nick summers review

The Madness of King LearBy Nick Summers - December 08, 2002 It is odd to think that true madness can ever be totally understood. Shakespeare's masterful depiction of the route to insanity, though, is one of the stronger elements of King Lear. The early to middle stages of Lear's deterioration (occurring in Acts I through III) form a highly rational pattern of irrationality: Lear's condition degenerates only when he is injured or when some piece of the bedrock upon which his old, stable world rested is jarred loose. His crazy behavior makes a lot of sense. Despite his age and frailty, Lear is no weak character; it is difficult to imagine how another character could have better resisted such mental and emotional weights as the king suffers under. Lear's worsening madness is understandable only when interpreted with a proper appreciation of the intense forces acting on him and of the gradual disappearance of everything he finds recognizable about his former world.As Lear sets out from his palace toward his daughters' homes, he is still sane, though he begins to regret disowning Cordelia ‹the first sign of mental stress and the first step toward his eventual madness. Lear's Fool needles him about the rash decision, and the king blurts out, "O! let me be not mad, not mad, sweet heaven; / Keep me in temper; I would not be mad!" (I.v.46-47) It is a harbinger of thoughts to come.Lear's impending madness is established in parallel with the growing storm; both threaten to break at any moment. But Lear is strong: he does not give in to insanity all at once; instead he holds on as long as he can, only gradually slipping into lunacy. And Lear is strong‹it is important to note the severity of the stressors acting on him; ignoring them can lead to a misinterpretation of his character as a weak, senile old man instead of a capable leader simply abused by the people he trusted. Perhaps he was foolish to trust them in the first place, but he was not crazy. Above all, Lear's madness is understandable. It is rooted in dismay. Each time a loved one wounds him, Lear weakens, and so does his increasingly tenuous grip on reality. One by one, the pillars that had for eighty years elevated him above the rest of Britain crumble, eventually leaving him at the bottom of the pile, in frightening, alien territory.When Lear discovers Kent in the stocks at the beginning of Act II, Scene iv, he simply cannot comprehend what has happened‹that his daughter would treat his messenger with such insolence. First, Lear laughs‹surely this must be a joke! But Kent informs him that Regan and Cornwall are personally behind the humiliation. Lear cannot believe it. Their exchange is almost comical (especially in contrast to the lines that follow): "No." "Yes." "No, I say." "I say, yea." "No, no; they would not." "Yes, they have." "By Jupiter, I swear, no." "By Juno, I swear, ay." Lear refuses to see the truth; he desperately seeks some other explanation for what is perfectly obvious. Whatever comedy the dialogue produces is then instantly negated by Lear's intense lament:A part of Lear's world that was once cement is suddenly loose, fluid, not at all dependable. He is hurt not just as a king by a subordinate but also as a father by a daughter, which brings its own special pains. Moreover, Regan's salvo compounds the injuries inflicted by Goneril, so Lear suffers doubly. Note the phrase "down, thou climbing sorrow!" The damage to Lear's heart is climbing psychosomatically toward his brain. He resists its ascent; when it eventually does overtake him, when the last of the vestiges of Lear's old world dies, he is subject to the awful floundering usually felt only by creatures in the midst of major earthquakes, when they discover that the one fundamental constant of life‹in their case, the solidity of the earth under their feet‹is no more than an illusion, a sham, and always has been.Lear has no earthquake; he has a thunderstorm, which, with its gusts and torrents, accurately enough mirrors the chaos of his mind. Lear's brain is at this point overwhelmed by grief in two flavors: he has lost his daughters and his political capacity as well. Lear is not losing his mind so much as having it wrenched away from him. Whatever the method, it is slipping away, and is doing so in time to the worsening of the storm outside. Thunder is heard just after Lear says he is "[a]s full of grief as age; wretched in both!" (II.iv.273) and moans, "O fool! I shall go mad!" (II.iv.286)Lear refuses to deign to stay without his knights at one of his daughters' homes; instead he chooses to retreat to the woods. Lear's first entrance on stage is in his formal, rigid palace; next he appears at the lesser homes of his daughters; now he is in the wild. As Lear moves to less and less formal locations, so too does his mind deteriorate.Act III reveals the political disorder that has overtaken Britain. In the absence of the king's central authority, Lear's feuding successors create their own mayhem with their machinations against him and each other. Disarray exists in three spheres: mental, inside Lear's head; political, as the villains scheme for power and each other's undoing; and physical, in the literal tempest. All of this is in contrast to Lear's earlier orderly rule.Lear's madness intensifies. In Act III, Scene ii, he talks to the weather; his rants aren't wholly mad, though, for they have an element of fun in them: a (once) powerful king having a good time, shouting at the elements to do their worst‹nothing more. Yet while Lear retains control of his faculties, there is still something unsettling about his tirade. It is the somewhat unconscious knowledge that true lunacy looms, that this kind of behavior will not be pardonable for long. Lear alternates scarily between being impressively aware of his mental decay (he breaks off his train of thought, recognizing he's ranting) and impulsively goading on the rain (the sudden "Pour on"). Lear's descent into madness is made all the more genuine by the appearance of Edgar, disguised as poor Tom; he feigns craziness with gibberish, like "O! do de, do de, do de" (III.iv.56-57) and "suum, mun ha no nonny," (III.iv.97) which just seems silly in contrast. The ridiculous babble makes Lear's authentic insanity all the more threatening. Edgar's