Any positive messages from King Lear?

[staka]

Does Shakespeare leave us with any positive messages or affirmations, or merely with a sense of the ultimate meaninglessness and absurdity of human existence?

[Gladys]

Edgar and Albany may see a future of sorts but Lear, Cordelia, Gloucester, Kent and Edmund seem more nihilistic. As for the play "King Lear", Shakespeare does offer us moral guidance:


Don't trust flatterers and deceivers - check the facts well and put safeguards in place.


Disloyalty and treachery fail in the end.


Honour thy father and mother...


But as we all know, sometimes the innocent do suffer.
So the play is not all gloom and doom.

[MarkBastable]

Does Shakespeare leave us with any positive messages or affirmations?


Of course it does. For a start, we can take from Lear the health-related positive that, used in moderation, salt is a good thing.

How many playwrights offer that sort of condiment-specific advice? The man was a culinary genius.

[staka]

I had some vague ideas on these messages Shakespeare gives us but couldn't really explain or categorize.. thanks for the help.

I'll see if I need any more help later on.

[JBI]

It is truly a bleak ending - even Edgar doesn't want to really continue on and rule. Truly a nihilistic vision of the world.

[staka]

Oh how about the Lear's change in his thought of human existence?

Or the whole idea of hierarchical order in the play.. what is the message that come from the change in hierarchical order?

[Gladys]

"Lear's change in his thought of human existence" seems to me further evidence that the play is less than bleak, although the innocent oft-times suffer with the guilty, as 20th century history shows even better than this play.

The "change in hierarchical order" suggests that a measure of justice will prevail in the end: the wicked are punished, which is far from true in the 20th century.

[staka]

Ohh, King Lear is deep! Thanks for clarifying.

[JBI]

Wicked are punished? Edmund is redeemed, Cordelia dead, and Edgar left to deal with everything, before the whole world explodes, as pertaining to the tradition, and he is murdered in battle (which we can say occurs after the play in the 'historical' or else decide to omit). By the end, no one actually wants the thrown. Power of that kind is rejected utterly, because everyone realizes that it signifies nothing, and is worth nothing in the end. What justice is there? The only thing the ending shows is that despite all his evils, and savage atrocities (as pertaining to the feelings at the time), Edmund was still better loved than any other character in the text, and in the end, he knew that, more so than Edgar, Lear, or Kent.

[Gladys]

Wicked are punished? Edmund is redeemed, Cordelia dead... There is some justice in that the wicked, without exception, perish dreadfully - unlike the tyrants Pol Pot, Stalin, Pinochet or Idi Amin. 'King Lear' is as much realist as nihilist: there is much evil in our world.


By the end, no one actually wants the throne. The end is certainly sobering and downbeat for "we that are young".


The only thing the ending shows is that despite all his evils, and savage atrocities (as pertaining to the feelings at the time), Edmund was still better loved than any other character in the text, and in the end, he knew that, more so than Edgar, Lear, or Kent. It may be that "Edmund was belov'd", although to quote Albany: by "Tigers, not daughters". Shakespeare is using irony here to discredit Edmund, who pathetically claims the love of Goneril, Regan and the psychopath Cornwall!


Duke of Cornwall.___I will lay trust upon thee [Edmund], and thou shalt find a dearer father in my love.

[staka]

Is there any significance to the phrase, "we that are young"?

[Gladys]

Is there any significance to the phrase, "we that are young"? If young Edgar rather than Albany is speaking, these words likely denote that life has dealt harsh blows to his wise and experienced father, Gloucester, and to his beloved king, Lear. It seems self evident to the immature and unassuming Edgar that his generation, the young, will neither "see so much, nor live so long".

The play, which began with irony, duplicity and outright deceit, ends with openness and self-effacing humility. Surely here is a positive message?

[Nick Capozzoli]

I think that if there is a "positive message" in King Lear, it has to do with Cordelia. I studied this play as a grad student at UC Berkeley in 1982 with Professor Booth, and wrote a term paper that included a discussion of the "weather imagery" and etymology of character names as these related to the themes of the play. It was a typically sophomoric exercise in New Critical intellectual Onanism, but I still think my comments on the meaning of "Cordelia" have some validity. The origin of "Cordelia" has never been certain. One theory is that it comes from Celtic and means something like daughetr or jewel of the sea....which wouldn't provide any clue to the meaning of KL. Another is that it relates to Cor deLeon, a sort of feminine "Lionheart." That might have bearing on the "message" of KL, but it would be pushing it.

