Information about King Lear
- This article is on the play. For the legendary king, see Leir of Britain. For the professional baseball player, see King Lear (baseball).
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There are two distinct versions of the play: The True Chronicle of the History of the Life and Death of King Lear and His Three Daughters, which appeared in quarto in 1608, and The Tragedy of King Lear, which appeared in the First Folio in 1623, a more theatrical version. The two texts are commonly printed in a conflated version, although many modern editors have argued that each version has its individual integrity.
After the Restoration the play was often modified by theatre practitioners who disliked its nihilistic flavour, but since World War II it has come to be regarded as one of Shakespeare's supreme achievements. The tragedy is particularly noted for its probing observations on the nature of human suffering and kinship on a cosmic scale.
Sources
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Cordelia's Portion by Ford Madox Brown
Date and text
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Title page of the first quarto edition, published in 1608
However, before Kenneth Muir set out the case for the play's indebtedness to Harsnett's 1603 text, a minority of scholars believed the play to be much older. In 1936, A.S. Cairncross argued that "the relationship of the two plays [Leir and Lear] has been inverted": Shakespeare's Lear came first and that the anonymous Leir is an imitation of it.[5] One piece of evidence for this view is that in 1594, King Leir was entered into the Stationers' Register (but never published), while in the same year a play called King Leare was recorded by Philip Henslowe as being performed at the Rose theatre.[6] However, the majority view is that these two references are simply variant spellings of the same play, King Leir.[7]In addition, Eva Turner Clark, an Oxfordian denier of Shakespeare's authorship, saw numerous parallels between the play and the events of 1589-90, including the Kent banishment subplot, which she believed to parallel the 1589 banishment of Sir Francis Drake by Queen Elizabeth.[8]
The question of dating is further complicated by the question of revision (see below).
The modern text of King Lear derives from three sources: two quartos, published in 1608 (Q1) and 1619 (Q2) [9] respectively, and the version in the First Folio of 1623 (F1). The differences between these versions are significant. Q1 contains 285 lines not in F1; F1 contains around 100 lines not in Q1. Also, at least a thousand individual words are changed between the two texts, each text has a completely different style of punctuation, and about half the verse lines in the F1 are either printed as prose or differently divided in the Q1. The early editors, beginning with Alexander Pope, simply conflated the two texts, creating the modern version that has remained nearly universal for centuries. The conflated version is born from the presumption that Shakespeare wrote only one original manuscript, now unfortunately lost, and that the Quarto and Folio versions are distortions of that original.
As early as 1931, Madeleine Doran suggested that the two texts had basically different provenances, and that these differences between them were critically interesting. This argument, however, was not widely discussed until the late 1970s, when it was revived, principally by Michael Warren and Gary Taylor. Their thesis, while controversial, has gained significant acceptance. It posits, essentially, that the Quarto derives from something close to Shakespeare's foul papers, and the Folio is drawn in some way from a promptbook, prepared for production by Shakespeare's company or someone else. In short, Q1 is "authorial"; F1 is "theatrical." In criticism, the rise of "revision criticism" has been part of the pronounced trend away from mid-century formalism. The New Cambridge Shakespeare has published separate editions of Q and F; the most recent Pelican Shakespeare edition contains both the 1608 Quarto and the 1623 Folio text as well as a conflated version; the New Arden edition edited by R.A. Foakes is not the only recent edition to offer the traditional conflated text.
Performance history
The first recorded performance on December 26, 1606 is the only one known with certainty from Shakespeare's era. The play was revived soon after the theatres re-opened at the start of the Restoration era, and was played in its original form as late as 1675. But the urge to adapt and change that was so liberally applied to Shakespeare's plays in that period eventually settled on Lear as on other works. Nahum Tate produced his famous or infamous adaptation in 1681—he gave the play a happy ending, with Edgar and Cordelia marrying and Lear restored to kingship. This was the version acted by Thomas Betterton, David Garrick, and Edmund Kean, and praised by Samuel Johnson. The play was suppressed in the late 18th and early 19th century by the British government, which disliked the dramatization of a mad monarch at a time when George III was insane[10]. The original text did not return to the stage till William Charles Macready's production of 1838.[11] Other actors who were famous as King Lear in the nineteenth century were Samuel Phelps and Edwin Booth.The play is among the most popular of Shakespeare’s works to be staged in the twentieth century. The most famous staging may be Paul Scofield's 1962 performance as Lear directed by Peter Brook, which was voted as the greatest performance in a Shakespearean play in the history of the RSC in a 2004 opinion poll of members of the Royal Shakespeare Company, and immortalized on film in 1971. The longest Broadway run of King Lear was the 1968 production starring Lee J. Cobb as Lear, with Stacy Keach as Edmund, Philip Bosco as Kent, and René Auberjonois as the Fool. It ran for 72 performances. No other Broadway production of the play has run for as many as 50 performances. A Soviet film adaptation was done by Mosfilm in 1971, directed by Grigori Koznitsev, with black-and-white photography and a score by Shostakovich. The script is based on a translation by Boris Pasternak, and Estonian actor Jüri Järvet plays the mad king.
