CRITICISM

Berger, Jr., Harry. “The Prince's Dog: Falstaff and the Perils of Speech-Prefixity.” Shakespeare Quarterly 49, no. 1 (spring 1998): 40-73.

Close analysis of Falstaff's language, motivation, and behavior in Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2 that explains his subversive status and complicity in his rejection by Hal.

Bevington, David, ed. Henry the Fourth Parts I and II: Critical Essays. New York: Garland Publishing, 1986, 457 p.

Collection of major critical essays on Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2 from the mid-eighteenth to the late twentieth centuries.

Bloom, Harold. William Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 2, edited by Harold Bloom, New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1987, 165 p.

Comprised of ten scholarly essays on Henry IV, Part 2 from the second half of the twentieth century, with particular attention focused on Falstaff and such topics as comedy, role-playing, and the subversion of authority.

Bowers, Fredson. “Theme and Structure in King Henry IV, Part I.” In The Drama of the Renaissance: Essays for Leicester Bradner, edited by Elmer M. Blistein, pp. 42-68. Providence, R.I.: Brown University Press, 1970.

Details the thematic structure of Henry IV, Part 1 as it involves a clash between central authority and feudal allegiances—concepts dramatically personified in the figures of Hal and Hotspur, respectively.

Cain, H. Edward. “Further Light on the Relation of 1 and 2 Henry IV.” Shakespeare Quarterly 3, no. 1 (January 1952): 21-38.

Claims that far from exhibiting unity in design, theme, structure, and character development, the two parts of Henry IV exhibit clear disjunctions that suggest they were not necessarily conceived of or composed as sequential works.

Henning, Joel. Review of Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2. Wall Street Journal (11 March 1999): A20.

Review of Barbara Gaines's 1999 staging of Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2 at Chicago's Shakespeare Repertory Theater that praises the outstanding performances of nearly all cast members, particularly Greg Vinkler's Falstaff, and lauds the overall production.

Hodgdon, Barbara, ed. The First Part of King Henry the Fourth: Texts and Contexts. Boston: Bedford Books, 1997, 419 p.

Endeavors to place Henry IV, Part 1 within the cultural context of late-sixteenth-century England by examining dozens of relevant primary texts.

Jackson, Russell. Review of Henry IV, Part 2. Shakespeare Quarterly 52, no. 1 (spring 2001): 107-23.

Examines Michael Attenborough's Henry IV performed at Stratford-upon-Avon in 2000, mentioning the production's thematic emphasis on fathers and sons and noting several strong performances, especially Desmond Barrit's witty but reticent Falstaff and William Houston's enigmatic Prince Hal.

Krims, Marvin B. “Hotspur's Antifeminine Prejudice in Shakespeare's 1 Henry IV.” Literature and Psychology 4, nos. 1-2 (1994): 118-32.

Psychoanalytic assessment of Hotspur centered on his phallocentric inability to accept feminine elements in his personality or in others.

Levine, Nina. “Extending Credit in the Henry IV Plays.” Shakespeare Quarterly 51, no. 4 (winter 2000): 403-31.

Probes the economic metaphors of Henry IV in terms of an early modern view of monetary exchange and social value.

McLoughlin, Cathleen T. “Introduction: Genealogy and Genre of Shakespeare's King Henry IV Part One and Part Two.” In Shakespeare, Rabelais, and the Comical-Historical, pp. 1-16. New York: Peter Lang, 2000.

Intertextual study of Henry IV, Part 1 and François Rabelais's Gargantua and Pantagruel that claims Shakespeare's probable awareness of the French novel and appropriation of its carnivalesque qualities in his delineation of Falstaff.

Tiffany, Grace. “Puritanism in Comic History: Exposing Royalty in the Henry Plays.” Shakespeare Studies 26 (1998): 256-87.

Interprets Falstaff in Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2 as a mockery of the Elizabethan Puritan, explaining that the figure's subversive power injects anti-monarchical and anti-hierarchical perspectives into these ideologically ambivalent historical dramas.

Traub, Valerie. “Prince Hal's Falstaff: Positioning Psychoanalysis and the Female Reproductive Body.” Shakespeare Quarterly 40, no. 4 (winter 1989): 456-74.

Feminist, psychoanalytical reading of Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2 that concentrates on the construction of Falstaff as a maternal figure.

Uhlmann, Dale C. “Prince Hal's Reformation Soliloquy: A ‘Macro-Sonnet.’” Upstart Crow 5 (fall 1984): 152-55.

Explicates Hal's soliloquy in Act I, scene ii of Henry IV, Part 1 as an extended sonnet designed to call attention to itself as a revelation of the prince's character.