 . . . Spring 2000
Alumna Helen Worth '35 recently completed a two-part play about the Hundred Years War, Royal Circumstances: Lions in Love and Lions Go Home. Monumental in scope (100 years), characters (more than two dozen) and stage business (37 scenes), the drama is "as flexible as a rubber band," Worth says, and she urges directors to stretch, contract or splice the work to fit their needs and resources. We invited her to share with readers the genesis of her four-year project. By Helen Worth Royal Circumstances deals with the imperialistic aggressions of England against France. History calls the period the Hundred Years War (1338-1453). I am on England's side.
While writing Royal Circumstances, I happened to speak to Lillian Rosenn, my one-time Mosher-Jordan roommate. She has remained my valued friend through the years. Lillian asked me the invariable author question: "What are you writing?" A play about the Hundred Years War, I told her. This response usually draws a blank stare. But not from Lillian. She exclaimed, "But you don't know anything about history!" She was right. Past tense.
By then, thanks to Life in a Medieval City and Life in a Medieval Castle by Joseph and Frances Gies [Joseph Class of '39 and Frances '37, '38 MA–Ed.], I figuratively toured medieval towns and along with a few rats (Middle Ages castles housed more rats than people) found my way around in those fortresses. All in all, I spent over two years sloughing through five dozen books and became amply acquainted with what I was beginning to think of as "my period." As Royal Circumstances progressed, I realized I was writing history the way I wish I had learned it. A verse I wrote once upon a time voiced my objection to the way history was taught: "The acrimony of an age/Is dilute poison/On a page of history."
My English history course–and every other political history course–bored me. The more-or-less dilute poison filled one ear with obligatory exam facts. Immediately after handing my blue book in, the acrimony of that age flew out the other ear. If Michigan had included any social history courses, they had escaped my ken. I packed Royal Circumstances with vigorous people–both royal and fictional. In the play the howling violence of many of their circumstances quiets down more than occasionally for a bit of romance, a titillation of sex and a laugh or two.
Edward and Philippa's eldest son, Prince Edward—called the Black Prince—proved a consummate battle commander, as courageous as his father. He married his cousin, the twice-married Joan of Kent, a renowned beauty. Their only child, Richard II, achieved passionate happiness with Anne of Bohemia, who was described at her funeral by the Archbishop of Canterbury as more joyous than any other woman he had ever known.
The final Plantagenet couple–the blithe and generous King Richard and his Queen Anne–embraced the arts. Their generosity made it possible to finish building the nave of Westminster Abbey.  My fictional characters are vitally active lords of war. Like King Edward, they find killing a voluptuous joy. I think of them as bullyboys–as in, Bully for you! They, and more than a few women, bring the period to vibrant life. Lord Lexton, for instance, has a large brain and an equally large case of satyriasis. Agreeable Lord Roose is somewhat lacking in the upper story. Baron Buford, married to a harridan–wealthy Lady Bethany–becomes a hero in a sacrifice that gratifies no one.
Sir John Froissart's The Chronicle of Froissart remains the major contemporary source for those long-ago days. But his work depends largely upon hearsay both social and military, and he was the personal secretary of Queen Philippa. Psychologists well know the accuracy of second-hand reports, especially by parties with personal interests. Truces frequently interrupted the century-long hostilities. Many were called to obtain funds to finance the war. (Comparably, war was as costly then as it is today.) The nobility conveniently excused themselves from paying taxes. So England's populace bore the enormous tax burden. The Bubonic Plague, begun during King Edward's reign, was a ravaging, natural truce maker. In its ability to kill, it far surpassed combat. In fact, the Black Death wiped out half the population of Europe. Concerning war, in The Lemurs' Legacy, author Robert Jay Russell notes, "Cycles of war and peace define human progress; we mark our culture's time in history books by first one war, then another." Wars–for any reason, for many reasons, for no reason–recycle history. I think of a blood-red thread circling the globe and the centuries, beginning as far back as archaeologists have taken us. Reaching from then to today. And most likely, to the end of time. Helen Worth '35, a poet, playwright, journalist, educator and pioneer presenter of gourmet cooking courses, lives in Charlottesville, Virginia.
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The historical cast includes six royal