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King Lear

The RSC Shakespeare

Edited by Jonathan Bate and Eric Rasmussen

Chief Associate Editor: Héloïse Sénéchal

Associate Editors: Trey Jansen, Eleanor Lowe, Lucy Munro,

Dee Anna Phares, Jan Sewell

King Lear

Textual editing: Eric Rasmussen and Trey Jansen

Introduction and Shakespeare’s Career in the Theater: Jonathan Bate

Commentary: Penelope Freedman and Héloïse Sénéchal

Scene-by-Scene Analysis: Esme Miskimmin

In Performance: Karin Brown (RSC stagings), Jan Sewell (overview),

Jonathan Bate (captions)

The Director’s Cut (interviews by Jonathan Bate and Kevin Wright):

Adrian Noble, Deborah Warner, Trevor Nunn

Editorial Advisory Board

Gregory Doran, Chief Associate Director,

Royal Shakespeare Company

Jim Davis, Professor of Theatre Studies, University of Warwick, UK

Charles Edelman, Senior Lecturer, Edith Cowan University,

Western Australia

Lukas Erne, Professor of Modern English Literature,

Université de Genève, Switzerland

Jacqui O’Hanlon, Director of Education, Royal Shakespeare Company

Akiko Kusunoki, Tokyo Woman’s Christian University, Japan

Ron Rosenbaum, author and journalist, New York, USA

James Shapiro, Professor of English and Comparative Literature,

Columbia University, USA

Tiffany Stern, Professor and Tutor in English, University of Oxford, UK

2009 Modern Library Paperback Edition

Copyright © 2007, 2009 by The Royal Shakespeare Company

Interview responses by Deborah Warner in “Director’s Cut”

copyright © 2009 by Deborah Warner

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Modern Library, an imprint of The

Random House Publishing Group, a division of

Random House, Inc., New York.

MODERN LIBRARY and the TORCHBEARER Design are registered trademarks

of Random House, Inc.

“Royal Shakespeare Company,” “RSC,” and the RSC logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of The Royal Shakespeare Company.

The version of King Lear and the corresponding footnotes that appear in this volume were originally published in William Shakespeare Complete Works, edited by Jonathan Bate and Eric Rasmussen, published in 2007 by Modern Library, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc.

eISBN: 978-1-58836-828-7

www.modernlibrary.com

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CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Introduction

An Old Man Tottering About the Stage?

The Division of the Kingdom

Ripeness Is All?

This Great Stage of Fools

About the Text

Key Facts

The Tragedy of King Lear

Act 1

Scene 1

Scene 2

Scene 3

Scene 4

Scene 5

Act 2

Scene 1

Scene 2

Act 3

Scene 1

Scene 2

Scene 3

Scene 4

Scene 5

Scene 6

Scene 7

Act 4

Scene 1

Scene 2

Scene 3

Scene 4

Scene 5

Scene 6

Act 5

Scene 1

Scene 2

Scene 3

Textual Notes

Quarto Passages That Do Not Appear in the Folio

Scene-by-Scene Analysis

King Lear in Performance: The RSC and Beyond

Four Centuries of King Lear: An Overview

At the RSC

The Director’s Cut: Interviews with Adrian Noble, Deborah Warner, and Trevor Nunn

Shakespeare’s Career in the Theater

Beginnings

Playhouses

The Ensemble at Work

The King’s Man

Shakespeare’s Works: A Chronology

The History Behind the Tragedies: A Chronology

Further Reading and Viewing

References

Acknowledgments and Picture Credits

INTRODUCTION

AN OLD MAN TOTTERING ABOUT THE STAGE?

“King Lear,” wrote the early nineteenth-century Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley in his Defence of Poetry, “may be judged to be the most perfect specimen of the dramatic art existing in the world.” For all the Romantics, Lear was Shakespeare’s most “sublime” and “universal” play. John Keats wrote a sonnet “On sitting down to read King Lear once again”: having burned his way through the play, he would feel somehow purified and regenerated. For Keats’ contemporary Charles Lamb, Shakespeare’s anatomy of the human condition was so profound and tempestuous that the play seemed too vast for the stage. It is the centerpiece of his essay “On the tragedies of Shakspeare, considered with reference to their fitness for stage representation”:

So to see Lear acted,—to see an old man tottering about the stage with a walking-stick, turned out of doors by his daughters in a rainy night, has nothing in it but what is painful and disgusting. We want to take him into shelter and relieve him. That is all the feeling which the acting of Lear ever produced in me. But the Lear of Shakspeare cannot be acted. The contemptible machinery by which they mimic the storm which he goes out in, is not more inadequate to represent the horrors of the real elements, than any actor can be to represent Lear: they might more easily propose to personate the Satan of Milton upon a stage, or one of Michael Angelo’s terrible figures. The greatness of Lear is not in corporal dimension, but in intellectual: the explosions of his passion are terrible as a volcano: they are storms turning up and disclosing to the bottom that sea his mind, with all its vast riches. It is his mind which is laid bare. This case of flesh and blood seems too insignificant to be thought on; even as he himself neglects it. On the stage we see nothing but corporal infirmities and weakness, the impotence of rage; while we read it, we see not Lear, but we are Lear,—we are in his mind, we are sustained by a grandeur which baffles the malice of daughters and storms; in the aberrations of his reason, we discover a mighty irregular power of reasoning, immethodized from the ordinary purposes of life, but exerting its powers, as the wind blows where it listeth, at will upon the corruptions and abuses of mankind. What have looks, or tones, to do with that sublime identification of his age with that of the Heavens themselves, when in his reproaches to them for conniving at the injustice of his children, he reminds them that “they themselves are old.” What gestures shall we appropriate to this? What has the voice or the eye to do with such things?

For Lamb, the technical necessities of the theater—the backstage machinery that creates the storm, the actor’s repertoire of gestures, looks, and vocal variations—are exterior and superficial distractions from the play’s inward and remorseless exploration of reason and madness, humankind and nature, the corruptions and abuses of power. Few theater lovers would agree with Lamb, but few would deny that the role of Lear presents perhaps the greatest of all challenges to the Shakespearean actor. There is a theater saying that by the time you’re old enough to play it, you are too old to play it.