crazy talk makes perfect sense to Lear, though, and while the former king may lose some rationality he gains some humanity when he tears off some of his own clothes in a show of solidarity for his new, naked companion. Lear thinks out loud: "Is man no more than this? Consider him well. [...] Ha! here's three on's are sophisticated; thou art the thing itself; unaccommodated man is no more but such a poor, bare, forked animal as thou art." (III.iv.103-106) Lear realizes that there is essentially no difference between a king and a beggar. His old world has been totally uprooted. After such upheaval‹such a precipitous descent‹Lear's abnormal behavior seems forgivable.Lear's madness is deftly woven by Shakespeare as it intensifies through the tragedy's first three acts. Because it is so plausible, given the intensity of the forces acting on Lear, the old king's plight is universal. What makes King Lear truly great, though, is the swiftness with which Lear's nation is plunged into absolute despair. The first three acts (minus the last few lines) must be separated from the final two. In the first "half," Lear is merely pitiable; he has wronged and been wronged and some treachery has transpired, but nothing apocalyptic has taken place. The blinding of Gloucester (this occurs so close to the end of Act III that for simplicity's sake it will be considered part of the second section of the play) is so violent, so vicious ("Out, vile jelly!" sneers Cornwall gratuitously), in contrast to the relatively tame earlier scenes that it marks a fundamental discontinuity in the tragedy. Before, only feelings were hurt, and reconciliation was a theoretical (if remote) possibility; now blood has been spilled, the storm truly rages, and there will be no turning back. Leaping forward over all the interceding action, the play ends with Lear cradling a dead Cordelia in his arms, the portrait of unqualified grief. This evokes not mere pity from the audience but something more like trauma, so heartrending is the image; instead of a relatively limited work about one man's descent into madness, Shakespeare has crafted a bitterly nihilistic tragedy. There is some redemption‹ Edgar defeats the evil Edmund; Lear is redeemed as a man and father‹but there is no escaping the awful weight of the final scene, driven by madness, and the haunting sense that its coming was all too logical.Gender, Power, and Economics in King LearBy Sonia Buck - January 20, 2002A common practice that William Shakespeare employs in many of his works is the experimentation with gender politics. Shakespeare often shows how notions of gender become unstable as a result of social forces. To discuss Shakespeare's treatment of gender in his plays, it is helpful to use Joan Wallach Scott's definition of gender, which she presents in her book, Gender and the Politics of History. Scott defines gender as "an element of social relationships based on perceived differences between the sexes, and gender is a primary way of signifying relationships of power." She notes that gender is constructed, in part, through relationships, including kinship as well as broader gender relations, based on politics and economics. Scott also asserts that the binary between males and females is unstable, and that gender gets constructed and reconstructed as conditions in society change. This phenomenon is played out in one of Shakespeare's most complex plays, King Lear.A historical event in the context of King Lear that influenced relationships and reconstructed gender roles was the decline of feudalism and the emergence of capitalism. In his article, "King Lear and the Decline of Feudalism," Paul Delany discusses how the move from feudal politics to capitalism resulted in a corresponding change in relationships, which represented a period of crisis for the aristocracy. Delany suggests that the division of Lear's kingdom is symbolic of the emergence of capitalism and the decline of feudalism, and that the tragic ending of the play shows Shakespeare's "attachment to traditional and aristocratic values, combined with a distaste of the fear of the acquisitive, unscrupulous bourgeois values . . .that are taking its place." To expand on Delany's premise, I will argue that, while using King Lear as a vehicle for criticizing the fundamentals of capitalism and promoting feudalism, Shakespeare also uses King Lear's fate to express a fear that aggressive females will be able to take on power roles within the new political structure, and male authority will thus be threatened. Before proceeding with this argument, it is important to examine gender roles as they exist in the overall realm of King Lear.In a book chapter he entitles, "The Situation of Women," Russ MacDonald describes how gender and power relations in feudal society stemmed from primitive societies, where the greater physical strength of males led to the belief that men were superior to women. MacDonald notes, "that women occupied a position subordinate to men in the early modern period is beyond dispute." In the larger cultural background of the play, this gender/power relationship (i.e., male superiority) is exhibited, particularly since the women in King Lear are defined with respect to their husbands. This is clear from the first line of the play, delivered by Kent: "I thought the King had more affected the Duke of Albany than Cornwall" (1.1.1-2). Note that he does not say "I thought the King had more affected Goneril than Regan." The daughters are not truly receiving the kingdom - despite their having to "earn" it by way of Lear's games of flattery; it will really belong to their husbands. Additionally, since Cordelia does not have a husband, her portion of the kingdom is intended to serve as a dowry. Thus, the female is situated at the start of the play as a marginal figure in the male-dominated world. However, as the play progresses, the females (i.e., Lear's daughters) become empowered, undermining traditional patriarchal notions that are already threatened by the new capitalist order and the loss of feudal values previously enjoyed by King Lear.The first scene is representative of Lear's attachment to feudalistic values, such as the accommodation of patriarchal wishes, and the importance of honor and obedience in feudal relationships. Also, Shakespeare