King Lear Quotes Study Guide

"Though this knave came something saucily to the world before he was sent for, yet was his mother fair, there was good sport at his making, and the whoreson must be acknowledg'd."

Gloucester to Kent

Describes how Edmund was conceived. Gloucester is not repentant for having a bastard son; this will come back to haunt him later.

"We have divided / In three our kingdom; and 'tis our fast intent / To shake all cares and business from our age."

Lear to Gloucester/Kent

Out of laziness, Lear splits kingdom in three. Whichever daughter flatters Lear the most will get the most opulent third. (Abraham Lincoln's thoughts: "A nation divided cannot stand.")

"What shall Cordelia speak? Love, / and be silent."

Cordelia to audience

Cordelia's first words connect her to the audience. She refuses to flatter her father.

"Nothing, my lord."

Cordelia to Lear

She doesn't want anything from Lear except fatherly love.

"Let it be so: thy truth then be thy dow'r!"

Lear to Cordelia

Mocking her; since she won't flatter him, he won't give her anything to get married with.

"I lov'd her most, and thought to set my rest / On her kind nursery."

Lear to Kent

Cordelia was his favorite, and he had planned to stay with Cordelia in his old age.

"Think'st thou that duty shall have dread to speak / When power to flattery bows?"

Kent to Lear

Calling him out on his flattery competition. (duty \= Kent, power \= Lear)

"If, on the tenth day following, / Thy banish'd trunk be found in our dominions, / The moment is thy death."

Lear to Kent

Banishing Kent from the kingdom because he spoke out against Lear in front of the Royal Court.

"Will you, with those infirmities she owes, / Unfriended, new adopted to our hate, / Dow'r'd with our curse, and stranger'd with our oath, / Take her, or leave her?"

Lear to Burgundy

Stabbing Cordelia in the back; impressing upon Burgundy that Cordelia is undesirable as a bride because he won't give her anything.

"It is no vicious blot, murther, or foulness, / No unchaste action, or dishonored step, / That hath depriv'd me of your grace and favor, / But even for want of that for which I am richer— / A still-soliciting eye, and such a tongue / That I am glad I have not, though not to have it / Hath lost me in your liking."

Cordelia to Lear

She didn't commit a crime to lose Lear's love, she just retained her virtue and integrity, and in so doing, she has lost Lear's love.

"Better thou / Hadst not been born than not t' have pleas'd me better."

Lear to Cordelia

In response to Cordelia saying that she did nothing wrong. This quote shows just how unhinged Lear is.

"She is herself a dowry."

King of France to Lear

This guy recognizes the value of Cordelia's virtue and so he accepts her as his bride without any money from Lear.

"Not all the dukes of wat'rish Burgundy / Can buy this unpriz'd precious maid of me."

King of France to Burgundy

Mocking Burgundy for not recognizing Cordelia's true value, which is not in the form of money.

"I know you what you are."

Cordelia to Regan and Goneril

Cordelia is very intelligent and realizes that Goneril and Regan are conniving and will want to take over their father's power. She has the spunk and the verve to say this in front of the entire court.

"Such unconstant starts are we like to have from him as this of Kent's banishment."

Regan to Goneril

Foreshadowing the upsets in Lear's kingdom / conspiring to control Lear in his retirement

"Thou, Nature, art my goddess, to thy law / My services are bound. / Wherefore should I / Stand in the plague of custom, and permit / The curiosity of nations to deprive me, / For that I am some twelve or fourteen moonshines / Lag of a brother?"

Edmund (soliloquy)

Being a child born out of wedlock, he is enraged that a cultural tradition is holding him back from getting his father's power.

"Why brand they us / With base? with baseness? bastardy? base, base? / Who, in the lusty stealth of nature, take / More composition, and fierce quality, / Than doth within a dull, stale, tired bed / Go to th' creating a whole tribe of fops, / Got 'tween asleep and wake?"