Other famous actors to play King Lear in the twentieth century are:
- Laurence Olivier, who decided to tackle the role for the second time at the age of 75 in a television production in 1982 with an all star cast that included Diana Rigg, John Hurt, and Colin Blakely. Olivier had played Lear previously in 1946, at the age of thirty-nine at the Old Vic, but without much success. His 1982 Lear was telecast in the United States in 1984 and was widely acclaimed, and Olivier received the last of his several Emmy Awards as Best Actor for his performance.
- John Gielgud was 26 when he first played Lear at the Old Vic Theatre in 1931, and played the part in three additional stage productions. He was 90 when he took on the part for the final time in a 1994 radio production with a cast that included Judi Dench, Kenneth Branagh and Derek Jacobi.
- Orson Welles played Lear at the New York Civic Center in 1958, breaking his ankle during the run and playing most of the performances in a wheelchair.
- Donald Wolfit was considered one of the great Lears, keeping the role in his repertory for over ten years and playing it on Broadway and for the Royal Shakespeare Company.
- Ian Holm won a Laurence Olivier Award for his performance of Lear at the Royal National Theatre and an Emmy nomination for the television version.
- James Earl Jones played Lear in the New York Shakespeare Festival, with Raul Julia as Edmund, Paul Sorvino as Gloucester, and Rene Auberjonois as Edgar.
Characters
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Charles H. Cameron as King Lear (1872) / print by A.L. Coburn
- King Lear is ruler of Britain. He is a patriarchal figure whose misjudgment of his daughters brings about his downfall.
- Goneril (sometimes written Gonerill) is Lear's treacherous eldest daughter and wife to the Duke of Albany.
- Regan is Lear's treacherous second daughter, and wife to the Duke of Cornwall.
- Cordelia (poss. "heart of a lion" [12]) is Lear's youngest daughter. At the beginning of the play, she has yet to marry and has two suitors: the Duke of Burgundy and the King of France.
- The Duke of Albany[13] is Goneril's husband. Goneril scorns him for his "milky gentleness". He turns against his wife later in the play.
- The Duke of Cornwall[13] is Regan's husband. He has the Earl of Kent put in the stocks, leaves Lear out on the heath during a storm, and gouges out Gloucester's eyes. After his attack on Gloucester, one of his servants attacks and mortally wounds him.
- The Earl of Gloucester[13] is Edgar's father, and the father of the illegitimate son, Edmund. Edmund deceives him against Edgar, and Edgar flees, taking on the disguise of Tom O'Bedlam.
- The Earl of Kent[13] is always faithful to Lear, but he is banished by the king after he protests against Lear's treatment of Cordelia. He takes on a disguise (Caius) and serves the king without letting him know his true identity.
- Edmund (sometimes written Edmond) is Gloucester's illegitimate son. He works with Goneril and Regan to further his ambitions, and the three of them form a romantic triangle.
- Edgar is the legitimate son of the Earl of Gloucester. Disguised as Tom O'Bedlam, he helps his blind father. At the end of the play he assumes rule of the kingdom and the 'Divine Right of Kings' is restored.
- Oswald is Goneril's servant, and is described as "a serviceable villain". He tries to murder Gloucester, but instead he is killed by Edgar.
- The Fool is a jester who is devoted to Lear and Cordelia, although his relationships with both are quite complex. Although he misses Cordelia when she is gone, we never see the two together. He has a privileged relationship with Lear; no one else would get away with taunting him the way the Fool does, through riddles and insults. When Lear begins to consider the feelings of others and the effects of his actions, he first thinks to help the Fool.
Synopsis
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King Lear: Cordelia's Farewell by Edwin Austin Abbey
Soon after Lear abdicates the throne, he finds that Goneril and Regan's feelings for him have turned cold, and arguments ensue. The Earl of Kent, who has spoken up for Cordelia and been banished for his pains, returns disguised as the servant Caius, who will "eat no fish" (that is to say, he is a Protestant), in order to protect the king, to whom he remains loyal. Meanwhile, Goneril and Regan fall out with one another over their attraction to Edmund, the bastard son of the Earl of Gloucester — and are forced to deal with an army from France, led by Cordelia, sent to restore Lear to his throne. A cataclysmic war is fought.
