Who makes the stage and the audience laugh? Who changes a frat boy's lifestyle? Who brings joy to everyone he annoys? None other than Sir John Falstaff, of course! Falstaff, in Henry IV, is a cleverly written simpleton who cares not about the rules of the court but those of the tavern and his own. He is his own creator, always unpredictable but predictable by everyone except himself. For many, Prince Hal is the hero of the play; Falstaff on the other hand is perceived as the trickster, a William Shakespeare based the infamous character Falstaff on a Sir John Oldcastle (1378-1417) a martyred leader of the Lollards, a medieval English sect based on the teachings of John Wycliffe. Oldcastle fought for the English during the Scottish campaign in 14700 and in the Welsh Wars where he met Henry, son of Henry IV. In 1413 he was indicted by a summons officiated by Archbishop Thomas of Canterbury, for having supported the Lollard preachers and their opinions. A year later he was imprisoned by the king in the Tower of London for forty days because he was found guilty of being a heretic. Oldcastle decided to interrupt his stay at the tower and stay with a Lollard bookseller William Fisher in Smithfield. While at Smithfield, he began to hatch a plan to kidnap the king of Kent while the Lollards were summoned to meet at St. Giles's Fields, near London. But as fate would have it, the king learned of the plan and sent a small group to arrest the fleeing Lollards. Once again Oldcastle evaded the law and fled until he was captured in November 1417, and Parliament found him guilty and he was hung at the fire on 14 December 1417. Falstaff is considered more boisterous than Oldcastle had been. Shakespeare originally had the name of Sir ...... in the center of the card ......ng to Hal. While he does not know the end result of his actions, he is not as foolish as Hal perceives him to be. When you look at both men, Falstaff is more human than Hal's wit. Examining Francis' scene, he is exactly the opposite of both Hal and Francis. Falstaff's jokes are to the detriment of himself, while Hal's jokes generally make fun of others. Unlike Francis, he is a man of many words and does not allow himself to be influenced by the prince's plans. Falstaff's wit is a multifaceted exercise in remarkable verbal inventiveness and social intelligence. He may be a liar, a coward and a thief, but he is far from being a hypocrite and a fool. He sees the world clear as day and knows his role on the global stage. He laughs at himself as much and as easily as he laughs at others around him, but his spirit lives for himself or herself. Rather.