Richard III

Richard III engages in self-deception. He wants to believe that he was self-made. He talks to himself about how he was born into the world deformed, unfinished, with hunchback and teeth. When Henry VI prophesied and mentioned the very things that Richard III soliloquized about, Richard couldn’t bear to hear any more and killed him.

That means that he would only hear about his own deformity and character if it was himself that was talking about it, not others. He can’t accept being a failure unless he was talking to himself about being a failure. He can’t accept hearing people talking about him because he wants to believe that he is his own creation.

1.IV

York:

Three times did Richard make a lane to me.
And thrice cried ‘Courage, father! fight it out!’
And full as oft came Edward to my side,
With purple falchion, painted to the hilt
In blood of those that had encounter’d him:
And when the hardiest warriors did retire,
Richard cried ‘Charge! and give no foot of ground!’
And cried ‘A crown, or else a glorious tomb!
A sceptre, or an earthly sepulchre!’
With this, we charged again: but, out, alas!
We bodged again; as I have seen a swan
With bootless labour swim against the tide
And spend her strength with over-matching waves.

1.III

“Di faciant laudis summa sit ista tuae!” Rutland said after he was stabbed by York.

Henry VI, part 3

EXETER My conscience tells me he is lawful king.

Sounds like referring to duke of York and not Henry VI.