The Nature of King Lear - Case Study Example

The Nature of King Lear Shakespeare has long been known as a master of tragedy. His play d King Lear chronicles the story of a king in advanced age who chooses to divide his kingdom among his three daughters based upon how well each one expresses her love for him in speech. When his youngest and favorite daughter refuses to participate because she feels such practice would cheapen her feelings for him, she is banished and disinherited. However, the two older daughters prove unfaithful to their father and he slowly sinks further and further into madness. Cordelia returns with an army while other friends return to the kingdom in disguise in attempts to help the insane king, but all falls to pieces in the end with most of the principle characters dead. Throughout the play, Shakespeare’s characters continue to emphasize the concept of nature as a means of trying to understand the forces at work around them. This concept is generally thought of in terms of the physical forces of the outer world, but has also been used to refer to familial relationships, the metaphysical harmony of the universe and the inner composition of man. Within this single play, Shakespeare explores many of these various meanings of nature. His message seems to be that nature, left unchecked, will most often lead to disaster. Shakespeare conveys this message within King Lear through his portrayal of physical nature, the nature of man and the nature of human relationships. Physical nature Perhaps the most visible element of nature apparent in the play is the element of physical nature. Lear invokes it in the opening scene as he gifts his daughters with their estates by pointing out the natural splendors that each territory has to offer and then calls upon nature in his curse of Cordelia’s lack of suitable response to his request: “by the sacred radiance of the sun, / The mysteries of Hecate and the night, / By all the operations of the orbs” (I, i, 109-111) as he disowns her. It is only after this pronouncement that Gloucester makes it clear that the kingdom has recently witnessed a number of strange eclipses of the sun and moon, suggesting that the upsetting situations then occurring in the human realm are just reflections of the upsets occurring in the heavens or vice versa. “Though the wisdom of nature can reason it thus and thus, yet nature finds itself scourged by the sequent effects” (I, ii, 102-103). Although Edmund seems to feel placing such blame for men’s actions on the physical natural environment is foolish, Shakespeare allows nature to continue reflecting the emotions and upsets of the human realm. As the relationships break down between families and within the individual characters involved, each of them going a bit insane as the play continues, the physical world of nature becomes more and more disordered as well. The play continues forward through the darkness of night before it finally leads to Lear’s banishment from both his daughter’s homes, leaving him to wander through the moors unsheltered during a fierce natural storm. This storm first breaks when Lear is confronted by both Goneril and Regan on the issue of his retinue. As they whittle him down from 100 to 50 knights and then down to 25 and finally into questioning whether he should have even one, the storm breaks on the lines of Lear’s refusal to weep with outrage at the daughters’ ungratefulness. In this, Shakespeare seems to suggest that since the king cannot weep for himself, the skies will do it for him. This storm continues to rage through the night, which takes place through the remainder of this scene as well as the following scenes until Lear begins to regain his own sanity. Nature of man The true nature of man is also brought out in the action of the play, in the major characters as well as the lesser cast. This is seen, for example, in the character of the Prince of Burgundy. As soon as Cordelia’s dowry is removed, the Prince withdraws his suit for her hand and leaves her to face her future without father, husband or home. This revelation of his true character causes Cordelia to instantly go cold against him and accept France’s offer of love in his willingness to take her just as she is. Edmund, Gloucester’s illegitimate son, is not such a minor character, but his true nature only emerges as his actions become clear. First introduced as his father’s bastard, but one his father is fond of, Edmund seems to claim that the causes of nature that are said to decree men’s lives are false even as he is proving them true. He says, “my father compounded with my mother under the Dragon’s Tail, and my nativity was under Ursa Major, so that it follows I am rough and lecherous. Fut! I should have been that I am, had the maidenliest star in the firmament twinkled on my bastardizing” (I, ii, 124-129). At this early stage of the play, it seems as if Edmund is arguing that the natural signs of his birth such as the positioning of the stars should have nothing to do with his inner nature. However, the portents he lists, indicating that he is both rough and lecherous, are seen to be essential elements of his character as he slyly lays a trap for his older and legitimate brother, plots against his own father in order to gain the family fortune for himself and openly flirts with both Goneril and Regan in order to try to further his own prospects. King Lear’s nature is depicted as a strong king gone weak with age. He is tired of the burdens of ruling a country and makes plans to divide his kingdom among his three daughters and then to live out his last years in peace and comfort, being provided for by those daughters he so lovingly set up to be rulers in their own right: “’tis our fast intent / To shake all cares and business from our age, / Conferring them on younger strengths while we / Unburdened crawl toward death” (I, i, 38-41). His royal nobility is evidenced in his societal position as well as in the great respect his subjects show him. There is nobility as well in his plan to divide his kingdom among his three daughters rather than giving it to one only or handing it off to the nearest male relative as was the custom throughout much of England at the time Shakespeare wrote his play. However, even in this element of the play, Lear shows a slight weakness in his nobility as he has been unable to produce a succeeding male generation and has failed to appropriately see the inner natures of those daughters he seeks to reward. Lear takes justifiable pride in the love he commands from his daughters and his subjects. He decides to make a game out of their love for him, “Which of you shall