Nothing is Something in King Lear
In The Critical Experience, David Cowles tries to explain the theory of deconstruction to befuddled literature students in a boiled-down version of basic tenets that discuss impossibly cloudy concepts like destabilized centers and traces and referents. Though I try to wrap my brain around these ideas, I inevitably fail to get to the heart of what Cowles means. My own interpretive inadequacy feeds on irony, because deconstruction theory itself warns that we cannot "get" to the transcendental center of meaning. King Lear, in its puzzling glory, is like my reaction to Cowles' attempt to explain deconstructive abstraction. I understand part of the play as the words rail at me from the page as vehemently as Lear rails at the heavens. Yet there is an aura of ambiguity that leaves the faintest trace of the text's essential truth, one that is alternately shrouded and then unveiled in the play's language.
Despite my interpretive performance anxiety, reading the play is not futile. Meaning can be derived from Shakespeare's text, but it means looking past the obvious. When King Lear's characters say "nothing" over and over, neither they nor Shakespeare himself really mean nothing, for in King Lear, every word drips with significance. Examining how something comes from nothing lends purpose to Lear's act of relinquishing power, and reconstructs, in the process, charitable redemption from scraps of betrayal and loss.
A key to understanding King Lear is recognizing the importance of reductivism: Characters have to be reduced to near-nothing in order for the tragedy to reveal itself in the text; first, nothing, then something else altogether. Shakespeare makes Lear strip hims...
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...oncrete sympathy for his devolution and devastation. Edgar gets to make his own kingdom that was once wrought with rot, so something else comes from nothing. While there is no flash of brilliant epiphany, Lear's debasement allows him to change, if not for the better, then for magnificent tragedy. And all the while, meaning worms its way up from the darkest trenches, deconstruction be damned.
Works Cited and Consulted
Hales, John. Notes and Essays on Shakespeare. New York, NY, USA: AMS Press. 1973.
Lerner, Laurence. Shakespeare's Tragedies. Middlesex, England: Penguin Books Ltd. 1964.
Shakespeare, William. King Lear. As reprinted in Elements of Literature. Toronto: Oxford University Press. 1990.
Young, David. Shakespeare's Middle Tragedies - A Collection of Critical Essays. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, USA: Prentice-Hall, Inc. 1993.
Through Lear, Shakespeare expertly portrays the inevitability of human suffering. The “little nothings,” seemingly insignificant choices that Lear makes over the course of the play, inevitably evolve into unstoppable forces that change Lear’s life for the worse. He falls for Goneril’s and Regan’s flattery and his pride turns him away from Cordelia’s unembellished affection. He is constantly advised by Kent and the Fool to avoid such choices, but his stubborn hubris prevents him from seeing the wisdom hidden in the Fool’s words: “Prithee, tell him, so much the rent of his land comes to: he will not believe a fool” (Shakespeare 21). This leads to Lear’s eventual “unburdening,” as foreshadowed in Act I. This unburdening is exacerbated by his failure to recognize and learn from his initial mistakes until it is too late. Lear’s lack of recognition is, in part, explained by his belief in a predestined life controlled completely by the gods: “It is the stars, the stars above us govern our conditions” (Shakespeare 101). The elder characters in King Lear pin their various sufferings on the will of...
There are a few factors why we segregate ourselves. One reason is that without recognizing it we stay with people from our own race and country. This is because we feel we share the same interest and have so much in common. This goes on every day without people knowing it. It happens in our schools and in our neighborhoods. There are some communities that are divided into same ethnicity.
The political instability inherent in emerging economies make for very challenging business environments. In late October 1995, Royal Dutch Shell founds itself in just such a tenuous environment in Niger. As Paine and Moldoveanu (2009) outlined,Shell came under scrutiny in the 1990’s for the environmental impact that they were having on the Niger Delta. Shell was accused of creating an “ecological disaster” on the region, caused by oil spills, emissions from flaring of natural gas, and drainage of contaminated water into the waterways (Paine & Moldoveanu, 2009). Adding to the operating complexity, the Nigerian government and its leader faced escalating international condemnation for the actions of a special military tribunal
As the play opens one can almost immediately see that Lear begins to make mistakes that will eventually result in his downfall. (Neher) This is the first and most significant of the many sins that he makes in this play. By abdicating his throne to fuel his ego he is disrupts the great chain of being which states that the King must not challenge the position that God has given him. This undermining of God's authority results in chaos that tears apart Lear's world. (Williams) Leaving him, in the end, with nothing. Following this Lear begins to banish those around him that genuinely care for him as at this stage he cannot see beyond the mask that the evil wear. He banishes Kent, a loyal servant to Lear, and his youngest and previously most loved daughter Cordelia. (Nixon) This results in Lear surrounding himself with people who only wish to use him which leaves him very vulnerable attack. This is precisely what happens and it is through this that he discovers his wrongs and amends them.
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Harbage, Alfred. " King Lear: An Introduction." Shakespeare: The Tragedies: A Collection of Critical Essays.