A generation before the Romantics, Dr. Samuel Johnson confessed that even reading the play was almost too much to bear: “I was many years ago so shocked by Cordelia’s death, that I know not whether I ever endured to read again the last scenes of the play till I undertook to revise them as an editor.” The shock for Johnson was both emotional and moral. The death of Cordelia—Shakespeare’s boldest alteration of his sources, in all of which she survives—was an extraordinary breach of the principal that Johnson called “poetical justice,” whereby “a play in which the wicked prosper, and the virtuous miscarry, may doubtless be good, because it is a just representation of the common events of human life: but since all reasonable beings naturally love justice, I cannot easily be persuaded, that the observation of justice makes a play worse; or, that if other excellencies are equal, the audience will not always rise better pleased from the final triumph of persecuted virtue.” It had been in order to impose poetical justice on the play that during the 1680s Nahum Tate, author of the hymn “While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks by Night,” had rewritten King Lear with a happy ending, in which Cordelia was married off to Edgar. Johnson had some sympathy with this alteration, which held the stage for a century and a half, whereas for Lamb it was yet one more indication that the theater was not to be trusted with Shakespeare’s sublime vision of universal despair.

THE DIVISION OF THE KINGDOM

Written soon after King James united the thrones of England and Scotland, and performed in his royal presence at Whitehall, King Lear reveals the dire consequences of dividing a united kingdom. In principle, the aged Lear’s decision to take voluntary retirement does not seem a bad thing: he is losing his grip on matters of state, his daughters and sons-in-law are “younger strengths” with more energy for government, and, most important, the division is intended to prevent a future civil war between rival claimants, which would have been a definite possibility in the absence of a son who would automatically inherit the whole kingdom. But can an anointed king abnegate his role at will? If he does, he certainly should not expect to retain the trappings of power. Goneril and Regan have a case for stripping him of his rowdy, extravagant retinue of one hundred knights.

Lear’s mistake is to link the division of the kingdom to a public show of affection. The two older sisters, well versed in the “glib and oily art” of courtly flattery, tell him what he wants to hear, but Cordelia cannot. She is one of the play’s truth tellers and simply lacks the capacity or the experience to dress her love in fine rhetoric. Lear knows that she loves him best, but we may assume that until this moment her love has always been expressed privately. As youngest and unmarried daughter, Cordelia has probably never spoken publicly before the court. Lear’s intention for the opening scene is that it will be Cordelia’s coming out: she is supposed to give public expression to her great love and in return she will be rewarded with the richest portion of the kingdom and the most prized husband. He does not bargain on her inability to play the role in which he has cast her. Kings and earls do not necessarily have to be blind to true virtue—witness the examples of Kent and France—but Lear, too long used to having his own way and hearing only the words of flatterers, has blinded himself. Only when he has been stripped of the fine clothes and fine words of the court, has heard truth in the mouths of a fool and a (supposed) Bedlam beggar, does he find out what it really means to be human.

Where Macbeth and Othello are focused tightly upon a single plotline, the action of Lear greatly extends the technique of parallel plotting with which Shakespeare had experimented in Hamlet, where Laertes and Fortinbras serve as foils to the hero. In Lear, the Gloucester family plot is a sustained presence. Gloucester is another father who is blind to the true nature of his children; that blindness leads, in Shakespeare’s cruelest literalization of metaphor, to the plucking out of his eyes. Edmund corresponds to the wicked daughters; several of the play’s many letters pass between them. It is wholly appropriate that he should end up promised to them both. Like the king’s favorite daughter, Cordelia, Edgar (who is the king’s godson) is unjustly exiled from home and excluded from parental care. It is fitting to the parallel structure of the twin plots that the play ends in the Folio version with him returning to take the reins of power, just as there is a certain, though very different, logic to Nahum Tate’s infamous Restoration-period rewrite.

RIPENESS IS ALL?

Shakespeare never takes one side of a question. In the very opening lines of the play we discover that it is Edmund who has previously been unjustly exiled from home and excluded from parental care. Kent, the play’s best judge of character, initially describes Edmund as “proper”: he has the bearing of a gentleman, but his illegitimacy has deprived him of the benefits of society. His first soliloquy makes a good case for the unfairness of a social order that practices primogeniture and stigmatizes bastardy; his discovery near the moment of death that “Edmund was beloved” is curiously touching. He is not, then, an uncomplicated stage “Machiavel,” an embodiment of pure, unmotivated evil.

Astrology and astronomy were synonymous in the Elizabethan age: the signs of the times were read in the signs of the skies. King Lear is a play about bad times. The state drifts rudderless, child turns against parent, the clouds of war gather, the king and all around him totter on the brink of the abyss. So it is that Gloucester blames it all on the stars: “These late eclipses in the sun and moon portend no good to us.” Edmund, however, disputes this: “an admirable evasion of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish disposition on the charge of a star!” He argues that things often regarded as the product of the “natural order” are actually shaped by “custom”—for him, primogeniture and legitimacy would come into this category. The position articulated here is close to that of the sixteenth-century French essayist Michel de Montaigne in the closing section of his Apology of Raymond Sebond: any custom abhorred or outlawed by one nation is sure to be praised or practiced by another. But if you have nothing save custom, no divinely sanctioned hierarchy, then where does your value system come from? Montaigne’s answer is blind faith in God, whereas Edmund, like an apologist before the letter for the political philosophy of Thomas Hobbes, commits himself to “nature” as a principle of survival and self-seeking.

Gloucester’s philosophical orientation, meanwhile, turns toward the classical Stoic idea of finding the right timing for death. After his mock suicide, he says “henceforth I’ll bear / Affliction till it do cry out itself / ‘Enough, enough’ and die.” But he cannot sustain this position: when Lear and Cordelia lose the battle, he is found in “ill thoughts again,” wanting to rot. Edgar responds with more Stoic advice: “Men must endure / Their going hence, even as their coming hither: / Ripeness is all.” But this idea of ripe timing doesn’t work out: by mistiming the revelation of his own identity to Gloucester, Edgar precipitates his father’s death.

