Abstract
William Shakespeare's dramatic take on valour is complex and multifaceted, yet we can distinguish a recurring pattern of fake/dubious valour contrasted with real/idealised valour, which in turns leads to a consideration on what valour is for.
Introduction
Let us give a working definition of valour as 'conspicuous courage, typically in conflict'. It has to be conspicuous, to appear to audiences and characters onstage. And drama typically revolves around conflict anyway. We are concerned with actions, the externalised aspect of courage, and sometimes but not always the prospect of witnesses, inciters, mockers or adversaries on the receiving end. And this must imply an appreciation of risk and hazard.
We will first take a brief run through the plays in the (probably unsatisfactory) categories of Tragicomedy, Comedies, Histories and Tragedies. We will ignore for now the idea of 'problem plays' or satires/parodies.
Our aim here is to pick out patterns and themes, and identify questions for a more searching analysis later. Rough notes rather than polished prose will be the style used for brevity, with uncertainty of what is most significant to the question of valour.
Then we will consider how Shakespeare distinguishes between false appearances, true natures and ethical purpose of valour, before concluding.
'Tragicomedy'
In The Tempest, a mature work, Prospero oppresses Caliban by terror, Caliban resists but finds his new masters lack valour (I’ll not serve him; he is not valiant.
) Prospero could strike at his foes, but The rarer action is in virtue than in vengeance.
Valour here is shown often stupid, stubborn, defensive or drunk, striking at air, achieving little. Sailors need unhampered professionalism to contend with storm, not valour. Mad valour drowns self?
The 'Comedies'
In Two Gentlemen of Verona, a servant lists his sacrifices for a dog, though dogs don’t give medals, nor thanks, nor recognition for taking their pillories. Solidarity is presented as a base attribute. Does a servant’s cheeky retort count as valour when they face a beating? Women are held to hate cowardice (along with falseness and poor descent, says Proteus). Valentine says I take your offer and will live with you, provided that you do no outrages on silly women or poor passengers.
Valour is presented in the list of gentlemanly virtues.
In Merry Wives of Windsor, outsider valour is encouraged and mocked in Welsh and French duellists. Some things are deemed contrary to self-styled valour: as Pistol says Shall I Sir Pandarus of Troy become, And by my side wear steel? then, Lucifer take all!
The Knight of the Realm Falstaff hides and flees.
In Twelfth Night, Viola implies her lack of valour is due to her sex, yet Sir Andrew Aguecheek’s lack of valour (gift of cowardice says Maria) suggests valour is not determined that way. Antonio follows Sebastian, saying But, come what may, I do adore thee so, That danger shall seem sport, and I will go.
Olivia: If one should be a prey, how much the better To fall before the lion, than the wolf?
. Fabian to Andrew: to awake your dormouse valour
. Do women love valour (in men? by report of valour
)? Andrew’s stated preference for valour over policy is more like action over thought. Antonio is not boastful about exploits, says he refused to pay for them (Act 3 scene 3). Swearing terrible oaths and swaggering may give reputation for valour (Toby). Putting quarrels on to taste valour (Viola).
In Measure for Measure, sister Isobel calls brother Claudio coward for preferring his life at her rape’s cost. Pompey the tapster: The valiant heart is not whipped out of his trade.
Takes much valour to confront authority figures in Vienna, who have awful tortures at their command.
In Much Ado About Nothing, is there (sometimes) valour in declaring love (if you fear rejection or ridicule, say)? Beatrice cannot become a man by wishing to get revenge for Hero, condemns the courtesy of modern valour, He is now as valiant as Hercules that only tells a lie and swears it.
The Watch would rather sleep than tackle criminals. Benedick: In a false quarrel there is no true valour.
In A Midsummer Night's Dream Titania’s defence of Indian boy for votarist’s sake seems to risk much; until her will is subdued by Oberon’s cowardly poisoning. valour flies
in face of love?
LYSANDER: This lion is a very fox for his valour. THESEUS: True, and a goose for his discretion.
In Love's Labour Lost, we see: warriors against desire? Valour in performance (stage fright)? In pursuing love (deer)?
