Love is defined as a strong positive emotion of regard and affection it can be extended to people, entities or even inanimate objects. It comes in many different forms and it is so common and prominent in our existence that it has managed to become part of various themes developed in literature and conventional stories. This is no different with king lear, a tragic play by williams shakespeare based on the legend of king leir, a king of pre roman britain that dates back to the 1600's. The play king lear reveals different kinds of love through characters: self love as expressed by king lear, false love expressed by lear's daughters regan and goneril and devotional love which is expressed by oswald, which all add significantly to the outcome of the story. First it is obvious lear only cares about himself since he likes to be subjected to flattery.

Which of you shall say doth love us most, that our longest bounty may extend where nature doth with merit challenge. Lear is bribing his daughters, goneril, cordelia and regan with wealth and land so he can see and hear who will express the most amount of affection. Cordelia is the opposite of her sisters she refuses to flatter her father because she is a realist and believes in genuine love, previously stating: my heart into my mouth: i love your majesty according to my bond nor more nor less.

With the refusal to flatter her father, she is disowned, showing us that lear is thinking about himself, since he can not get her to exaggerate her fondness and please him, he finds it more fitting to cast her away, thus satisfying himself. The duo easily falls pray to temptation and fulfil their father's selfish test of love. Second, king lear suffers from excessive pride which leads to self love, stating therefore be gone/ without our grace, our love, our benison. Lear finds flattery so appealing he becomes distraught when cordelia will not over praise him. It is clear that he is consumed by pride, and it is also influencing his judgement he would rather be flattered then to have a daughter who admits that she truly, genuinely loves him. To save face, gladden himself and feed his pride he casts cordelia off as a last ditch effort to achieve satisfaction. Lear is so self centred and devoted to himself, he can not even tell when his two of his own daughters are clearly lying.

Goneril claims to love lear more then eyesight, space, and liberty and regan claims to love lear more then goneril. Lear treats this flattery as gospel and does not even raise an eyebrow to what even goneril has professed. A terrible folly that will lead him down a path of darkness and realization through out the whole play. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of king lear.

Gradesaver provides access to 678 study guide pdfs and quizzes, 3587 literature essays, 1197 sample college application essays, 118 lesson plans, and ad free surfing in this premium content, ldquo members only rdquo section of the site! membership includes a 10% discount on all editing orders. In elizabethan times, the role of a fool, or court jester, was to professionally entertain others, specifically the king. The images of sight given, taken, or abused resonate deeply in king lear from kent's first imperative, see better, lear i.i.158 , to the painful images of a stumbling, eyeless gloucester.

In king lear, the recurring images of sight and blindness associated with the characters of lear and gloucester illustrate the theme of self knowledge and consciousness that exist in the play. Auden once asserted that shakespearean tragedy is necessarily parabolic, pertaining to the only myth that christianity possesses: that of the 'unrepentant thief'. 'all's cheerless, dark and deadly' are kent's words a fair summary of the tragedy of king lear? questions of personal responsibility, free will, and justice move our sympathies through a work of literature, causing readers to relate with or despise characters as they are shaped within a piece. Why, in spite of everything do we like lear and are on his side? william shakespeare's tragedy, king lear, is not merely a story of the ill effects of aging, but an illustration of a man plagued by pride and arrogance. Initially, lear deems himself a man worthy of worship by his family and friends, an ill for.

By: regina bull 1,180 words bull december 8, 2009 bull 587 views love is defined as a strong positive emotion of regard and affection it can be extended to people, entities or even inanimate objects. This is no different with king lear, a tragic play by williams shakespeare based on the legend of king leir, a king of pre roman britain that dates back to the 1600’s. The play king lear reveals different kinds of love through characters: self love as expressed by king lear, false love expressed by lear’s daughters regan and goneril and devotional love which is expressed by oswald, which all add significantly to the outcome of the story.

