King Lear

By William Shakespeare

The story of a king who craves flattery—and the daughter who refuses him even at the cost of her own inheritance.
 
King Lear wants nothing more than to be praised, and when he decides to divide his realm according to how much each of his daughters can impress him with their declarations of love, Goneril and Regan are quick to oblige. Only the youngest, Cordelia, cannot give him what he wants—and she is promptly cut out of his will.
 
Lear’s decision will roil not only his family but his kingdom, for the political implications of the inheritance set off a tragic series of events as Lear’s madness grows. One of the theater’s greatest works, re-popularized most recently by the 2018 film adaptation starring Anthony Hopkins, King Lear is a cornerstone of Western literature and a timeless story.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Media
• Release date: May 5, 2020
• ISBN: 9781504062954

William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare is widely regarded as the greatest playwright the world has seen. He produced an astonishing amount of work; 37 plays, 154 sonnets, and 5 poems. He died on 23rd April 1616, aged 52, and was buried in the Holy Trinity Church, Stratford.

Book preview

�|��dbook_preview_excerpt.html�Z�nܸ���{� ̼�A7��q��Ap0���*1%�j��Z�?bf~��d�ڤ.�}l �.�Dr_�^{��V�����k���5�/�ETW����������|���_��_�\���ɶ{um������ӵ.� V᝷��s�F�է�����x}������ŗ��m�.>|�z�a:��%�(.P����++�靖�u�ٕ.U�Qz�3E4�|��?�v*�;����n�{��A������E���FU�R�z�cP��F��S}8U�>�� e[9;�)� ֵc��t ^�JwL�,���E����?(|x�u�O��L�W��^�6Z<�PR�e���ʔ*U�{낍#�j�Ŧ^о�0LQ9[̂��􂸰q���q�vG� V6����Ռ�v������[oL mT�~��Jm�i���E��ޜ"$+�0���.�m݇��wJ��6�ި�6�"x����Vn��Wz��jKR�µ��:�&���d,���Ե�Փ�\_�� �M�!v&5 {o屰|3�fKW3�������XN� �Jƌ��uYe3،Y�UՇ-��^¦�>�T���xu��:>r���i���З� ���l� ��E2L1Lg8��3�5�}��G&؎ q�pN����5p2o����Z`�~���P�Dȇ�Q%^��H!�.��6�.yJ$J�<���B7F��3������@� ������xЄ�6� 9�O�m��ɕ��3n�Ӛ�s� ��)"��$}�>��I4HӇ����gO�Q�&/k���d�i4��l��GA0���Sn����約>�dhno�p��eF��;��E�k
?���5��������P ��Ce����X�v ����NLJ�nM�O��3B N\!OQ�T�}9"E�v�S^��:V)ۦ�IL�r�L'�Uz�m{����(\st4���i[�����棺�8GY�������F�_�;��'����ŗ+<�r���F��pq}u�d8�e�R�1��v+�\[��y��v�{�ߢ0��[C�\40
x�u��>����� ��!�
�הəj��Idp^�-[J��X�C�[P�j��okV���V��D���H1�`��2��Cϵ�>��=�%#�����@�����j��9�/Ck�F^Z׈ed�G�o�Xd��a��f�h��P;��cʙQ�b0՗��c�H��c2����!y݌�M@�)����Ei����D`�6� �^��Ǟ��79��q�I��{9�2�����>‹�Pϫ�������RD��-Nt�"�@;��eY2�$iX�:G %�3�-I���1D�h�D A9E��ȏ�3��G����x�o�����{O�Y[�H�uI��lo�3���
�dq�݉��A0�%��ȑW0�fU�I;�,��H#�%�0A�xA�t(�A��L>^�QBC8� ���t����]�5�Jc 9Q�u9�f��c r����T��LDg{�-�6[JS�a����s���';�8u* ��;��#;y.�� &.�gVS���{p{]��u�djev�%p�_R����5�U�J���{�~���z@`�V����������`F���-: �N&����&���=혐3��������$�Rc�ݍ+ � �)Y� +�����D1-�<$�;[+-:��t dokK�^Q��t���"q`��~��8T�V�}N���8��2��nj�E"]����H@N�"�2&�c����l�s�{�R 5`�~��v�?I��������TH7~L]Ob`v�g���2��-6�`��[�\��A�� � ʅ�D�pl� K�sk�d(�$w�g �����@�|���T�����&23S�Htɤ¦�ψ���Gj���-A� ��%��u=�*�-͡$1�s�lp�8iݟo\�w}^��k�z��E1�i�6=<��"wo/�k[�'�� �$�o�R�o?��d�
�4h(��U��@����ٽ�E
 ��[��"c�k��x~�
.����|c��S��(�1��5���B����(��G���T9n�q1��O��0���d$ "�|�O�2F�iɜd���q��8�i�ζw6.�nk���O��:b,ߪ1S��<�i���R�Fɨ%iDž]Jݼ�]=�1�^͌�\�JLC����)H$ ��]-���`�~>�R�e�M\DF�U~L�/��8�x�a�'q�<��,��o[NF����=,$*0��e�43������&�H; ������iq��B��n��[?8[&��&�pw…��s��.����{�T�K3u�BeSLI���O�=]��ؙ\m�h��_��D�N��iձw�dă;|���FF(�g���X@�@GT�M���Ǡ�C���6ͫUH\1em+�"V����ϐ%�x�*�Ӏ{.�!�e�rx�}�"�uy��\d��~IЫqm�p"�e����<~��� F$���J�N�w&�
E:��I�&ǭ+W�C��rsl�eh��tnER@o��E�@��K4�R�7��g�a��#{,5��_*cz�ŤD�O��T*�f����7+d���$���ɤ���)�i8��sbUx7P��&����� ª�E�b!�(I����=�j:3}��i��j�4�;�/j�`M���X�4>�����i�ZHb�x��eS#d�/��0�]��7׹��>+���P`L����^\�ρ0��S��` 6��g� "H�%7�e�Y����& V�氶=��;R���rv�;XYn��9>P`���j}�h �8T�^��4C;�bj[BH����/��0�U'~ޖ�����9�Huv����ޛ�$����t���i���¶��ޗ{�3q�>���>D1�wyʑ[���>ѧi��s�tq|#�3cG4#��e�-�n�һ�`o_י}�]2Ic+�y/���� W��Wh�5B�:=,0�Ԡ����J،2ڲH���1#�?���zg"}6aM�������1��q��[��ɗ�ɑ�4|'oXм�
�eV��u{Hh�y�_C�e��r�ѩO�S����-����䀽+e.�����oL�V�F��y����G���C��s��Ǔ"�9ϗЏN�H��@o�?^���g>ɍ t�1�B��ԧ�����yN���9�s=o�AwxXn}� 1�a���Ff�~���;���@�L*�&!)���-���'

