 Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
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Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
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Table of Contents Act IV, Scene VI Summary The battle has begun. Talbot rescues his son from the French. Talbot commends him on his courage and tells him that now that he has proved himself, he must flee and live to avenge his father’s death when he dies. He adds that with John’s life the Talbot name will go on. But John refuses to perform so cowardly an act and so Talbot has to accept his decision. Notes In this battle, Talbot and his son must die and Bordeaux will never be retaken. For Shakespeare, this is to be the last battle of the Hundred-Year-War and the last stand of the English Chivalry. Whatever "victory" Talbot and his son might achieve here will not be commemorated in actualities of human history. Talbot unwittingly formulates this problem when he commands his son, "Fly, to revenge my death if I be slain." Young Talbot’s answer, "He that flees so will never return again." Serves to expose the insolubility of their dilemma. If he flees he will cease to be Talbot’s son. But if he remains their "name" will be extinct in another sense. They discover that the ideal, which is figured by their heroic "name," is so pure that it can be ratified only in the very act of death. Table of Contents | |
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