In Merchant of Venice, the Prince of Morocco comes closest to valour in a suitor. Mere appearance (or excrement) of valour in Bassanio's beards of Hercules and frowning Mars
.
In As You Like It, we see combatants wrestle for credit or in despair; swashing disguises; breaking a sword on a stone; a bullying approach rebuked; and brave lovers mocked.
In All's Well that Ends Well, animal valour is conjured in an image of a hind-lion love-death. Helena says torture me to death King if I cannot effect your cure in 24 hours. Meanwhile Parolles’ valour is extensively mocked. Valour seems empty at court. Frenchmen serve Mars not Woman? Reputation of Commanders' valour is comically disputed. When innkeeper's daughter Diana faces death within the hour, she faces down the King of France.
In Taming of the Shrew, men fear women’s scorn.
In Winter's Tale, Paulina is the exemplar of valour, standing between jailer and danger, confronting jealous King Leontes, shaming others as she would offer combat to defend the Queen if she was a man (but see later). Hermione shows great composure during trial but perhaps not outright valour since she seeks death. Autolychus represents anti-valour.
Summary of Comedies
So, in the Comedies, valour is seen as an admirable quality in men (and possibly a rare one, given the many examples of cowardice, 'mouth honour', empty oath-laden bragging or simply preferring to pick on the weak). Women seem to need valour as much as men in their declarations of love. But some women are particularly forward in defending other women or children, and their valour shines in opposition to powerful men (at the point the play wobbles between comedy and tragedy).
The 'Histories'
In Macbeth we early on hear some suspect testimony from the captain on his thane's extreme battle prowess valour’s minion
. Lady Macbeth sees herself as a valour-imparter: the valour of my tongue
? But stabbing an old man to death in his sleep is surely contrary to valour. The wren (paragon) against the owl (we'll return to this). Macbeth’s disputed valiant fury
is still of an unruly kind. The play ends with a battle of unnatural cowards, charmed Macbeth and flighty Macduff. A few characters do show approximate valour (and die with wounds in front).
In King John we see a badge of proclaimed valour in a lion skin. Hubert risks disobeying king; young Arthur faces horror without falling apart; bastard Faulconbridge tells King John to inspire others against the valour of the invading French The youth says well!
In Richard II, Henry and Mowbray chafe for single combat (defending reputation). Ross says Urge doubts to them that fear.
By the exchange of gages after Richard’s fall, we hear sympathy as spur to valour. Banished Mowbray seemed to have turned crusader. Valour can become silliness which gets in the way of truth-finding public investigations. Valour as abnegation of one’s own interests. Valour as standing up to an authority (king). Valour from (self and other) endurance. Valour as strongest and surest way to get.
In Henry IV part 1 Henry4 wants to kill pagans in their homes for crusading glory; praises friend and foe for valour (Hotspur’s is source of envy). Poins predicts cowardice of Falstaff and confederates. Valorous deeds obsess Hotspur, but his wife Kate tells of his other side (PTSD? Peacetime melancholy?). Is valour compatible with love, or a competitor? Falstaff’s valiant lion won’t touch the true Prince excuse (valour versus loyalty?); aged valour more valiant. Glendower mixes valour with restraint contrasting Hotspur’s harsh rage, defect of manners, want of government, pride, haughtiness, opinion, and disdain
. Hotspur disdains poetry yet speaks nothing else in praise of valour; is the report of valour necessarily poetic? Does valour typically require haste? Henry4: nothing can seem foul to those that win
. Henry4 is a vile hypocrite in all-abhorred war
: the unprovoked war he wishes to pursue in crusades. Does Henry5 vowing to save others’ blood (single combat) constitute the highest form of valour, or posturing? Henry5 says Falstaff owest God a death
. Falstaff’s soliloquy on honour. Relation of honour (valour?) to detraction. Hotspur talks so much he is cut off by imminent battle. Valour as becoming a target instead of your lord; as persistence. Hotspur associates Henry5’s valour with vanity (human valour as self-love?). So, valour can be deceitful? What are the rewards of valour? Falstaff, opposite of valour perhaps, has 3 of 150 ragamuffins left alive, those 3 destined for beggary (implied maiming). Does valour encompass jests that endanger comrades (sack a city
)? Henry5 delivers captive Douglas free in respect of his valour. What is the goal of valour?
