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Notes

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Inspired by 'Henry IV, Part 1', the sculpture is the sixth in a series of sculptures designed for the Great Garden at New Place. The design features a buoyant Falstaff, contrasting with the disillusioned knight of Part II. It is inscribed with an extract from Falstaff's speech beginning 'A good sherry-sack'.

Shakespeare's New Place

Stratford-upon-Avon

Title

Henry IV, Part 1

Date

c. 2006

Medium

bronze

Accession number

STRST : SBT 2007-18/1

Acquisition method

gift from the Newington-Cropsey Foundation, 2006

Work type

Statue

Signature/marks description

rear base: Greg Wyatt / © 1/3 2005

Inscription description

rear: SIR JOHN FALSTAFF / A good sherris-sack hath a two / fold operation in it. It ascends me / into the brain, dries me there / the foolish and dull and crudy / vapours which environ it; makes apprehensive, quick, forgetive / full of nimble, fiery, and delectable / shapes, which delivered o'er to / the voice, the which is / the birth, becomes excellent wit. / The second your / excellent sherris is the warming / of the blood; which cold / and settled, left the liver white / and pale, which is the badge of / pusillanimity and cowardice; but the sherris warms it and makes / it course from the inwards to the parts extreme / it illumineth the face, which as a beacon gives / warning to all the rest of this little kingdom / man, to arm; and then the vital commoners and / inland petty spirits muster me all to their captain / the heart, who, great and puffed up with this / retinue, doth any deed of courage; and this valour / comes of sherris. So that skill in the weapon is / nothing without sack, for that sets it a-work; and / learning a mere hoard of gold kept by a devil, till / sack commences it and sets it in act and use; Hereof comes it that Prince Harry is valiant; for / the cold blood he did naturally inherit of his / father, he hath, like lean, sterile and bare land / manured, husbanded and tilled with excellent/ endeavour of drinking good and good store of fertile / sherris, that he is become very hot and valiant. If / I had a thousand sons, the first humane principle I / would teach them should be, to forswear thin / potations and to addict themselves to sack / 2 Henry IV, Act 4, scene 2

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