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Tragedies of William Shakespeare and Sonnets: Critical Commentary

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From: Monarch Notes
Date: 19630101
Author:Shakespeare, William

Shakespeare, William
Monarch Notes
01-01-1963
Critic: Schuettinger, Robert
Affiliation: Earhart Fellow, Oxford University

Critical Commentary

In 1681 Nahum Tate, a popular hack playwright of the day, and the poet
laureate of England, undertook to revise King Lear on the theory that it was
"a Heap of Jewels, unstrung and unpolisht." He completely rewrote the play,
giving it a happy ending, with Lear, Gloucester and Cordelia all surviving and
Edgar marrying Cordelia and ruling Britain happily forever after. Tate's
version held the stage until 1838, when the great actor, Macready, restored
the ...

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