immediately connects the loss of Lear's feudal-aristocratic traditions to the change in gender and power dynamics. King Lear is portrayed as a traditional aristocrat, and one who prizes subservience from his daughters. Although he is giving up power by dividing his kingdom, he clings to his authoritative position, and demands that his daughters publicly express their love and affection for him. Cordelia infuriates him because she refuses to engage in the love game. When asked to put her love for her father into flattering words, she states, "Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave/ My heart into my mouth. I love your majesty / According to my bond, no more no less" (1.1.92-93). Because Cordelia refuses to play along with Lear's flattery game, Lear feels that she is usurping his patriarchal authority, so he berates and banishes her. Two different readings of Cordelia's remarks support the notion that is at the heart of the critique of capitalism going on in the play: the new politic order results in the instability of gender roles, as well as the degradation of relationships. Acknowledging both interpretations helps to illustrate Shakespeare's clever crisscrossing of these two implications of the emergence of capitalism. First, there is Paul Delany's reading, based on the Marxist theory of the cash- nexus, which holds that capitalism reduces all relations to rates of economic exchange, and makes the only human connection one based on monetary value. As Delany states, "The new order . . .having set up cash payment as the only measure of social obligation, ruthlessly attacks all customary bonds . . ." . He notes that Cordelia's remarks serve to remind Lear, Regan and Goneril, whose relationships resemble the cash-nexus, that relationships should not be based on rates of exchange, such as the use of flattery to obtain financial security. Relationships should instead be based on a natural relationship, which were associated with feudal economics and politics. In this context, Cordelia seems to endorse traditional feudal bonds and relationships, and to repudiate the new capitalistic relationships.Secondly, Cordelia's refusal to flatter her father could also be read as a rebellion against her prescribed gender role and a direct challenge to her father's expectations. As Catherine Cox points out, she contradicts her own silence and becomes defiant toward the patriarchal order, when she tries to justify her silence and questions her sisters' flattery, saying that they would not have room for loving their husbands if they loved King Lear as much as they proclaimed. Cordelia says, Cordelia's statements can be considered aggressive, and therefore, threatening to Lear's patriarchal power. As Cox notes, "when Cordelia betrays her own silence, she abandons her identity as a daughter; apparently affronted at having to compete with her sisters in so ludicrous a game, she exhibits a masculine sense of entitlement, as if the 'bond' she and Lear share should rightly ensure her place as Lear's successor and exempt her from public display." Accordingly, her act of rebellion against Lear can thus be viewed as an attempt to invert the social structure in which she lives. This reading emphasizes the threat of female power that is emerging with the new political order.By acknowledging both readings of Cordelia's opening remarks concomitantly, one can see that a double context for the critique of capitalism is immediately set up: (i) how it reduces relationships to rates of exchange; and (ii) how it destabilizes gender roles. This double play of the negative results of capitalism is continued throughout the text. While condemning the new order, Shakespeare simultaneously critiques the effects that the changing society has on gender roles. He shows how Lear's downfall is in part due to the reconstruction of power and the destabilizing of gender that resulted from the changing political order and the breakdown of Lear's kingdom the end of his natural patriarchal stability. This is further developed through Lear's relationships with his daughters after the division of Lear's kingdom.Before the kingdom is divided, Lear's daughters provide a sense of stability through their affection and loyalty, which Lear considers to be their duty. His daughters were subservient to him while he was King, but that is no longer the case once they claim Queenship. Lear expected his daughters to fulfill his needs, and was dependent on their gratitude and affection. They failed to live up to Lear's expectations, and he becomes enraged. Lear's dependence on them for attention depended on their reciprocal reliance on him, since he was the source of their power. When the situation changed and his daughters became empowered, Lear, with his patriarchal values, could not emotionally handle the new power dynamics. He even entertains the notion of regaining his kingdom, during his conversation with his Fool, when he says, "[t]o tak't again perforce! Monster ingratitude!" (1.5.37). Lear's statements reinforce the notion that going back to feudalism would enable him to regain his power, which would create a reversion back to his previous relationships with his daughters, when they used to fulfill their role of giving him pleasure through obedience and affection. So, the breakdown of his kingdom perpetuates a change in gender dynamics, and results in the deterioration of Lear's power and the destruction of his most important kinship his daughters. In this way, Shakespeare connects the decline of strong feudal relationships with the threat of female power both of which followed the emergence of capitalism.We see a similar connection in Act II, when Lear's daughters deny him his full retinue of knights. Paul Delany discusses how the new social order created "the opposition between a feudal-aristocratic ethic that promotes display, generosity and conspicuous consumption, and a bourgeois ethic that values thrift because it promotes the accumulation rather than the dissipation of capital." Lear's insistence that he maintain his full retinue of knights shows his dependence on such feudal values, and it is interesting to observe that Shakespeare makes Lear's daughters, with their greed and ambition, the power source that deprives Lear of his knights. Lear