Stephen Lewis SS
Blindness, foolishness and nothingness each play a symbolic role in the play. Analyze Shakespeare’s intentional use of one or more of these in King Lear.
By: Hasmat Sidhu ENG 4U0
J. Tsanis 2018,07,13
“Foolishness is more than being stupid, that deadly combination of arrogance and Ignorance” said by Paul David Tripp. This deadly combination is evident in the characters of King Lear such as Lear and Gloucester, when they make some foolish decisions which costs them their life and their loved ones. In the book King Lear, Shakespeare suggests through the use of characters and Rhetoric, when Lear and Gloucester were on the top of the hierarchy, their blindness and foolishness lead them to their nothingness.
In the first place, Lear’s foolish decision to banish Kent and Cordelia leads him to losing all of his power and kingdom. Moreover, the irony is that Lear later on gains wisdom from a fool after making a thoughtless decision of banishing Cordelia. “I am better than thou art now, I am a fool, thou art nothing” (1.4) said by Fool, while addressing Lear after Lear loses his knights and his kingdom. Therefore, Lear’s decision to banish Cordelia and Kent leads him to losing his power and identity as a king and which lets the enemies to gain all of his power and kingdom. The author uses irony to describe that Lear is now nothing and also the Fool, who used to entertain people, is now greater than Lear. Lastly, Fool still has his identity as a Fool, but Lear has lost his identity due to his mistake of splitting his kingdom with his traitor daughters and leaving the innocent and trustworthy daughter, Cordelia, aside.
Pursuing this further, Gloucester makes foolish decision on wanting to kill Edgar, the innocent son over Edmund, the traitor who just wants his father’s wealth. As soon as Gloucester literally becomes blind he realises that Edgar is more genuine and loyal compared to Edmund. “O dear son Edgar, the food of thy abusd father’s wrath might I but live to see thee in my touch, I’d say I had eyes again!” (4.1) said by Gloucester. In other words, Gloucester in the beginning of the novel, is easily manipulated by Edmund to believe the
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worst about Edgar. Edmund makes up stories about how Edgar is harming the family and is wanting to kill his father, Gloucester, for his wealth. This is totally incorrect; Edmund is tricking and controlling his father by giving his father false information about Edgar to gain Gloucester’s wealth. Once Gloucester loses his eyes and gets banished, he realises that Edgar is innocent and is the trustworthy son, whereas Edmund is a traitor. Later, on Edgar is the only one there to help and guide Gloucester after him going blind.
In conclusion, In the book King Lear, Shakespeare suggests through the use of characters and rhetoric that Lear and Gloucester despite bring on the top of the hierarchy, were blinded and foolish with certain key decisions in their life which lead them to their nothingness. It shows that Lear and Gloucester have children that are trustworthy to them (Cordelia and Edgar) and children who are planning to harm them, take their wealth and land (Goneril, Regan and Edmund). Both fathers have mistaken the loving children for the unloving children. Where Lear has been after the daughters that show love but do not love them from inside, but Cordelia was the one that actually loved her father. Since Cordelia did not describe much about her love towards her father, Lear got disappointed and banished her. Also, Gloucester was being controlled and played by his son Edmund. Edmund lies about Edgar that he is running for Gloucester’s wealth and is wanting to kill him, which leads Gloucester to madness about his son. But what he doesn’t know is that Edmund is the one who is traitor. This leads both of the characters to having nothingness in the end and also losing their lives and their loved ones. This means that words that someone says about you is not always really what they mean from inside of their heart, they could even be your enemies. So it becomes clear that one should never judge a person by the person’s words; instead one should always study a person deeply to understand them better.