Here is a short plot summary of Henry IV Part 1: Henry
Bolingbroke has usurped his cousin, Richard II, to become King
of England. News comes of a rebellion in Wales, where his
cousin, Edmund Mortimer, has been taken prisoner by Owen
Glendower, and in the North, where Harry Hotspur, the young son
of the Earl of Northumberland, is fighting the Earl of Douglas.
The king’s problems mount up and he is forced to postpone his
proposed participation in a crusade. Moreover, his heir, Henry,
known as Hal, shows no interest in princely matters and spends
all his time in the London taverns with disreputable companions,
particularly one dissolute old knight, Sir John Falstaff.
Falstaff will do anything to finance his eating and drinking. He
carries out a robbery with two of hisfriends but Hal and Poins
rob them in turn. Hal protects Falstaff from the law and returns
the money to the victims. Although Hotspur has been forced to
agree to support the king he joins a plot with his father and
his uncle, Worcester, to support G