Reviews for King Lear

[therebelprince · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A very enjoyable edition. Unlike most of the Arden editions, Foakes comes across more as an educator than an academic-among-friends. This does mean occasionally that he'll cover ground most professional-level readers already understand, but it makes this a really well-rounded introduction to the play.

The decision here is to incorporate both Quarto and Folio texts in one, with the differences clearly delineated. It's probably the best possible option for this play, and well done.

[jbd1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

One of my favorite Shakespeare plays, though it had been a long time since I read it. Didn't disappoint on a reread!

[jhudsui_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This did not quite top Hamlet as my favorite Shakespeare play but it is way up there. With the exception of the black and white hatted Gloucester boys there is a lot more moral complexity and ambiguity than you normally see in Shakespeare play; it wasn't until well into the play that I had any idea who I was supposed to sympathize with between the king and the daughters and that suspense actually adding a great deal to my interest while reading. Edgar's antic disposition is a lot more interesting and entertaining to me than Hamlet's but he doesn't have anything like Hamlet's soliloquies.

[jscape2000 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The version of Lear I saw in 2012 too closely matched the texted: too many story lines, too many gag scenes, and too much talking about how hard it is to be king. The tragedy of Lear is that he gets exactly what he deserved. For me, it lacks much of the intrigue of Macbeth or the poetry of Hamlet or Othello.

[dirkjohnson_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I'm somewhat biased: Lear is my favorite play written since the time of Euripides (who wrote later than my absolute favorites Aeschylus and Sophocles).The cast and execution of the Naxos audiobook are also excellent. I would list the cast, but the combination of blurred lines between book and performance and my own laziness and busy schedule prohibit me.

[thatsfresh_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Another great tragic tale as told my Shakespeare. Like all his plays, you're able to dig deep into this story and draw out tons of stories, themes and hidden meanings out of all its layers. An enjoyable read for any Shakespeare enthusiast.

