English 144: King Lear

Whoa... What a way to end a play. No happiness whatsoever.

It is sad how there never seems to be any true, pure happiness/ love throughout the play. Love is seen as a way to betray someone... From the very beginning people (Regan, Goneril, and Edmund) confess to their father how it is them who love their father the most. They use the human emotion of wanting to be loved and feel like you are the greatest thing, to destroy their fathers. Now these two fathers (Lear and Gloucester) other children also show their love, but in a way that is down played from their siblings. Cordelia who tells her father she loves him but that half her love will go to her husband, once married, is punished for not claiming to love her fahter above everything. Same goes for Gloucester's other son, Edgar, who truly loves his father but is made out as the bad guy because Edmund sets him up.

In the end it is Cordelia and Edgar that end up being the faithful and loving children that both fathers had truly longed for. Goneril, Regan, and Edmund only wanted to get more powerful and rich... so they lied about their love in order to impress their father which then allowed them to be able to betray him more easily. The whole play is very weird and messed up.

There is no real love that survivies... Everyone seems to use love as a way to gain more power and control--> which in the end doesn't matter because everyone dies who was trying to betray each other. Actually, even the good ones die too. I don't know... This play has too many turns and twists. At first you think it is about love but then it turns into betrayal and hate. However, I still enjoyed the play and thought it was interesting that Shakespeare took this direction in the play...