Themes
1 Nothingness
- Lear loses everything: his kingly status, his family, his mind.
- Lear has to come to terms with his own ‘nothingness’ as a man – instead of seeing himself as ‘constructed’ king.
- Gloucester is a second figure of authority who is reduced to nothing in order to see more clearly.
- Goneril and Regan’s so-called speeches of love are worth nothing.
2 Animals
- Goneril and Regan are compared throughout to savage animals; they are cruel and inhuman.
- Goneril and Regan are destroyed by their own animal instincts.
- Albany describes Lear’s daughters as ‘tigers not daughters’.
- Gloucester and Cordelia describe how even a wild beast would not be turned out in the storm – as is Lear.
3 Madness
- The play presents different models of madness: Lear’s mental anguish, the Fool’s professional clowning and Edgar’s ‘Poor Tom’ disguise.
- Edgar, disguised as a beggar who would feign insanity for money, speaks in nonsensical rhyme and is plagued by demons.
- In the mock courtroom scene all is turned on its head so those who are mad are in charge.
- The Fool has special status – he has licence to speak the truth, and Lear accepts this from him.
4 Suffering
- Lear’s suffering is mental torture; it is relentless and his mind disintegrates. With Cordelia’s death his heart breaks.
- Femininity is linked to suffering; Lear rages against female sexuality, denouncing women as ‘centaurs’ – half human, half beast.
- Gloucester’s physical suffering reflects the mental anguish of Lear. They are both overwhelmed by their suffering and yearn for death.
- The violence of Edgar’s frantic speeches on the heath intensifies the suffering – they contain imagery of whipping, knives and nooses.
5 Nature
- Lear searches for reason – he asks why his daughters have such hard hearts. Is nature responsible for the chaos?
- Evil characters dominate in the play, which may lead us to think of nature as being a malevolent force.
- Lear, as king, represents the natural order. He upsets this when he fails to see Cordelia’s genuine love.
- Cordelia’s death makes it difficult to believe that the natural order ‘wins’. There is no resolution – only continued struggle.
Copyright © York Press, 2017