we say doth love us most, that we our largest bounty may extend where nature doth with merit challenge” (I, i, 51-53) rather than depending upon his own knowledge of their being. Regan and Goneril are both eager to convince the king of their love, vying with each other regarding which one can praise him the most. The first event of tragedy occurs as Lear fails to recognize their falsity or Cordelia’s honesty. After being disappointed with Cordelia’s response to him regarding her love for him, he proclaims: “Here, I disclaim all my paternal care, propinquity and property of blood, and as a stranger to my heart and me hold thee from this for ever” (I, i, 113-116). By disowning Cordelia, Lear separates himself from his most loyal supporter and the one daughter who would have cared for him in the way he’d envisioned. Lear only realizes his mistake when Goneril confronts him with his powerlessness. “O most small fault, how ugly didst thou in Cordelia show! Which, like an engine, wrenched my frame of nature from the fixed place; drew from my heart all love and added to the gall. O Lear, Lear, Lear! Beat at this gate that let this folly in” (I, iv, 257-262). Without a place to turn or a coherent thought pattern, Lear is then forced to suffer a much longer spiritual and physical journey through madness and a harrowing night on the moors. Lear is finally reunited with Cordelia again just as he’s dying. With this reunion, Lear is again provided with the physical comforts he expected in his old age and begins to recover his intellect. This recovery occurs just in time for Lear to rescue Cordelia from certain death which, in turn, provides him with his one chance at salvation. In recovering himself enough to rescue his youngest and only surviving daughter by the end of the play, Lear is in actuality saving himself. Unfortunately, after his physical battle with the storm, his body is beyond saving and he slips off into eternal sleep knowing himself for a fool because of the unnecessary hardships he’d endured. Cordelia’s inner nature is also revealed through the course of the play. She, too, possesses nobility in that she is a princess and remains true to her heart throughout the action. She is proud of this trait, particularly as compared to her sisters, and she is unwilling to trivialize it in any way. When she’s pressed to ‘mend her speech’ in order to gain her father’s favor, all she can say is “Haply, when I shall wed, that lord whose hand must take my plight shall carry half my love with him, half my care and duty” (I, i, 100-102). In making this statement, Cordelia indicates that whoever she might eventually marry will only be able to claim half of her affection because the other half will still be devoted to her father. Cordelia argues that she is sincere in her affections to the point that she cannot lie about her affections now, whether it is to convince him of her love for him or for any other reason. More than that, she insists he should be aware of her feelings for him based upon her unwillingness to lie in order to gain his favor. As one of the few characters able to keep her inner nature under control within these harsh circumstances, she is one of the few characters to emerge from the play still intact. Nature of human relationships King Lear has overstepped the bounds of authority and allowed vicious cruelty to reign by simply doing nothing to curtail it, thus upsetting the natural laws of human relationships. In giving his authority to his daughters Goneril and Regan, Lear becomes a victim of the same sort of indifferent cruelty with which he has ruled his kingdom. He is slowly stripped of his belongings, as illustrated through the whittling away of his train of knights, and is provided no sympathy or understanding in the face of his oncoming mental illness. This sort of mental torture further serves to destroy Lear’s mental abilities and he becomes a homeless raging lunatic on the moors before he is finally discovered and skillfully handled by Edgar and the blinded Gloucester, both of whom still adhere to the natural laws of lord and liege. Unnatural physical abuse is graphically evident in the play as Regan and Goneril begin poking at the tightly tied Gloucester in Act 3, scene 7, revealing their violation of natural law of relationships as well as those unable to defend themselves should not be subjected to additional trial. This abuse is brought to a point of no return when Corwall gouges out Gloucester’s eyes as punishment for remaining loyal to, meaning concerned about the health and welfare of, the old king. By allowing this action to take place on stage and then having the blind man continue to appear throughout the remainder of the play, Shakespeare again illustrates how violent acts such as gaining allegiance through torture will only serve to blind new rulers to the actions that lead to their doom as it serves to teach the old rulers of the many ways in which they have blinded themselves to the reality of fear and instability torture introduces. Conclusion Through the concept of nature, in all its various forms, Shakespeare seems to indicate that there is a natural order to the universe that extends down through all levels of creation and into the confines of the human soul. The tempest that breaks upon the moors the night Lear confronts his two eldest daughters is revealed to be the grief of the king while his madness seems to be echoed in the strange eclipses of sun and moon discovered at an even earlier point in the play. When the universe is out of sorts, the nature of human relationships is bent out of joint and the balance of inner human nature is tipped out of control. Only those accustomed to controlling their ‘natural’ fires, such as Cordelia, Gloucester and Edgar, are able to weather these storms – inner, outer and physical, with relative success. Gloucester suffers more lasting damage because of his capitulation to wild nature under the delusions planted there by his other son Edmund, but he is given time to regain his senses and make amends to both king and son before his death. Through his frequent blending of meaning when discussing elements of nature from the physical properties of the outdoors and the cosmos to the common or proper relationships among men to the inner spirit of the characters involved, Shakespeare seeks to convey a message of nature as an unstoppable force that can nevertheless be guided and controlled to some extent when all parties involved exert the necessary effort. Works Cited Shakespeare, William. “King Lear.” The Complete Pelican Shakespeare. Alfred Harbage (Ed.). New York: Penguin, 1969: 1060-1106. Read More