King Richard III [Naxos] - William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare

Public domain

Category: Plays & Theater

Narrator: Kenneth Branagh

Tags: Plays & Theater, Classic, Literature, Adults

Written in 1593, King Richard III is one of Shakespeares earliest plays. This play differs from its predecessors, being amore structured piece, examining the development and motivations of a single character, Richard Duke of Gloucester, who will stop at nothing to gain control of the throne occupied by his brother Edward IV., Richard III is a self-motivating character who defies determinism (a life preordained by God) and sets his life on a course chosen by his own will and desire, as he puns in the opening soliloquy: I am determined to be a villain. Determined by birth and God, and determined in the other sense, by his own will.