Alas, What Shall I Do For Love

“Alas, What Shall I Do For Love?” is a song performed at court by Henry VIII and Thomas Wyatt. Its refrain gives a musical form to the question of love, while the surrounding scene places that question beside the king’s marriage, Anne Boleyn’s position, and the political consequences of royal desire.

Court Performance

At the celebration following Anne’s installation, music and dancing bring courtiers together in a public display of companionship and status. The king calls Wyatt to sing with him, and the two perform the song. Stephen Gardiner, listening nearby, answers its question with a dry assessment of Henry: the king will do anything he can think of for love, and there is, in Gardiner’s view, no limit to what he might attempt. The song’s refrain thus becomes more than entertainment; it prompts a pointed judgment about the ruler whose choices shape the court.

Love and Political Power

The song appears amid the unsettled consequences of Henry’s pursuit of Anne and the effort to secure the succession of their children. Elsewhere, Henry and Anne’s marriage is performed in a small chapel at Whitehall before a limited group of witnesses, and the king’s councillors later consider legislation for the succession. Against those developments, the song’s question makes private desire audible within a political setting. Gardiner’s reply draws attention to the imbalance between an ordinary expression of love and a king’s capacity to make his desires consequential for others.

Recurrence and Meaning

The song’s title also names a broader concern with compacts between people, especially the obligations binding husband and wife. In the court scene, however, the performance does not resolve what love demands; it leaves the question suspended between Wyatt’s song and Gardiner’s commentary. That contrast gives the refrain its force: love is voiced as a personal question, while the surrounding action shows how royal choices can turn it into a matter of marriage, authority, and succession.