In Henry IV part 2 after war, true valour is turned bear-herd
(Falstaff: I have the wars for my colour
). In what sense does valour rely on imagination? Women’s tailor Feeble envisaged as valiant as the wrathful dove or most magnanimous mouse
but Feeble accepts conscription with We owe God a death.
Falstaff: I never knew yet but rebuke and check were the reward of valour.
What is the reward of valour? Falstaff: and this valour comes of sherris
(Dutch courage) not natural to many. Lord Chief Justice shows valour in standing up to Henry5?
In Henry V we see class comparisons of valour. Face-saving de-escalation (show thy valour, put up thy sword
). Valour facing exposure for treason and death sentence. Physical bringing on of valour in to the breach
. Inherited capacity for valour. Boy’s observation on (cowardly) companions. Terror used when valour fails? Does wind and sun produce more valour than beer and fog? Brave words (of Pistol) unreliable measure of valour. Can you have hidden valour (Dauphin’s)? Over-valiant mastiffs. Valour depending on (beef) full stomachs? Does having more time and opportunity to consider dangers increase valour shown? Can (care and) valour go out of fashion)? Do few die well that die in battle
? Divine aid adding valour. Can valour be transmitted by bodily fluid (horse blood)? Is there valour in evening the odds for a disadvantaged foe? Or wish no advantage being the underdog? How to deal with shame? With unexpected victory? After victory, how should valour present? The price of valour (disordered nature etc). Relation of valour to (lifelong) constancy?
In Henry the Sixth Part 1 we see valour in reclaiming hostages. Do you fear valour more or madness? Joan (later made France’s saint) lets Talbot live. Slack of duty undoing valour. How easily is valour impersonated for pecuniary gain? How is women’s valour smeared? Does prior warning approve valour? Does ambition count against? Is the greatest source of valour maternal (Joan-Burgundy)? Shared intergenerational battlefields. Joan’s offer of supernatural sacrifice. Treatment of prisoners. Joan’s valour in denying ‘father’s’ (vicious?) offer of salvation from execution. What can valour gain (on the long term)? Recognised valour can catapult family to high aristocracy.
In Henry the Sixth Part 2, Jack Cade rails against English who won’t fight for their ancient freedoms but give themselves up to slavery to the nobility, breaking their oaths and betraying their families to rapine. Nobles invent enemy in France. Escalation: you killed our fathers, we’ll kill your children.
In Henry the Sixth Part 3 Henry6’s weapons are words etc but is Henry6’s self-interested peace opposite to valour? Margaret: The soldiers should have tossed me on their pikes before…
. Valour and oaths. Valour or revenge? Richard’s testimony of his sons’ valour towards his life’s end. What is inhuman? Tigers? Chivalry and valour. Valour and fame/glory. Response to battlefield loss. Numbers in battle. Draw sword in right or for the crown? Effect of valour on opponents. Is valour a lie, told by aristocracy? Valour on civil war where you might kill kin. Grief and valour. Dying of wounds. Variable mercy. A mother stands up alone to a king. Valour and (newmade or old) friendship. Is valour loyalty- or honour- or kin- or principle-oriented? Queen Margaret: you have no children, butchers
(irony). Is there valour in killing a future killer? Is the goal of valour really just to lift a baby to the throne?
In Richard III, we see valour in self-destruction. Sleep-stabbing seems cowardly. Conscience makes cowards? Angels and valour. Guilt and valour. Richard3 prepares for final battle berating subordinates, is haunted (Tomorrow, in the battle, think on me, And fall thy edgeless sword. Despair and die!
). Richmond prays and encourages, has angels’ wishes in dreams. Does valour gain strength from clear consciences? Radcliffe: Nay, good my lord, be not afraid of shadows.
Omens of success. God’s soldiers. Fight for wives and children, boldly and cheerfully. Stanley’s son held hostage. Richard3 disses foes as badly-led scum: Shall these enjoy our lands, lie with our wives, Ravish our daughters?
