Richard III Revenge Quotes

During the Elizabethan times, citizens were governed by conscience and justice. Sins were punished by divine justice, and past vendettas were not forgiven or forgotten. Therefore, Shakespeare highlights vengeance and punishment as the prevalent themes in the play, King Richard III. None of the characters are innocent in the War of the Roses, and Shakespeare plans to deliver them to justice. As one who has suffered the fall of power, Queen Margaret symbolizes consequence, or repercussion. In lines 186 to 231 of Act I Scene iii, she relieves all the wrongdoings that the Yorkist have done to her. This includes King Edward IV, Queen Elizabeth, Rivers, Hastings, Dorset, and Richard. Earlier in the scene, Richard describes all the unjust acts she

This is her response to their unified accusations. There is an implied metaphor; ‘snarling’ is what she uses to compare all the characters in the room to animals. This gives a sense that she feels the characters are beastial in nature. She uses rhetorical questions to emphasizes her hatred for the nobles and the positions they are now. “Did York’s dread curse prevail so much with heaven/That Henry’s death, my Lovely Edward’s death/Their kingdom’s loss, my woeful banishment/Could all but answer for that peevish brat?” By asking these question in a rhetorical way, Margaret demands their recognition for her loss of power, due to killing Rutland. Here she represents the wheel of fortune, as well as the consequences of civil war between members of the royal family. The next line, “Can curses pierce the clouds and enter heaven?” also accentuate the power of cursing and language. Margaret uses a metaphor to compare curses to spears or weapons that can physically pierce armour—in this case the clouds of heaven—and seems to realize now that when Richard’s father cursed her, she has felt the results of her sin. By wondering rhetorically, she gives a sense of curiosity to whether curses may actually come

“Thou elvish-marked, abortive, rooting hog” uses asyndeton to give the effect of unpremeditated multiplicity to the her insults to him, as well as climax to add a crescendo to her insults to him in parallel to her growing hatred. She believes there is something supernatural about him as well, as if he had been cast a spell by some evil fairies, and uses a metaphor ‘rooting hog’ to describe his lack of intelligence to see the bigger picture instead of what is ahead. She continues on the theme that he is being manipulated by a greater force: “Thou that wast sealed in thy nativity/The slave of nature and the son of hell.” She uses an implied metaphor ‘sealed’ insult him with the fact that it was his birth that drove him to do such evil acts, and she uses hyperboles to emphasizes his lack of choice to his evil deeds because it is in his nature, and also because he was born to the son of hell, all of of which are an extended metaphor, on her comparison of his lack of choice to his evil character, emphasizing his insult to him being used by a some greater power that he is unintelligent enough to realize. She then uses more implied metaphors: “Thou slander of thy heavy mother’s womb/Thou loathèd issue of thy father’s loins.” This implies that even his