Prince Arthur and Hercules Gallicus

Résumé Fr En

Dans King John de Shakespeare, le jeune Arthur fait usage de sa verve afin de convaincre ses bourreaux de ne pas le rendre aveugle. Son talent d’éloquence n’est pas sans évoquer l’Hercule gaulois, figure mythique représentée dans un portrait “with a long chayne tyed by one end at his tong, by the other end at the peoples eares, who stood a farre of that chayne fastned to his tong” (George Puttenham, The Arte of English Poesie). De façon similaire, Arthur captive et subjugue son adversaire adulte grâce à son éloquence, bien que ne possédant ni l’âge, ni la stature d’Hercule. Cette différence majeure rend le triomphe d’Arthur encore plus spectaculaire et renforce sa puissance dramatique. Les discours hautement rhétoriques d’Arthur l’associent-ils immanquablement à la duplicité en compromettant la vraisemblance de son jeune âge ou, au contraire, une stylisation aussi marquée doit-elle être perçue comme un stimulus esthétique qui se suffirait à lui seul, libéré des contingences narratives et du souci de vraisemblance ? Après avoir analysé l’appareil rhétorique de la pièce, mon article tentera de démontrer qu’il est possible de considérer Arthur comme un enfant faisant usage de la rhétorique et de la duplicité pour faire face aux intentions des adultes.

In Shakespeare’s King John, the child Arthur uses his tongue to frustrate an attempt to blind him. As regards the remarkable success of his eloquence, Arthur may be seen as embodying a variation on the figure of Hercules Gallicus. The alleged portrait of Hercules celebrates his eloquence by showing him “with a long chayne tyed by one end at his tong, by the other end at the peoples eares, who stood a farre of that chayne fastned to his tong” (George Puttenham, The Arte of English Poesie). Arthur similarly captivates and subdues his adult adversary by his eloquence, although he lacks Hercules’ age and stature. This obvious difference would serve to render Arthur’s triumph more spectacular and theatrically compelling. One may ask, does the ascription of heavily rhetorical speeches to Arthur associate him inescapably with deceit and compromise his childlike-ness? Or else, is such obvious stylization meant to be appreciated as a stand-alone aesthetic stimulus, free from contingencies of narrative and vraisemblance? Even after factoring in the thick rhetorical apparatus of the play it may be possible to show, my article argues, that Arthur is an embattled child who uses rhetoric (and deceit) to cope with adult intentions.