Background: King John was born in 1167 as the youngest of three sons of King Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine (Queen Elinor in the play). His brother Richard the Lion-Hearted, acceded to the throne in 1189, but envious John tried to usurp the kingship while Richard was fighting in the Third Crusade. After Richard died in battle in France in 1189, John inherited the throne. 
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Arthur, just a child, is the son of John’s deceased brother Geoffrey Plantagenet. John and Geoffrey's other brother, Richard I the Lion-Hearted (1157-1199), sat on the English throne from 1189 until his death in 1199 during a battle in France. It was Arthur’s mother, Constance, who persuaded the French king to claim the English throne for Arthur. As a kind of stage mother, she is ever ready to bully, badger, and browbeat to further her son’s career. And she has been quite successful in making her case on behalf of little Arthur. John is weak and cowardly, but he has a powerful ally: his domineering mother, Queen Elinor. She is as forceful in championing John as Constance is in championing Arthur. John dismisses Chatillon, warning him that England chooses war. 

       Turn your forces from this paltry siege
And stir them up against a mightier task.
England, impatient of your just demands,
Hath put himself in arms: the adverse winds,
Whose leisure I have stay’d, have given him time
To land his legions all as soon as I;
His marches are expedient to this town,
His forces strong, his soldiers confident. (2. 1. 57-64)

QUEEN ELINOR   Thou monstrous slanderer of heaven and earth!
CONSTANCE   Thou monstrous injurer of heaven and earth!
Call not me slanderer; thou and thine usurp
The dominations, royalties and rights
Of this oppressed boy: this is thy eld’st son’s son. (2. 1. 181-185)

Tell him this tale; and from the mouth of England
Add thus much more, that no Italian priest
Shall tithe or toll in our dominions;
But as we, under heaven, are supreme head,
So under Him that great supremacy,
Where we do reign, we will alone uphold,
Without the assistance of a mortal hand. (3. 1. 158-164)

Grief fills the room up of my absent child,
Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me,
Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words,
Remembers me of all his gracious parts,
Stuffs out his vacant garments with his form. (3. 4. 98)

Poison’d–ill fare–dead, forsook, cast off:
And none of you will bid the winter come
To thrust his icy fingers in my maw,
Nor let my kingdom’s rivers take their course
Through my burn’d bosom, nor entreat the north
To make his bleak winds kiss my parched lips
And comfort me with cold. I do not ask you much,
I beg cold comfort; and you are so strait
And so ingrateful, you deny me that. (5. 7. 41-49)

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Climax

The climax of a play or another narrative work, such as a short story or a novel, can be defined as (1) the turning point at which the conflict begins to resolve itself for better or worse, or as (2) the final and most exciting event in a series of events. The climax of King John occurs, according to the first definition, when John orders the death of Arthur even though John has won the battle against the French. His cruelty turns his own people against him and sets in motion his downfall. According to the second definition, the climax occurs when John dies by poisoning.
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Themes
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Family feuds can bring deadly results. Unresolved disputes involving family members lead to great political and social upheaval, war, and sometimes death.
The power-hungry often victimize the innocent. In the struggle for power in King John–and in struggles for power in any age and place–the adversaries often stop at nothing to achieve their goals. Arthur, a little boy who is the focus of the conflict in King John, becomes a pawn in the effort of his grasping mother and her French supporters to seize the throne of England. Ironically, Arthur himself has no desire to be king. In Act II, Scene I, he says, "I would that I were low laid in my grave: / I am not worth this coil that's made for me."
Mothers can be mighty. Arthur's mother, Constance, persuades the King of France to press England to accept Arthur as its rightful king. John's mother, Elinor, stands by her son like a rabid pit bull.

Life is as tedious as a twice-told tale 
Vexing the dull ear of a drowsy man. (3. 4. 113-114) 
In a simile, Lewis compares life to a tale. Alliteration occurs in tedious, twice-told, and tale. 

When Fortune means to men most good, 
She looks upon them with a threatening eye. (3. 4. 124-125) 
Cardinal Pandulph uses personification, turning fortune into a person. Alliteration occurs in means, men, and most.

To gild refined gold, to paint the lily, 
To throw a perfume on the violet, 
To smooth the ice, or add another hue 
Unto the rainbow, or with taper-light 
To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish, 
Is wasteful and ridiculous excess. (4. 2. 13-18) 
In a metaphor, Salisbury compares excess to gilding gold, painting a lily, etc.