Shakespeare's King Lear has been the source of much contention as to the way in which the text can be read. The play originally was written for the Jacobean audience of Shakespeare's time, but since then has taken on many other readings. These new readings are produced to comment on issues in the society in which it is explored. Readings encompass a wide range of ideas - from the Dominant reading, the manner in which Shakespeare's audience would have perceived the text, to feminist ideals. The various readings are influenced by the context in which they are discussed. In particular the dominant and feminist readings of King Lear both perceive the text in different contexts; the dominant following the traditional Jacobean interpretation as it was originally written, and the feminist reading pursuing a need for the lack of a patriarchal society in the twentieth century. King Lear can be read in a variety of ways, achieving a set perspective that suits the reader.
Shakespeare’s tragedy, King Lear, portrays many important misconceptions which result in a long sequence of tragic events. The foundation of the story revolves around two characters, King Lear and Gloucester, and concentrates on their common flaw, the inability to read truth in other characters. For example, the king condemns his own daughter after he clearly misreads the truth behind her “dower,”(1.1.107) or honesty. Later, Gloucester passes judgment on his son Edgar based on a letter in which he “shall not need spectacles”(1.2.35) to read. While these two characters continue to misread people’s words, advisors around them repeatedly give hints to their misinterpretations, which pave the road for possible reconciliation. The realization of their mistakes, however, occurs after tragedy is inevitable.
Despite its undeniable greatness, throughout the last four centuries King Lear has left audiences, readers and critics alike emotionally exhausted and mentally unsatisfied by its conclusion. Shakespeare seems to have created a world too cruel and unmerciful to be true to life and too filled with horror and unrelieved suffering to be true to the art of tragedy. These divergent impressions arise from the fact that of all Shakespeare's works, King Lear expresses human existence in its most universal aspect and in its profoundest depths. A psychological analysis of the characters such as Bradley undertook cannot by itself resolve or place in proper perspective all the elements which contribute to these impressions because there is much here beyond the normal scope of psychology and the conscious or unconscious motivations in men.
These classic tropes are inverted in King Lear, producing a situation in which those with healthy eyes are ignorant of what is going on around them, and those without vision appear to "see" the clearest. While Lear's "blindness" is one which is metaphorical, the blindness of Gloucester, who carries the parallel plot of the play, is literal. Nevertheless, both characters suffer from an inability to see the true nature of their children, an ability only gained once the two patriarchs have plummeted to the utter depths of depravity. Through a close reading of the text, I will argue that Shakespeare employs the plot of Gloucester to explicate Lear's plot, and, in effect, contextualizes Lear's metaphorical blindness with Gloucester's physical loss of vision.
oil in Nigeria. Nigeria’s large supply of high quality crude oil helped Shell climb to the top,
Home is a term that is used throughout the world as the place where one lives. Is this really what home means? In looking deeper at what the word really means, many interpretations become apparent. Another word that sometimes is confused with home is the word house. A house is the actual building where a person lives, whereas a home is more personal. The dictionary defines the word home as the place in which one's domestic affections are centered (Scott, Foresman Advanced Dictionary p.528). A house is made of mud and bricks but a home is made from love. A home is made of love, sorrow, laughter, excitement, hope, care, atmosphere and feelings of everyone. A home reflects your personality. When a guest enters in the house, he/she comes to know what sort of person you are. A home is a place to rest. There's no place except home which seems like heaven to us.
The first stage of Lear’s transformation is resentment. At the start of the play it is made quite clear that Lear is a proud, impulsive, hot-tempered old man. He is so self-centered that he simply cannot fathom being criticized. The strength of Lear’s ego becomes evident in the brutal images with which he expresses his anger towards Cordelia: “The barbarous Scythian,/Or he that makes his generation messes/To gorge his appetite, shall to my bosom/Be as well neighboured, pitied, and relieved,/As thou may sometime daughter.” (1.1.118-122). The powerful language that Lear uses to describe his intense hatred towards Cordelia is so incommensurable to the cause, that there can be only one explanation: Lear is so passionately wrapped up in his own particular self-image, that he simply cannot comprehend any viewpoint (regarding himself) that differs from his own (no matter how politely framed). It is this anger and resentment that sets Lear’s suffering and ultimate purification in motion.
King Lear gives the reader a bleak and lonely impression. People suffer unjustly and are killed by heartbreak. Albany points out that if left alone by the gods, "Humanity must perforce prey on itself / like monsters of the deep," expressing that justice and humanity do not house comfortably together. And how can there be meaning or purpose in life if there is no justice? Lear himself alludes poetically to this when upon Cordelia's death he asks, "Why should a dog, a horse, a rat have life / And thou no breath at all?" He also realizes that "I am a man more sinned against than sinning" when it is made obvious that the punishment for his mistake in scene one is harsher than it should be, making it unjust...
“Home is where love resides, memories are created, friends always belong, and laughter never ends (Robot check).” A place becomes a home for me when I am around all the things that I enjoy and love. For example, when I am around everyone that I love, I enjoy a peaceful environment and the beautiful landscapes around me. The interpretation of home for me is not a physical thing that I see or that I can remember or even certain thoughts that I can relate, but it is a sensation that overcomes me when I envision being in the comfort of my own home. However, I know that this is a feeling that is calming to my soul and it quietly reassures me that I genuinely belong in a place where I can be free from people constantly judging me.