The play’s pattern, then, is of Stoic comfort not working. At the beginning of the fourth act Edgar reflects on his own condition and cheers himself up with thoughts about the worst, but then his father comes on blinded and he is instantly confounded—things are worse than before. If the case of Edgar reveals the deficiency of Stoic comfort, that of Albany demonstrates the inadequacy of belief in divine justice. His credo is that the good shall taste “The wages of their virtue” and the bad drink from the poisoned “cup of their deservings.” This scheme works for the bad, but not for the good. In the closing scene, Albany tries to orchestrate events, to make order out of chaos, but each of his resolutions is followed by new disaster: he greets the restored Edgar, then immediately hears the news of Gloucester’s death, then the news of the two queens’ deaths; then Kent comes on, dying; then in response to the news that Cordelia is to be hanged, Albany says “The gods defend her!,” only for Lear to enter with her in his arms already hanged. The gods have not defended her. Then Albany tries to give power back to Lear—and he promptly dies. Then he tries to persuade Kent and Edgar to divide the kingdom, and Kent promptly goes off to die.

The final lines of the play—given to different speakers in the Quarto and Folio versions of the text—suggest that the lesson has been learned that Stoic comfort will not do, that it is better to speak what we feel than what we ought to say. The Folio’s ascription of this speech to Edgar makes more dramatic sense than the Quarto’s to Albany, since Edgar’s stripping down in Act 3 is an exposure to feeling, occurring in conjunction with Lear’s feeling with and for the poor, which makes him the character better prepared to voice this sentiment.

THIS GREAT STAGE OF FOOLS

The Stoic philosopher tries to be ruled by reason rather than passion. But for the great sixteenth-century humanist Desiderius Erasmus in his Praise of Folly, there is inhumanity in the notion that to be wise you must suppress the emotions. The most important thing is to “feel”—as Gloucester has to learn, to see the world not rationally but “feelingly.” Erasmus’ personification of Folly points out that friendship is among the highest human values, and it depends on emotion. The people who show friendship to Lear (Fool, Kent disguised as Caius, Edgar disguised as Poor Tom and then as Peasant) and to Gloucester (Servants, Old Man) are not the wise or the rich.

We are ruled by our passions and our bodies; we go through life performing a series of different roles of which we are by no means in control. “All this life of mortal men, what is it else but a certain kind of stage play?” asks Erasmus’ Folly. Lear echoes the sentiment: “When we are born, we cry that we are come / To this great stage of fools.” In the great theater of the world, with the gods as audience, we are the fools on stage. Under the aspect of Folly, we see that a king is no different from any other man. The trappings of monarchy are but a costume: this is both Folly’s and Lear’s discovery.

Erasmus’ Folly tells us that there are two kinds of madness—one is the thirst for gold, lust, and power. That is the madness of Regan, Cornwall, Edmund, and the rest. Their madness is what Lear rejects. The second madness is the desirable one, the state of folly in which “a certain pleasant raving, or error of the mind, delivereth the heart of that man whom it possesseth from all wonted carefulness, and rendreth it divers ways much recreated with new delectation” (Praise of Folly, in the sixteenth-century English translation of Sir Thomas Chaloner). This “error of the mind” is a special gift of the goddess Folly. Thus Lear is happy when his mind is free, when he is running around in his madness like a child on a country holiday: “Look, look, a mouse! Peace, peace, this piece of toasted cheese will do’t.” Lines such as that bring a smile to our faces, not least because the mouse isn’t really there. Lear repeats his “look, look” at the end of his life. Cordelia is dead, but he deceives himself into the belief that she lives—that the feather moves, that her breath mists the looking-glass. His final words are spoken in the delusion that her lips are moving: “Look on her, look, her lips, / Look there, look there!” Her lips are not moving, just as there is no mouse, but it is better for Lear that he should not know this. Philosophers say that it is miserable to be deceived; Folly replies that it is most miserable “not to be deceived,” for nothing could be further from the truth than the notion that man’s happiness resides in things as they actually are. Lear’s Fool says that he would fain “learn to lie.” Lying is destructive in the mouths of Goneril, Regan, and Edmund at the beginning of the play, but Cordelia—who has a special bond with the Fool—has to learn to lie. At the beginning, she can only tell the truth (hence her banishment), but later she lies beautifully and generously when Lear says that she has cause to do him wrong, and she replies, “No cause, no cause.”

The closing section of Erasmus’ Praise of Folly undertakes a serious praise of Christian “madness.” Christ says that the mystery of salvation is hidden from the wise and given to the simple. He delighted in simple people, fishermen and women. He chose to ride an ass when he could have mounted a lion. The language of his parables is steeped in simple, natural things—lilies, mustard seed, sparrows, a language analogous to that of Lear in his madness. The fundamental folly of Christianity is its demand that you throw away your possessions. Lear pretends to do this in Act 1, but actually he wants to keep “The name and all th’addition to a king.” Only when he loses his knights, his clothes, and his sanity does he find happiness.

But he also becomes kind. Little things show us this: in Act 1, he’s still always giving orders. Even in the storm he continues to make demands: “Come, unbutton here.” But in the end he learns to say “please” and “thank you”: “Pray you undo this button: thank you, sir.” He has begun to learn true manners not at court, but through the love he shows for Poor Tom, the image of unaccommodated man, the image of himself: “Did’st thou give all to thy daughters? And art thou come to this?” True wisdom comes not in Gloucester’s and Edgar’s words of Stoic comfort or Albany’s hapless faith in divine providence, but in moments of folly and love, as in this exchange:

EDGAR    Bless thy five wits!

KENT    O pity! Sir, where is the patience now That you so oft have boasted to retain?

Patience is the boast of the Stoic. It’s a retainer like the hundred knights. To achieve true wisdom, you must let it go. You must let even the wits, the sanity, go. What you must keep are the pity and the blessing. Pity and blessing are at the very heart of King Lear. Pity means the performance of certain deeds, such as showing kindness to strangers. Blessing is a performative speech act, an utterance that effects an action by the very act of being spoken. Typically blessing is accompanied by a small but forceful gesture, a kind of action that is of vital importance on the bare boards of the Shakespearean theater.

The play ends on a note of apocalypse, millennial doom. A trumpet sounds three times to announce the final showdown. Then when Lear enters with his beloved daughter dead in his arms, loyal Kent asks, “Is this the promised end?” He is thinking of Doomsday, but the line is also a sly allusion on Shakespeare’s part: in all previous versions of the Lear story, several of which would have been familiar to members of his audience, Cordelia survives and Lear is restored to the throne. The death of Cordelia is all the more painful because it is not the end “promised” by previous literary and theatrical tradition.