[kettle666 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The writer I feel most in awe of, by a mile, is Shakespeare. I'm not going to say anything much about him because it's all been said, so I'll just say he's the boss, and the play that most shocks and thrills and saddens me is King Lear. But I could almost have said exactly the same about most of the plays he wrote. Every time I experience him in performance I feel overwhelmed by his brilliance, and I just have to shut up before I get too sycophantic.

[jpsnow · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Compare to his other masterpieces, this was for me too wide in character and at the same time lacking the intimacy of baseline human feelings or experience. "Thy truth be thy dower."

[othemts · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This is my favorite Shakespeare tragedy. The plot, language, and characterization show the dramatist at his mature best.

[crazy4reading · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Took me awhile to read this book due to life taking over my reading time. I also just wasn't interested in reading the play for awhile. The Tragedy of King Lear is a well written play by William Shakespeare. I have only read one other work by Shakespeare and that is Romeo and Juliet. I enjoyed the story of King Lear, I just wish I had a better understanding of his English writing to fully understand Shakespeare's works.

[m2gilbert · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The proud King Lear disowns his most dutiful daughter and is consequently betrayed by his other two. A bastard son betrays both his brother and father out of jealousy and malice. I think it is the saddest of his tragedies, and it moves very quickly to me (though not as quickly as Macbeth). It is also really one of the most profound expressions of human suffering ever written in the English language. The play sees deeply into the soul, and so I would often linger a bit on a line or speech with a quiet awe. The actions pierce its characters with a sad, penetrating irony. The eyes will eventually see in their blindness. The heart bleeds and the storm rages. It is depressing, yes. But in all, as depraved as its villains are, I also read in King Lear what is very beautiful about humanity and kinship, however frail it may appear teetering on the edge of a cliff: compassion, loyalty, charity, and mercy.

[cheme2005 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This is my favorite of all of Shakespeare's works. Blood, death, and treachery. Who could ask for more!

[jaelmore · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

If I could only recommend one Shakespeare Play it would be King Lear.

[eustaciatan · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

There's probably nothing more I can say about this book, since it's been studied for a long time. But although this was a school book, for my Independent Oral Commentary, I really grew to love this book. Shakespeare's mastery of the English language is obvious here. From the truncated but meaningful dialogue, with the most famous probably being "Nothing my Lord". These three words manage to express love, and I have the utmost respect for Shakespeare for writing this. Even after our IOC, we are still influenced by this wonderful play. One friend proceeded to enact the storm scene in the rain (from sheer joy), and this was one of the most quoted books in our inscriptions to our Teacher on Teacher's Day. I could go on and on, but "no, let me shun that. That way madness lies" (Too much of a good thing can be bad after all)

[rbeene-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Shakespeare but I have not read it in a long time and I do not think that I have ever seen it.

[alanwpowers · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Maybe the fifteenth time I've read Lear (this time in the tiny red-leather RSC edition). Always impressed, especially with the curses and curse-like screeds. I can't stand Lear onstage, particularly the blinding of Gloster (so spelled in this edition). How sharper than a serpants teeth it is / to have a thankless child--though having a thankless parent like Lear, Act I Sc I, ain't so great either. I do love the Russian film Lear with music by Shostakovich, and the King's grand route through his bestiary of hawks and eagles.I suppose this is Shakespeare's great (that's redundant, since "Sh" is mostly "great") assessment of homelessness. The undeservingly roofless. it is also his only play on retirement, which he recommends against. Or perhaps Lear should have had a condo in Florida? Of course, his hundred knights, a problem for the condominium board, as it was for his daughters. And Shakespeare, who says in a sonnet he was "lame by fortune's despite" also addresses the handicapped here, recommending tripping blind persons to cheer them up.Of course, Lear has his personal Letterman-Colbert, the Fool, so he doesn't need a TV in the electrical storm on the heath. That's fortunate, because it would have been dangerous to turn on a TV with all that lightening. The play seems also to recommend serious disguises like Kent's dialects and Edgar's mud. Next time I go to a party I'll think about some mud, which reduces Edgar's likelihood of being killed by his former friends.And finally, the play touches on senility, where Lear cannot be sure at first Cordelia is his daughter.I'm not sure, but the author may be recommending senility as a palliative to tragedy--and to aging. A friend of mine once put it, "Who's to say the senile's not having the time of his life?"

[briandewey · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Shakespeare, William. King Lear. University of Virginia Electronic Text Center, 15XX. This is my favorite Shakespeare play. I don't know if I would have re-read it now if I hadn't had a copy on my iPaq and needed something to read at night without disturbing Molly and Tony on our trip to Madrid. I like Lear for its apocalyptic vision and because I think the transition from one generation to the next is an interesting topic. The paper I wrote on this play in college, which compares Edgar to the Fool, is one of my favorites.