The subplot involves the Earl of Gloucester and his two sons, the good Edgar and the evil Edmund. Edmund concocts false stories about his legitimate half-brother, and Edgar is forced into exile, affecting lunacy. Edmund engages in liaisons with Goneril and Regan. Gloucester is confronted by Regan's husband, the Duke of Cornwall, but is saved from death by several of Cornwall's servants, who object to the duke's treatment of Lear; one of the servants wounds the duke (but is killed by Regan), who throws Gloucester into the storm in order for him to, "smell his way to Dover" after plucking out his eyes. Cornwall dies of his wound shortly thereafter. The storm scene is where Lear exclaims how he is "a man more sinned against than sinning".
Edgar, still under the guise of a homeless lunatic, finds Gloucester out in the storm. The earl asks him whether he knows the way to Dover, to which Edgar replies that he will lead him. Edgar, whose voice Gloucester fails to recognise, is shaken by encountering his blinded father and his guise is put to the test.
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Lear and Cordelia by Ford Madox Brown
Edgar, in disguise, then fights Edmund, fatally wounding him. On seeing this, Goneril, who has already poisoned Regan out of jealousy, kills herself. Edgar reveals himself to Edmund and tells him that Gloucester has just died. On hearing this, and of Goneril and Regan's deaths, Edmund tells Edgar of his order to have Lear and Cordelia murdered and gives orders for them to be reprieved - perhaps his one act of goodness in the entire play.
Unfortunately, the reprieve comes too late. Lear appears on stage with Cordelia's dead body in his arms, having killed the servant who hanged her, then dies himself.
Besides the subplot involving the Earl of Gloucester and his sons, the principal innovation Shakespeare made to this story was the death of Cordelia and Lear at the end. During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, this tragic ending was much criticised, and alternative versions were written and performed, in which the leading characters survived and Edgar and Cordelia were married.
Points of debate
Opening
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Goneril and Regan by Edwin Austin Abbey
| Kent: I thought the King had more affected the Duke of Albany than Cornwall. Gloucester: It did always seem so to us, but now in the division of the kingdom it appears not which of the Dukes he values most, for equalities are so weighed that curiosity in neither can make choice of either's moiety. | ||
—King Lear, Act I, Scene I | ||
Ball interprets this statement to mean that the court already knows how the King is going to divide his kingdom; that the outcome of the ceremony is already decided and publicly known. If the court knows that the outcome of the contest is not going to change, then they must also be aware that it is only a formality, or in Ball's words "a public relations stunt."[15]
There are only two clues from the text on how balanced the king's division of the kingdom that the audience needs to take into account for understanding the nature of this ceremony. The first is the above quoted section where Gloucester describes the shares as equal. The second is in Lear's description that while Regan's portion of the kingdom is "No less in space, validity, and pleasure/Than that conferred on Goneril." (Act I/Scene 1) but for Cordelia's "more opulent than [her] sisters" (Act I/Scene 1). There is a contradiction in how the court views the coming action and how the king presents it.
Alternatively, it has been suggested that the King's "contest" has more to do with his control over the unmarried Cordelia.[16] On receiving her proclamations of devout love and loyalty, he plans to force her into a marriage which she could not possibly object to after claiming such stolid obedience. Of course, the trap fails disastrously for all parties. It is not clear whether or not Shakespeare intended his audience to be aware of this subtext, or whether he assumed the details of the situation were not relevant.
Tragic ending
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King Lear mourns Cordelia's death, James Barry, 1786-1788
Shakespeare's tragic conclusion gains its sting from such a discrepancy. The traditional legend and all adaptations preceding Shakespeare's have it that after Lear is restored to the throne, he remains there until "made ripe for death" (Edmund Spenser). Cordelia, her sisters also deceased, takes the throne as rightful heir, but after a few years is overthrown and imprisoned by nephews, leading to her suicide.
Shakespeare shocks his audience by bringing the worn and haggard Lear onto the stage, carrying his dead youngest daughter. He taunts them with the possibility that she may live yet with Lear saying, "This feather stirs; she lives!" But Cordelia's death is soon confirmed.
