Falstaff: Give Me Life

Harold Bloom, Sterling Professor of Humanities

(Scribner)

This book is a portrait of Falstaff, considered one of Shakespeare’s greatest enduring and complex comedic characters.

Falstaff is both a comic and tragic central protagonist in Shakespeare’s three “Henry” plays: “Henry IV, Part One,” “Henry IV, Part Two,” and “Henry V.” He is companion to Prince Hal (the future Henry V), who loves him, goads, him, teases him, indulges his vast appetites, and commits all sorts of mischief with him — some innocent, some cruel. Falstaff can be lewd, funny, careless of others, a bad creditor, an unreliable friend, and in the end, reckless in his presumption of loyalty from the new king.

Bloom uses the relationship between Falstaff and Hal to explore the devastation of severed bonds and the heartbreak of betrayal. He also writes about his own shifting understanding of Falstaff over the course of his lifetime.