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The Role Of The Fool In King Lear

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The Role Of The Fool In King Lear
To understand the Fool in this story we need to know what a fool is. "Fool: also called jester, a comic entertainer whose madness or imbecility, real or pretended, made him a source of amusement and gave him license to abuse and poke fun at even the most exalted of his patrons." (Encyclopedia Brittanica, 1995 ed.) Although the fool is a funny entertainer, he tells the hard truth. He is “allowed” to tell the cold, hard truth about someone or something. This is only allowed for him, it would be inappropriate for someone else to point out hardships. The way they would do this is through a parable, riddle, or a story. Where he can act funny, crazy, weird, and outrageous, but underneath, he is giving us an underlining meaning about a certain issue or hard truth. With saying all of that, the fool was a crucial part of that time period and make critical changes in society. …show more content…
The fool is an essential character role in this drama. Like we said earlier, the fool was allowed to point out the King’s mistakes. He is the only one that can and anyone else could be put to the death if they did. He would not be blunt about it, but rather humorous and sarcastic to ease the truth. This would allow the King not to get angry so he would not make irrational decisions. When the fool is calling out the King’s wrong, he is being his moral and spiritual ego. Allowing the King to see what is right and the correct way to approach an issue. The fool also travels wherever the King goes. The fool is like a butler or bodyguard in that
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