Rhetorical Rebound: Disabling Critique in Richard III

abstract: Although the body of Shakespeare's Richard III has been a long time object of ableist contempt, disability scholars have, in the twenty-first century, shown it to be far more than symbolic of a villainous mind. Why, then, spend further time on Richard's physique? Often, he is still understood as the only disabled–or "unnatural"–one in the play, despite the fundamental instability of the category of disability. Many contemporary theorists have stressed just this. The present article argues that Richard anticipates their insights. He turns the rhetoric of somatic aberrance against his accusers, insists that his antagonists are just as unnatural as he, and nabs the English crown for his efforts. Recognizing this strategy shines new light on the play's most confusing scenes, as well as its latent political commentary. At a time when polemicists were describing the aged female sovereign as "unnatural, Shakespeare reveals not only that the flexibility of this label undercuts its usefulness, but also that political discourse reduced to individual bodies unleashes cycles of insult in which only the most shameless calumniators prevail. What is more, attending to these cycles in Richard III prepares us for their more complicated iterations in Shakespeare's later plays–and by extension, his iconoclastic tragic technique. abstract: Although the body of Shakespeare's Richard III has long been an object of ableist contempt, disability scholars have, in the twenty-first century, shown it to be far more than symbolic of a villainous mind. Why, then, spend further time on Richard's physique? Often, he is still understood as the only disabled—or "unnatural"—one in the play, despite the fundamental instability of the category of disability. Many contemporary theorists have stressed just such an unwieldiness. The present article argues that Richard anticipates their insights. He turns the rhetoric of somatic aberrance against his accusers, insists that his antagonists are just as unnatural as he, and nabs the English crown for his efforts. Recognizing this strategy shines new light on the play's most confusing scenes, as well as its latent political commentary. At a time when polemicists were describing the aged female sovereign as "unnatural," Shakespeare reveals not only that the flexibility of this label undercuts its usefulness, but also that political discourse reduced to individual bodies unleashes cycles of insult in which only the most shameless calumniators prevail. What is more, attending to these cycles in Richard III prepares us for their more complicated iterations in Shakespeare's later plays—and, by extension, his iconoclastic tragic technique.