ABSTRACT
This chapter takes an approach to the Henry VI of Shakespeare’s text, and argues that the plays are influenced by aspects of medieval thinking on madness, particularly the gendered nature of humoral medicine, and that the encoding of madness found in the chronicles persists in the plays in the repeated references to Henry in terms of weakness, coldness, and loss of masculinity. The chronicle accounts (both contemporary and near-contemporary) tend to agree that at the beginning of the proceedings, Henry occupied the kingly space, until York intruded upon and appropriated this space by force or threat of force. The mis-gendering of Henry is continued by Margaret in the lines that follow. She too continues the criticism of Henry’s fear in feminine terms, attacking him for his fear, and lack of strength and agency, calling him “timorous wretch”, and expressing shame at his apparent cowardice.