Calls on St George. What would Richard3 do with a horse, without a kingdom? Dies with wounds in his front.
In Henry VIII Queen Katherine stands up to brace of cardinals.
Summary of Histories
Valour in the Histories is pretty much an aristocratic construct, a kind of weaponised propagandistic class war lie based on a truth embodied by very few examples, and some of those are very much not lords or knights.
The 'Tragedies'
Troilus and Cressida may rather be a satire on war? Valour invoked as defending/competing attributes (wiser, fairer, truer) of women-loved. Cressida's valour is defensive and watchful. Complex debate among Trojans gravitates towards Helen’s beauty/worth inspiring valour. Achilles called ‘lion-sick’, with a pride that eats valour? Animal valours crammed into slow-as-bear Ajax. Factionalism and hollow tents (Odysseus), competition kills in various ways. Does heat breed both love and valour? Voices of lions and acts of hares. How to treat contests (of unequal strength). Valour requires motion? Thersites would rather be a tick in a sheep than such a valiant ignorance
: a theme of wars, lechery and incontinent varlets. Corruption encased within armour. Diomede condemns both sides. Sometimes war is murder.
In Timon of Athens senators rebuke Alciabides' character testimony saying there is no valour in drunken quarrelling and revenge. He’s truly valiant that can wisely suffer
.
Coriolanus says he cannot make my heart consent to take a bribe to pay my sword
in a play largely revolving around questions of valour and class war, where cicatrices — scars of wounds — are esteemed as badges of martial courage (as long as they aren't on the back, one imagines). Coriolanus rejects rewards and honours of valour while embracing combat and comradeship (though his mother Volumnia initially says she’d accept his good report and a dead son), and doesn’t want to hear of deeds in council.
Why do Patricians hold that valour (the chiefest virtue and most dignifies the haver
) is the best qualification for Consulship? While in the same speech Cominius' shows disrepect in woman in the scene
throway jibe, do the Patricians fear their power along with that of commoners? Coriolanus reckons speaking openly is valorous, diplomacy is base, while cowardice in war should disenfranchise commoners. But if commoners were valorous and armed, why would they need a smaller military class of nobles to defend them?
What are the Stratocracy’s virtues? Coriolanus, bred i’ th’ wars since he could draw a sword
, says (of Rome's commoners, the plebians) On fair ground I could beat forty of them.
How should wisdom harness valour? you are too absolute
: Volumnia’s arguments are worth quoting her telling rebuke:
To beg of thee, it is my more dishonour Than thou of them. Come all to ruin. Let Thy mother rather feel thy pride than fear Thy dangerous stoutness, for I mock at death With as big heart as thou. Do as thou list. Thy valiantness was mine; thou suck’st it from me, But owe thy pride thyself.
When Coriolanus tells his frenemy Aufidius I also am
longer to live most weary, and present
my throat to thee and to thy ancient malice
is any valour annulled by a deathwish? Indeed, Aufidius later says to a Volsci lieutenant that our virtues lie in the interpretation of the time
, a clear indication that behaviour which might be seen as appropriate valour in one situation will be inappropriate in others, and with this he plans to bring down Coriolanus. When Aufidius tells Coriolanus You keep a constant temper
, this in not so much an acknowledgement that constancy is a requirement of valour, than a mock.
As the play's final crisis unfolds, Coriolanus appears to re-evaluate his long-suffering/silent wife best of my flesh
Virgilia: stubborn-constant, worldview-accurate, an integrated if limited personality. Where is valour in this scene? Perhaps for Coriolanus' martial version, the end of valour is destruction, but the women show a valour that leads to salvation.
In Julius Caesar armies march forward to demonstrate courage. Suicide is taken as a better option than being paraded in triumph, glory is found in losing. Caesar may despise base spaniel fawnings
, but is he really supernaturally fearless? Cowards die many times before their deaths; The valiant never taste of death but once.
