GOOD KING HARRY

by Denise Giardina ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 2, 1984

Henry V of England--super-king and squeaky clean in this version--tells his own deathbed story. The major fictional invention here: Harry's life-tong love for fragile Merryn, first encountered as a Welsh waft when Prince Harry reluctantly accompanies his father Henry IV's forces as they smite the Welsh; Harry rescues the starving lass by hiding her from English marauders--and will much later return to take Merryn to his Welsh home for a clean-up, food, and tutoring from his old nurse. Meanwhile, young Harry's troubles with his father follow the well-traveled (if ill-documented) path. Harry just doesn't measure up to the King's ideal of what his heir should be, being a lad who dislikes slaughter and won't settle down. Furthermore, it's obvious to Harry that Father always liked brother Tom best; and there's the matter of King Richard II, whose throne Henry IV, nÉ Bolingbroke, usurped. (""Richard has been more of a father to me than have you."") So the king passes Harry over to ""Hotspur"" Percy for some war training (very different from Shakespeare's version); he also allows Archbishop Arundel's anti-Harry prejudices full play--even with a hint that Arundel plans an assassination of the Prince. And Harry turns for friendship to Sir John Oldcastle (Shakespeare's model for Falstaff); but the two will part company over religion when Oldcastle espouses the Lollard heresy--though later Henry V will, implausibly, stage-manage Oldcastle's escape from the Tower. Then the ill and old Henry IV nears death: there's a father/son reconciliation; pregnant Merryn is brought to the sickbed to comfort the King. But Merryn will die in childbirth, and the new Henry V sets about conquering France. Of course, Henry hates slaughter and war in general. On the other hand, wouldn't it be a good idea to unite Christendom under one leader so there would be no more wars? Furthermore, Henry gets his marching orders from an ancient holy man: ""Pick up the sword therefore and smite the enemies of God."" So smite he does. And there then follow: brief accounts of French battles; the long story of Agincourt and Henry's famous strategy in the use of archers and pointed stakes (which the archers thought was ""a frivolous idea""); and marriage to the mad French king's daughter--who, she hints, might have been dallying previous to wedlock. In all: fudged-up history, unconvincing and anachronistic in tone--with a hero-king who's far too goody-goody for interest or comfort.

Pub Date: May 2, 1984

ISBN: 0449005755

Page Count: -

Publisher: Harper & Row

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 1984

Categories: FICTION