Cultural depictions of Richard I of England

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Richard I of England has been depicted many times in popular culture.

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[edit] Robin Hood

The Scots philosopher and chronicler John Mair was the first to associate Richard with the Robin Hood legends in his Historia majoris Britannae, tam Angliae quam Scotiae (1521). In the earliest Robin Hood ballads the only king mentioned is "Edward our comely king", most probably Edward II or Edward III. However, Sir Walter Scott's novel Ivanhoe popularised Mair's linking of the Hood legends to Richard's reign, and it was taken up by later novelists and by cinema. Typically Robin is depicted upholding justice in Richard's name against John and his officials during the king's imprisonment.

[edit] Other literature

Richard has appeared frequently in fiction, as a result of the 'chivalric revival' of the Romantic era. In 1822, he was the subject of Eleanor Anne Porden's epic poem, Cœur de Lion. After Ivanhoe, in which he is depicted as initially adopting the pseudonym of Le Noir Fainéant ("The Black Sluggard"), Sir Walter Scott portrayed Richard in The Talisman, a highly fictionalised treatment of the Third Crusade. The young Richard is also a major character in James Goldman's play The Lion in Winter (1966), which depicts him as homosexual. He features in Graham Shelby's The Kings of Vain Intent and, more centrally, in The Devil is Loose, Norah Lofts' The Lute-Player, and Jean Plaidy (Eleanor Hibbert)'s The Heart of the Lion. He is portrayed as a merciless Muslim killer in a novel that follows Arn Magnusson in the Knight Templar Crusade Trilogy written by Swedish author Jan Guillou. He is seen as the reluctant husband of Berengaria of Navarre, and as Crusader, in Rachel Bard's Queen Without a Country. He is generally represented in a heroic role in children's fiction, such as Ronald Welch's Knight Crusader. Jennifer Roberson also makes reference to Richard in her novels Lady of the Forest and Lady of Sherwood.

[edit] Film

Richard has been portrayed on film by:

[edit] Television

Richard has been portrayed on television by:

[edit] Video games