The duo easily falls pray to temptation and fulfil their father’s selfish test of love. To begin with, oswald is clearly devoted to lear’s daughter goneril, seeing that he is her steward. The first example of his devotion can be seen when he is told by goneril to annoy king lear and does so. He mocks and taunts king lear to the point of getting physically assaulted by an enraged lear and the kent. In death oswald recites a soliloquy to edgar: slave, thou hast slain me: villain, take my purse: if ever thou wilt thrive, bury my body and give the letters which thou find’st about me to edmund earl of gloucester seek him out upon the british party: o, untimely death! even after being mortally wounded by edgar, oswald still intends have the lady goneril’s letter delivered seeing that he is on the brink of death and can no longer do so.

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Even in death, the servant still has his master’s intentions first, quite a self less act. 7 works cited length: 3115 words 8.9 double spaced pages rating: red free severe mercy in king lear the best thing about king lear is that the deeper you dig, the more meat you find. It seems straightforward enough, except that every now and then something leaps out of the dialogue that severs the veil of coherent reality to strike sharp blows at the eternal within. And like all truth, lear abounds with paradox: we love him, we hate him he is as king, deity as father, a child. The two are hopelessly bound up with one another, but we shall consider them a little separated in hopes of making some progress through such mvstic mire. We needn't understand something to be affected by it, for intuition is recognition on the sub conscious level, which is equally, if not more, important. But unlike the jolts of glory that images may bear, the story is gradually grasped, perhaps even long after the performance, when the mind may consolidate and review the witnessed events.

But it has, for all that, no shortage of appeals to deity and interesting speculation. This is, after all, a play set on the brink of eternity and it must make us wonder on the universe in relationship to the characters and ourselves. We who watch the play with the benefit of a christian worldview have got to displace ourselves and push our assurances and belief aside, if possible, to let inan inkling of the dispair and horror which must meet each man with no hope. Asin beowulf, one of our language's oldest pieces of mythic literature, a man's only assurance of afterlife was living on in the memory of those who remained alive, and the greatest end would be a heroic ballad, a song through which a man may live forever, if forever it were sung.

But shakespeare, and thus his characters, could not cope with this bleak vision of man's existence, and almost in spite of themselves hopes were whispered and oaths wrung. Gloucester, as edmund tells us, places his hope in astrology i.ii.130 5 , while edmund himself worships nature i.ii.1. Edgar hopes upon what seems to be a regular pantheon of gods, and refers to them often. Those at least must look beyond themselves rather than face the prospect of hopelessness. Lear, in fact, upon waking in act four and seeing cordelia, takes the afterlife for granted and figures himself in a purgatorial state, beholding a soul in bliss even asking her when she died iv.vii.45 9. And instead he demands men must endure their going hence, even as their coming hither. Hunter comments that that is an attempt to evade or repress the unbearable knowledge of his mistreatment of edgar hunter 188.

But though gloucester may for the moment remain in a denial stage as regards his own sins, he is quite fully aware of wickedness in others about him though still trying to blame it on the stars: love cools, friendship falls off, brothers divide: in cities mutinies in countries, discord in palaces, treason and the bond cracked 'twixt son and father i.ii.114 8. Edmund continues the list, droning unnaturalness between the child and the parent death, dearth, dissolutions of ancient amities divisions in state, menaces and maledictions against king and nobles needless diffidences, banishment of friends, dissipation of cohorts, nuptial breaches and i know not what i.ii.155 62.a veritable plethora of wickedness through which to wade. Perhaps the worst of all, though,is to be found in lear himself, as we find him at the beginning of the play. We see this not only in the obeisance he demands, but also in symbolism which is easily seen once pointed out: as father and king he is truely god like, but then he wishes to step down and be once again a child. This, to the elizabethan ear would suggest blasphemy, for lear, like god the father, is master over all like god the spirit he is the impregnator and like god the son he would be a child. An even more compelling biblical allusion is proposed by susan snyder, who writes that in king lear shakespeare found.

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