And oftentimes excusing of a fault 
Doth make the fault the worse by the excuse. (4. 2. 32-33) 
Pembroke uses paradox and irony to say that excusing a fault worsens it.

 How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds 
 Makes deeds ill done! (4. 2. 233-234) 
 King John uses irony to express his view. Alliteration occurs in do, deeds, deeds, and done.

                              [H]is pure brain, 
Which some suppose the soul’s frail dwelling-house, 
Doth by the idle comments that it makes 
Foretell the ending of mortality. (5. 7. 4-8) 
Prince Henry, observing his poisoned father, uses a metaphor to compare brain to house and synecdoche to make the brain represent man. lliteration occurs in some, suppose, and soul’s. Synecdoche occurs when brain represents a man.

There is so hot a summer in my bosom, 
That all my bowels crumble up to dust: 
I am a scribbled form, drawn with a pen 
Upon a parchment, and against this fire 
Do I shrink up. (5. 7. 35-39) 
In a metaphor, King John, dying, compares the hot summer to pain and debility. In another metaphor, he compares himself to a scribbled drawing.

And none of you will bid the winter come 
To thrust his icy fingers in my maw, 
Nor let my kingdom’s rivers take their course 
Through my burn’d bosom, nor entreat the north 
To make his bleak winds kiss my parched lips 
And comfort me with cold. I do not ask you much, 
I beg cold comfort; and you are so strait 
And so ingrateful, you deny me that. (5. 7. 42-49) 
King John dying, uses personification and metaphor to compare winter and north wind to persons. Alliteration occurs in my maw, burn’d bosom, comfort and cold, cold and comfort,  and so strait.

The conflict in King John similar to the conflict between Elizabeth and Mary in the 16th Century. Mary Queen of Scots (1542-1587), a grand-niece of King Henry VIII (1491-1547), claimed the English throne after Elizabeth (1533-1603), Henry's daughter by Anne Boleyn (1507-1536), became Queen of England in 1558. Because Henry eventually rejected and executed Elizabeth's mother and remarried, supporters of Mary Queen of Scots declared she was the rightful queen of England, not Elizabeth. A period of unrest ensued in England, mainly between Catholic supporters of Mary and Protestant supporters of Elizabeth. Like King John, Queen Elizabeth was condemned by the papacy. Like the throne claimant Arthur, Mary eventually died (by beheading). 

Murder by Poisoning
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Poison kills King John to make way for a new ruler. This murder method has been a favorite of assassins since ancient times. It is said that the custom of garnishing food with parsley originated in the time of the Caesars. Parsley was a secret sign from a friend in the kitchen that food was uncontaminated. Poisoning was only one of a remarkable of variety of killing tools and methods Shakespeare used to send his characters to the beyond. In Othello, Moor of Venice, Othello smothers Desdemona, apparently with a pillow. (The stage directions say he "stifles" Desdemona.)  In Antony and Cleopatra, Cleopatra commits suicide via the bite of an asp. In Richard III, Clarence is drowned in a barrel of wine. In Macbeth, hired assassins inflict "twenty trenched gashes" upon Banquo's head. In Cymbeline, Guiderius decapitates Clotan. In King Lear, Goneril stabs herself while Gloucester, blinded by his enemies, hurls himself off a cliff. But because the cliff is only about six feet high, he survives. In Hamlet, Claudius murders his predecessor by pouring poison into his ear.

Study Questions and Essay Topics

1. Which character in the play do you most admire ? Which do you least admire? 
2. In King John, does Shakespeare interpret history or does he report history? 
3. If you had lived in the England of King John, would you have been among the nobles who rebelled against him? Explain your answer.
4. Write a psychological profile of King John, using quotations from Shakespeare’s play–as well as other research–to support your views. 
5. Many conflicts arose in early England and elsewhere in Europe over birthrights and inheritances. In King John, the French and English ....argue over who is the rightful heir to the throne of England. In addition, two Englishmen–Philip Faulconbridge and his brother, Robert, ....who have the same mother but different fathers–argue over who is the rightful heir to family property. In an expository essay, explain the ....laws and customs used in the time of King John to determine rightful heirs to the throne and rightful heirs to family property.
6. What was everyday life like for an ordinary citizen in the England of King John?
7. According to Shakespeare’s play, King John was poisoned. In your view, do citizens ruled by a tyrant–a Nero, a Hitler, a Saddam ....Hussein–have a moral right or even a moral duty to assassinate the tyrant? Explain your answer. 

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