I think that Shakespeare, with his little Latin and less Greek, certainly could have figured out that "cor" (L=heart) + "delos" (Gr=open/apparent) would connote the essential character of Cordelia, i.e. that she was the guileless daughter with the honest and open heart. The tragedy of Lear is that he failed to appreciate the love of his guileless daughter, something that was apparent not only in her words and actions, but even in her name.

Anyone want to comment on this idea?

Nick

[Gladys]

...[Cordelia] was the guileless daughter with the honest and open heart. The tragedy of Lear is that he failed to appreciate the love of his guileless daughter, something that was apparent not only in her words and actions, but even in her name.

Did Lear fail to appreciate Cordelia or, rather, overrate her sisters and himself?


Lear: I lov'd her most, and thought to set my rest
On her kind nursery.

and


France: This is most strange,
That she that even but now was your best object,
The argument of your praise, balm of your age,
Most best, most dearest

and


Goneril: He always lov'd our sister most, and with what poor judgment he hath now cast her off appears too grossly.

[Nick Capozzoli]

Did Lear fail to appreciate Cordelia or, rather, overrate her sisters and himself?


Lear: I lov'd her most, and thought to set my rest
On her kind nursery.

and


France: This is most strange,
That she that even but now was your best object,
The argument of your praise, balm of your age,
Most best, most dearest

and


Goneril: He always lov'd our sister most, and with what poor judgment he hath now cast her off appears too grossly.

Lear failed to appreciate Cordelia's love and his love for her (acknowledged by Goneril) was undermined by the jealousy of her sisters. Lear was taken in by their manipulation, and realized his mistake after it was too late.

[Gladys]

Lear was taken in by their manipulation Was he?

Rather, the proud Lear thrived on flattery from any source as his rejection of faithful Kent shows.

[kiki1982]

Was he?

Rather, the proud Lear thrived on flattery from any source as his rejection of faithful Kent shows.

Let's say that Goneril and Regan are daughters of the same father... He thrives on flattery and they know that and flatter him when they need something.

Cordelia is totally different: she does not thrive on flattery and does not understand the significance of it.

Naturally King Lear does not understand that she loves him, and is deceived by Goneril and Regan's 'love' which 'reveals' itself in their flattery by which they procure a dowry of half the country in the end...

For Lear, in the beginning, love is a material thing that is measurable: in a dowry, in words, in actions. For Cordelia and Kent, this is not the case. They see love/loyalty as honesty and a defending force. And that is where both views conflict: Lear misinterprets both Cordelia and Kent's words and actions and concludes they don't love him. So, he denies her her dowry (which was to him a sign of his love for her) and he denies him his function as courtier (which was also a pledge of love to him).

[Gladys]

Naturally King Lear does not understand that she loves him...

For Lear, 'to be loved' means, in part, 'to be flattered'. Isn't this view common even today, and especially among celebrities?

[Plumbum]

I think we can certainly see that Lear and Cordelia had different ideas of love and professing love during the ceremony scene at the beginning of the play. Cordelia knows she loves her father and doesn't understand why she has to profess it in the manner that he's asking her to. Lear asks his daughters, "Which of you shall we say doth love us most?" rather than "Which of you doth love us most?"

You could say "to be loved" means in part "to be flattered," but wouldn't that negate the love that Cordelia has for her father? Maybe Lear doesn't feel loved/flattered, but certainly Cordelia loves him.

[Theunderground]

I think Lear offers a fabulous message of Redemption through true love,but also with a warning not to be foolish with loved ones. I found the ending truely uplifting and full of hope. And the Earl of Kent is a true star and model of devoted and wise love. Im very suprised many find it nihilistic.

[kelby_lake]

I wouldn't call it uplifting but it does serve as a warning and a plea to the young and old generations to understand each other.

[WICKES]

Some have argued that at the moment of death Shakespeare's characters seem to undergo some kind of sublime vision. Lear seems to see something in Cordelia and Gloucester's heart breaks smilingly.

Lear is nihilistic, but then Shakespeare pretty much was a nihilist. Harold Bloom wrote of an undecurrent of nihilism even in the comedies. But life is redeemed by the beautiful, sublime, radiant language which in itself lifts the audience out of themselves. And the nihilism itself is often strangely uplifting. I am thinking of Prospero's great lines "We are such stuff as dreams are made on/ And our little life is rounded with a sleep". That should be a depressing statement, yet it seems joyful and liberating.

[Gladys]

Some have argued that at the moment of death Shakespeare's characters seem to undergo some kind of sublime vision.

These characters seem to experience something so universal, so everlastingly human that, even in unremitting loneliness and despair, they fellowship with us and partake with all mankind.