king lear critics

shakespearean tradgedy

tradgedy is a fall from prosperity to wretchedness

uncompensated suffering

is it fate or human error - uncertainty is the point

kastan

the shakespearean tragic hero

suffering and calamity contrasted with previous happiness or glory

a total reversal of fortune

tragic hero’s welfare affects the welfare of an entire nation

the fall reflects the weakness of man and the power of fate

Bradley

tradgedy and madness

madness is a punishment but also allows insight

mad characters have the privildge to comment on ideas eg the corruption of jacobran society

mack

language and female power

edmund’s mother is only desribed as a sexual object

lear is portrayed like mary carrying on cordelia as christ

the womb is described as a ‘dark and viscious place’

lear appropriates womens discourse - cursing

goneril and regan assume the male voice and space that lear abandones

Lear knows his tears make a woman of him

Rutter

ways of speaking

in the play no truth is spoken as the good is distorted by pain and the evil by their wickedness

apart from the fool and poor tom - ‘violent local colour

the love test is a ‘self gratifying charade’ as Lear has already decided

goneril and regans verse is inscinscere - goneril topic of inexpressibility, regan outdoing

kermode

the morality of king lear

no reassertion of morality in the play

two endings - the moral ending and the second ending

it does not endorse or deny morality

loyalty and knowing one’s place is no longer useful - eg oswald and cornwall

o’toole

Lear and Cordelia

about male anxiety

lear goes mad becuase he refuses to accept that he is depednat on his daughters. when he does cry and discoveres a loving, non-patriarchal relationship with cordelia, he is redeemed#

sees femininity as a posotive force

kahn

edmund

"Edmund swings from unfaith to the verge of faith suspended in indecision, sinks into the abyss of evil once more, and tries to crawl out-too late

revenge and the storm

"Lear wishes both the microcosm (himself) and the macrocosm (the universe) the be crushed in revenge upon his daughters"

"The storm acts as a symbol of the last judgement...connotations of doomsday that would have reached a christian audience"

dunn

the storm, power

"The knowledge of himself that Lear gains in the storm... demonstrates that pride and vanity are not irreversible. His suffering in the storm is remedial because it brings insights into the flaws of his life plan and permits him to transcend them"

"his three daughters and Edmund are driven by the need to achieve social, personal, and sexual power."

mclaughlin

kent and loyalty and the fool

Kent: "His final lines reinforce the audience's sense of him as a character who exists only to serve the king he loves."

"Together, the Fool and Kent serve as Cordelia's surrogates, as they repeatedly draw attention to the contemptible behavior of the sisters"

martha rozett

lear’s inner voice

"Lear has no soliloquies... the Fool provides the means for Lear to use a more intimate and unguarded voice"

woods