King Lear is a play full of questions. The big ones go unanswered. The biggest of all is Lear’s “Why should a dog, a horse, a rat have life, / And thou no breath at all?” In this world, there is no rhyme or reason, no pattern of divine justice. Here again, Shakespeare departs strikingly from his source, the old anonymous play of King Leir, in which Christian providence prevails. Shakespeare reimagines his material in a bleak pagan world. In this, he not only looks back to the past, but also anticipates a future that is ours—a time when the old religious hierarchies and moral certainties have been stripped away.

But in a strange way an answer is to be found in Edgar’s reply to Kent’s line about the promised end. A question is answered with a question: “Or image of that horror?” It’s not really the end of the world; it’s an image of the end. Hamlet said that the player holds up a mirror to nature, but in King Lear we are again and again reminded that what you see in a mirror is an image, not the thing itself. Gloucester doesn’t really jump off the cliff: it’s all an elaborate game, designed by Edgar to teach him a lesson. In uncertain times, we need images, games, and experiments as ways of trying to make sense of our world. We need plays. That is why, four centuries on, we keep going back to Shakespeare and his dazzling mirror world in which everyone is a player.

Looked at in one way, the world of King Lear, with its images of doom, its mad king, scheming ugly sisters, its fool and its (pretend) mad Bedlam beggar, could not be further from ordinary life. But looked at another way, it is an image of ordinary things, but seen in extremity. It is a play that has more time for a language of ordinary things—garden waterpots, wrens, and toasted cheese—than for the “glib and oily art” of courtly speech.

So is the whole play, like the “Dover cliff” scene, an elaborate game designed by Shakespeare to teach us a lesson? Only if we think of it as a lesson in feeling, not in high-minded judgment. To be truly responsive to the play we must, as the final speech has it, “Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say.” To be human is to see feelingly, not to fall back on easy moralizing, the “ought to say” that characterizes people like Albany. And seeing feelingly is to do with our sympathetic response to the images that confront us, both on the stage and in the great theater of the world. Lear becomes human when he stops caring about one kind of image (the glorious trappings of monarchy) and instead confronts another: the image of raw human being, of a fool and a Bedlam beggar, of poor naked wretches. Come the last trump, the play tells us, we will be judged by our fellow feeling for the dispossessed, not our status in society. In this, as in so much else, Shakespeare speaks not only for his own age, but for ours.

LEAR    Who is it that can tell me who I am?

FOOL    Lear’s shadow.

1. Robert Armin took over as company clown after Will Kempe left the Chamberlain’s Men in 1599. A playwright as well as the author of joke books, he practiced a more intellectual form of comedy than Kempe, full of witty verbal pyrotechnics: his style was given full rein in such parts as Lear’s Fool, Feste in Twelfth Night, and the sour Lavatch in All’s Well That Ends Well.

ABOUT THE TEXT

Shakespeare endures through history. He illuminates later times as well as his own. He helps us to understand the human condition. But he cannot do this without a good text of the plays. Without editions there would be no Shakespeare. That is why every twenty years or so throughout the last three centuries there has been a major new edition of his complete works. One aspect of editing is the process of keeping the texts up to date—modernizing the spelling, punctuation, and typography (though not, of course, the actual words), providing explanatory notes in the light of changing educational practices (a generation ago, most of Shakespeare’s classical and biblical allusions could be assumed to be generally understood, but now they can’t).

But because Shakespeare did not personally oversee the publication of his plays, editors also have to make decisions about the relative authority of the early printed editions. Half of the sum of his plays only appeared posthumously, in the elaborately produced First Folio text of 1623, the original “Complete Works” prepared for the press by Shakespeare’s fellow actors, the people who knew the plays better than anyone else. The other half had appeared in print in his lifetime, in the more compact and cheaper form of “Quarto” editions, some of which reproduced good quality texts, others of which were to a greater or lesser degree garbled and error strewn. In the case of a few plays there are hundreds of differences between the Quarto and Folio editions, some of them far from trivial.

Who is left in charge at the end of King Lear? According to the conventions of Elizabethan and Jacobean tragedy, the senior remaining character speaks the final speech. That is the mark of his assumption of power. Thus Fortinbras rules Denmark at the end of Hamlet, Lodovico speaks for Venice at the end of Othello, Malcolm rules Scotland at the end of Macbeth, and Octavius rules the world at the end of Antony and Cleopatra.

So who rules Britain? The answer used to be something like this. As the husband of the king’s eldest daughter, Albany is the obvious candidate, but he seems reluctant to take on the role and, with astonishing stupidity given the chaos brought about by Lear’s division of the kingdom at the beginning of the play, he proposes to divide the kingdom at the end of the play, suggesting that Kent and Edgar should share power between them. Kent, wise as ever, sees the foolishness of this and gracefully withdraws, presumably to commit suicide or will on the heart attack that he is already sensing. By implication, Edgar, who was the king’s godson and is now Duke of Gloucester, is left in charge. So it is that in the Folio text, which is the most authoritative that we have, Edgar speaks the final speech:

The weight of this sad time we must obey:

Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say.

The oldest hath borne most: we that are young

Shall never see so much nor live so long.

If we were being very scrupulous, we would have added that there is some uncertainty over the matter, since in the Quarto text it is Albany who speaks the final speech, an ascription that has been followed by many editors since Alexander Pope.

Thanks to the textual scholarship of the late twentieth century, the new answer is something like this. Ah: that’s a question over which Shakespeare himself seems to have had some uncertainty. In his original version of the play Albany speaks the final speech and thus rules the realm. But then Shakespeare changed his mind. In his revised version of the play Edgar speaks the final speech and thus rules the realm. We must posit two very different stagings. In the first one, Kent’s words of refusal of his half-share in the kingdom would have been accompanied by some gesture of refusal, such as a turning away, on Edgar’s part. In the second one, Edgar’s speaking of the final speech would have been staged so as to betoken acceptance of Albany’s offer. This alteration to the ending marks the climax of Shakespeare’s subtle but thoroughgoing revision of the roles of Albany and Edgar in his two versions of King Lear. We do not know exactly when the revision took place, but it is a fair assumption that it was as a result of experience in the playhouse and with the collaboration of the company. Presumably there was dissatisfaction on the part of dramatist and/or performers with the way in which the two roles had turned out, so various adjustments were made. Shakespeare’s plays were not polished for publication; they were designed as scripts to be worked upon in the theater. To be cut, added to, and altered.

