Anyone who read Shakespeare's immortal "chronicle plays" is sure: King Edward III was a model of nobility, Richard III was an unprincipled killer, frivolous and charming Henry V was a brilliant commander, Henry VI was a gullible simpleton. But what does all this have to do with historical reality? In his study "The History of England and Shakespeare's Kings," equally interesting both for historians and literary scholars, and for everyone who is familiar with Shakespeare's works, Sir John Julius Norwich analyzes how authentic images of English monarchs of the 14th-15th centuries correspond to the interpretation of the great playwright.