[karl6steel · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Teaching it for the second time. The Folger edition is okay, but it badly needs to be updated; and the illustrations in the facing page are, to my mind, badly chosen, unless they're meant only to promote the grandeur of the Folger library. I think they would have done much better to provide photos of scenes taken from various productions/films/adaptations of Lear; no doubt the students would pay more attention to such things, to say nothing of nonexpert instructors like me.

Oh, the play: certainly very good at cutting the legs out from under the notion that suffering can be redemptive. Lear discovers compassion and love, Gloucester grows up, but what do they get? Death. And what are we left with? The two appalling milquetoast prigs, Albany and Edgar,* perhaps the two characters in Lear who understand least well what the whole thing is about. At least Kent has the grace to go off and wait to die.

* Hilarious: I just googled these names and the second hit is some plagiarism mill that's selling an essay that reads "Albany and Edgar both possess honest and kind characters." You have got to be kidding me! Please, please, please let someone try to get this paper past me. How stupid or desperate would someone have to be to pay for a paper that's, at best, a B-?

[alcracka · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

My absolute favorite Shakespeare play. Extra love for the fact that this came up when I searched for Stephen King.

[kant1066 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I don’t really know what to say about King Lear, or anything by Shakespeare, really. A summary would be redundant and out of place. So would gushing about the stunning beauty of the poetry, or how this is some of the greatest writing in the history of the English language, or any language.Only one thing comes to mind when I think of Shakespeare’s greatest plays. Think what you will of Harold Bloom (and there are certainly many opinions about him), I always think, more than anything else, of the title of his book of essays on the plays: “Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human.” Is the title a typically hyperbolic publishing stunt? The more I read and re-read the plays, the less I’m starting to think so. Words simply fail me. They really do. The wonderful things about Modern Library/RSC edition are the introduction, critically informed notes on the text, folio notes, and a sizeable section on historically important performances of “King Lear.” These do a superb job of contextualizing the play, especially in how it performed on stage.

[meditationesmartini · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This is especially devastating because (sorry, Aristotle's Poetics, but indeed because) it departs from the conventions of good Greek tragedy. Nobody's led astray slickly by their tragic flaw;* Lear's ennobled by suffering perhaps but at the start he's no philosopher king (as I'd envisioned) but a belching, beer can crushing Dark Ages thug lord who definitely brings it on himself, but not in any exquisite "his virtue was his fall" way. Cordelia is, not an ungrateful, but an ungracious child whose tongue is a fat slab of ham and who can't even manage the basic level of social graces to not spark a family feud that leaves everyone killed (surely a low bar!!). Goneril and Regan are straight-up venial malice, Shakespeare's Pardoner and Summoner; Edmund, obviously, charismatic, but a baaaad man; and the default good guys, the ones with the chance to win the day and transform this blood-filled torture show into two hours' pleasing traffic of the stage, obviously fumble it bigly (Albany, unbrave and too subtle; Kent, brave and too unsubtle; Gloucester, a spineless joke; and what is Edgar doing out in that wilderness when he should be teaming up with Cordelia and Kent to plan an invasion that's a MacArthuresque comeback and not a disaster, to go down as the plucky band of good friends who renewed the social compact with their steel and founded a second Camelot, a new England). They're not all monsters, and there are frequent glimmers of greatness, but they fuck it all up; in other words, they're us.And then Lear's madness has much too much of, like, an MRA drum circle meeting, with the Fool and Kent and Edgar/John o'Bedlam (that's a name, that) farting around the wastes going "Fuckin' bitches, can't live with em, can't smack em one like they deserve" (though of course this is a Shakespearean tragedy, so everyone pretty much gonna get smacked one sooner or later). Not tragic flaws, in other words, but just flaws, with only glimmers of the good, and all the more devastating for that because all the more real. It's haaard to keep it together for a whole lifetime and not degenerate into a sad caricature of you at your best, or you as you could have been, and I wonder how many families start out full of love and functional relations and wind up kind of hating each other in a low key way just because of the accretion of mental abrasions plus the occasional big wound and because life is long.This seems like a family that just got tired of not hating each other, standing in for a social order that's gotten tired of basically working from day to day, and everyone's just itching to flip the table and ruin Thanksgiving. I have little faith, post-play, that Edgar or Albany in charge will salvage the day--historically, of course, their analogues did not--and it's gonna be a long hard road to a fresh start (we don't of course try to find one such in the actual history--I mean, 1066?--pretty sure fresh starts don't happen in actual history--but I trust the general point is clear). This seems like the most plausible/least arbitrary of Shakespeare's tragedies, I am saying here, and thus also the most desolate, and one with lessons for any family (cf., say, Hamlet, with its very important lessons for families where the mother kills the dad and marries his brother and the dad's ghost comes back to tell the son to kill his uncle, a niche market to say the least), and one that I'll revisit again and again.*Side note, my friend Dan calls me "My favourite Hamartian," and I'm recording that here because we may grow apart and I may forget that but I never want to forget really and so, hope to find it here once more