Until recently, editors were remarkably reluctant to admit this. From the eighteenth century until the 1980s, editions attempted to recover an ideal unitary text, to get as close as they could to “what Shakespeare wrote.” There was a curious resistance to the idea that Shakespeare wrote one thing, tested it in the theater, and then wrote another. It was assumed that there was a single King Lear and that the editorial task was to reconstruct it. Generations of editors adopted a “pick and mix” approach to the text, moving between Quarto and Folio readings, making choices on either aesthetic or bibliographic grounds, and creating a composite text that Shakespeare never actually wrote.

How, then, did editors deal with the following awkward fact? King Lear exists in two different texts, the Quarto and the Folio. The Quarto has nearly three hundred lines that are not in the Folio; the Folio has more than a hundred lines that are not in the Quarto; there are more than eight hundred verbal variants in the parts of the play that the two texts share. The standard editorial response to this difficulty was the claim that the Quarto was some kind of “Bad Quarto,” that is to say a text based on memorial reconstruction by actors, not on Shakespeare’s own script (his “foul papers”) or the playhouse script (the “promptbook”). It was, however, a difficult position to maintain because the Quarto text of Lear, although corrupt in many places, does not have the usual characteristics of memorial reconstruction, the kind of features so apparent in the Bad Quarto of Hamlet, such as the actor remembering “The first verse of the godly ballad / Will tell you all,” where Shakespeare wrote “the first row of the pious chanson will show you more” (Hamlet, Act 2 Scene 2). Getting the structure of a line just about right but the actual words nearly all wrong is typical of texts based on memory, but not typical of the textual anomalies in Quarto Lear.

In the 1970s the scholar Peter Blayney proved decisively by means of meticulous and highly technical bibliographic investigation that Quarto King Lear was not a bad text based on actors’ memories but an authoritative one, almost certainly deriving from Shakespeare’s own holograph (The Texts of “King Lear” and their Origins: vol. 1 Nicholas Okes and the First Quarto, published 1982). The poor quality of the text was the result of the personnel in the printing shop being unused to setting drama. Thus the fact that much of Shakespeare’s verse was set as prose was due to the printer running out of the blocks that were needed to fill in the margins where text was set as verse—Okes’ shop didn’t have the proper equipment, so the compositors resorted to prose.

Both Quarto and Folio texts are authentically Shakespearean, yet they differ substantially. Logic suggests that Quarto was his first version of the play, Folio his second. The textual variants give us a unique opportunity to see the plays as working scripts.

In the received editorial tradition, there is a very puzzling moment in Act 3 Scene 1 where Kent reports to the Gentleman on the division between Albany and Cornwall (3.1.13–23). The syntax halfway through the speech is incomprehensible and the content is contradictory: are there merely French spies in the households of great ones or has a French army actually landed in Dover? The confusion comes from editors having conflated alternative scenarios: in Quarto the French army has landed, whereas in Folio there are only spies reporting to France (thus lines 30–42 in conflated texts are Quarto only, 22–29 are Folio only: in the RSC text, compare and contrast 3.1.13–23 and Quarto Passages, 46–59).

The alteration seems to be part of a wider process of diminishing the French connection. In the Quarto we have a scene in which Shakespeare feels compelled to explain away the absence of the King of France—why isn’t he leading his own army?

KENT    Why the King of France is so suddenly gone back, know you no reason?

GENTLEMAN    Something he left imperfect in the state, which since his coming forth is thought of, which imports to the kingdom so much fear and danger that his personal return was most required and necessary. (Quarto Passages, 168–73)

It is, to say the least, a halting explanation, which is perhaps one reason why Shakespeare cut the whole of this scene, Act 4 Scene 3 in the received editorial tradition, from the Folio text. Theater audiences tend to think most about the things that are mentioned: by drawing attention to the king’s absence, the dramatist in a curious way establishes his presence. Better just to keep quiet about him, which is what happens in Folio—since he’s not mentioned, the audience forgets him.

Who, then, is to lead the French army? In Quarto, the Gentleman informs Kent that the Marshall of France, Monsieur La Far, has been left in charge. By omitting the scene in question, Folio obliterates Monsieur La Far; it compensates by altering the staging of the next scene (Act 4 scene 4 in the received editorial tradition, Act 4 Scene 3 in ours). In Quarto, the scene begins “Enter Cordelia, Doctor and others,” whereas in Folio it begins “Enter with Drum and Colours Cordelia, Gentleman and Soldiers.” Where in Quarto Cordelia is a daughter seeking medical attention for her father, in Folio she is a general leading an army. She has replaced Monsieur La Far. This alteration is part of a broad shift of emphasis from family to state in the revision—Folio makes less of the familial love trial and more of the fractured internal politics of the divided kingdom. So it is that the later version adds some crucial lines in the opening scene, giving a stronger political justification for the division of the kingdom:

We have this hour a constant will to publish

Our daughters’ several dowers, that future strife

May be prevented now.… (1.1.41–43)

Furthermore, Folio cuts the so-called arraignment of Goneril, the mock trial in the hovel scene that is the quid pro quo for the show trial of love in the opening scene. This has the effect of retrospectively rendering the opening more political and less personal.

Other Folio cuts include the passage at the end of the blinding scene when loyal servants promise to apply flax and whites of egg to Gloucester’s bleeding eye sockets. When Peter Brook cut this from his famous 1962 RSC production, critics rebuked him for imposing on the play his own theater of cruelty. But now we know that Brook’s cut was made in Shakespeare’s own theater.

A further intensification of the play’s moral bleakness is brought about by a series of cuts to Albany’s role: his castigations of Goneril in Act 4 Scene 2 are severely trimmed back, considerably reducing his moral force. Quarto Albany is a well-developed character who closes the play as a mature and victorious duke assuming responsibility for the kingdom. In Folio he is weaker, he stands by as his wife walks all over both him and the moral order, he avoids responsibility. His ultimate vacation of power is such that the revision ends at the point where my discussion began: with Edgar having no choice but to take over as sustainer of the gored state.

If you look at printers’ handbooks from the age of Shakespeare, you quickly discover that one of the first rules was that, whenever possible, compositors were recommended to set their type from existing printed books rather than manuscripts. This was the age before mechanical typesetting, where each individual letter had to be picked out by hand from the compositor’s case and placed on a stick (upside down and back to front) before being laid on the press. It was an age of murky rushlight and of manuscripts written in a secretary hand that had dozens of different, hard-to-decipher forms. Printers’ lives were a lot easier when they were reprinting existing books rather than struggling with handwritten copy. Easily the quickest way to have created the First Folio would have been simply to reprint those eighteen plays that had already appeared in Quarto and only work from manuscript on the other eighteen.