expects that, of all people, his own daughters should grant his wish, and when they tell him that his retinue and his power are to be cut even further, his remarks serves to express his anger over his daughters' disobedience, and also to provide an endorsement of feudal consumption: Lear's justification for his knights exemplifies his bond to strong feudal, patriarchal values. He is saying that humans would be no different from the animals if they did not need more than the fundamental necessities of life to be happy a feudalistic value and a strong opposition to capitalism, which supports practicality and frugality. Lear needs knights and attendants not only because of the service that they provide him but because of what their presence represents: namely, his identity, both as a king and as a patriarchal figure. Further, Goneril and Regan's refusal to accommodate Lear's requests infuriated him because, again, women challenged his authority, and not just any women, but his own daughters. Despite his attempt to assert his authority, Lear finds himself powerless; all he can do is vent his rage and, ultimately, go mad. Again, capitalism is criticized, and ill effects of female power are concurrently portrayed. This crisscrossing of gender, power and politics adds to the complexity of the play and shows Shakespeare's genius.It is interesting that, right after his daughters undermine Lear's authority by denying his requests for knights, Lear seems to find himself slipping into a feminine role. He associates himself with the female gender by his discussion of crying a device he attributes to women. He states fearfully, "And let not women's weapons water drops / Stain my man's cheeks" (2.2.456-457). Lear is concerned that the new power dynamics are robbing him of his masculinity and patriarchy, and making his daughters the new hierarchy of power. In addition, just as Lear associates himself with weakness and femininity, he later aligns his daughter, Goneril, with masculinity and seniority, when he says of her, "Ha! Goneril with a white beard?" (4.6.96). With these remarks, Lear himself acknowledges the reversal in gender and power roles that has resulted from surrendering his kingdom and granting his daughters Queenship. By this point in the play, Lear's entire patriarchal order of the world that he so long was accustomed to has become to him a world of disorder and chaos. Lear expresses his disgust with the reversal of authorative roles and the shattered order of the world during the mock trial scene. He talks about authority, and how it is full of deception and confused roles:Here, Lear criticizes capitalism and the new societal order by describing a world that has been turned upside down, and where images of authority become disconnected from reality. The harsh language in this passage shows how disturbed Lear is by the current order of England, one that is now controlled by a capitalist society as opposed to the stable, feudal hierarchal order that Lear initially represents. When feudal values fall apart, disorder takes over the realm. The theme of disorder and reversed roles in this scene runs parallel to Lear's previous references to gender reversal, particularly because he then returns to his discussion of crying. He states, "We came crying hither: / thou knowst the first time that we smell the air we wawl and cry" (4.6.178-179). Whereas Lear previously referred to tears as "women's weapons," now that he has lost everything and gone mad, he takes on a feminine position by acknowledging that he will end his life in tears. Clearly, the perceived difference between males and females and the gender dynamics that existed prior to the division of Lear's kingdom have been broken down, and the relationships that Lear depended on for his authority have been overturned. Thus, the play ends with King Lear as a conquered man, stripped not only of power, but also of masculinity. Through the tragic ending of King Lear, Shakespeare shows how the change in politics completely altered relationships and reconstructed concepts of gender; he shows how the decline of feudalism adversely affects power relations and the natural patriarchal order, and changes female roles so that they become threatening to society. Of course, by today's standards, such anxiety over capitalism and feminism is absurd. In fact, I wish the Bard could be around to see just how powerful capitalism can be for America, especially once a woman, like Hillary Clinton, is elected President.
Lear and Glouchester's Transformation Bryn Lander-SimonKing Lear is one of the most tragic parables ever brought forth in literature, dealing with betrayal, familial deception, madness and violence. In presenting such tragic themes and ideas in his work Shakespeare uses a subplot to mirror the main action which therefore increases the effect of the parable's lessons. In both stories, parents are deceived and betrayed by their own children, one of the most abhorrant crimes in Shakespeare's time. It is this mistreatment by children that lead both Lear and Gloucester to madness and then death. But they are not completely innocent victims who have fallen to their children's ill intentions. Both have made critical and constant errors in judgment that caused their downfall, and they both must realize their errors before their deaths.In the first scene in the first act, we are presented with Lear's misguided dependence on artifice and flattery that catapults the action of the play and leads to both his positive transformation and sadly, his death. Before dividing up his kingdom among his three daughters Lear asks "which of you shall we say doth love us most,/That we our largest bounty may extend" (King Lear I.i.51-52). From the beginning it is obvious that Lear equates quality with quantity, as he so blatantly states that whoever says they love him most will receive the most. He does not realize that inflated praise and flattery are not the same as love and honest affection, something that Lear will have to learn very painfully. The responses of his daughters Goneril, Regan and lastly, Cordelia show further Lear's lack of understanding. Goneril and Regan both make inflated and obviously dishonest claims of love. For example, Goneril describes her love as "a love that makes breath poor, and