I also finished reading "Henry V" last night. (My original geeky thought would be to finish it on St. David's Day - March 1 - seeing as I started it on St. Crispan/Crispian's day...both those figures are mentioned in the play. But I got distracted by other things).

I enjoyed it. Not my favorite ever (that still belongs to Twelfth Night), but very interesting all the same.

One thing that strikes me about the play is that even in the middle of very serious action (the fact that people are going to be killed, it is warfare), there are some extremely comic moments (with Nym and Pistol and Bardolph...two of whom are no longer alive at the end of the play).

The portrayals of the representatives of the different countries (Wales, Scotland, Ireland) are interesting if a bit uncomfortable. (That said, I still like Fluellen a lot; he is what C.S. Lewis would probably refer to as a "brick.") I'm sure those characters were a bit of English jingoism inserted for the audience's benefit. (Makes you wonder about the portrayals of people from other countries in movies and such today).

I also was struck by the fact that the speech to the delegation from France (at the very end) starts out with this extremely formal language filled with honorifics and such, and then, after the French king and queen have left, and Henry is 'wooing' Katherine, the speech between him and his nobles devolves very quickly into double entendres.

I also found the Chorus an interesting feature, always going on about "We know we can't adequately capture the scope of what really happens on the battlefield on stage; please forgive us and use your imaginations." Makes me wonder who was the first playwright to break the fourth wall; surely Shakespeare was not the first? Maybe some of the Greek dramatists did so as well? (Would Shakespeare have known anything of the Greek dramatists?)

I don't feel quite knowledgeable enough to comment on either the whole issue of history and how it is used (essentially the topic of the "modern" essay at the back of the edition I had) or to determine if the play is a celebration or a condemnation of war. (I think in some respects, it is both...)

Probably Henry V is one of the top five or top ten plays in terms of being quoted regularly. There are others that are less commonly quoted. (I was not even aware, until reading the final essay in my little Folger edition of this play, that there was a Henry VI. I knew of Henry IV...in fact, a copy is on my bookshelf...but not Henry VI.)

I still think I like the idea of making it a life plan to read all of Shakespeare. ALL. Not just the plays I previously knew the existence of.

But, I think the next one is going to be Merchant of Venice, because that's on the top of the stack. And it's supposed to be more of a comedy, even though I've been roundly warned by various commentators that the treatment of Shylock in the play (who is Jewish) is not at all nice, especially by modern standards.