But that is not what happened. Whenever Quartos were used, playhouse “promptbooks” were also consulted and stage directions copied in from them. And in the case of several major plays where a reasonably well-printed Quarto was available, Lear notable among them, the Folio printers were instructed to work from an alternative, playhouse-derived manuscript. This meant that the whole process of producing the first complete Shakespeare took months, even years, longer than it might have done. But for the men overseeing the project, John Hemings and Henry Condell, friends and fellow actors who had been remembered in Shakespeare’s will, the additional labor and cost were worth the effort for the sake of producing an edition that was close to the practice of the theater. They wanted all the plays in print so that people could, as they wrote in their prefatory address to the reader, “read him and again and again,” but they also wanted “the great variety of readers” to work from texts that were close to the theater-life for which Shakespeare originally intended them. For this reason, the RSC Shakespeare, in both Complete Works and individual volumes, uses the Folio as base text wherever possible. Significant Quarto variants are, however, noted in the Textual Notes and Quarto-only passages are appended after the text of King Lear.

The following notes highlight various aspects of the editorial process and indicate conventions used in the text of this edition:

Lists of Parts are supplied in the First Folio for only six plays, not including Lear, so the list at the beginning of the play is provided by the editors, arranged by groups of character. Capitals indicate that part of the name which is used for speech headings in the script (thus “LEAR, King of Britain”).

Locations are provided by the Folio for only two plays. Eighteenth-century editors, working in an age of elaborately realistic stage sets, were the first to provide detailed locations. Given that Shakespeare wrote for a bare stage and often an imprecise sense of place, we have relegated locations to the explanatory notes, where they are given at the beginning of each scene where the imaginary location is different from the one before. We have emphasized broad geographical settings rather than specifics of the kind that suggest anachronistically realistic staging. We have therefore avoided such niceties as “another room in the palace.”

Act and Scene Divisions were provided in the Folio in a much more thoroughgoing way than in the Quartos. Sometimes, however, they were erroneous or omitted; corrections and additions supplied by editorial tradition are indicated by square brackets. Five-act division is based on a classical model, and act breaks provided the opportunity to replace the candles in the indoor Blackfriars playhouse, which the King’s Men used after 1608, but Shakespeare did not necessarily think in terms of a five-part structure of dramatic composition. The Folio convention is that a scene ends when the stage is empty. Nowadays, partly under the influence of film, we tend to consider a scene to be a dramatic unit that ends with either a change of imaginary location or a significant passage of time within the narrative. Shakespeare’s fluidity of composition accords well with this convention, so in addition to act and scene numbers we provide a running scene count in the right margin at the beginning of each new scene, in the typeface used for editorial directions. Where there is a scene break caused by a momentary bare stage, but the location does not change and extra time does not pass, we use the convention running scene continues. There is inevitably a degree of editorial judgment in making such calls, but the system is very valuable in suggesting the pace of the plays.

Speakers’ Names are often inconsistent in Folio. We have regularized speech headings, but retained an element of deliberate inconsistency in entry directions, in order to give the flavor of Folio.

Verse is indicated by lines that do not run to the right margin and by capitalization of each line. The Folio printers sometimes set verse as prose, and vice versa (either out of misunderstanding or for reasons of space). We have silently corrected in such cases, although in some instances there is ambiguity, in which case we have leaned toward the preservation of Folio layout. Folio sometimes uses contraction (“turnd” rather than “turned”) to indicate whether or not the final “-ed” of a past participle is sounded, an area where there is variation for the sake of the five-beat iambic pentameter rhythm. We use the convention of a grave accent to indicate sounding (thus “turnèd” would be two syllables), but would urge actors not to overstress. In cases where one speaker ends with a verse half-line and the next begins with the other half of the pentameter, editors since the late eighteenth century have indented the second line. We have abandoned this convention, since the Folio does not use it, and nor did actors’ cues in the Shakespearean theater. An exception is made when the second speaker actively interrupts or completes the first speaker’s sentence.

Spelling is modernized, but older forms are occasionally maintained where necessary for rhythm or aural effect.

Punctuation in Shakespeare’s time was as much rhetorical as grammatical. “Colon” was originally a term for a unit of thought in an argument. The semicolon was a new unit of punctuation (some of the Quartos lack them altogether). We have modernized punctuation throughout but have given more weight to Folio punctuation than many editors, since, though not Shakespearean, it reflects the usage of his period. In particular, we have used the colon far more than many editors: it is exceptionally useful as a way of indicating how many Shakespearean speeches unfold clause by clause in a developing argument that gives the illusion of enacting the process of thinking in the moment. We have also kept in mind the origin of punctuation in classical times as a way of assisting the actor and orator: the comma suggests the briefest of pauses for breath, the colon a middling one, and a full stop or period a longer pause. Semicolons, by contrast, belong to an era of punctuation that was only just coming in during Shakespeare’s time and that is coming to an end now: we have accordingly only used them where they occur in our copy texts (and not always then). Dashes are sometimes used for parenthetical interjections where the Folio has brackets. They are also used for interruptions and changes in train of thought. Where a change of addressee occurs within a speech, we have used a dash preceded by a full stop (or occasionally another form of punctuation). Often the identity of the respective addressees is obvious from the context. When it is not, this has been indicated in a marginal stage direction.

Entrances and Exits are fairly thorough in Folio, which has accordingly been followed as faithfully as possible. Where characters are omitted or corrections are necessary, this is indicated by square brackets (e.g. “[and Attendants]”). Exit is sometimes silently normalized to Exeunt and Manet anglicized to “remains.” We trust Folio positioning of entrances and exits to a greater degree than most editors.

Editorial Stage Directions such as stage business, asides, indications of addressee and of characters’ position on the gallery stage are only used sparingly in Folio. Other editions mingle directions of this kind with original Folio and Quarto directions, sometimes marking them by means of square brackets. We have sought to distinguish what could be described as directorial interventions of this kind from Folio-style directions (either original or supplied) by placing in the right margin in a smaller typeface. There is a degree of subjectivity about which directions are of which kind, but the procedure is intended as a reminder to the reader and the actor that Shakespearean stage directions are often dependent upon editorial inference alone and are not set in stone. We also depart from editorial tradition in sometimes admitting uncertainty and thus printing permissive stage directions, such as an Aside? (often a line may be equally effective as an aside or a direct address—it is for each production or reading to make its own decision) or a may exit or a piece of business placed between arrows to indicate that it may occur at various moments within a scene.