When Octavius calls the third member of the triumvirate, Lepidus, a tried and valiant soldier
, Antony replies:
So is my horse, Octavius, and for that I do appoint him store of provender. It is a creature that I teach to fight, To wind, to stop, to run directly on, His corporal motion governed by my spirit; And, in some taste, is Lepidus but so.
which is a decidedly unglamorous view of valour, from a commander who — here at least — seems to appreciate obedient, drilled and disciplined subordinates.
Antony and Cleopatra: Antony may have once thrived on horse piss and human corpses, but do these hardships make him a valiant soldier? Antony tells Cleopatra she has conquered him, uses a metaphor for valour my sword, made weak by my affection
.
Enobarbus, long loyal to Antony, now distances himself from the latter's excess of valour:
Now he’ll outstare the lightning. To be furious Is to be frighted out of fear, and in that mood The dove will peck the estridge; and I see still A diminution in our captain’s brain Restores his heart. When valour preys on reason, It eats the sword it fights with. I will seek Some way to leave him.
Antony calls self-stabbing 'Valiant Eros' Thrice nobler than myself
, and at the end Octavius gives much the same accolade to Cleopatra: Bravest at the last
.
Cymbeline compares valour and recklessness, considers valour in (social etc) unequals, valour as redemption, valour in treating prisoners and vanquished, valour in dangerous confession. The play is ambiguous about inherited qualities, the supposed genetic valour of the King's lost sons contrasts with the surprisingly dim son of a clever Queen.
Posthumus shows a leonine association of habitual show and valour, although he is beginning to see the light:
Let me make men know More valour in me, than my habits show. Gods put the strength o’ the Leonati in me! To shame the guise o’ the world, I will begin The fashion, less without, and more within.
In Titus Andronicus, a particularly unvalorous act — sacrifice of captive — sets off a chain of events. Goth Queen Tamora pleads:
But must my sons be slaughtered in the streets For valiant doings in their country’s cause? O, if to fight for king and commonweal Were piety in thine, it is in these!
Titus chooses revenge over mercy, clearly there are double standards in Rome's treatment of patriotic valour. Titus the centrist (approved valour, but poor judge of character?) chooses madly unfit Saturninus. Gives away daughter Livinia in arguable act of despicable cowardice. Titus cannot escape unvalorous son-slaying act by disowning sons. Valour and piety. Marcus calls on Titus not to be barbarous. Aaron’s defence of newborn. Tamora’s exposition of strength: sun, eagles, is your city strong? When we see free Goths, they profess valour. But Lucius calls to hang a child. Superdad villain Aaron desperately bargains for the life of his baby. Valour against Rapine and Murder.
In Pericles Prince of Tyre valour in competition combat (and possibly some dancing) wins the Princess. Marina shows more than just undaunted valour and wit in defying brothel culture (more spine than her would-be murderer Leonine).
In King Lear, daughter Cordelia and liegeman Kent stand up to Lear’s apparent rage.
Gloster would die to relieve his old master the king, stands the course against terror.
Servant stands armed up to Cornwall, both die. The baddies attack weakness. Goodies more insistent on level playing field. Edgar harps on a theme: Men must endure their going hence even as their coming hither.
Valour of prisoners? The wages of generalship. Was Kent battle-promoted?
Romeo and Juliet: valour as in standing (servants, innuendo).
Nurse rebounds after being sexually assaulted in public.
Does voluntary duelling constitute valour or perhaps mimic it? Romeo laments that Juliet's beauty has effected him and
softened valour’s steel
, but then why does Romeo immediately get the better of Tybalt (without apparently sustaining a scratch) when Mercutio didn’t? The Prince uses a line reminiscent of Angelo in Measure for Measure: Mercy but murders, pardoning those that kill.
which relates to both civil administrations' suppression of high-spirited deeds. Friar Lawrence dares Juliet’s valour in death-defying, to which she replies (and how can we doubt her):
O, bid me leap, rather than marry Paris, From off the battlements of any tower, Or walk in thievish ways, or bid me lurk Where serpents are. Chain me with roaring bears, Or hide me nightly in a charnel house, O’ercovered quite with dead men’s rattling bones, With reeky shanks and yellow chapless skulls. Or bid me go into a new-made grave And hide me with a dead man in his shroud (Things that to hear them told have made me tremble), And I will do it without fear or doubt, To live an unstained wife to my sweet love.
