Prologue
Between 1603 and 1606, William Shakespeare introduced a new tragedy into his library of plays. This story revolves around an egotistical ruler who committed the sin of pride. Through this sin, the protagonist, by denying his partner, affected Shakespeare’s own universe Lear.
Periocha
William Shakespeare’s King Lear opens with Britain’s most powerful prince, Lear, dividing the kingdom between his daughters and suitors. Two of the three daughters tell him how much they adore Lear; the third, Cordelia, speaks the truth, when words cannot describe her love. The violent Lear drives Cordelia and the defender of Kent from his kingdom, giving part of the land to his sisters. Fortunately, the king of Gaul, moved by her honesty, accepts her as his queen.
Now in Act II, Kent, who has returned to the king’s servile habit, defends Lear’s honor by fighting Oswald, Lear’s daughter’s servant. Lear learned what had happened, and learned that his daughters were lying in wait for him. Enraged, Lear decides not to stay with either daughter.
In Act III, Lear wanders through the countryside and the wild thunder. Meanwhile Kent sends a messenger to inform Cordelia what has happened to her father. Unfortunately, the King of France (Cordelia’s husband) is now planning to invade England.
In Act IV, Cordelia is saddened by her father’s current condition. It is so sad that Lear sends his men to find him before the battle begins. Fortunately he finds him and Lear is sorry for what he has done to him.
However, the pernicious sister Cordelia killed herself, and also killed the other with poison. Lear and Cordelia are imprisoned and, although Lear has achieved redemption and healing, Cordelia seems to be punished by her own death. Heartbroken, Lear soon dies, leaving the throne of Albany open.
Character Analysis
“I never held my life but as a pledge against your enemies, nor fear to lose it. These are the first lines of Kent from William Shakespeare’s tragedy King Lear. Leaving ACT 1 – SCENE 1, we note Kent is faithful to his King; saying that he will go to the death , as is likely to protect Lear. In this sense Semper Fi, Kent proves the importance of both Lear’s life and Shakespeare’s own play.
Unfortunately, the king of Kent does not recognize this purest form of faith, and drives him out of the kingdom. Kent, a charming and talented man, returns to act in the Winter’s Tale, and disguises himself as a peasant to serve Lear again. From this we can assume that he had the physical appearance of father and daughter, puts the world back, as it once was was, and showed a true sense of piety. Therefore, lessons can be learned from his behavior and opinions. As the Bible says: “Faith and truth have not forsaken you, bind them around your neck, write them on the tablets of your heart.” If the characters of King Lear had known this line, things might have been different.
Personal Analysis
I was not impressed with the first act. I began to attend to Lear’s cries as if maddened, while he was engaged against the wild thunder. However, it soon died down, until my interest in the irony of Cordelia and Lear.
This is not to say the story isn’t good, it just lost my interest easily. After I started studying and not reading, I still saw stories, themes, patterns, and papers. For example, a particular theme in a tragic story is his delusion. The best scene in the play, in my opinion, is precisely when the storm and thunder intervene, when both the fury of nature and the fury of Lear are in sync.
The model I saw was a model of nature (in the sense of fate and the supernatural). Gloucester is an astrologer, and Lear himself seems to use the word “nature” in some expression or other in his arguments many times. Other characteristics mark something as being natural or unnatural.
The message of King Lear can be briefly summarized. We have a unique hope, we try to be honest with other people. Imagine if Lear caught what Cordelia said about her love of honor. If the sisters had stopped taking the rest of Lear’s power, there would have been no war between France and England, and Cordelia would not have died so soon.
Critical Analysis
In King Lear, Gloucester noted the injustice, the lack of order, and the sheer nihilism of the plot of this play. He is quoted as saying, “As flies to lascivious boys, we will be to the gods, / they kill us by means of sport” (Shakespeare, 1606. IV.i.37-38). What is this passage about Gloucester’s thoughts about the gods controlling King Lear’s world in the king’s silence. by no means proposing to do so.
To say that Shakespeare is a persistent story about nothing is really, however, not fair. The story touches on themes such as greed and madness. In the same way, think if Shakespeare had written Goneril and Regan as despised characters. If greed had not driven him to reject Lear to take control, the story would have
it went completely differently. The same is true of many different problems in the story, such as madness. James Topham’s major theme explains this further.
“Madness played a large part in the crisis of King Lear, and for certain reason. As the storm raged around him, Lear took up his life with insane tortures and held an imaginary court in which he tried his daughters for treachery. This madness, the story seems to suggest, was a natural reaction to a life that lacks meaning or purpose.
Blindness can be a symbol of this madness. Both metaphorical (poor character choices) and physical blindness (Gloucester) are present. Lear, because of his lack of wisdom (blindness), loved his only daughter, and banished his only maidservant, who stuck with him in the end. Gloucester had physical blindness, but ironically enough, only when he lost his sight did he reveal to him the treachery of his son.
Although King Lear is a tragedy and seems unjust at the end, there is still a positive outlook. The idea of reconciliation exists. Lear is reunited with the only daughter who truly loved him (albeit for a brief moment), and realizes the mistakes he made. Patricia Coleman argues that the whole story is not a study of sin or the effects of sin, but of the hope of atonement and reconciliation for that sin (Coleman, 1992). Hope Lear acknowledges his mistakes, and soon atones.
King Lear is said to be Shakespeare’s best work. This sentence is based on double entanglements, ridiculous twists and tragic (yet memorable) plots. Shakespeare’s vice of egotism burned in Lear’s soul. Here the choices he made, and the choices he made, affected the other characters very badly. Through this thought process, the reader would learn to be more careful about acting first and thinking later.
Conclusion
Perhaps Shakespeare made this a pleasurable experience in the theater. Perhaps he wrote it for glory and gold. Either way, the author of King Lear could most likely be a parable of pride and his work.
Bibliography
Coleman, King Lear: An Optimist Tragedy (1992).
http://www.bard.org/education/studyguides/kinglear/learooptimistic.html
Shakespeare, King Lear (1606).
Logan, Iowa: Cover Craft Publishing
Topham, King Lear (2004).
http://classiclit.about.com/od/kinglearshakespeare/fr/aa_kinglear.htm