This was indeed too bleak for some to take, even many years later. King Lear was at first unsuccessful on the Restoration stage, and it was only with Nahum Tate's happy-ending version of 1681 that it became part of the repertory. Tate's Lear, where Lear survives and triumphs, and Edgar and Cordelia get married, held the stage until 1838. Samuel Johnson endorsed the use of Tate's version in his edition of Shakespeare's plays (1765): "Cordelia, from the time of Tate, has always retired with victory and felicity. And, if my sensations could add anything to the general suffrage, I might relate that I was many years ago so shocked by Cordelia's death, that I know not whether I ever endured to read again the last scenes of the play till I undertook to revise them as an editor".
Cordelia and the Fool
The character of Lear's Fool, important in the first act, disappears without explanation in the third. He appears in Act I, scene four, and disappears in Act III, scene six. His final line is "And I'll go to bed at noon", a line that many think might mean that he is to die at the highest point of his life, when he lies in prison separated from his friends.A popular explanation for the fool's disappearance is that the actor playing the Fool also played Cordelia. The two characters are never on stage simultaneously, and dual-roling was common in Shakespeare's time. However, the Fool would have been performed by Robert Armin, the regular clown actor of Shakespeare's company, who is unlikely to have been cast as a tragic heroine. Even so, the play does ask us to at least compare the two; Lear chides Cordelia for foolishness in Act I; chides himself as equal in folly in Act V; and as he holds the dead Cordelia in the final scene, says "And my poor fool is hanged" ("fool" could be taken as either a direct reference to the Fool, or an affectionate reference to Cordelia herself, or it could refer to both the fool and Cordelia).
An alternative explanation may be that the dual-role is meant to be visble to the audience; upon appearing after Cordelia's disappearance, the fool is described as 'Wan, and pale with grief', consistant with him now being played by the actor who previously played a woman, Cordelia. The theme of women being unable to be effective in their traditional role is a recurrent one in Shakespeare's works, with their true character only coming out when they represent themselves as male. (See Portia in The Merchant of Venice as an example.)
In Elizabethan English, "fool" was a term used to mean "child" (cf. foal). For example, in Hamlet Polonius warns Ophelia that if she doesn't keep her distance from Hamlet, she'll "tender me a fool," i.e. present him with a child. As Lear holds the dead body of Cordelia, he remembers holding her in his arms as a baby. (Modern English still uses "foolish" and "childish" as near synonyms.)
Adaptations and cultural references
- Portions of a radio performance of the play on BBC Radio 3 in the UK were used by John Lennon in The Beatles' song "I Am the Walrus", starting at about the halfway point, but most audible towards the end and during the long fadeout. Lennon added the BBC audio (live as it was being broadcast) on a whim during mixing of the track. The character Oswald's exhortation, "bury my body", as well as his lament, "O, untimely death!" (Act IV, Scene VI) were interpreted by fans as further pieces of evidence that band member Paul McCartney was dead.
- A lake in Watermead Country Park, between Birstall and Thurmaston, Leicester is named King Lear's Lake, owing to its proximity of the legendary burial tomb of King Lear. A statue in the lake depicts the final scene of Shakespeare's play.
- The post-hardcore band Chiodos based their song "One Day Women Will All Become Monsters" on 'The Tragedy of King Lear'. Many lines in the song are actually direct quotes from the play itself.
Readings
A number of significant and diverse readings have emerged from eras and societies since the play was first written; evidence of the ability of Shakespeare to encompass many human experiences. The play was poorly received in the 17th century because the theme of fallen royalty was too close to the events of the period; the exile of the court to France. In 1681 Nahum Tate rewrote King Lear to suit the 17th century audience; a complete and didactic love story with the brutal scenes omitted. The plot is rewritten; Edgar has unrequited love for Cordelia, the King of France omitted.As society and time changed to take more notice of pain and suffering, especially in the nineteenth century, more of Shakespeare's unhappy ending was reinstalled.
The twentieth century saw a number of diverse and rich readings of the play emerge as a result of the turbulent social changes of the century. A.C Bradley saw this play as an individual coming to terms with his personality; that Lear was a great man and therefore the play is almost unfathomable. The feminist movement that emerged last century interpreted that the message of the play was that chaos occurred when power was given to women and that order was restored only when men returned to power. This overshadowing message, coupled with a number of Lear's misogynist remarks has fueled this debate.