[composingcomposer · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

There are three main reasons for the disorder already occurring by the end of Act I. The first and most obvious is Lear's madness. He certain seems to be loosing it a bit, and his crazed banishment of Cordelia and Kent couldn't possibly have done anything but harm to him. The second reason is Cordelia's sister's treachery. It could be argued that they appear to be trying to protect him and their people by taking away his knights, he is crazy after all, if it weren't for Cordelia's parting words to them; "I know you what you are;/And, like a sister, am most loth to call/Your faults as they are nam'd. Love well our father:/To your professed bosoms I commit him:/But yet, alas, stood I within his grace, I would prefer him to a better place." And a few lines later; "Time shall unfold what plighted cunning/Who cover faults, at last shame them derides." These lines seem to indicate that Cordelia knows that Goneril and Regan are not only flattering Lear for gain, but also that they hold him in contempt, and will likely do him harm, and revealing the second harbinger of disorder.

The third indicator of the chaos to come is Edmund. I feel bad for him, for the contempt others hold him in because of the doings of his parents, but he quickly does what he can to dispel my pity for him with his evil attitudes as he works to turn his father and brother against one another. I find it ironic that he distains his father's belief in fate through astrology, yet confesses that because of when he was born he was supposed to be 'rough and lecherous,' yet doesn't believe himself to have those traits he was just showing.

Shakespeare's purpose in showing this disorder seems to come from the idea of dividing his kingdom. A divided kingdom would often lead to civil war and chaos, so Lear's deliberate dividing of the kingdom would probably have been viewed as deliberately inviting disorder.

Power in England was structured in a pyramid. The king on top, and wealth and power went to a few nobles who had all the money. Lear was trying to disrupt that structure in a way that would have alarmed the people watching the play. Cordelia took a great risk in not bowing to her father's wishes, as his denying her dowry could have driven away both her suitors, leaving her alone and destitute in a world that didn't favor lone women. In her case, however Cordelia's suitor from France still marries her, which would be very unusual since she had no dowry, and she wouldn't gain him an alliance with England.

Family dynamics can change depending on the health of a person, as others may come into their lives and as children grow up. Cordelia was Lear's favorite child, yet when she would not lie to him with flattery, he cast her off. Why? Did he not realize that her impending marriage would change is relationship with her? She would still love him, of course, but even with the play being in pre-Christian era, the belief would probably have been that the wife's foremost alliegence should be to her husband, and Lear should have understood this. In fact, it seems strange that he would have even questioned this part of the structure of society at all.

No one has a perfect family. This is shown in Edgar and Edmund's family. Gloster (or Gloucester as some versions call him) may have been unfaithful to his wife, it's never stated whether she was alive at the time of Edmund's conception. If Gloster was unfaithful to his wife than he was dishonest and breaking one of the oldest understandings of marriage. If Edgar's mother had already died, that Gloster was not responsible enough to remarry, and to marry Edmund's mother, or at least admit himself Edmund's father when the boy was a child, instead of waiting until Edmund was old enough to distinguish himself, and in doing so, add to Gloster's reputation. It seems very unfair that Edmund, and almost any other illigitmate child born until the the late 1900s should be punished for something that their parents did. Yet neither should Edmund take out his misfortunes on his brother, who was, in all probability, guiltless in tormenting him. After all, Edgar trusts Edmund completely, which does not seem like an attitude he would hold had he tormented Edmund before. I think that Gloster could have stopped his fate had he treated Edmund with kindness from the beginning of his life, rather than waiting until Edmund could add to his reputation to acknowledge him.