Hamlet: facing the supernatural is not the valour expected of guards. Hamlet seeks examples (will his mother see Denmark in ruins like Hecuba did Troy? Will assassination lead to civil war as in Julius Caesar?), looks for words to fire mood of revenge. Should you aim to send your enemies to hell? Hamlet and Laertes see failing to take revenge for father as moral failing.
Othello’s actual valour is not shown but much attested.
Valour in drink?
Othello is a play about the suppression of valour (until Emilia at the end).
Ophelia dares Othello’s rage.
Deceitful Iago declares Rodrigo’s valour is apt.
Unarmed Emilia I care not for thy sword. I’ll make thee known,
Though I lost twenty lives.
stands up to armed lord Othello and equally armed husband Iago.
Summary of Tragedies
The Tragedies are often more explicate of valour, unsurprisingly since the genre deals with high deeds and purer (if not worthier) motivations. In non-Christian Rome, Greece-Troy, Egypt, different cultural standards and expectations of piety apply, and suicide (rejected by Hamlet) may be approved. The consequences are as great as in the Histories, but the characters are generally a bit more reflective, some to the point of self-absorption, as they weigh their actions. Some consider Macbeth to be a tragedy, not a history, and that fits.
Questions Arising
The topics in Shakespeare's plays are often treated ambiguously, tropes are undercut, conventions subverted. The questions raised are often open-ended.
- Is valour (in)compatible with: desperation; deathwish; wrath; vengeance; professionalism; deceit; injustice; conscience; fear; vanity; ambition; pride; reward?
- If compatible with reward, what are the rewards of valour: honour, reputation, love, survival (of others, maybe), promotion, loot, even a kingdom? And what of the costs of valour: wounds, possible humiliation and dispossession, death?
- Can valour be: taught; habituated; inherited; inconstant; imparted by speech or environment or alcohol?
- Does valour incline to: selfishness or selflessness? Preserving or changing the world? Haste or deliberation? Competition or grace? Imagination or immediate focus? Loyal obedience or dangerous dissent? Heat and motion, or weighed wisdom and justice?
- Is unseen courage a worthier attribute than obvious valour?
- Is there valour in disarming yourself (famously Prospero; or (re)arming an opponent) or exposing vulnerabilities? Is there valour in evening the odds for a disadvantaged foe?
- Can some forms of valour even be scandalous? Woman’s lone pilgrimage in man’s world (Julia in Two Gentlemen of Verona; cast as impudent strumpet, maybe).
- Or to the contrary, is true valour a feature of the underdog, the undervalued and socially disadvantaged?
- Is there a time and place for valour? A formality owing to it? A class, gender, role or species determinant? Does it go in and out of fashion? How do we recognise valour?
- How easy is it to fake valour? In what common ways is this attempted? Is there a playbook, like a code of chivalry?
- To what extent might legal challenges or whistleblowing (perhaps against powerful authorities) or breaking social codes/expectations require valour?
- What reactions might valour provoke: envy; desire; emulation; mockery; respect; fear?
Drama may not give definitive answers, but shows patterns of interaction in favouring some interpretations over others, otherwise we could not tell comedies from tragedies.
The Lion (guise or customary form of valour)
The lion is, of course, a heraldic charge in the coats of arms of English Queens and Kings (including Elizabeth I and James I/VI of Scotland), and earlier Richard 'Lionheart'. So it is quite a bold move of Shakespeare to play so subversively with lions. Not least by Falstaff likening himself to a valiant lion, and calling Prince Hal a lion's whelp.
Real lions may be ambush predators, eaters of carrion, sometime predators on much weaker or less aggressive animals. Male lions may kill lion cubs sired by another, and scavenge while female lions do most of the actual hunting. Their family grouping (pride) is named after a Christian deadly sin, and Shakespeare uses 'lion-sick' to mean over-proud.