One of the most important reading of the 20th century is the existential point of view. The threat of nuclear annihilation and environmental destruction have contributed to this reading which has gained pace throughout the century compounded by World War I, World War II, the Cold War, a civil or regional war occurring in almost every year, mass genocides and the propaganda power of the mass media. These events have led to a sense for some that life is meaningless, has no reward and there is no justice in the universe. This is represented in the play by Edmund's rejection of the Gods, Gloucester's declaration that the gods are cruel and unjust and the ruthless animal imagery throughout the play—also an important feature of textual integrity. The storm scene is viewed as the centre of ruthless devastation and the lack of hope and futile loss of life at the end of the play looks towards a bleak future. Interestingly, this reading can be seen as a direct contrast to the Aristotelian interpretation which suggests that the audience rejoice in the reconciliation between Lear and Cordelia and although the play ends tragically, humanity has learned a lesson and looks toward a brighter future.
The Family Drama reading has also become prevalent in the 20th century; critics suggesting that the chaos was a result of the inevitable psychodynamics that can emerge in any family situation. Key issues include the relationship between Lear and Goneril/Regan, between Lear and Cordelia and the relationship between Gloucester and his sons.
The play has been interpreted by many societies. Communist Russia emphasised the suffering of the common people and the oppressive nature of the monarch in Korol Lear (1970) while the Jewish community emphasised other aspects of the play.
Lear's suffering as a form of purgatory, within a shifting religious landscape in contemporary England, have also been put forward as a context for this play as well as Hamlet.[17]
Reworkings
Since the 1950s, there have been various "reworkings" of King Lear. These include:- The novel A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley
- The play Lear by Edward Bond
- The play Lear's Daughters by WTG and Elaine Feinstein
- The play Seven Lears by Howard Barker
- The play Lear Reloaded by Scot Lahaie
- The film The King is Alive, directed by Kristian Levring
Film adaptations
- 1909 - A silent, black and white film directed by J. Stuart Blackton and William V. Ranous, with William V. Ranous as Lear.
- 1916 - Directed by Ernest C. Warde, with Frederick Warde as Lear.
- 1934 - "Der Yidisher Kenig Lear," or The Yiddish King Lear, is an adapted of Jacob Gordin's play set in Jewish Vilna, Lithuania. The film is directed by Harry Thomashefsky.
- 1948 - Directed by Royston Morley with William Devlin as Lear.
- 1953 - Directed by Andrew McCullough with Orson Welles as Lear. This one does not feature the subplot of Gloucester and his sons, and has Poor Tom as a character in his own right.
- 1971 - Directed by Grigori Kozintsev with Jüri Järvet as Lear. Russian version, original title: Korol Lir.
- 1971 - Directed by Peter Brook with Paul Scofield as Lear, Alan Webb as Duke of Gloucester, Irene Worth as Goneril, Susan Engel as Regan, Anne-Lise Gabold as Cordelia, Jack MacGowran as Fool. The text has been severely cut and the remainder has been reassembled. All is bleak in this black and white, existential experience.
- 1974 - A live recorded performance from the New York Shakespeare Festival, directed by Edwin Sherin, with James Earl Jones as Lear.
- 1974 - A Thames Television production, directed by Tony Davenall with Patrick Magee as Lear.
- 1975 - Directed by Jonathan Miller for BBC TV, as part of the "Play for the Month" series, with Michael Hordern as Lear.
- 1982 - Directed by Jonathan Miller for BBC TV with Michael Hordern once again cast as Lear. Part of the Shakespeare Plays series, this version follows the text closely.
- 1984 - Directed by Michael Elliott with Laurence Olivier as Lear. The film begins and ends at Stonehenge, and features Dorothy Tutin as Goneril, Diana Rigg as Regan, Anna Calder-Marshall as Cordelia, John Hurt as the Fool, Colin Blakely as Kent, Leo McKern as Gloucester, and Robert Lindsay as Edmund. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087561/IMDB. Olivier won the Emmy Award for his performance.
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In this image from Akira Kurosawa's Ran, Hidetora (Lear) flees from his burning castle.
- 1985 - The film Ran by Akira Kurosawa sets the story in Edo-period Japan and replaces the three daughters with three sons.
- 1997 - A modern retelling, set on a farm in Iowa, was Jane Smiley's A Thousand Acres. This novel attempted to explain the elder sisters' hatred of their father, was later adapted as a 1997 film directed by Jocelyn Moorhouse and starring Jason Robards, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Jessica Lange, Michelle Pfeiffer, and Colin Firth.
- 1997 - Sir Ian Holm starred in a television adaptation, directed by Richard Eyre. Minimalist sets put the focus on the acting.
- 1999 - Directed by and starring Brian Blessed as Lear .
