Lady Percy: The Woman Left Behind
First appears: Act 2, Scene 3
Kate Percy is one of Shakespeare's most vivid brief portraits. Her scene with Hotspur in Act 2, Scene 3 (where she demands to know what he is planning and he refuses to tell her anything while clearly adoring her) is a precise study in a marriage between two extremely stubborn people.
Hotspur is going somewhere she cannot follow, and he knows she knows it. He keeps deflecting; she keeps pressing. The deflection is a kind of tenderness, since he does not want to worry her. This makes it worse.
She has a farewell scene in Act 3, Scene 1 when Hotspur marches toward Shrewsbury, and then she disappears from Part 1. In Henry IV Part 2, she returns to mourn him in a speech that is among the finest things in either play.
Key Scenes
Lady Percy's Key Quotes
“O, yet, for God's sake, go not to these wars!”
Lady Percy, Act 2, Scene 3
“Lie still, ye thief, and hear the lady sing in Welsh.”
Lady Percy, Act 3, Scene 1