Moreover, Shakespeare's lions are often hollow skins, trappings and disguises such as Snug the Joiner's theatrical costume or the Duke of Austria's robe. A lion's destiny might to be beguiled by foxes, outwitted by wolves, ultimately becoming old and fangless. Yet referenced lion myths show a gentler, more merciful side than many human characters. The lion's roar may shake the forest, but it gets hungry and tired all the same. When Shakespeare really wants unbridled savagery, he tends to refer to tigers instead of lions.
So we see a pattern in characters with lion names. Leonatus Posthumus hardly inherits his father's valour, remotely instructing his servant to murder his wife over a false accusation of infidelity. Leonato decries his own innocent and unjustly-accused daughter Hero (whose accuser-fiancé is described as a lamb doing lion-like martial feats). Leontes condemns his innocent wife to death on mere suspicion of adultery, kills his son with grief, and orders the murder of his daughter. Leonine is set to murder innocent Marina on the orders of her ungrateful-envious foster-mother Dionyza. In each case a positive reputation is at odds with foul and cowardly actions.
This is a pattern repeated throughout the works. Macbeth (inexplicably woundless in battle) buys golden opinion, then murders his king under his wife's battlements (gold is, of course, the colour of lions and crowns). The martially-reputed Othello turns to sordid spouse murder. Parolles' vaunted valour seems not to extend beyond his scarves, though his arc is more redemptive.
And most signficantly, these outward shows are mocked throughout the plays, as in many of the examples already noted. Mocked, and contrasted…
The Wren (paragon or true nature of valour)
While there are a few warrior characters who might embody valour, they tend to muddy or undermine their own claims. Typical of these, Harry 'Hotspur' Percy is a hothead craving honour. Hector initially seems to argue virtuously, but (perhaps Godspelled) rejects Cassandra's warnings and fights a stupid war. Joan of Arc represents at least four kinds collective-valour cases that we have not especially touched on: nationalism (she fights for France); class (she fights for peasants); sex (she fights for women); and religion (she fights for God); however, Joan is a complex character, who is somewhat changeable (though even the valorous flinch at being burnt at the stake), and pursues some elevated place by the Dauphin's side.
A purer form of valour is presented in contrast to warrior stereotypes and authority figures, and particularly in defiance of them.
The Duke of Cornwall's unnamed servant takes up arms and fatally wounds his evil master, dying in the action. The woman's tailor, Francis Feeble, impresses recruiter Bardolph — Well said. Th’ art a good fellow.
— with a stoic response to being called up to fight (and likely die) in the Prince's service, while others buy their way out (although we don't see Feeble in action, where he may flee). Doll Tearsheet stands up against 'Captain' Pistol, knife against sword, peppering him with ridicule. But what if you have no human weapons? What if, like the dove that pecks the estridge, you only have fury (or some other driving emotion)?
Unarmed Emilia stands up to not just one but two armed men, saying to her lord Othello: Thou hast not half that power to do me harm as I have to be hurt
which is a fascinating statement that seems to stop him in his tracks, and to her husband Iago.
IAGO: Be wise, and get you home. Offers to stab his wife EMILIA: I will not.
But Emilia has unfairly punched down on Bianca in the previous scene: O fie upon thee, strumpet!
, been a too-easily-duped party to Iago's plots, and her undoubted valour (the only heroic action in a play centring around male martial posturing) comes a little too late, though she pays the ultimate price.
Physician Paulina stands up against the tyranny (he disputes this) of her jealous king Leontes, inspiring her husband to try to save the life of the royal newborn, facing a stream of royal threats and insults:
LEONTES: I’ll have thee burn'd. PAULINA: I care not: It is a heretick that makes the fire, Not she which burns in’t. I’ll not call you tyrant; But this most cruel usage of your queen (Not able to produce more accusation Than your own weak-hing'd fancy) something savours Of tyranny, and will ignoble make you, Yea, scandalous to the world.
Yet Paulina is too crafty to be a pure exemplar of valour, though valour she displays.
Another female physician, Helen, boldly invites the King of France to torture her to death if she cannot cure his fatal sickess. Yet there is something unsavoury about her motivation to force Bertram to marry her.
