Post 2: The “Knight’s Tale” as a Source of Falstaff’s Death from “Henry V”?

The description of Falstaff’s death in Henry V is very famous. We read:

Bard. Would I were with him, wheresomere hee is,/ eyther in Heauen, or in Hell./ Hostesse. Nay sure, hee’s not in Hell: hee’s in Arthurs Bosome, if euer man went to Arthurs Bosome: a made a/ finer end, and went away and it had beene any Christome/ Child: a parted eu’n iust between Twelue and One, eu’n/ at the turning o’th’Tyde: for after I saw him fumble with/ the Sheets, and play with Flowers, and smile vpon his fin-/ gers end, I knew there was but one way: for his Nose was/ as sharpe as a Pen, and a Table of greene fields. Ho now/ Sir Iohn (quot I?) what man? be a good cheare: so a/ cryed out, God, God, God, three or foure times: now I,/ to comfort him, bid him a should not hinke of God; I/ hop’d there was no neede to trouble himselfe with any/ such thoughts yet: so a bad me lay more Clothes on his/ feet: I put my hand into the Bed, and felt them, and they/ were as cold as any stone:/ then I felt to his knees, and so/ vp-peer’d, and vpward, and all was as cold as any stone. (830 – 847) [1]

The passage is dense, and not editorally obvious due to textual issues, but I wish to make a point on the motif of Falstaff’s cold feet only.

As an influence editors usually cited Plato’s description of Socrates’ death from the dialogue Phaedo where we read that

this man who had administered the poison began examining him, and when some time had passed he probed his feet and legs and then he pinched his foot hard and asked if he could feel it. 118A He said, “No.” And after this the man felt his shin once more, and working upwards in this way he showed us that he was going cold and stiff. And again, he touched him and said that when it reached the heart, he would then be gone. [2]

However, it may perhaps also be true that Shakespeare was inspired by Chaucer’s Knight’s Tale where mortally wounded Arcite is dying in a similar fashion (just like his direct model Arcita from Boccaccio’s Teseida). We read:

And with that word his speche faille gan,/ For from his feet up to his brest was come/ The coold of deeth, that hadde hym overcome,/ And yet moreover, for in his armes two/ The vital strengthe is lost and al ago./ Oonly the intellect, withouten moore,/ That dwelled in his herte syk and soore,/ Gan faillen whan the herte felte deeth./ Dusked his eyen two, and failed breeth,/ But on his lady yet case he his ye;/ His laste word was, mercy, emelye! His spirit chaunged hous and wente ther,/ As I cam nevere, I kan nat tellen wher./ Therfore I stynte; I nam no divinistre;/ Of soules fynde I nat in this registre,/ Ne me ne list thilke opinions to telle/ Of hem, though that they writen wher they dwelle./ Arcite is coold, ther Mars his soule gye! (2799-2815) [3]

I wish to emphasise the phrase according to which “from his feet up to his brest was come/ The coold of deeth” (2800-2801), and that Arcite’s fading is associated with the moment “whan the herte felte deeth” (2805). Perhaps similarly, the hostess puts “Clothes on his/ feet” (844-845), and puts her hand into the bed to feel them, moving then upwards, and upwards. Again, as R. S. Fraser has argued also [4], Falstaff can be read as associated symbolically with the heart, and the Hostess even seems to call him as “poore hearte” (616).

Moreover, in terms of topic, as with Arcite’s death his soul is at stake (“ther Mars his soule gye” [5]), so in Henry V the question is explicitly posed where Falstaff will reside after he passed away (in “Arthur’s bosom”).

Again, one may argue that his crying out “of Women” (850) on his deathbed echoes Arcite’s final words “mercy, Emelye” (2808).

Generally speaking, Falstaff can certainly be called, like Socrates, a misleader of youth, but one may point instead to his mock-chivalric presentation as Falstaff, the knight. And Shakespeare certainly knew and estimated the Knight’s Tale, already if we consider merely the fact that he drew on it on the very least for constructing his plot of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and for co-writing the late play Two Noble Kinsmen. It may be more probable a source than Plato whose writings were certainly less well-known and far spread at the time.

This argument will be spelled out in a forthcoming text (unpublished).

_______________________________

For other opinions on Falstaff’s death, including the connection with Socrates, see, for example, P. M . Cubeta, “Falstaff and the Art of Dying,” Studies in English Literature, 1500-1900 27, no. 2 (1987): 197–211. https://doi.org/10.2307/450462.

[1] “Henry V (Folio 1, 1623),” Internet Shakespeare Editions, University of Victoria, NaN undefined NaN. Web. 2 Nov. 2024. https://internetshakespeare.uvic.ca/doc/H5_F1/complete/index.html.

[2] The Dialogues of Plato, translated by D. Horan, https://www.platonicfoundation.org/translation/phaedo/ (accessed on 02.111.2024).

[3] See G. Chaucer, “The Knight’s Tale,” The Riverside Chaucer (Houghton-Mifflin company) as cited on https://chaucer.fas.harvard.edu/pages/knights-tale-0.

[4] R. S. Fraser, “‘The king hs killed his heart’: The Death of Falstaff in Henry V, Sederi 20 (2010): 145-157. Available on jstor.

[5] In contrast with Chaucer’s description of Troilus death in Troilus and Cryseide, where Chaucer is almost as elaborate on the fate of Troilus’ soul as Boccaccio is on the fate of Arcita’s soul, his refusal to say anything about the fate of Arcite’s soul is conspicuous.