Rock Doc

My father taught me the line when I was a child: “A horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse!”

Those were the words William Shakespeare put into the mouth of King Richard III when he was knocked off his horse in the midst of the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485. Richard was killed, ending the rule of the Plantagenet royalty in England and ushering in the time of the Tudors.

Shakespeare famously depicted Richard III as a hunchbacked villain who murdered members of his own family to cement his claim to the throne. Later historians have not all painted such a grim picture of Richard as Shakespeare...