speech unable" (King Lear I.i.60), quite amazing considering she is in fact speaking at that moment. When Lear's one loving and honest daughter Cordelia explains to Lear that her sisters are lying to him, "why have my sisters husbands if they say/They love you all?" (King Lear I.i.99-100), and that she loves him too much to lie and flatter him and will therefore say nothing, he quite sorely misses the point. This opening scene clearly presents the reader with Lear's chief error in judgment that he will have to overcome by the end of the play.While Lear so heavily depends on words and flattery Gloucester trusts what his eyes see too much, and therefore falls prey to Edmunds cunning and deception. In the second scene Edmund begins his plot to discredit Edgar in Gloucester's eyes so that he, the illegitimate son, will get everything, including property, title and material wealth. Whereas Goneril and Regan use words to illicit the response they desire from Lear, Edmund plays off of Gloucester's trust of appearance and his own eyes to trick him. He pretends to have a letter from Edgar that he is trying to hide from him when in fact he knows that Gloucester will demand to see the letter. Gloucester alludes to this dependence on sight and appearances himself when asking for the letter from Edmund in his use of vocabulary. He says "let's see. Come, if it/Be nothing, I shall not need spectacles...Let's see, let's see" (King Lear I.ii.35-44). Because he has read these words himself, Gloucester does not even for a moment truly doubt their validity and immediately is put in a violent rage against his son without even questioning the situation. As he says moments after reading the letter, "O villain, villain! His very opinion in the/Letter. Abhorred villain, unnatural, detested, brutish villain;/Worse than brutish! Go, sirrah, seek him. I'll apprehend him. Abominable villain!" (King Lear I.ii.77-80). Just like Lear, Gloucester is easily led into the trap that his child devises by his own fault.It is not until Lear is presented with Tom the beggar, a character completely stripped of artifice, that he can see the errors of his values and judgments. After speaking with Tom and spending time in the cave Lear makes his transformation into a man who cares not for artifice or flattery, but rather honesty and truth. As he says to Tom, "Thou art the thing itself; unaccommodated man is no/ more but such a poor, bare, forked animal as thou art. Off, off, you lendings! Come, unbutton here" (King Lear III.iv.107-109). By trying to literally undress himself, Lear is trying to shed himself of all of his artifice and unnaturalness. By the time he sees Cordelia again he realizes the error in his judgments, saying "if you have poison for me, I will drink it./I know you do not love me...You have some cause" (King Lear IV.vii.75-78) and looks forward to passing the time in prison to "pray, and sing, and tell old tales" (King Lear V.iii.12).As king, Lear has lived his life with the comfort of always being flattered and treated with the utmost respect and importance. Once he has given up his power and authority to Goneril and Regan, he is faced with a situation in which he is not treated with such respect. All of Goneril and Regan's elevated prose of their false love for Lear is replaced with a forthright lack of respect and love. When Lear begs Regan to take care of him in his old age she simply replies, "Good sir, no more. These are unsightly tricks./Return you to my sister." (King Lear II.iv.155-156). This change in his position is more than the weary old king can bear and he must reach madness from this ingratitude and hypocrisy before he can realize his faults of equating flattery and materialism with happiness and love.Just as Lear must suffer such great disrespect and harshness of words and actions to learn not to depend on them, Gloucester must lose his vision before he can depend on his mind and heart to judge situations instead of depending on what he thinks he sees. While Lear may be slow to transform, Gloucester quickly realizes the error of his ways, saying to Tom the beggar, "I have no way, and therefore want no eyes;/I stumbled when I saw. Full oft 'tis seen/our means secure us, and our mere defects/prove our commodities" (King Lear IV.i.18-21). He realizes that when he could see he was overconfident and did not judge situations carefully, but now that he is blind he has learned to not depend on his eyes to show him the truth.While both of these characters have in many ways made a positive transformation, both recognizing and attempting to change their flaws that caused so much harm, Shakespeare's work is still a tragedy. By the end of the play, after both characters fully realize their mistakes, they both die from a combination of shock and old age. Lear realizes his mistakes in the way he quantified the love of his daughter, culminating in his excitement to pass time in prison with Cordelia, but she is killed and the shock of her death kills him. Like Lear, Gloucester realizes he misjudged Edgar's character and is deeply repentative. But it is too late, and he dies from the shock of discovering Tom's true identity, that of his son. King Lear ends sadly, but also with a sense of a positive future. Though it may have been too late for these characters to realize their mistakes and change their lives, the message their stories give is that of working to change what is wrong in one's character.Power vs. IntelligenceBy Cindy Pang - September 12, 2002In Shakespeare's King Lear, the characters in a position of power are most often the ones who are blindest to the truth. Only after losing that power are they able to gain a clear understanding of the events occurring around them and to realize who their true friends and enemies are. The converse is true as well. Those characters with no power are usually the ones who can see the true motives of other characters. This inverse relationship between power and knowledge is most clearly reflected in four characters: Gloucester, King Lear, the Fool, and Kent.In Gloucester's situation, his power can be equated with his vision. A member of the court, Gloucester has the noble title of earl. In this high position, he is not aware of the motivations behind the actions of those around him. His own