- 2001 - My Kingdom stars Richard Harris, Lynn Redgrave. A modern gangland version of King Lear.
- 2002 - Patrick Stewart played John Lear in a television adaptation called King of Texas, set in frontier Texas and directed by Uli Edel.
- 2007 - Baby Cakes Sees a Play, Brad Neely's retelling of King Lear through the eyes of Baby Cakes.
References
1. ^ Soula Mitakidou and Anthony L. Manna, with Melpomeni Kanatsouli, Folktales from Greece: A Treasury of Delights, p 100 ISBN 1-56308-908-4; see also D. L. Ashliman, "Love Like Salt: folktales of types 923 and 510"
2. ^ Frank Kermode, 'King Lear', The Riverside Shakespeare (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1974), 1249.
3. ^ R.A. Foakes, ed. King Lear. London: Arden, 1997), 89-90.
4. ^ Kermode, Riverside, 1250.
5. ^ Alfred S. Cairncross, The Problem of Hamlet, A Solution, 1936
6. ^ Chambers & Alexander, as sourced in Ogburn's The Mystery of William Shakespeare, 1984, page 337
7. ^ Lee, Sidney. The Chronicle History of King Leir. London: Chatto and Windus, 1908: ix.
8. ^ Eva Turner Clark, Hidden Allusions in Shakespeares Plays, 1930,pgs 866-888
9. ^ The 1619 quarto is part of William Jaggard's so-called False Folio.
10. ^ Shakespeare A to Z by Charles Boyce, Dell Publishing, 1990
11. ^ F. E. Halliday, A Shakespeare Companion 1564-1964, Baltimore, Penguin, 1964; pp. 265-66.
12. ^ While it has been claimed that "Cordelia" derives from the Latin "cor" (heart) followed by "delia", an anagram of "ideal", this is questionable. A more likely etymology is that her name is a feminine form of coeur de lion, meaning "lion-hearted". Another possible source is a Welsh word of uncertain meaning; it may mean "jewel of the sea" or "lady of the sea".
13. ^ These titles are anachronistic. The first use of the title of Duke of Albany occurred in 1398. The first use of the title of Duke of Cornwall took place about 1140. The first use of the title of Earl of Gloucester took place in 1122. The first use of the title Earl of Kent was in 1067.
14. ^ Ball, David; (1983). Backwards & Forwards. Illinois: Southern Illinois University Press. ISBN 0-8093-1110-0
15. ^ Ball, David; (1983). Backwards & Forwards. Illinois: Southern Illinois University Press. ISBN 0-8093-1110-0
16. ^ McLaughlin, John. "The Dynamics of Power in King Lear: An Adlerian Interpretation." Shakespeare Quarterly 29 (1978): 39.
17. ^ "Just Passing Through", Review of Stephen Greenblatt's 'Hamlet in Purgatory', 20th May 2001, New York Times.[1]
2. ^ Frank Kermode, 'King Lear', The Riverside Shakespeare (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1974), 1249.
3. ^ R.A. Foakes, ed. King Lear. London: Arden, 1997), 89-90.
4. ^ Kermode, Riverside, 1250.
5. ^ Alfred S. Cairncross, The Problem of Hamlet, A Solution, 1936
6. ^ Chambers & Alexander, as sourced in Ogburn's The Mystery of William Shakespeare, 1984, page 337
7. ^ Lee, Sidney. The Chronicle History of King Leir. London: Chatto and Windus, 1908: ix.
8. ^ Eva Turner Clark, Hidden Allusions in Shakespeares Plays, 1930,pgs 866-888
9. ^ The 1619 quarto is part of William Jaggard's so-called False Folio.
10. ^ Shakespeare A to Z by Charles Boyce, Dell Publishing, 1990
11. ^ F. E. Halliday, A Shakespeare Companion 1564-1964, Baltimore, Penguin, 1964; pp. 265-66.
12. ^ While it has been claimed that "Cordelia" derives from the Latin "cor" (heart) followed by "delia", an anagram of "ideal", this is questionable. A more likely etymology is that her name is a feminine form of coeur de lion, meaning "lion-hearted". Another possible source is a Welsh word of uncertain meaning; it may mean "jewel of the sea" or "lady of the sea".
13. ^ These titles are anachronistic. The first use of the title of Duke of Albany occurred in 1398. The first use of the title of Duke of Cornwall took place about 1140. The first use of the title of Earl of Gloucester took place in 1122. The first use of the title Earl of Kent was in 1067.
