Suggestions
Use up and down arrows to review and enter to select.Please wait while we process your payment
If you don't see it, please check your spam folder. Sometimes it can end up there.
If you don't see it, please check your spam folder. Sometimes it can end up there.
Please wait while we process your payment
By signing up you agree to our terms and privacy policy.
Don’t have an account? Subscribe now
Create Your Account
Sign up for your FREE 7-day trial
Already have an account? Log in
Your Email
Choose Your Plan
Save over 50% with a SparkNotes PLUS Annual Plan!
Purchasing SparkNotes PLUS for a group?
Get Annual Plans at a discount when you buy 2 or more!
Price
$24.99 $18.74 /subscription + tax
Subtotal $37.48 + tax
Save 25% on 2-49 accounts
Save 30% on 50-99 accounts
Want 100 or more? Contact us for a customized plan.
Your Plan
Payment Details
Payment Summary
SparkNotes Plus
You'll be billed after your free trial ends.
7-Day Free Trial
Not Applicable
Renews June 8, 2023 June 1, 2023
Discounts (applied to next billing)
DUE NOW
US $0.00
SNPLUSROCKS20 | 20% Discount
This is not a valid promo code.
Discount Code (one code per order)
SparkNotes Plus subscription is $4.99/month or $24.99/year as selected above. The free trial period is the first 7 days of your subscription. TO CANCEL YOUR SUBSCRIPTION AND AVOID BEING CHARGED, YOU MUST CANCEL BEFORE THE END OF THE FREE TRIAL PERIOD. You may cancel your subscription on your Subscription and Billing page or contact Customer Support at custserv@bn.com. Your subscription will continue automatically once the free trial period is over. Free trial is available to new customers only.
Choose Your Plan
For the next 7 days, you'll have access to awesome PLUS stuff like AP English test prep, No Fear Shakespeare translations and audio, a note-taking tool, personalized dashboard, & much more!
You’ve successfully purchased a group discount. Your group members can use the joining link below to redeem their group membership. You'll also receive an email with the link.
Members will be prompted to log in or create an account to redeem their group membership.
Thanks for creating a SparkNotes account! Continue to start your free trial.
Please wait while we process your payment
Your PLUS subscription has expired
Please wait while we process your payment
Please wait while we process your payment
Is Richard the hero of the play or its villain?
Richard is obviously a villain—he almost single-handedly generates all of the evil and violence in the play. But
Read more about anti-heroes as protagonists in Robert Louis Stevenson’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
How does Richard’s personality change over the course of the play?
At the beginning of the play, Richard seems very much in control of the situation around him. Bitter and alienated from others, he nonetheless enters into a close relationship with the audience, pausing frequently to let us know what is going on in his mind. Richard therefore has a closer relationship with us than he does with anyone else in the play, at least in the early acts. However, as Richard’s plot unfolds and he rises in rank, his speeches change. He ceases to offer monologues to us and is instead surrounded by noblemen all the time. He also stops using his subtle powers of manipulation and veers toward achieving his goals by force, ordering executions overtly and no longer pretending to be a friend to all. Moreover, almost at the moment of his coronation, he alienates Buckingham—his only friend, whom he later has executed. Richard does not seem to be able to return love; he solicits it only in order to twist it to his own purposes, as when he seduces Anne, and when he attempts to make friends with Elizabeth. Furthermore, he exploits the selfless love of his family members to take advantage of them. By the time Richard is finished, all his friends, lovers, and family either are dead at his hands or hate him. This state of affairs leads to Richard’s sudden revelation and nightmare in Act V, scene v, that “[t]here is no creature loves me” (V.v.
What roles do women play in Richard III?
Women play a number of different roles in this play, but these roles are for the most part defined by their relationships to men, and the capacity of the female characters to act is mostly frustrated by men. Young Elizabeth and Anne are wives or potential wives whom Richard tries to use as pawns to shore up his power. Queen Elizabeth and the duchess of Windsor are mothers who unsuccessfully try to use their influence to protect themselves and their children. Once Richard kills his brothers and Queen Elizabeth’s kinsmen, Queen Elizabeth and the duchess become like Margaret—irrelevant and seemingly powerless. Interestingly, however, women seem to acquire power in this play only when they lose their male relatives—and, thus, their social influence and power in the court—and forge their own power out of grief and pain. This pain lies behind Margaret’s terrifying cursing, and Elizabeth and the duchess try to learn the skill of cursing from her after the deaths of the Princes.
Please wait while we process your payment