1_King Lear Critics

1_King Lear Critics

1. A04 - Context

   • Religion
     • According to Foakes the Pagan Gods in Lear 'Show no sign of being interested in human affairs and may not exist at all.'
       • Maxwell thinks the text is 'a Christian play about a pagan world.'
         • Lear's own resemblance to the divine speaks to Sh's own era as according to King James 'Kings are justly called Gods, for that they exercise a manner or resemblance of divine power on earth'
   • Society
     • Following WW2 Danby reinterpreted the play in relation to his own society, reconfiguring Lear and Cordelia as 'representatives of an ideal community' and Edmund, R and G as the 'ruthless embodiment of self-seeking capitalism.'
     • Foakes: 'King Lear depicts an authoritarian society that takes violence for granted'
     • By the 1960s redemptionist readings were rejected in favour of emphasis on bleakness and despair. Holloway viewed it as 'the universal disruption of nature, that descent into chaos which for millennia had been a standing dread of mankind.'
     • Maynard Mack argues that 'After two world wars and Auschwitz, our sensibility is significantly more in touch than our grandparents was with the play's jagged violence, its sadism, madness and processional deaths.'
   • Politics
     • The distinction between virtuous disobedience and improper loyalty is examined in King Lear' (Strier)
       • This marks a significant change in Sh's political thinking. All disobedients are punished which would have pleased King James
       • Booth 'Even our own evaluations of the play are unfixed.' For example the fact that Albany's power is reduced could be because sh did not want KJ to think there was desire for Prince Charles Duke of Albany to succeed him

2. Other readings

   • Feminist
     • Cordelia and Lear's relationship takes on a maternal sense
     • Adleman ' In recognising his daughters as part of himself he will be led to recognise not only his terrifying dependence on female forces outside himself but also an equally terrifying femaleness within himself.' - This could be reflected in the references to Lear's infantile nature which actually could suggest effeminacy
     • Lear's pardon to Gloucester's adultery is a 'misogynistic outburst against all women.'
     • King Lear 'Reinforces patriarchy and a misogynistic attitude to women' - McLuskie
   • Marxist
     • The play is often seen to reflect a transition from an old order to a new one. In Marxist terms it could be 'an order collapsing because of its own internal contradictions.'
   • For many critics there is no way to look at the text simplistically in terms of either pessimistic or optimistic which promotes a 'distrust of all attempts at closure (and a) negation of the possibility of unity, coherence and resolution.' - Fly

3. Critics about Lear himself

   • Foakes: 'The storm mirrors Lear's inner turmoil and pushes him into madness.'
   • Cavell If Lear progresses neither to redemption or despair the play could be seen to offer the paradox that 'we can only learn through suffering, [yet] have nothing to learn from it.'
   • Mack Maynard views Lear as 'Shakespeare's more tragic version of the creature who's fate it is to learn to love only to lose the loved one, and to reach a ripeness through suffering and struggle only to die.'
     • This is one reading that reflects the Christian teaching of patience in adversity
   • Alternative reading of Lear
     • Lear may harbour incestuous desires that surface late in the play when he envisages a future in Cordelia's embrace ' We two alone will sing like birds i'the cage.'
       • Kahn thinks Cordelia is 'Both a substitute mother and a fantasy object of sexual desire.'

4. Other characters

   • Danby - Cordelia is 'the perfection of truth, justice, charity.' This makes her death make more sense as her role is identified as a martyr
   • Regan and Goneril are 'inadequately characterised if seen merely as wicked.' Foakes
     • Although the sisters' death is somewhat melodramatic, Sh 'had to find a way to have them die so the last scene could display Lear with the bodies of all three daughters, destroyed by the process he started with the division of the kingdom.'
   • Edmund's attitude is likened to 'that of a professional criminal' - Bradley
     • 'Edmund's challenge of Edgar's inheritance and pursual of wealth and status brings out the obsession of power, property and inheritance.' - Foakes
       • Edmund was often played as a 'cheery swashbuckler who could engage the audience's complicit laughter.' Peter Holland's review of Noble's 1993 production - Edmund was played by Owen Teale
   • Edgar 'A Christian gentleman in a pagan play.' - Harley Granville Baker
     • Although he has been criticised for begrudging Gloucester his eyes because he does not reveal his true identity
       • Which links to Cavell's point that 'Edgar wants his father to still be a father, powerful, so that he can remain a child.'
   • The Fool
     • 'The fool breaks out of every category in which he might be fixed.' - Stephen Booth
       • The role has been played by both men and women - women usually play him a weaker apart from Emma Thompson in the 1990 Kenneth Branagh production of KL
     • Could be seen as voice of social protest who 'shrivels into a wretched little human being on the soaking heath.' - Bayley
       • His dialogue speaks of a world of experience, not innocence. 'He has been played as a counterpart to Lear in age. described as 'very much Lear's alter-ego.' -Anthony Curtis, Financial Times
   • Gloucester 'gains insight in losing his physical sight' - Foakes
   • Kent is 'the quintessence of a good servant' -Jonas A. Barish
     • Contrast to Edmund who is 'willing to serve the lust' of any mistress to gain