Richard III's humor

Marie wrote: To return to the subject of Richard's dry
humour discussed a couple of months back ...

***

Thanks for quoting this, Marie.

I'm surprised that I'm can understand as much of
Richard's French as I can.

Is there really less difference between 15th cent.
French and the French I learned in school than 15th
cent. English and mid-Atlantic states American
English?

(Henry Higgins claims that: "There even are places
where English completely disappears. In America they
haven't used it for years" <g>)

It sounds to me like Richard's also making fun of
diplomatic-speak. Am I reading too much into it?

***

Marie wrote: PS this wrtten 20th August 1483, at time
when Richard supposed to have either just ordered
murder of Princes or be brooding over same. He seems
in a surprisingly perky mood. . . .

***

Here are two possibilities:

1) Richard was as bad as his detractors say he was,
and he was feeling good about putting his nephews to
death;

2) Richard had succeeded in smuggling his nephews out
of the Tower to a place of safety, and he was feeling
good because he'd outwitted his enemies.

I vote for the second possibility, with thanks to
Audrey Williamson (The Mystery of the Princes) and
Isabel Wigram (Were the "Princes in the Tower"
Murdered?).

Marion





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--- In , marion davis
<phaecilia@y...> wrote:
> Marie wrote: To return to the subject of Richard's dry
> humour discussed a couple of months back ...
>
> ***
>
> Thanks for quoting this, Marie.
>
> I'm surprised that I'm can understand as much of
> Richard's French as I can.
>
> Is there really less difference between 15th cent.
> French and the French I learned in school than 15th
> cent. English and mid-Atlantic states American
> English?
>
> (Henry Higgins claims that: "There even are places
> where English completely disappears. In America they
> haven't used it for years" <g>)

Yes, absolutely. I've updated the spelling, but even so it's much
closer to modern French than late Middle English is to moden English.
English has changed more than most European languages. That's said to
be due to the clash between first Old English (Anglo-Saxon) and
Norse, and then Norman French. It took a long while for a settled
compromise language to emerge, and the attempts at communication in
the meantime led to most of the Anglo-Saxon grammatical complexities
being lost. Also, once the grammarians got at English in the 17th
century they started trying to make it look more like Latin,
inventing new rules - also the educated classes started favouring
long words based on French or Latin originals at the expense of the
good old Anglo-Saxon, so we've lost a lot of native words.
The pronunciation of French has changed a lot, I think, but they've
kept such archaic spelling that it doesn't cause a problem with the
written language.
The main difference you get with 15th century French is that, like
modern Spanish, you didn't need to use subject pronouns but could
rely on the verb endings to tell you the person. Modern French, of
course, has too many endings silent for that to be do-able. I notice
louis himself drops the subject pronouns but richard put them all in,
presumably because that came more naturally to him as an English
speaker.
By the way, there are also some letters in Spanish in Harley. There
seem to be quite a lot of mistranscriptions in them, though. I don't
know whether that's the fault of the printed edition or of Richard's
clerks, as they were all copies of incoming docs.

>
> It sounds to me like Richard's also making fun of
> diplomatic-speak. Am I reading too much into it?

I don't think so. That's how I read it. Both his letters seem to
directly mock Louis' own, in fact. Perhaps when I get a minute I'll
post them all up together. They're only short.

>
> ***
>
> Marie wrote: PS this wrtten 20th August 1483, at time
> when Richard supposed to have either just ordered
> murder of Princes or be brooding over same. He seems
> in a surprisingly perky mood. . . .
>
> ***
>
> Here are two possibilities:
>
> 1) Richard was as bad as his detractors say he was,
> and he was feeling good about putting his nephews to
> death;
>
> 2) Richard had succeeded in smuggling his nephews out
> of the Tower to a place of safety, and he was feeling
> good because he'd outwitted his enemies.
>
> I vote for the second possibility, with thanks to
> Audrey Williamson (The Mystery of the Princes) and
> Isabel Wigram (Were the "Princes in the Tower"
> Murdered?).
>
> Marion
>

Yes, honestly, the more I look at richard's own correspondence the
more it becomes obvious that he felt very strongly about a lot of
issues, particularly where they concerned people or countries to whom
he felt hew owed a debt of gratitude or some family loyalty. So I
just can't see him having been at all gleeful about killing his
nephews.
Also, it's occurred to me that once he realised about the plot to
smuggle the princesses abroad to marry to find continental husbands
to invade the country in the event of the boys' death - which he had
certainly done before the end of July - Richard would have been very
keen indeed to keep the boys alive. As a rival, a child you have in
your own custody is, I would say, infinitely less dangerous than a
young woman that you don't have and who is threatening to become the
wife of a foreign prince.
The sticking point for me is that if richard wanted to get rid of
rivals he knew from July 1483 that these included all of Edward IV's
issue. Yet he never showed any inclination even to marry off the
girls to powerless yes-men.

Marie
>
>
>
>
> __________________________________
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The sticking point for me is that if richard wanted to get rid of
rivals he knew from July 1483 that these included all of Edward IV's
issue. Yet he never showed any inclination even to marry off the
girls to powerless yes-men.

Marie


That is one of my concerns too. Why on earth did he do nothing about
the sisters? And in particular why did he not marry off Elizabeth,
especially after the scandal of the rumour that he intended to marry
her himself. I have found myself wondering if the alleged letter,
now lost, from Elizabeth to Norfolk, declaring her love for Richard
himself might have some bearing on this?

Brunhild wrote: I have found myself wondering if the
alleged letter, now lost, from Elizabeth to Norfolk,
declaring her love for Richard himself might have some
bearing on this?

***



I've given that letter some thought. There's an
article in the Ricardian about it: "Sir George Buck
and Princess Elizabeth's Letter : a Problem in
Detection," by Alison Hanham. Audrey Williamson
discusses it briefly in "The Mystery of the Princes."

Hanham says: "... [Richard] controlled the provision
of a suitable marriage such as had been agreed when
Elizabeth's mother consented to leave sanctuary with
her daughters."

I have lots of doubts about that letter. It's hard to
believe that Elizabeth would write anything as
incriminating and dangerous as "I fear the queen will
never die." Wasn't she asking for big trouble? Was
it safe to say she wanted the queen dead because a
queen wasn't as important as a king? How did she
think John Howard, Duke of Norfolk was going to react
to that? How could she believe that was going to help
her?

It's even hard to see how Richard's enemies expected
to benefit from passing around a letter like that.
Would anyone believe Elizabeth would write such a
thing? What would happen if they got caught with the
letter? Wouldn't they pay the same price as the man
who put up the verse about Catesby, Ratcliff, and
Lovell ruling England under a hog?

Did any of Richard and Elizabeth's contemporaries
write about this letter? Or was George Buck the only
one?

Marion




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