Edmund (soliloquy)

Here Edmund is saying that since bastard children are born with fierce passion, they should be celebrated, even above legitimate children, because legitimate children are (literally) born from a sense of duty, rather than the passion that consumes lovers.

"I hope, for my brother's justification, he wrote this but as an essay or taste of my virtue."

Edmund to Gloucester

Edmund presents to Gloucester the letter that he forged in Edgar's name, with a supposed (ridiculous) plot to murder their father and seize his lands and wealth.

"O villain, villain! his very opinion in the letter."

Gloucester to Edmund

Gloucester fails to see through this sham of Edmund's, and so he completely believes that Edgar actually wrote this letter to Edmund.

"An admirable evasion of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish disposition on the charge of a star!"

Edmund to audience

Criticizing Gloucester for blaming his fortune on the stars.

Also, here Shakespeare mocks the human desire to lay blame elsewhere besides on oneself.

"Some villain hath done me wrong."

"That's my fear."

Edgar, Edmund

Edmund now feigns innocence in order to gain Edgar's trust, so that he can betray him later.

"Let me, if not by birth, have lands by wit."

Edgar to audience

Announcing his plans to dupe Gloucester and Edgar into allowing him to have the power, lands and wealth.

"Put on what weary negligence you please, / You and your fellows; I'd have it come to question. / If he distaste it, let him to my sister, / Whose mind and mine I know in that are one, / Not to be overrul'd. Idle old man, / That still would manage those authorities / That he hath given away!"

Goneril to Oswald

Conspiring to take over Lear's power. She wants the servants to dress as she says so that she can show Lear who's boss, even now.

"Now, banish'd Kent, / If thou canst serve where thou dost stand condemn'd, / So may it come, thy master, whom thou lov'st, / Shall find thee full of labors."

Kent to audience

Working up the courage not to be outspoken, and showing his devotion to Lear; he'll disguise himself and come back to serve Lear.

"if thou follow him, thou must needs wear my coxcomb."

Fool to Kent

The Fool is telling Kent that he's foolish to follow Lear, because Lear doesn't deserve it.

"thou hadst little wit in thy bald crown when thou gav'st thy golden one away."

Fool to Lear

The Fool has license to criticize anyone, even the king, and so he does here. The "golden one" is Cordelia (she has blonde hair), and the Fool is calling Lear out on letting her go.

"I had rather be any kind o' thing than a Fool, and yet I would not be thee"

Fool to Lear

I don't like being a fool very much, but being you would be worse.

"The hedge-sparrow fed the cuckoo so long, / That it had it head bit off by it young."

Fool to Lear

The Fool points out that Regan and Goneril want to take over Lear's power, just like the baby cuckoo bird eventually takes over its host's nest.

"Yet have I left a daughter."

Lear to Goneril

Lear thinks he can still count on Goneril to be on his side. (Oh how wrong he is.)

"How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is / To have a thankless child!"

Lear to Goneril/Albany

Lear is realizing that Goneril and Regan are completely ungrateful and is burned by it.

"Striving to better, oft we mar what's well."

Albany to Goneril

This is the first sign that Albany wants to be reasonable about taking over Lear's power.

"Thou shouldst not have been old till thou hadst been wise."

Fool to Lear

When you're young, you can bounce back from foolishness. The only thing that can protect you in old age is wisdom. (Lear obviously missed this.)

"Have you heard of no likely wars toward, / 'twixt the Dukes of Cornwall and Albany?"

Curan to Edmund

This is a consequence of Lear dividing the kingdom: Cornwall and Albany are now fighting for complete control of the whole kingdom.

"Pardon me: / In cunning I must draw my sword upon you. / Draw, seem to defend yourself; now quit you well.— / Yield! Come before my father. Light ho, here!— / Fly, brother."

Edmund to Edgar

Setting Edgar up.

"Look, sir, I bleed. . . . [Edgar] Fled this way, sir, when by no means he / could—

Persuade me to the murther of you lordship."