Line Numbers are editorial, for reference and to key the explanatory and textual notes.

Explanatory Notes explain allusions and gloss obsolete and difficult words, confusing phraseology, occasional major textual cruces, and so on. Particular attention is given to nonstandard usage, bawdy innuendo, and technical terms (e.g. legal and military language). Where more than one sense is given, commas indicate shades of related meaning, slashes alternative or double meanings.

Textual Notes at the end of the play indicate major departures from the Folio. They take the following form: the reading of our text is given in bold and its source given after an equals sign, with “Q” indicating one that derives from the principal Quarto, “F2” one that derives from the Second Folio of 1632, and “Ed” one that derives from the editorial tradition. The rejected Folio (“F”) reading is then given. A selection of Quarto variants and plausible unadopted editorial readings are also included. Thus, for example, at Act 1 Scene 1 line 299, “plighted = F. Q = pleated.” This indicates that we have retained the Folio reading “plighted” and that “pleated” is an interestingly different reading in the Quarto.

KEY FACTS

MAJOR PARTS: (with percentage of lines/number of speeches/scenes on stage) Lear (22%/188/10), Edgar (11%/98/10), Earl of Kent (11%/127/12), Earl of Gloucester (10%/118/12), Edmund (9%/79/9), Fool (7%/58/6), Goneril (6%/53/8), Regan (5%/73/8), Duke of Albany (5%/58/5), Cordelia (3%/31/4), Duke of Cornwall (3%/63/5), Oswald (2%/38/7).

LINGUISTIC MEDIUM: 75% verse, 25% prose.

DATE: 1605–6. Performed at court December 1606; draws on old Leir play (published 1605); seems to refer to eclipses of September and October 1605; borrows from books by Samuel Harsnett and John Florio that were published in 1603.

SOURCES: Based on The True Chronicle Historie of King Leir and his Three Daughters, an old play of unknown authorship that was in the London theatrical repertoire in the early 1590s, but makes many changes, including alteration of providential Christian to pagan language and the introduction of a tragic ending. The Lear story also appeared in other sources familiar to Shakespeare: The Mirrour for Magistrates (edition of 1574), Holinshed’s Chronicles (1587), and book 2 canto 10 of Edmund Spenser’s epic poem The Faerie Queene (1590). In all versions of the story before Shakespeare’s, there is a “romance” ending whereby the old king is restored to his daughter Cordelia and to the throne. The Gloucester subplot is derived from the story of the Paphlagonian king in book 2 chapter 10 of The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia by Sir Philip Sidney (1590): a blind old man is led to the top of a cliff from where he contemplates suicide because he has been deceived by his bastard son; the good son returns and encounters the bad one in a chivalric duel. The story was intended to exemplify both “true natural goodness” and “wretched ungratefulness”; a few chapters later (2.15), Sidney tells of a different credulous king who is tricked into mistrusting his virtuous son. The characters of “Poor Tom” and the Fool are entirely Shakespearean creations, though some of the language of demonic possession feigned by Edgar is borrowed from Samuel Harsnett’s Declaration of Egregious Popish Impostures (1603), a work of propaganda about Catholic plots and faked exorcisms that Shakespeare probably read because of the Stratford origins of one of the exorcizing priests, Robert Debdale. The language of the play and some of its philosophical ideas reveal that Shakespeare had also been reading The Essayes of Montaigne in John Florio’s English translation (1603).

TEXT: Published in Quarto in 1608 under the title M. William Shakspeare: HIS True Chronicle Historie of the life and death of King LEAR and his three Daughters. With the vnfortunate life of Edgar, sonne and heire to the Earle of Gloster, and his sullen and assumed humor of TOM of Bedlam: As it was played before the Kings Maiestie at Whitehall vpon S. Stephans night in Christmas Hollidayes. By his Maiesties seruants playing vsually at the Gloabe on the Bancke-side. This text was very poorly printed, partly because its printer (Nicholas Okes) was unaccustomed to setting plays and also because it seems to derive from Shakespeare’s own working manuscript, which would have been difficult to read. Quarto includes about 300 lines that are not in the 1623 Folio text, which was entitled “The Tragedy of King Lear,” and has clear signs of derivation from the theatrical playbook (though, to complicate matters, the Folio printing was also influenced by a reprint of the Quarto that appeared in 1619 as one of the ten plays published by Thomas Pavier in an attempt to produce a collected Shakespeare). The Folio in turn has about 100 lines that are not in the Quarto, and nearly 1,000 lines have variations of word or phrase. The two early texts thus represent two different stages in the life of the play, with extensive revision having been carried out, either systematically or incrementally. Revisions include diminution of the prominence given to the invading French army (perhaps for political reasons), clarification of Lear’s motives for dividing his kingdom, and weakening of the role of Albany (including reassignment from him to Edgar of the play’s closing speech, and thus by implication—since it was a convention of Shakespearean tragedy that the new man in power always has the last word—of the right to rule Britain). Among the more striking cuts are the mock trial of Goneril in the hovel and the moment of compassion when loyal servants apply a palliative to Gloucester’s bleeding eyes. For centuries, editors have conflated the Quarto and Folio texts, creating a play that Shakespeare never wrote. We endorse the body of scholarship since the 1980s and the new editorial tradition in which Folio and Quarto are regarded as discrete entities. We have edited the more theatrical Folio text but have corrected its errors (which are plentiful, since much of it was set in type by “Compositor E,” the apprentice who was by far the worst printer in Isaac Jaggard’s shop). The influence of Quarto copy on the Folio is of great assistance in making these corrections. Textual notes are perforce more numerous than for any other work by Shakespeare; several hundred Quarto variants are listed. All the most significant Quarto-only passages are printed at the end of the play.

