Part 2 explores the play’s language and imagery and how it reflects the political plot. It discusses the political strategies and goals of Bolingbroke and Richard to ask what the play reveals about power and why Richard seems to gain in power as a literary, tragic figure precisely as he loses power as king – and why Richard seems to desire this tragic fate. It concludes by looking at how Richard’s story has been marshaled as political propaganda and at the political questions that Shakespeare leaves ambiguous: how should we regard Richard’s fate?