It is in Macbeth, a play which ends with a duel between two cowards (the mass-murderer and protection-charm-relier Macbeth, and family-abandoner Macduff), that Shakespeare produces the greatest contrast.
LADY MACDUFF: What had he done to make him fly the land? ROSS: You must have patience, madam. LADY MACDUFF: He had none. His flight was madness. When our actions do not, Our fears do make us traitors. ROSS: You know not Whether it was his wisdom or his fear. LADY MACDUFF: Wisdom? To leave his wife, to leave his babes, His mansion and his titles in a place From whence himself does fly? He loves us not; He wants the natural touch; for the poor wren, The most diminutive of birds, will fight, Her young ones in her nest, against the owl. All is the fear, and nothing is the love, As little is the wisdom, where the flight So runs against all reason.
So there you have it. Shakespeare's paragon of valour is the tiny mother wren, hurling herself at the mighty owl to defend her young.
The Warpath (goal or best use of valour)
We have seen examples of self-abnegation, service to others, willing sacrifice, dissent, holding power accountable, defending the weak. Shakespeare turns to nature: not ultimately to the haughty lion, but humbler beasts. As Clifford appeals to Henry VI in face of looming battle for the crown:
My gracious liege, this too much lenity And harmful pity must be laid aside. To whom do lions cast their gentle looks? Not to the beast that would usurp their den. Whose hand is that the forest bear doth lick? Not his that spoils her young before her face. Who scapes the lurking serpent’s mortal sting? Not he that sets his foot upon her back. The smallest worm will turn, being trodden on, And doves will peck in safeguard of their brood.
As social animals, in the human world, valour must also work at a collective, social, crowd scale.
A generation after Shakespeare's death (in 1616) and the publication of his works in the First Folio (1623), the English staged a revolution (c1640) and cut the head off their King (1649). Whatever the causes, whatever Shakespeare's take on the monarchomachs ("those who fight against monarchs") was, his dramatic works interacted with the times. Under tyrannical oppression, even dormouse valour may awake.
Shakespearean drama is very much concerned with tyranny, with unjust power relations, and more or less cruel abuses, but whilst a keen political analyst and commentator, Shakespeare the dramatist was no utopia-builder (his anarchist idylls seem impractical daydreams or naturalistic musings). Shakespeare satirises war and shows its heinous, criminal, aristocratic and stupid side. But he also mocks the populist uprisings of Jack Cade, and in many cases the multi-headed and changeable commons. Shakespeare's disinterest in parliaments is countered by perhaps a view of the London stage as one, with crowd participation. However, his depiction of Republics (Roman and Venetian) suggests his interest in exploring alternatives to the dynastic rule his plays so mercilessly skewer.
We need valour because the world is unjust, to defend ourselves and others, and to right wrongs, we must confront wrongdoers and their accomplices, who so often hold positions of power or advantage. Shakespeare does not glorify political violence, nor does he shun it. The path to war leads to many harms, but who would prefer to live under Macbeth's regime, and watch their children murdered before them? And dynastic rule may throw up another Macbeth at any time.
Conclusion
We've looked at portrayals and examples of valour in the plays of Shakespeare, looking for patterns in categories and discovering open questions. Where we have identified patterns and answered questions, we find that: conventional appearances of valour (the warrior, the Lion) fall short or are false; underdog characters are more likely to represent true valour when standing up to powerful figures in defence of others without craft or ulterior motives (the healer, the Wren); and we consider that collective valour must be needed to overcome tyranny.
Shakespeare's take on valour is multifaceted and more angles could be pursued. A semi-automated textual analysis might reveal more, as would comparisons with other works. Shakespeare may have been familiar with the works of political theorists like Machiavelli, whose writings may have provoked some dramatic treatments. Many questions raised here remain unanswered.
What is clear, is that examples of valour inspire others, on stage, in animal paragons, or in real life. Just don’t imagine that dressing in a lionskin and waving a sword about will fool anyone. Or that valour alone is nearly enough: remember Shakespeare's portrayal of fighting thin air in The Tempest, and Hotspur's deficiencies. In our world, the Wren is always fighting off the predatory owl.
