Kent out of loyalty urges Lear to “see better” and to “reserve thy state”, taking on a desperate tone. Lear with his fiery anger takes on a commanding tone, “out of my sight!” His rage asserted by the exclamation mark. His anger is continued with use of pagan language, “now by Apollo”. Kent corrects Lear that he “swear’st thy gods in vain!” The audience would feel shocked by Lear’s use of pagan language as Lear as king would be seen as to be a man of God. The audience is alarmed at Lear’s arrogance in his inability to cope with a challenge. Also, the fact that he calls Kent a “recreant” shows his blindness to see Kent’s loyalty to him.
Shakespeare presents Lear as an unfit king being irresponsible in his division of his kingdom. It is Lear’s duty to look after his kingdom which he sees as a burden, “unburdened crawl”; therefore he selfishly decides to give up his responsibility. Shakespeare extends this theme of division by the division of the family. Lear’s misuse of power and the division of his kingdom sees a steady decline in his authority and the consequences of his behaviour leads to chaos, paving the way to civil war. Lear also expects to keep his authority even though he has divided his kingdom, “I do invest you jointly with my power”. The audience is shocked at Lear’s ignorance.
The speech at the end of Act 1, scene 1, between Goneril and Regan presents Lear as foolish and now weak as they conspire against him. They recognise Lear’s “poor judgement” due to his blindness and “how full of changes his age is” and take advantage. It has become apparent that Goneril and Regan have become more powerful as they already start to use the royal plural, “us”. This conversation reinforces the audience’s impression of Lear as a flawed character.
Shakespeare brings back a sense of authority to Lear with the stage direction ‘horns within’ in Act 1, scene 4. The audience may begin to feel sympathy for Lear when shown disrespect by Goneril’s servant, Oswald. The major flaw is that while stepping down from the throne, Lear has given up all his formal authority to those who do not love him and will misuse their power against Lear. Lear does not have the authority to command anyone, but does not realise this at this stage. This is the first time that Lear sees a change in the way people act towards him.
Shakespeare then presents the close relationship between Lear and the Fool through their informal manner of speaking to each other shown by the Fool addressing Lear as “nuncle”. The Fool arrives on the scene with a series of puns as he cleverly uses his position as the court jester to tell Lear important truths such as
“Thou shouldst not have been old till thou hadst been wise”.
The riddles and songs make the audience realise that Lear has to be approached like a child when telling him he is wrong.
Shakespeare uses the new power of Goneril and Reagan to prove Lear’s declining power as Goneril and Regan conspire to destroy Lear’s remaining influence. Shakespeare presents an enraged Lear when Goneril tries to force Lear to cut the number of his knights down as he uses pagan language, “Darkness and devils!” The exclamation mark confirms Lear’s shock at Goneril’s betrayal and regrets handing power to her, “O Lear, Lear, Lear!” This has dramatic effect on the audience as Lear is striking his head as if mad and seems like a step to realisation of what he has done. The audience would be particularly amazed at Lear’s violent language and curses and see him as unnatural.
“Create her child of spleen”. Lear calls upon Nature as a creative force but his curses would make nature unnatural, “disnatured torment to her”. Shakespeare uses animal imagery to convey the message that Lear’s response to Goneril is a speech of rage, “wolvish visage” and he only thinks about Goneril’s ingratitude.
We note a change in Lear’s initial approach to Regan. Lear actually learns something; that if he carries on the way he has been, he will not get his way. This has a dramatic effect as the audience sees the beginning of the change in Lear. Lear pleads and actually kneels in desperation to Regan
“Dear daughter, I confess that I am old”.
This is dramatic as we see Lear humble himself; a king kneeling to a subject, also a father kneeling to a daughter. When he realises that he will not get his way, Lear curses Regan as he did with Goneril. “Thou art a boil, a plague sore”. Lear keeps fighting for his knights as this is the only thing he has left representing his authority and ego. Lear’s lack of success with Regan leaves him homeless. He now has no daughters left, realises he has wronged Cordelia and is put out into the storm-homeless, where he begins to go mad.
Shakespeare develops the psychological focus of the play with Act 3, scene 2, focusing on the cruelty and madness of Lear on the moors. Lear’s metaphorical blindness begins to push him to the edge of insanity, where the audience begins to feel sympathy for him. Lear opens the scene with a speech of rage,
“Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! Rage! Blow!”
The angry tone of a now powerless Lear is evident through his commands creating a bitter and revengeful mood. The language Lear uses mirrors his situation. “Cataracts” cover the eye and symbolises Lear’s clouded vision.
The early stages on the moor see Lear concentrating on the ingratitude of his daughters. Gradually we see a change. “How dost my boy? Art cold?” and “poor naked wretches” see the first time that Lear shows sensitivity towards others. The reaction of the audience would be encouraging and positive.
Shakespeare presents Lear and Edgar both on the moors to develop the theme of changing ‘wheels of fortune’, which is particularly emphasised here as they are both characters whose fortunes have changed severely, making them homeless. Shakespeare then presents Lear and Gloucester together on the moors showing that they have learnt and have become sharper in their thinking.
The real change in Lear that Shakespeare presents is Lear’s acceptance to his fault in the reconciliation scene with Cordelia, where he repents, “I am a very foolish fond old man”. He has also lost the royal plural and says “I am”, presenting no pride or arrogance in him. Lear uses words such as “Methinks” and “doubtful”, suggesting that he may be doubting himself now; this is a contrast to the beginning of the play where he was stubborn.
“I fear I am not in my perfect mind” is ironic. Lear is sane to accept the fact that he has made mistakes; he made wrong decisions when he was mad. We also see a change in Lear’s language. It seems as though he has reconciled with God, as his language is more Christian like, rather than pagan as we saw at the beginning of the play and when he was angry. “Faith”, “pray” shows this as he accepts his fault and repents. Lear has learnt many lessons, but the audience soon realise that Lear has not learnt everything. This is shown when Lear does not want to accept the things he does not like or does not want to hear, as seen when Cordelia and he are captured.
“We…will sing like birds I’ the cage”
shows that Lear has not accepted the situation for what it is, and that his only concern is happiness with Cordelia. In this he is unrealistic and seems to revert to his initial position of not wishing to accept things he doesn’t like.
This reconciliation scene builds the audience up for a happy ending, but this has been a false sense of security. With the death of Cordelia, Lear’s goes back into madness. The audience sympathise with him as Cordelia was that Lear had.
“Howl, howl, howl, howl! O you are men of stones!”
shows Lear’s howl of despair and grief. Lear kills the man who hanged Cordelia for a sense of justice, also as he feels so much guilt for having ever wronged Cordelia.
The new humble Lear that we see towards the end of the play is far from the arrogant king we saw at the beginning of the play. Lear in the audience’s view has been transformed from an egotistical king to a loving figure complete with the transformation from blindness into sight. Shakespeare presents Lear as a tragic hero who gains insight through suffering. In the first scene, Lear changes the fortune of Cordelia and Kent. As a result of his misjudgement, his fortune is changed by Goneril and Regan. His behaviour inevitably led to bringing the kingdom on to the edge of civil war, but the extent of Lear’s punishment and final loss is not deserved. Shakespeare’s different presentations of Lear trigger different audience responses towards Lear. The audience’s response to Lear changes from detesting him to pitying him.