14. ^ Ball, David; (1983). Backwards & Forwards. Illinois: Southern Illinois University Press. ISBN 0-8093-1110-0
15. ^ Ball, David; (1983). Backwards & Forwards. Illinois: Southern Illinois University Press. ISBN 0-8093-1110-0
16. ^ McLaughlin, John. "The Dynamics of Power in King Lear: An Adlerian Interpretation." Shakespeare Quarterly 29 (1978): 39.
17. ^ "Just Passing Through", Review of Stephen Greenblatt's 'Hamlet in Purgatory', 20th May 2001, New York Times.[1]
Further reading
- Service in King Lear
- Charity in King Lear
- King Lear Metamorphosed
- Shakespeare's "Folly": King Lear
- 'Love' in King Lear
- King Lear: A Prophetic Tragedy
- An Existential Examination of King Lear
External links
- the complete text of King Lear with Quarto and Folio Variations, Annotations, and Commentary
- King Lear - plain vanilla text at Project Gutenberg.
- King Lear - Complete text in HTML.
- The Tragedie of King Lear - HTML version of this title.
- Cordelia, King Lear and His Fool Free online book.
- Slashdoc : King Lear Amateur essays on Shakespeare's King Lear
- Shakespeare's King Lear and the Nature of Disguise
- Lesson plans for King Lear at Web English Teacher
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Leir was the son of King Bladud and a legendary king of the Britons as accounted by Geoffrey of Monmouth. His story is told in much-modified and romanticized form in William Shakespeare's King Lear.
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Charles Bernard Lear (born January 23, 1891, in Greencastle, Pennsylvania, died October 31, 1976) was a professional baseball player who played 2 seasons for the Cincinnati Reds of Major League Baseball.
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William Shakespeare
The Chandos portrait, artist and authenticity unconfirmed. National Portrait Gallery, London.
Born: April 1564 (exact date unknown)
Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England
Died: 23 March 1616
Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England
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The Chandos portrait, artist and authenticity unconfirmed. National Portrait Gallery, London.
Born: April 1564 (exact date unknown)
Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England
Died: 23 March 1616
Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England
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list of legendary kings of Britain derives predominantly from Geoffrey of Monmouth's circa 1136 work Historia Regum Britanniae ("the History of the Kings of Britain").
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Leir was the son of King Bladud and a legendary king of the Britons as accounted by Geoffrey of Monmouth. His story is told in much-modified and romanticized form in William Shakespeare's King Lear.
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Brython and Brythonic are terms which refer to indigenous, pre-Roman, Celtic speaking inhabitants of most of the island of Great Britain, and their cultures and languages, the Brythonic languages.
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- Richard Briers, with Emma Thompson as his fool
- Richard Burbage
- Brian Cox
- Michael Gambon, with Antony Sher as his fool
- John Gielgud
- Ian Holm
- Anthony Hopkins
- Michael Hordern
- William Hutt
- Stacey Keach
- Kevin Kline
- Robert B.
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8th century - 9th century - 10th century
850s 860s 870s - 880s - 890s 900s 910s
885 886 887 - 888 - 889 890 891
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Subjects: Archaeology - Architecture -
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850s 860s 870s - 880s - 890s 900s 910s
885 886 887 - 888 - 889 890 891
:
Subjects: Archaeology - Architecture -
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First Folio is the term applied by modern scholars to the first published collection of William Shakespeare's plays; its actual title is Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies.
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8th century - 9th century - 10th century
850s 860s 870s - 880s - 890s 900s 910s
885 886 887 - 888 - 889 890 891
:
Subjects: Archaeology - Architecture -
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850s 860s 870s - 880s - 890s 900s 910s
885 886 887 - 888 - 889 890 891
:
Subjects: Archaeology - Architecture -
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English Restoration, or simply The Restoration, was an episode in the history of Britain beginning in 1660 when the English monarchy, Scottish monarchy and Irish monarchy were restored under King Charles II after the English Civil War.
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Nihilism (from the Latin nihil, nothing) is a philosophical position, sometimes called an anti-philosophy, which argues that the world, especially past and current human existence, is without objective meaning, purpose, comprehensible truth, or essential value.
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Allied powers:
Soviet Union
United States
United Kingdom
China
France
...et al. Axis powers:
Germany
Japan
Italy
...et al.
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Soviet Union
United States
United Kingdom
China
France
...et al. Axis powers:
Germany
Japan
Italy
...et al.
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Leir was the son of King Bladud and a legendary king of the Britons as accounted by Geoffrey of Monmouth. His story is told in much-modified and romanticized form in William Shakespeare's King Lear.