son, Edmund, deceives him. Angry at being the illegitimate son and greedy for inheritance, Edmund convinces his father that his other son, Edgar, is plotting to kill him. This does not require much effort since Gloucester quickly believes Edmund. Although they plan to meet again to determine whether Edgar really is conspiring against his father, it seems as if Gloucester already believes Edgar to be guilty. This can be seen in the way he refers to Edgar as he instructs Edmund to "find out this villain" (I.2.115). The next time they meet, Gloucester finds Edmund injured. Although he does not see what happens, Gloucester is easily tricked into believing that Edgar attacked him. At this point, Gloucester is mistakenly convinced that Edgar is the evil son and that Edmund is the good son. He then rewards Edmund, telling him, "...and of my land, ... I'll work the means to make thee capable" (II.1.83-85).Gloucester learns "to see" only in his blindness. Six lines after Cornwall completely blinds Gloucester, Gloucester discovers the truth. When he is injured, Gloucester calls out for Edmund to help, but Cornwall quickly informs him that "it was [Edmund] that made the overture of thy treasons to us" (III.7.89-90). It is here that Gloucester understands what is happening, exclaiming, "O my follies! Then Edgar was abused" (III.7.92). Aside from this realization, Gloucester also gains other knowledge in his state of blindness. For one thing, he is less easily persuaded by others. When Edgar tries to convince his father that they are on a hill, Gloucester states, "Methinks the ground is even" (IV.6.3). His newfound insight is also evident in his encounter with Edgar. When Gloucester could see, he does not recognize his son, asking "What are you there? Your names?" (III.4.127), when he sees Edgar. After he is blinded, however, he connects Tom Bedlam with Edgar saying, "I such a fellow saw... My son came then into my mind" (IV.1.33-35). Now that he is blind and powerless, he is suddenly more perceptive to the world around him.King Lear experiences a similar exchange between power and knowledge. As ruler of his kingdom, he is first presented in the play as a man with the most power. However, he is also unable to recognize who his friends and enemies are. First, his daughters, Goneril and Regan, easily deceive him. They tell him that they both love him the most, "more than word can wield the matter" (I.1.55). He believes their lies and divides the kingdom between them, while leaving nothing to his other daughter, Cordelia, who truly loves him. Simply because she refuses to flatter him, he was unable to see the reality of Cordelia's true love for him. As a result, he banishes her from his kingdom with the following words: "...for we have no such daughter, nor shall ever see that face of her again. Therefore be gone without our grace, our love, our benison" (I.1.265-267). King Lear also punishes one of his most loyal followers, Kent. Kent sees Cordelia's true love for her father, and tries to advise him against making a mistake. Instead, Lear irrationally prefers to believe in Goneril and Regan's lies and banishes Kent also. Not only is King Lear unable to see the evil in his own personal life, but also that of the kingdom. He neglects the poor and does not even acknowledge the existence of poverty in his land.Once Lear gives up his kingdom, however, his lower position allows him to see the truth. He descends into a position of total powerlessness once he is locked out of the castle during a tremendous storm. At this point, he has nowhere to go and cannot even keep his train of men. He now realizes how wicked his two eldest daughters really are, referring to them as "pernicious" (III.2.22). During the storm, he also sees the poverty in his kingdom, which he fails to recognize when he is in a position of power. Lear wonders how the "houseless heads and unfed sides defend [the poor] from seasons such as these". He continues to say, "O, I have ta'en too little care of this!" (III.4.32-35), admitting his neglect toward the poor. More importantly, Lear sees through Cordelia's lack of flattering and realizes that her love for him is so great that she could not express it in words.Unlike Gloucester and King Lear, the Fool does not experience a fall from power in order to gain knowledge. Instead, because he is already in a low position, he is able to be intelligent. One of two reasons why he already has knowledge is because of the way the other characters perceive him. Most people are not conscious of him, and when they are, they dismiss his presence as unimportant. When Kent asks who the Fool is, for example, the Gentleman answers, "None but the fool" (III.1.16). They basically see him as a nobody. As a result, the other characters do not pretend to be someone else. They are their true selves around him and thus, the Fool sees the truth. The second reason why his low position allows him to be intelligent stems from the first. Because the other characters do not consider him important, the Fool can say anything he wants and not anger anyone. No one is threatened by him or his statements, as is clear from the King's actions. The Fool's statements are usually much harsher than any other characters' words. It is the other characters, however, who are punished while nothing happens to him. When Kent and Cordelia speak the truth, for example, the king becomes so angry that he banishes them from the kingdom. However, when the Fool criticizes the King with, "The sweet and bitter fool will presently appear, the one in motley here, the other found out there" (I.4.141-144), Lear only replies with, "Dost thou call me fool, boy?" (I.4.144). The Fool is basically calling the King a fool, but the King does not even get angry.Throughout the play, the Fool provides insight into the actions of the characters. The Fool shows his knowledge through ambiguous statements and clever witticism. The only problem is that no one takes him seriously. When the Fool advises Lear to "speak less than thou knowest" (I.4.116), Kent says, "This is nothing, fool" (I.4.125). The Fool also provides simple and clear reasoning for a one sighted King. The Fool only first appears the fourth scene of act 1, after Cordelia has moved away with the King of France. The Fool knows that Lear has