King Lear and his straying daughters

[Chief characters]

* King Lear of Britain – Speaks 752 lines in the full text. A great part for Thespians to play and can be built on stronger, powerful imagination

* Earl of Kent – The most loyal of Lear’s followers and follows him as he do not wish to outlive his beloved master

* Earl of Gloucester – The blinding scene is heart-rendering as not found in anything of the nature in his Folio

* Edgar – Edmund’s challenger and son to Gloucester

* Edmund – Gloucester’s bastard son. A traitor to the end and is killed by Edgar

* Goneril and Regan – The daughters who denied their father and devastated him

* Cordelia – Lear’s youngest daughter who truly loved and cherished him and dies in his arms after being hanged

* Fool – Lear’s personified conscience. Lost in the theatre for 150 years and restored in 1838 in Macready’s version at Convent Garden

The play is set in Britain and rightfully involves many Dukes and Earls making it look more royal than history. William Shakespeare wrote King Lear in 1605 at the approach at the height of his playwriting. The plot revolves around the aged king who resolves to divide his realm between his three daughters in accordance with the depth of their professed love for him.

Goneril married to the gentle Duke of Albany and Regan to the cruel Duke of Cornwall, extravagantly declare their deep affection to the king. But the youngest Cordelia, disdaining their hypocrisy, simply declares ‘I cannot heavel my heart into my mouth’ for which the angered King Lear disinherit her and banish her friend, the Earl of Kent who has spoken on her behalf. However, the King of France makes her his Queen. King Lear decides to divide her share to her sisters, proposing to live alternatively with them with his 100 knights.

Earl of Gloucestor’s bastard son, Edmund with furious discord between his legitimate brother, Edgar and their father. Kent who is faithful to Lear, returns disguised as a servant to serve the aged and feeble king. Goneril receives the king with contempt and hatred; Lear leaves her with a curse upon to Regan’s place. She in turn, proves to be harsher than Goneril, believing that madness will supervent. Lear leaves for heat while the night’s storm is breaking wild. He is accompanied by Fool where the loyal Kent finds him sad and weary. Braving the wrath of the two sisters and Cornwall. Gloucester gets shelter for them in a hovel.

Edgar is also there disguised as a half-witted Poor Tom. Gloucester pleads to Kent to take the King to Dover. This done. Gloucester returns to his castle and is reviled and savagely blinded by Cornwall who is then slain by a servant. (sight and blindness are two themes in the play)

Still as Poor Tom, Edgar an unknown to his blinded father, sets off with him to Dover. There is a strange meeting between the mad King and the blind man. Lear dressed stupidly with wild flowers, enter:

Lear ‘No, they cannot touch me for coining. I am the king himself
Edgar – O’ thou side-piercing sight .....
Lear – Ha, Goneril; with a white beard; They flattered me like a dog and told me, I had white hairs in my beard...
Act. IV, Scene VI

Soon afterwards, Cordelia who has come from France, is reunited with her feeble father. Captured in a battle which the French forces have lost, they are sent to Prison with Edmund’s strict instructions, they are to be murdered. However, Edmund who had been deceiving Goneril and Ragen is killed by Edgar in a single combat. Goneril has poisoned her sister Regan and stabs herself in repentance. Cordelia has been hanged in prison. Divastated King Lear bears her in his arms and within minutes, he himself dies. Edgar at Albany’s wish, will look to the state and the ever faithful Kent will follow Lear, whispering.

Albany – ‘Bear them from hence. Our present business is general woe
(to Kent and Edgar)
Friends of my soul, you twain
Rule in this realm, and the gor’d state sustain
Kent - ‘I have a journey, sir, shortly to go;
My master calls me, I must not say No
ACT. V Scene III

In performance

In an anguished storm-ridden journey of the mind and soul. King Lear is a tragedy of retribution in Britain of the time. With much searching passages, it has still to acquire taste among the audiences and academics. The willful patriarch driven to madness without reservations has been the main character on stage in the 20th century because many believe the play cannot be acted since it is brimming of characters that made up the play. Among the sources of his tragedy is the ‘unaccommodated’ man. It is believed that Shakespeare worked directly from an old chronicle drama.

The play did not fare well when in 1681 it fell into the hands of Nahum Tate who produced a ridiculous mutilation with Edgar and Cordelia as lovers and the Fool eliminated with a happy ending (Shakespeare would have turned in his grave). This version continued for 150 years until David Garrick restored it to original play retaining a bit of Tate’s version from 1756 throughout the following 30-odd years at Drury Lane. King Lear took off from 1823, beginning at Covent Garden followed by a version at Sadler’s Wells in 1845. Old Vic staged it in 1928 and again in 1931 and 1940.

At Scala, King Lear had a spectacular version mounted with Donald Wolfit as Lear. Back again at Stratford in 1950, it was again a great play. In Palace in 1955 with Charles Laughton followed by Peter Brook’s Lear at Stratford in 1962. The one to remember was Anthony Quayle at the Old Vic in 1978.

The play continued to gather momentum down the years in the 19th and 20th centuries with great Thespians taking on the role of Lear. Several film directors brought it to the big screen. In 1983, Granada televised it with Sir Laurence Olivier as King Lear and directed by Michael Elliott.

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