The St. Crispin's Day speech is the passage students remember longest from Henry V, which makes it both a gift and a trap for teachers. Many essays quote the famous "we few, we happy few, we band of brothers" lines and then announce that the speech is inspiring. That is an observation, not an analysis. Grading these essays well means separating admiration from explanation and rewarding students who show how the language actually works.

Start by checking whether the student places the speech in its dramatic moment. Henry speaks on the eve of Agincourt to an exhausted English army that is badly outnumbered, and Westmorland has just wished for more men. Henry's answer reframes small numbers as an advantage, turning a weakness into honor. Essays that ignore this situation tend to treat the speech as timeless motivation and miss the specific problem Henry is trying to solve.

Next, look for evidence that the student has read the speech line by line rather than remembering the general feeling. Strong writers notice details such as the shift from "if we are marked to die" toward the promise of future storytelling, the repeated appeals to memory, and the way social rank dissolves into brotherhood. Weak essays paraphrase the speech in slightly different words. A useful grading question is whether the student could only have written this paragraph by studying the actual text.

Separate Rhetorical Devices From Rhetorical Effects

Many students identify devices such as repetition or alliteration and stop there, which earns partial credit at most. The stronger move is explaining the effect on the listeners in the scene. Repetition of "we" builds a sense of shared identity, and the promise that veterans will show their scars each year gives the soldiers something to imagine beyond the battle. Your rubric should reward the connection between technique and purpose more than the mere labeling of technique.

• Identifies the specific audience and situation before analyzing language
• Quotes short phrases and explains their connotations instead of paraphrasing the whole speech
• Connects rhetorical choices to the outcome Henry wants from his soldiers
• Considers whether the speech is sincere, strategic, or both
• Avoids treating patriotic emotion as proof of literary quality

Reward Students Who Complicate the Speech

The most impressive essays acknowledge that the speech works on multiple levels. Henry is inspiring his troops, but he is also managing morale, and he has just spent a night in disguise hearing soldiers doubt the cause of the war. A student who connects the speech to that earlier scene is showing real command of the play. Give extra credit in the interpretation category for essays that bring in evidence beyond the speech itself.

You can also reward students who consider audience beyond the stage. Shakespeare's original theatergoers knew that England had eventually lost the French territory Henry conquers, and the play's Epilogue says so directly. An essay that asks how that knowledge changes the emotional force of the speech is doing sophisticated work. Even if the argument is not fully developed, the instinct deserves recognition in your feedback.

Write Feedback That Moves the Student Forward

The most common weakness in these essays is a lack of explanation after the quotation. A helpful comment might read: "You quote 'band of brothers' but do not say what this phrase does to the difference between the king and the common soldier. Try explaining what Henry gains by using family language here." This tells the student exactly what is missing and offers a concrete next step. Compare that to a margin note that simply says "analyze more."

It also helps to point students toward a model paragraph, either from a strong peer essay with permission or one you write yourself. Seeing what a full quotation-plus-explanation looks like is often more useful than any abstract advice. Over several assignments, students begin to internalize the pattern and produce it without prompting, which is the real goal of feedback.

Keep Your Standards Consistent Across the Stack

Because this speech is so familiar, essays on it can blur together, and graders often become more lenient or more critical as fatigue builds. Read the first five essays, then return to the first one before finalizing any grades to check that your standards have not shifted. Writing down two or three anchor descriptors for each score level keeps your judgments steady over a long grading session.

If you teach several sections, consider grading all responses to the same question in one sitting instead of one class at a time. This reduces the chance that section three receives a different level of scrutiny than section one. Consistency is not glamorous, but students notice when it is missing, and they trust your feedback more when it is applied evenly.