In Henry VI, Part 1, Shakespeare portrayed the title character as a boy. After inheriting the Crown when he was still far too young to rule, Henry came of age surrounded by counsellors and courtiers scheming for power. Though in that play he was eventually crowned king and thereby authorized to rule, his age and inexperience rendered him inert as a ruler, unable effectively to command those in his court. Picking up where Part 1 left off, Part 2 portrays Henry as an adolescent king whose religious fervor and penchant for contemplation leads him increasingly to withdraw from political matters. When his beloved uncle and close advisor, the duke of Gloucester faces accusations of treason, Henry chooses to withdraw from the situation rather than fight with his wife and his scheming courtiers. Even though he believes Gloucester to be innocent, the king feels unable to act. Henry shows himself to be easily manipulated elsewhere in the play, as when he quickly assents to the commoners’ demand that Suffolk be punished. Margaret also pushes him around constantly. He is ultimately a weak king whose “bookish rule” (1.1.259), as York calls it, is growing more disastrous by the day.