Let me start by saying, I have never been much of a Shakespeare fan. I appreciate his work, don’t get me wrong, but I just don’t understand it. I think the wording is confusing and I don’t like the fact that there is always a violent death or two. King Lear wasn’t any different from my stereotype – but I have to admit, the story line wasn’t too bad.
Throughout the play King Lear, there is an absence of a female role model, including absence of a mother for each of the characters. I believe that Lear’s condescending ways are much the reason that he is not married (or remarried?). I also believe that this has had an effect on the daughters’ feelings toward Lear. Each of the daughters professes their love in the first scene and the one that seemed most sincere to me was Cordelia. Cordelia states: “I love your majesty / According to my bond;” which enrages Lear because he is expecting each of the daughters to compete for him. The eldest daughters tell Lear that they love him more than anything else in the world, Goneril stating:
Sir, I do love you more than words can wield the matter,
Dearer than eyesight, space, and liberty,
Beyond what can be valued, rich or rare,
No less than life, with grace, health, beauty, honor,
As much as child e'er loved or father found—
A love that makes breath poor and speech unable.
Beyond all manner of so much I love you.
Because of these words, Lear turns over a portion of his kingdom to her and then a portion to Regan. With this transfer, Lear gives the power to his daughters.
The Fool tells Lear that he has “madest thy daughters thy mothers. / For when thou gavest them the rod, and put'st / down thine own breeches.” With the exchange of power, the girls begin to treat Lear with the same respect, or lack thereof. Lear’s daughters take full advantage of this and begin to take away his authority by taking away his knights. Throughout the remainder of the play, the girls continue to treat Lear poorly. I, as a reader, initially felt bad for Lear’s daughters but soon came to see that it was Lear himself that I should be sympathizing for. The vindictive nature of Goneril and Regan throughout the play only infuriates Lear further. Not only do the girls not have a mother, but they are slowly losing their father because of it. I feel that Lear’s daughters do not know how to act toward him. They do not know how to respect him without feeling as if they have to obey him. It is only in the end that we see Lear’s maternal (paternal) instincts when he is mourning the death of Cordelia causing his own. Goneril, Regan, and Cordelia did not have a mother – but honestly, I did not feel that they had a father either.
I agree with you that Goneril, Regan and Cordelia seemed to lack any sufficient example of a parental role model throughout their entire lives. King Lear chose to treat his daughters like he treated every else, as employees or people below him. Yes they were below him, but they were also royalty and most importantly his kin. They were going to take over for him eventually so one would think he would have tried to teach them to lead with both directness and also compassion. Seeing as Lear refused to acknowledge his emotional side, it is not surprising that Goneril and Regan grew up to become rigid and cutthroat. Somehow Cordelia was able to let her emotional and more feminine side shine through and for that King Lear saw something in her that made him choose her as his favorite.
ReplyDeleteThroughout Lear’s search for his emotional side, the Fool continues to try to help him realize where he went wrong. For this, I feel the Fool served as a type of mentor to Lear, where he provided guidance in his own clever way in the hopes that Lear would see the error of his ways. The Fool could have easily left Lear by the wayside, especially with his businesslike demeanor, but clearly he knew Lear’s capabilities and truly believed he could overcome this if he just had someone to help him out. Even though Lear realizes much too late how his life and his daughters’, especially Cordelia’s, lives have been destroyed by his actions, the fact that he even comes to this realization is an accomplishment for Lear. Yes his entire family is killed off, but it almost makes the whole tragedy not be completely in vain since he was able to see his wrongdoings and think about other for once instead of only himself.
Honestly, I have never been a fan of Shakespeare either so I had a hard time with the play. I understood the plot but just could not grasp how immature Lear was in asking the daughters to profess their love. Who does that? I ended up getting in to it and surprisingly I enjoyed it. I hate how it ended but I can’t say that I wasn’t expecting it. After reading your blog I can’t help but realize that it’s funny how Goneril and Regan honor and respect their father while he is in power but the minute they have what they want and are in control they start backstabbing him. Cordelia on the other hand stays true to herself and is honest and faithful to her father regardless of what he has to offer her. I never really felt bad for Goneril or Regan. I know that it was absurd for Lear to ask his daughters to profess their love but he was use to treating them this way, which is why they probably turned out the way they did. It was obvious they were only playing into Lear by exaggerating how much they loved him. Even though Lear used his power to get his daughters to make him feel better and profess how much they loved him I still felt more sorry for him than Goneril and Regan. I liked the role of The Fool best. He stood by Lear’s side and was always trying to share his wisdom to help Lear see that his thoughts and his ways were what were causing his pain and troubles
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