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Shakespeare's King Lear and Dickens's the Pickwick Papers.(William Shakespeare)(Charles Dickens)(Brief Article)(Critical Essay)

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From: The Explicator
Date: 20010922
Author:Edgecombe, Rodney Stenning

In the second act of King Lear, the Fool gives acerbic mock counsel to remedy his master's rising heart: "Cry to it, Nuncle, as the cockney did to the eels when she put 'em in the paste alive; she knapp'd 'em o'th'coxcombs with a stick and cried 'Down, wantons, down"' (2.4.84-85). Kenneth Muir, editor of the Arden edition, informs the reader that "Halliwell and Dyce suspect that there is an allusion to some lost story." A few lines later Muir assumes that the story did indeed exist: "The present use of the word [cockney] is difficult to determine, as affected woman, cook and ...

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