Out of all the Shakespearen plays I have read King Lear had to be the easiest for me. I feel that Shakespeare is playing the concept of nothing. At the end, all of the monarchy dies, and in a way Shakespeare could be saying that monarchy is not a suitable form of government because there is nothing left of the kingdom and no one to rule it. The last scene ends with Albany asking the Earl of Kent and Edgar if they want to rule the kingdom. Kent refuses this offer saying he must go on a journey, while Edgar's answer is ambiguous.
The sub-plot of Edmund, Edgar, and Gloucester is related to King Lear and his conflict with his daughters. Gloucester's youngest (and illegitimate) son Edmund is tired of being mocked for the status of his mother and wants to be the prized son that Edgar is. To win the heart of his father he plants a letter of conspiracy and shows it to his father to misguide his father's trust of Edgar, and even stabs himself with his own knife and blames it on Edgar. He displays the same greediness as Goneril and Regan.
King Lear happens to make the most fatal error a king could ever do. He split his kingdom between his three daughters and then asks them say who loves him the most. Lear mixes his personal duties as a father and his public duties as a king. He could not choose who suited to be the best ruler in fear of hurting the two other children. Cordelia was the only child who did not say she loved her father the most. She thought that actions of the past better represented her feelings, because anyone could say they loved their father the most.
Blindness is another factor contributing to the fall of Lear's Kingdom. Furthermore, there are two different types of blindness, literal and figurative. Gloucester experiences literal blindness when his eyes are poked out by Regan and Cornwall. Here Gloucester is betrayed by Edmund, Cornwall, and Regan because he remained loyal to Lear. King Lear experiences figurative blindness after he banishes Cordelia and leaves the kingdom to Goneril and Regan. Together they plot to overthrow their father, saying he is too old and insane (because he banished the daughter he loved the most) to rule the kingdom.
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First I must note that this novel seems to have a complicated knot of characters. Based on reading this blog this play must have many layers of conflict. Character vs. character, character vs. civilization, and character vs. self are the conflicts that I can see. The external conflicts based on relationships mostly father and child. The overall conflict leading to the downfall of the kingdom. The self conflict leading to the division of the kingdom and banishment of a beloved child. This play seems to show a lot of duality also. There are two different sets of parent child problems, Two blind men (figuratively and literaly), and two plots to win the father's favor.
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