I don't actually seem him mocking Edmund, so much as simply being ashamed of his illegitimacy because it was Gloster's own act that was the cause of Edmund's bastardy. As Gloster was speaking to Kent, he was very frank about the manner of Edmund's conception, to the point that we would say he was being rude to Edmund, but really, for the time, the fact that he had acknowledged Edmund as his son at all was better than many bastards would have gotten. For this reason I think that more than anything it was the fact that he took so long to acknowledge Edmund, that led to Edmund's bitterness and Gloster's downfall.

(This review is patched up from posts I made on an online Shakespeare class)

[seriousgrace · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

To sum up the play in one sentence: this is the story of a king seeking to divide his kingdom among his three daughters based on who could articulate her love for him the best. Beyond that it is the tragedy of emotional greed - of wanting to be loved at any cost. It is the tragedy of politics and family dynamics. Youngest daughter Cordelia is unwilling to conform to her father's wishes of exaggerated devotion. Isn't the last born always the rebel in the family? As a result Cordelia's portion of the kingdom is divided among her two sisters, Goneril and Regan. The story goes on to ooze betrayal and madness. Lear is trapped by his own ego and made foolish by his hubris.

[cbl_tn · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

King Lear makes a fateful decision to divide his kingdom between his three daughters. The reaction of one daughter, Cordelia, displeases the king so much that he cuts her out of any inheritance. The kingdom will be divided between the other two daughters, Goneril and Regan. His plan is that they will take care of him in his old age. They soon decide that they don't want to use their inheritance to support their father, and the king finds himself with nowhere to shelter in a violent storm. Meanwhile, the Earl of Gloucester's illegitimate son plots to usurp his legitimate brother's place as their father's heir. As in many of Shakespeare's plays, there are characters in disguise. It's filled with violence and cruelty without comic relief like the gravedigger scene in Hamlet. The family conflict at its heart will continue to resonate with audiences and readers as long as there are families.

[katieloucks · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Not my cup of tea, but it was nice to read it because I haven't before.

[leslie398 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Thoughts on the play: -A classic tragedy in which almost everyone dies at the end. -I really didn't have much sympathy for Lear. He acted incredibly foolishly, not just once in turning his back on Cordelia, but many times. -At first, Goneral seemed to be acting reasonably. If Lear had restrained his knights, much of the tragedy would have been lessened. (This was one of the foolish actions of Lear's I mentioned above.) However, as the plot moves on, she is revealed as being more and more terrible. -Edmund struck me as the villain, and he also acted as a catalyst for villainy. So I found the scene at near the end after he & Edgar had dueled a bit hard to believe - after everything, Edgar just forgives him!?! -I was shocked when Cornwall plucks out Gloucester's eyes. I didn't know that was going to happen! Gloucester struck me as the true tragic hero, rather than Lear. Both of them cast off deserving children, but Gloucester realized his error and suffered for it. It wasn't clear to me that Lear recognized his own faults the way Gloucester did.

[ron_peters-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I enjoy the Folger editions of Shakespeare - to each his own in this matter. Some find Lear to be overblown, I am tremendously moved by it, and haunted by the image of the old man howling across the barren heaths with his dead daughter in his arms. 'I am bound upon a wheel of fire, that mine own tears Do scald like molten lead.' Lear 4.7.52-54

[angelarenea-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

A fairly quick read. I didn't love it as much as I remember. Lear was way obsessed with 'nature' and the whole thing was so pompous. But not as bad as some of his other stuff.

[jwhenderson_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The division of the Kingdom begins the play with first, the Earls of Kent and Gloucester speculating on the basis for the division and second, the actual division by Lear based on professions of love requested from his three daughters. When this event goes not as planned the action of the play ensues and the reader is in for a wild ride, much as Lear himself.The play provides one of Shakespeare's most thoroughly evil characters in Edmund while much of the rest of the cast is aligned against each other with Lear the outcast suffering along with the Earl of Gloucester who is tricked by his bastard son Edmund into believing that his other son Edgar is plotting against him. While there are some lighter moments the play is generally very dark filled with the bitter results of Lear's poor decisions at the outset. Interestingly we do not get much of a back story and find, other than his age of four score years, little else to suggest why Lear would surrender his power and his Kingdom at the outset. The play is certainly powerful and maintains your interest through dramatic scenes, while it also provides for many questions - some of which remain unanswered.

[rosenstern · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

One of my favorite Shakespeare plays. King Lear asks his daughters who truly loves him, and the oldest two spin golden words of flattery while the third one cannot do so. Lear abandons his third daughter and this opens the story to the madness that follows. Brilliantly imagined characters and psyches. Worth it