Books: The Eagle And the Hart By Helen Castor

 (Drivebycuriosity) - Power corrupts. Helen Castor`s double biography of Richard of Bordeaux and Henry of Bolingbroke, two cousins, who became successive England´s kings Richard II and then Henry IV in the 14th century, is another confirmation of this truth ( amazon). 

The book, based on historical documents, reads like a farce. Richard of Bordeaux became England´s king in the tender age of 10 and the country was ruled for a while by a snotty kid, suffering its wilful adolescent decisions. When Richard grew up, he did not become better. The king saw himself as the human incarnation in the two kingdoms of God’s authority on earth. He divided his subjects into two categories: "His favored servants on whom he lavished boundless rewards; and the rest, whose suspect loyalty he intended to compel with endless punishments". 

Even being king of England, Richard corresponded with his cousin Charles, the King of France, and England´s enemy, who was in war with England, to support him against the English, his subjects! 

"Extravagance, corruption, and mismanagement lay at the heart of England’s problems" -  "Richard was irredeemable; had conclusively shown the danger he posed to his people. There was an alarming amount of evidence to support their position. Time and again, the king had proved that he understood his kingship as a matter of rights, but not responsibilities; that he saw any attempt to constrain his will as unlawful, even treasonable; that he would not learn from either adverse experience or unpalatable advice; that his word could not be trusted".   

Richard´s paranoia, the ongoing search for enemies within, was becoming the standard operational mode of Richard’s state. Three of England’s greatest nobles had been destroyed, one executed, one imprisoned, one murdered, for offenses that had already been pardoned. Richard’s authority was volatile, threatening, and apparently impossible to resist. 

Eventually Richard´s kingdom turned into chaos and his regency imploded. His cousin Henry of Bolingbroke took advantage of Richard`s mess and turned himself into King Henry I. Even though he saved England from the chaos he met resistance and his right to rule by heritage (both had the same grandfather King Edward III) had been contested from the start. Henry`s enemies called the legitimacy of his kingship questionable, what exposed his regime to repeated attack from inside and out.