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Raphael Holinshed (died c. 1580) was an English chronicler, whose work, commonly known as Holinshed's Chronicles, was one of the major sources used by William Shakespeare for a number of his plays.
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15th century - 16th century - 17th century
1550s 1560s 1570s - 1580s - 1590s 1600s 1610s
1584 1585 1586 - 1587 - 1588 1589 1590
:
Subjects: Archaeology - Architecture -
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1550s 1560s 1570s - 1580s - 1590s 1600s 1610s
1584 1585 1586 - 1587 - 1588 1589 1590
:
Subjects: Archaeology - Architecture -
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Geoffrey of Monmouth (Welsh: Gruffudd ap Arthur or Sieffre o Fynwy) (c. 1100 – c. 1155) was a clergyman and one of the major figures in the development of British history and the popularity of tales of King Arthur.
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Edmund Spenser (c. 1552–13 January, 1599) was an English poet and Poet Laureate. Spenser is a controversial figure due to his zeal for the destruction of Irish culture and colonisation of Ireland, yet he is one of the premier craftsmen of Modern English verse in its infancy.
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The Faerie Queene is an English epic poem by Edmund Spenser, published first in three books in 1590, and later in six books in 1596. The Faerie Queene is notable for its form: it was the first work written in Spenserian stanza.
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15th century - 16th century - 17th century
1560s 1570s 1580s - 1590s - 1600s 1610s 1620s
1587 1588 1589 - 1590 - 1591 1592 1593
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Subjects: Archaeology - Architecture -
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1560s 1570s 1580s - 1590s - 1600s 1610s 1620s
1587 1588 1589 - 1590 - 1591 1592 1593
:
Subjects: Archaeology - Architecture -
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This page is about death by hanging. For other uses, see hang.
Hanging is the lethal suspension of a person by a ligature. The Oxford English Dictionary states that hanging in this sense is specifically to put to death by suspension by the neck..... Click the link for more information.
Mirror for Magistrates is a collection of English poems from the Tudor period by various authors which retell the lives and the tragic ends of various historical figures.
The work was conceived as a continuation of the Fall of Princes
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The work was conceived as a continuation of the Fall of Princes
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15th century - 16th century - 17th century
1540s 1550s 1560s - 1570s - 1580s 1590s 1600s
1571 1572 1573 - 1574 - 1575 1576 1577
:
Subjects: Archaeology - Architecture -
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1540s 1550s 1560s - 1570s - 1580s 1590s 1600s
1571 1572 1573 - 1574 - 1575 1576 1577
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Subjects: Archaeology - Architecture -
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16th century - 17th century - 18th century
1570s 1580s 1590s - 1600s - 1610s 1620s 1630s
1601 1602 1603 - 1604 - 1605 1606 1607
:
Subjects: Archaeology - Architecture -
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1570s 1580s 1590s - 1600s - 1610s 1620s 1630s
1601 1602 1603 - 1604 - 1605 1606 1607
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Subjects: Archaeology - Architecture -
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For the industrialist, see .
John Marston (baptised October 7, 1576 – June 25, 1634) was an English poet, playwright and satirist during the late Elizabethan and Jacobean periods.
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Prodigal may refer to
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- The Prodigal, a 1955 epic biblical film
- "The Prodigal" (Angel episode), a Season 1 episode of the TV show Angel
- "Prodigal" (Smallville episode), a Season 2 episode of the TV show Smallville
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16th century - 17th century - 18th century
1570s 1580s 1590s - 1600s - 1610s 1620s 1630s
1602 1603 1604 - 1605 - 1606 1607 1608
:
Subjects: Archaeology - Architecture -
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1570s 1580s 1590s - 1600s - 1610s 1620s 1630s
1602 1603 1604 - 1605 - 1606 1607 1608
:
Subjects: Archaeology - Architecture -
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Sir Philip Sidney (November 30, 1554 – October 17, 1586) became one of the Elizabethan Age's most prominent figures. Famous in his day in England as a poet, courtier and soldier, he remains known as the author of Astrophil and Stella (1581, pub.
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Montaigne (also known as Michel Eyquem de Montaigne) (IPA pronunciation: [miʃɛl ekɛm də mɔ̃tɛɲ
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John Florio (1553 - 1625), known in Italian as Giovanni Florio, was an accomplished linguist and lexicographer, a royal language tutor at the Court of James I , a probable close friend and influence on William Shakespeare and the translator of Montaigne.
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Herod_Archelaus
