1623–-1673. Ed. J. Q. Adams. New Haven, London, and Oxford. 1917. P. 44.)
On account of its subject, the play was freighted with extrinsic political significance as long as the doctrine of kingship by divine right was mooted in England. In 1681, the year of Absalom and Achitophel, Nahum Tate's adaptation, though under the new title of The Sicilian Usurper, with changed names for the dramatis personæ, was 'silenced the third day.' In the preface to the published version (1681), the author complains that his production was suppressed without examination and that he wrote 'with as little design of Satyr on present Transactions as Shakespear himself that wrote this Story before this Age began.' He alleges, moreover, that (if there was any such effect) he showed Richard in a better light than Shakespeare had done; 'I have everywhere given him the Language of an Active, Prudent Prince. Preferring the Good of his Subjects to his own private Pleasure.' Besides altering the King's character, Tate made York a broadly comic figure speaking prose, and gave Queen Isabella a much larger rôle. He not only omitted several scenes and altered the order of others, but inserted totally new scenes, such as one of low comedy between Bolingbroke and a Rabble in Act II., and a rather purposeless scene between the King and the Queen before the abdication. His excision of the impeachment of Aumerle and everything connected with the Abbot of Westminster's plot set a precedent followed by practically everyone who has since prepared an acting version of this play. What deprives his adaptation of any right to be considered Shakespearean is the numerous irritating and senseless verbal changes throughout, such as vessels for buckets (IV. i. 185) and the following rendering of a famous passage:
