The night before the battle of Harfleur, the dukes and the king’s son Dauphin chatted relaxingly, paying no attention to the battle and having no worries about defeating the English, as the French were overconfident with themselves. They despised and mocked at the English, as the English were ‘foolish curs, that run winking into the mouth of a Russian bear, and have their heads crushed like rotten apples!’ Metaphorically, the English were compared to dogs, which had a much lower status than humans; and they seek death, using simile of their injured heads by comparing to the ‘rotten apples’. In a contrast, the English well-planned the battle, they were more serious than the French. The contempt for the ‘foolish’ English showed the over-confidence of the French, who were finally defeated by the English.
In Act 3 scene 4, Katherine, the daughter of the French King, learnt English from an old gentlewoman Alice. She started learning English before the battle of Agincourt, before the French were completely defeated. The preparation of her, to cope with learning English, signified that she was ready to accept the loss in battle. Moreover, the French accent was deliberately imitated in a way to make the French look stupid, as she pronounced fingers as ‘fingres’, showing the lower status of the French.. Unlike the other foolish French nobles, she was humble and respected the English King by learning the English language.
In Act 1 scene 2, the insulting gift of the tennis ball from Dauphin, was the ignition of ‘the English fire’, ensuring the need of war. The tennis ball was an insult to King Henry, symbolizing wildness and playful past life when Henry was Prince Hal. However, the newly reformed King Henry was not rankled by the Dauphin’s insults, instead, he responded with an even-temper, self-control, and courtesy, as he said ‘we are glad the Dauphin is so pleasant with us. His present and your pains we thank you for.’ But he would fight back for his insults from Dauphin, as he said ‘when we have matched our rackets to these balls. We will in France… play a set strike his father’s crown into the hazard’. Metaphorically, he used tennis balls instead of cannons, he declared war to France.
In addition, in Act 4 scene 5, after the French were completely defeated, the Duke of Bourbon repeated shame three times, as he said ‘shame and eternal shame, nothing but shame.’ The French were shamed as they were outnumbered the English but still lost in the battle. The repetition of shame emphasized on the shame of the French.
Shakespeare presented the French unsympathetically; instead, Shakespeare presented war sympathetically. In Act 3 scene4, the imagery of horror is depicted vividly, ‘The blind and bloody soldier with foul hand’ if not opening the gates of Harfleur, contrasting with ‘Your fresh fair virgins and your flowering infants’ if opening the gates. The horror image is enhanced by the alliteration of repeated ‘b’ sounds and the fair image is enhanced by the alliteration of repeated ‘f’ sounds. Also, by contrasting the two, the horror image is reinforced the horridness.