done wrong by giving all his land away to his two evil daughters, and tells him so when he says, "All thy other titles thou hast given away; that thou wast born with" (I.4.146-147). The Fool is supposed to be an idiot, but he is anything but that. The one character in this play who is supposed to be the mad one, is in fact the one person who says things that make sense.Another character who reflects the inverse relationship between power and intelligence is Kent. He is first presented as an earl, a member of the court with a considerable amount of power. However, he is also knowledgeable since he is able to discern which daughters are good and evil. Because no character in King Lear can have both power and intelligence, Kent is quickly put into a position of no power once Lear banishes him. Throughout the rest of the play, Kent plays the role of Lear's servant. Because he is in this low position, he can continue to be knowledgeable and take care of the King.In King Lear, power and knowledge do not go hand in hand. In order to obtain one, the other must be lost. This is clearly seen in our discussion of Gloucester, King Lear, Fool, and Kent. Gloucester and King Lear both have to give up their power in order to see what is going on. It is not coincidental that once they lose their power, they are able to see the truth. The Fool is the most knowledgeable character, but only because he has no power. And Kent is forced to become a powerless figure in order to continue his existence as a knowledgeable character.Recognizing Humanity In William Shakespeare's King LearBy Noura Badawi - December 15, 1999William Shakespeare's tragedy, King Lear, is not merely a story of the ill effects of aging, but an illustration of a man plagued by pride and arrogance. Initially, Lear deems himself a man worthy of worship by his family and friends, an ill for which he suffers profoundly. 'The world remains what it was, a merciless, heart-breaking world. Lear is broken by it, but he has learned...' (Stein 69). Through his experiences, Lear gradually realizes that his pride has caused him to lose touch with his humanity, which he regains when he is humbled.Lear abuses his authority when he plays favorites with his daughters. He is infuriated upon hearing that his youngest daughter, Cordelia has nothing to say while her sisters present an eloquent testimony of their love, only it is that much more insincere. He says "Nothing will come of nothing. Speak again" (I.i. 90). He is arrogant in assuming that he can control the feelings of his children and lacks the humility to accept that his daughter may not feel so strongly about him. Lear's arrogance prevents him from seeing that Cordeila's plainness of speech indicated that she loved, but not for gain. Similarly, he is unable to detect the insincerity of the crafty and flattering speeches delivered by Goneril, and Regan. After he is made aware of the truth, he is utterly humiliated at his vile treatment of his beloved, innocent daughter. He says "I am a very foolish fond old man...I am mainly ignorant" (IV.vii 60,65). Lear comes to acknowledge his limitations as a result of being humbled.Throughout his life, Lear felt that the rules did not apply to him because of his royal position. "Proud obstinacy becomes his case" (Elliott 263). His pride gets in the way when he banishes Kent. His arrogance would not allow Kent or anyone to point out his wrongs. Occupied in his pursuit of power, Lear is unable to see that Kent is one of few who are willing to sacrifice for him. He pushes him further away than anyone and eventually loses him. "His, [Kent's] passionate affection for, and fidelity to, Lear acts on our feelings in Lear's favour: virtue itself seems to be in company with him" (Bonheim 19). It is not until he is humbled that he begins to understand that his pride caused him to sink further down and lose his sense of honesty and humanity.Due to his lack of humility throughout most of the play, Lear has difficulty finding his identity. He embodies that uncertainty as he never succeeds in naming himself. He is much too occupied with his wealth and kingship that he fails to consider his flaws and shortcomings. The identity he does finally settle on is a recognition of present reality and his pitiful condition, a drastic change from an arrogant Lear of earlier scenes. He says "Fourscore and upward, not an hour more nor less;/ and to deal plainly/ I fear I am not in my perfect mind (IV.vi 53-6). He is rather timid and apologetic, trying to kneel to Cordelia. His ability to humble himself in this manner indicates hat he has begun to learn the true essence of humility.In the same scene, Cordelia is seen tending her father. Because Lear has done her wrong, he sites reason for possible admonishment. His ability to admit to his faults and anticipate punishment is a true mark of his humility. It is at this point that Lear gives away his kingship. He refuses to acknowledge the titles with which she addresses him. When told he is in his own kingdom, he replies: 'Do not abuse me' (IV.vi. 71). Lear feels unworthy of praise. After being humbled, he comes to understand that his pride caused him enormous devastation.Later in the play, Lear puts his guilty daughters on trial. The attempt is futile, but this is justice as he knows it and desires to assert his authority. His arrogance has stripped him of patience and thus he makes this hasty decision. Lear's mind is constantly on the move, "... in a dynamic pattern of advance and retreat, surrender and resistance" (Leggatt 78). There are instances in which he fights his feelings and those in which he expresses them directly, but since he is recovering from his plague of pride, he is confused. When his frailty of mind and body become apparent, Lear realizes that his pride brought him to this point and that he cannot win and thus he is humbled.Following the confrontation with Goneril, Lear begins to remember what he has done. "I know you do not love; for your sisters/ Have, as I do remember, done me wrong./ You have some cause; they have not" (IV.vi. 66-8). His identity is gradually reasserting itself.'I know you do not love me' shows him in some danger of repeating his old mistake about Cordelia; but at least he is re-establishing some sense of his identity, not through counting up the number of knights he is allowed, or gestures of respect (he rejects those) but simply through an awareness that he has a relationship with Cordelia (Leggatt 87).His consuming pride kept him from accepting anyone's disapproval, but he is now aware that his pride has been the cause of great turmoil and is ready to suffer the consequences by virtue of the humility he has gained.There exists a tension between Lear's awareness of his worldly surroundings and his absorption with himself. His kingship was a major distraction that raised his level of arrogance and prevented him from keeping in touch with his common humanity. Goneril's mistreatment of him leads him to question his identity:Does any here know me? This is not Lear. Does Lear walk thus, speak thus? Where are his eyes? Either his notion weakens, his discernings Are lethargied‹ha, waking? 