divinely ordained institution. I would add, moreover, that not only does a history play like Henry Vemphasize the individual ability of the monarch, but it also demonstrates the active virtue of the common people, and republican ideals feature in many ways in the history plays as in the Roman plays. In this paper, I read Henry V and Coriolanus together, seeking to demonstrate that the phenomenon of war is judged in both plays with respect to the republican ideal of the common good and is seen to serve only sectional, that is, absolutist, oligarchical, or ecclesiastical interests. The common people, who are the most exploited by the practice of war, appear as its most articulate critics. The plays concern themselves with the political rights of the subject and the citizen. Acquisition of power by the people in Coriolanus provides a solution. Moreover, a republican vision of history breaks through the facade of the official ideology and historiography to which Henry V, as I hope to show, only nominally subscribes.
Henry V
By and large, the history plays dramatized the process of nation-building that was going on in western Europe simultaneously with the growth of centralized monarchies. (13) The official Tudor historiography showed Henry as a strong king whose reign prefigured that of Elizabeth. (14) His victory in France could apparently be represented only as a national triumph. The consolidation of absolutist power was closely connected with warfare. As Perry Anderson writes, "Warfare was not the 'sport' of princes, it was their fate ... it beckoned them inexorably as a social necessity of their estate." (15) War was useful to princes for a variety of reasons--to keep discontented minds at home busy, achieve national unity, and acquire foreign territory--although subjects were often kept ignorant of the real reasons. While watching Shakespeare's play, the audience might have been reminded of dubious contemporaneous practices, as Nina Taunton suggests: "The playtext was also completed in the context of debate over Elizabeth's method of fighting foreign wars abroad in order to maintain peace at home." (16) That Henry V shows the monarch and other proponents of war trying to justify the phenomenon in terms of the national weal would indicate the prevalence of republican ideas. The play, however, exposes the pretensions that the sectional interests present, ultimately suggesting that wars of conquest contradict notions of the general good.
Before calling the ambassadors, Henry debates the pros and cons of the war with his nobles and clergymen. Each section pretends to argue...
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