ABSTRACT
This chapter describes that although there is no bastard figure in Richard II whose illegitimacy derives from unsanctioned sex, as there is in King John, the topos of illegitimacy nonetheless features as an important rhetorical strategy. Richard II employs language and imagery that align it closely with King John and the earlier Henry VI tetralogy. As the plot unfolds, Richard's banishment and unlawful disinheritance of his cousin Henry Bolingbroke destabilises concepts of identity and succession to such an extent that the play ends with Bolingbroke stepping neatly into Richard's own place. Like King John, Richard II dramatises the struggle for the crown of England in terms of inheritance and in terms of familial and national identity. By separating Bolingbroke from his father and from his paternal identity, Richard renders Bolingbroke illegitimate, 'gelding' him of his patrimony and thereby rendering him incapable either of inheriting as an heir or of engendering heirs himself.
