Arguably, Hal, Prince of Wales, underwent a gigantic transformation during 1 Henry IV. As an audience we are thrown into the middle of the conflict regarding the prince. At the beginning of the play, the king's son is portrayed as an immature wild man, who drinks and prostitutes himself. The audience sees a man who is "truant to chivalry" (5.1.95). However, it is more likely that Hal was ready for kingship long before this story began, and is simply waiting for his opportunity to right all the wrongs of his father's reign with a return to glory and chivalry at the right time. Richard II's usurpation of the throne left little room for his father's success, so Hal realizes that he must create a way to win the hearts and minds of the English people and create peace under one ruler. In his soliloquy, Hal states: Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay So when this dissolute behavior I abandon And pay the debt I never promised, By how much better I am than my word, By how much will I falsify the hopes of men; and, like shining metal on a dark ground, my reform, shining above my guilt, will show itself more beautiful and attract more glances than that which has no element to highlight it. (1.2.215-222) Clearly Hal has already thought about the transformation he will have to pretend to undergo in order to gain the people's favor. By the end of the play, the Prince of Wales becomes the perfect prince, having a greater ability to speak than most due to his constant battle of wits with Falstaff and appreciation of honor in war, which he learns from Hotspur, the "tongue of honor theme" (1.1.80). In other words, Hal must achieve his greatness by doing two things: defeating his enemies and showing his honor on the battlefield by reuniting England and putting an end to the "civil butchery" that causes the "intestinal shock" that is tearing the country apart. Country (1.1.13).During the Battle of Shrewsbury near the end of Act 5, Hal realizes one aspect of his rise to greatness when he saves his father, King Bolingbroke, from Douglass. This phase of realization is further solidified when Hal slays the formidable Hotspur in one-on-one combat. However, in his final statements to Hotspur and Falstaff, Hal displays the one thing that truly distinguishes him from all of Shakespeare's characters: his ability to speak to and understand the common man ["...I can drink with any tinkerer in the his own tongue during my lifetime"] and also to speak so well as to raise an army, unlike his flagship Hotspur (2.4.18-19). Like his father in the opera's opening scene, Hal does not tell all he knows, a theme characterized by Falstaff when he states that "discretion is the better part of valor" (5.3.115). Even when Falstaff lies "breathless and bleeding on the ground," Hal continues, even in his final speech to his supposedly dear friend, to remark on his fatness, saying "I would miss you very much," and so on (5.4. 108.138). Thus the audience is forced to believe that Hal has established that Falstaff is not dead and is aware of his plan to steal the glory of killing the great warrior Hotspur from him. When Falstaff returns, Hal says something that echoes York ["but is your Grace dead, my lord of Somerset?" (1.1.17)] in 3 Henry V:... Are you alive? Or is it fantasy playing on our sight? Please speak. We won't trust our eyes without our ears. You are not what you seem. (5.4.137-41)Hal's response is unnatural, ringing false and melodramatic, as if Hal already knew that Falstaff would.