'Tis not so. Who is it that can tell me who I am? (I.iv. 208-212)Lear's sense of identity is contingent on how other people treat him. Where as before he was so confident in himself, this experience allows him to realize that his pride caused him to dismiss his humanity. As his question implies, Lear is on the verge of embarking on a journey of self-discovery as a result of his becoming more humble.Lear's diminishing arrogance is also apparent when he is given fresh clothes in order to look respectable before Cordelia's husband. "In his earlier tirades, he was grandly unaware of his absurdity. Now with nothing absurd about him," (Leggatt 86) he asks gently, 'Pray do not mock'; 'Do not laugh at me' (IV.vi. 52, 61[IV.vii]). Lear's old self-assertive nature begins to disappear. While he began "... a man that grossly overvalued material things..." (Taylor 365), he is now aware that ostentatious clothing will not erase his pain. He learns that his arrogance had caused him to lose touch with the fact that was merely an imperfect, and limited human. An application of his humility, he no longer deems himself superior and realizes that his conceit lead to his downfall.Lear's humbleness is also evident when he displays pity he feels for the Fool in the midst of the storm:Lear grows in compassion, and admits to his own failures. Although the fool is of insignificant status, Lear realizes that humans are vulnerable creatures. Whereas before Lear "...ignored if not through callous indifference, simply because he had not experienced it" (Dollimore 73), he now finds pity for a human other than himself. Lear also sympathizes with homeless poverty because he himself is homeless, and with Poor Tom because he claims his daughter did him wrong. As result of his trying predicament, he comes to discover pity for his fellow man which demonstrates his humility.As his humility allows him to accept his ill fate, we no longer see the beast like Lear, but one who is calm and further in touch with his humanity.There is some self-pity evident in Lear's words, but it is apparent that he has lost much pride. "For Lear, the assurance of interconnection between man and nature is breaking down..." (Brooke 33). Through his humbling life experiences, Lear realizes that pride no longer suits him for it was that pride that caused him to lose his humanity.Lear's humility is unequivocally a breakthrough that leads to his seeking Cordelia's forgiveness. This is not to say that he has undergone a complete transformation, but that Lear is slowly learning to be humble. "He gropes reluctantly towards his new life, trying at first to cling to the old certainties of pain and punishment" (Leggatt 88). Lear's mind is beginning to expand as his concern for his kingship, justice and power diminish. He begins to concern himself less with worldly matters and more about his family, namely, Cordelia. From the reunion, it becomes apparent that Lear is content with losing the battle and being sent to prison so long as he has Cordelia on his side.In his heart, there is a void that cannot be removed except with the company of his dearest daughter and he is willing to sacrifice his kingship to be with her. Lear realizes that being proud and only seeking wealth and status inhibits the recognition of his human need to be loved and consequently becomes more humble.Lear struggles to accept the cold fact that his beloved is dead. Cordelia's death is the play's final reality after which the efforts of human words cease to have an effect. His last speech includes aspects of the entire play. "And my poor fool is hanged! No, no, no life?/ Why should a dog, a forse, a rat have life,/ And thou no breath at all? Thou'lt come no more./ Never, never, never, never, never (To Kent) Pray you, undo the button." (V.iii. 281-6). He mentions the fool, the animals, and Kent's service. While Lear at one point controlled vast amounts of wealth and servants, as the play comes to an end, it as though everything is bearing down on Lear which makes vivid to him his incapacity to alter destiny. He begins to understand the inevitability of mortality, a concept that was foreign to him before the loss of his kingship and family, and hence he is humbled.When it comes time for Lear's death, he is so preoccupied with Cordelia, that he doesn't know he is dying. He is exhausted and overwhelmed by what has occurred. He says "Do you see this? Look on her. Look, her lips, / Look there, look there" (V.iii. 312-13). He is desperate to see her alive, but again his inability to change his fate is apparent. In this scene, Lear is faced with the depth of his love for Cordelia which ultimately leads to his death. The human need of being genuinely loved and loving comes through clearly. Sadly, it was something his pride caused him to over look and after he grew in humility, it was finally acknowledged, only at too late a stage.Although Lear endured a great deal of hardship in his life, he came to realize his limitations. It was through this acknowledgment of his humanity that he became humble. "There is nothing more noble and beautiful than the effect of suffering in reviving the greatness and eliciting the sweetness of Lear's nature" (Bradley 284). While initially priding himself on his high level of authority and status, he learns that pride is evil and the cause of his loss of loved ones and eventually his own life.
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