King John Men and Masculinity Quotes

Can you say "phallic symbolism"? Seriously. Let's let these macho hotheads have their fun playing swords. Still, before we go, we do think it's interesting that, when push comes to shove and machismo confronts machismo, artificial questions about social hierarchy don't matter so much anymore. It all comes down to who's top dog… or, it would, anyway, if these two guys actually ended up fighting. In the end, though, Salisbury walks away.

Louis's reaction to Salisbury's tears here is interesting. Given the emphasis his medieval culture places on machismo, you might expect Louis to think less of Salisbury as a man. Instead, though, he claims that Salisbury's tears make him respect him all the more. His reasoning is that women cry all the time, so if Salisbury is crying, something really big must be wrong. Okay, so maybe Louis is still stuck within his cultural mindset, after all. And, in any case, we probably can't read too much into this speech as a sign of Louis's thoughts; after all, we learn later on that he's secretly planning to have Salisbury killed. We're guessing Louis doesn't plan to be moved by Salisbury's tears when he's begging for his life. (Of course, this never happens in the play, because Salisbury learns about Louis's plot and defects to King John's side again.)

Even the biggest macho man has a soft spot for his mother. And this is the weak spot that the Bastard tries to exploit in talking to the rebels Salisbury, Pembroke, and Lord Bigot. In this case, of course, the Bastard is referring to their metaphorical mother, England. By calling them "Neroes," the Bastard is talking about the infamous Roman emperor who killed his own mother. "You don't want to be like Nero," he seems to be telling them, "so stop killing your own mother, England." Then he tries to make them feel like lesser men by pointing out that even the women of the land (presumably less interested in war than men) have been transforming their sewing supplies into weapons to fight for England's cause. We're not sure how seriously to take this (you never can tell with the Bastard); it might mainly be designed to needle the rebels (so to speak) into taking a good hard look at what they're doing.

P.S. In King John, warfare is mostly a (manly) man's game. But a few years before Shakespeare wrote this play, Queen Elizabeth I's troops defeated the Spanish Armada. At one point in the conflict, she went into the field and delivered a kick-butt speech to her troops. Check it out here.