Goneril Unfinished

love that makes breath poor and speech unable

• Act One Scene One

• She says her love makes “speech unable,” even though she is in the middle of a speech about love.

• This contrast indicates that Goneril speaks insincerely.

• Lear’s inability to distinguish between empty flattery and truth introduces an important theme of the play: the unreliable nature of words.

You see how full of changes his age is… He always loved our sister most, and with what poor judgment he hath now cast her off

• Act One Scene One

• Blindness

• Sees Lear more clearly than he sees himself.

• Here Goneril explains Lear’s situation: as he ages, he is losing his ability to make good decisions.

Dearer than eyesight, space, and liberty

• Act One Scene One

• Hubris

• Goneril claims she loves Lear more than the fundamentals of life (LIES)

Unruly waywardness that infirm and choleric years bring with them

• Act One Scene One

‘old fools are babes again

• Act One Scene Three

By day and night he wrongs me; every hour he flashes into one gross crime or other

• Act One Scene Three

• Betrayal

Say if I do, the laws are mine, not thine. Who can arraign me for’t?

• Act Five Scene Two

• Power of rulers

• Goneril declares that as queen, she is above the law.

• The play asks what justice is and where it comes from: is simply whatever the monarch says it is?

• Justice was an important topic for King Lear. King James I of England was especially interested in ideas surrounding justice and the law.