Edmund to Gloucester

Edmund's MO (modus operandi, mode of operation) is to gain people's trust, use that trust to his advantage, and then betray them.

"of my land, / Loyal and natural boy, I'll work the means / To make thee capable."

Gloucester to Edmund

Sealing the deal: now that Gloucester thinks Edgar was trying to kill Edmund, Gloucester entrusts his lands and wealth to him rather than to Edgar, his legitimate son.

"For you, Edmund, / Whose virtue and obedience doth this instant / So much commend itself, you shall be ours. / Natures of such deep trust we shall much need; / You we first seize on."

Cornwall to Edmund

IRONY!!! Edmund seems so virtuous because he supposedly foiled a plot to murder Gloucester, so now Cornwall is trusting him with some power.

"A knave, a rascal, an eater of broken meats; a base, proud, shallow, beggarly, three-suited, hundred-pound, filthy worsted-stocking knave; a lily-liver'd, action-taking, whoreson, glass-gazing, superserviceable, finical rogue; one-trunk-inheriting slave."

Kent to Oswald

Insulting Oswald to put him in his place, because Oswald has been strutting about the castle indulging his own self-interests, while Kent has always been loyal to Lear.

"a stone-cutter or a painter could not have made him so ill, though they had been but two years o' th' trade."

Kent to Cornwall

Stone-cutters and painters can make something beautiful even if they're not that skilled, but tailors have to be skilled to produce a work of art, and so a tailor fashioned Oswald at his birth, because Oswald is an abhorrence.

"Fetch forth the stocks! / You stubborn ancient knave, you reverent braggart, / We'll teach you."

Cornwall to Kent

Cornwall wants to emphasize that Lear no longer has any power, so he puts his most loyal servant into the stocks.

"Sir, I am too old to learn. / Call not your stocks for me, I serve the King, / On whose employment I was sent to you."

Kent to Cornwall

Kent tells Cornwall that he's too old to be punished, he's just serving the rightful king.

"My face I'll grime with filth, / Blanket my loins, elf all my hairs in knots, / And with presented nakedness outface / The winds and persecutions of the sky. / The country gives me proof and president / Of Bedlam beggars, who, with roaring voices, / Strike in their numb'd and mortified arms / Pins, wooden pricks, nails, sprigs of rosemary; / And with this horrible object, from low farms, / Poor pelting villages, sheep-cotes, and mills, / Sometimes with lunatic bans, sometime with prayers, / Enforce their charity."

Edgar to audience

Edgar's second soliloquy reveals his true biterness about Edmund and Gloucester.

"Winter's not gone yet, if the wild geese fly that way."

Fool to Lear

The worst is yet to come. (speaking about Goneril and Regan)

"I would have all well betwixt you."

Gloucester to Lear

Playing the peacemaker.

"I cannot think my sister in the least / Would fail her obligation. If, sir, perchance / She have restrain'd the riots of your followers, / 'Tis on such ground and to such wholesome end / As clears her from all blame."

Regan to Lear

Putting their conspiracy into action. Goneril has already rejected Lear, so Lear goes to Regan for charity, but Regan rejects him too.

"O, sir, you are old, / Nature in you stands on the very verge / Of his confine. You should be rul'd and led / By some discretion that discerns your state / Better than you yourself. Therefore I pray you / That to our sister you do make return. / Say you have wrong'd her."

Regan to Lear

Again, Regan and Goneril are tag-teaming Lear to get his power from him.

"Age is unnecessary."

Lear to Regan

Recognizing that he's vulnerable in his old age.

"All's not offense that indiscretion finds / And dotage terms so."

Goneril to Lear

"Return to her? And fifty men dismiss'd? / No, rather I abjure all roofs, and choose / To wage against the enmity o' th' air."

Lear to Goneril/Regan

This starts Regan and Goneril's process of stripping Lear of all his knights.