THE TRAGEDY

OF KING LEAR

LIST OF PARTS

LEAR, King of Britain

GONERIL, Lear’s eldest daughter

REGAN, Lear’s middle daughter

CORDELIA, Lear’s youngest daughter

Duke of ALBANY, Goneril’s husband

Duke of CORNWALL, Regan’s husband

King of FRANCE, suitor and later husband to Cordelia

Duke of BURGUNDY, suitor to Cordelia

Earl of KENT, later disguised as Caius

Earl of GLOUCESTER

EDGAR, Gloucester’s son, later disguised as Poor Tom

EDMUND, Gloucester’s illegitimate son

OLD MAN, Gloucester’s tenant

CURAN, Gloucester’s retainer

Lear’s FOOL

OSWALD, Goneril’s steward

GENTLEMAN, a Knight serving Lear

GENTLEMAN, attendant on Cordelia

SERVANT of Cornwall

HERALD

CAPTAIN

Knights attendant upon Lear, other Attendants, Messengers, Soldiers, Servants, and Trumpeters

Act 1 Scene 1

running scene 1

Enter Kent, Gloucester and Edmund

KENT    I thought the king had more affected^1 the Duke of

Albany than Cornwall.

GLOUCESTER    It did always seem so to us: but now in the division

of the kingdom it appears not which of the dukes he values

most, for qualities are so weighed that curiosity in neither^5

can make choice of either’s moiety.

KENT    Is not this your son, my lord?

GLOUCESTER    His breeding^8, sir, hath been at my charge. I have so

often blushed to acknowledge him that now I am brazed^9 to’t.

KENT    I cannot conceive^10 you.

GLOUCESTER    Sir, this young fellow’s mother could; whereupon

she grew round-wombed and had indeed, sir, a son for her

cradle ere^13 she had a husband for her bed. Do you smell a

fault^14?

KENT    I cannot wish the fault undone^15, the issue of it being

so proper^16.

GLOUCESTER    But I have a son, sir, by order of law, some^17 year elder

than this, who yet is no dearer in my account^18, though this

knave came something saucily to the world before he was

sent for: yet was his mother fair, there was good sport at his

making and the whoreson^21 must be acknowledged.— Do you

know this noble gentleman, Edmund?

EDMUND    No, my lord.

GLOUCESTER    My lord of Kent: remember him hereafter as my

honourable friend.

EDMUND    My services to your lordship.

KENT    I must love you, and sue^27 to know you better.

EDMUND    Sir, I shall study deserving^28.

GLOUCESTER    He hath been out^29 nine years, and away he shall

again. The king is coming.

Sennet. Enter [one bearing a coronet, then] King Lear, Cornwall, Albany, Goneril, Regan, Cordelia and Attendants

LEAR    Attend^31 the lords of France and Burgundy,

Gloucester.

GLOUCESTER    I shall, my lord.

Exit

LEAR    Meantime we shall express our darker^34 purpose.

Give me the map there.

Kent or an Attendant gives Lear a map

Know that we have divided

In three our kingdom, and ’tis our fast intent^36

To shake all cares and business^37 from our age,

Conferring them on younger strengths while we

Unburdened crawl toward death. Our son^39 of Cornwall,

And you our no less loving son of Albany,

We have this hour a constant will to publish^41

Our daughters’ several dowers, that^42 future strife

May be prevented now. The princes, France and Burgundy,

Great rivals in our youngest daughter’s love,

Long in our court have made their amorous sojourn^45

And here are to be answered. Tell me, my daughters —

Since now we will divest us both of rule,

Interest^48 of territory, cares of state —

Which of you shall we say doth love us most,

That we our largest bounty^50 may extend

Where nature doth with merit challenge^51? Goneril,

Our eldest born, speak first.

GONERIL    Sir, I love you more than word can wield^53 the matter,

Dearer than eyesight, space and liberty,

Beyond what can be valued rich or rare,

No less than life, with grace^56, health, beauty, honour:

As much as child e’er loved or father found:

A love that makes breath poor and speech unable^58:

Beyond all manner of so much^59 I love you.

Aside

CORDELIA    What shall Cordelia speak? Love and be silent.

Points to the map

LEAR    Of all these bounds^61, even from this line to this,

With shadowy forests and with champaigns riched^62,

With plenteous rivers and wide-skirted meads^63,

We make thee lady. To thine and Albany’s issues

Be this perpetual.— What says our second daughter?

Our dearest Regan, wife of Cornwall?

REGAN    I am made of that self-mettle^67 as my sister,

And prize me at her worth^68. In my true heart,

I find she names my very deed^69 of love:

Only she comes too short, that^70 I profess

Myself an enemy to all other joys

Which the most precious square of sense^72 professes,

And find I am alone felicitate^73

In your dear highness’ love.

Aside

CORDELIA    Then poor Cordelia:

And yet not so, since I am sure my love’s

More ponderous^77 than my tongue.

LEAR    To thee and thine hereditary^78 ever

Remain this ample third of our fair kingdom,

No less in space, validity^80 and pleasure

To Cordelia

Than that conferred on Goneril.— Now, our joy,

Although our last and least, to whose young love

The vines of France and milk of Burgundy^83

Strive to be interessed, what can you say to draw^84

A third more opulent than your sisters’? Speak.

CORDELIA    Nothing, my lord.

LEAR    Nothing?

CORDELIA    Nothing.

LEAR    Nothing will come of nothing: speak again.

CORDELIA    Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave

My heart into my mouth: I love your majesty

According to my bond^92, no more nor less.

LEAR    How, how, Cordelia? Mend^93 your speech a little,

Lest you may mar^94 your fortunes.

CORDELIA    Good my lord,

You have begot me, bred^96 me, loved me:

I return those duties back as are right fit,

Obey you, love you and most honour you.

Why have my sisters husbands if they say

They love you all? Happily when I shall wed,

That lord whose hand must take my plight^101 shall carry

Half my love with him, half my care and duty:

Sure I shall never marry like my sisters.

LEAR    But goes thy heart with this?

CORDELIA    Ay, my good lord.

LEAR    So young and so untender^106?

CORDELIA    So young, my lord, and true.

LEAR    Let it be so: thy truth then be thy dower,

For by the sacred radiance of the sun,

The mysteries of Hecate^110 and the night,

By all the operation of the orbs^111

From whom we do exist and cease to be,

Here I disclaim all my paternal care,

Propinquity and property of blood^114,

And as a stranger to my heart and me

Hold thee from this for ever. The barbarous Scythian^116,

Or he that makes his generation messes^117

To gorge his appetite, shall to my bosom

Be as well neighboured^119, pitied and relieved

As thou my sometime^120 daughter.

KENT    Good my liege^121—

LEAR    Peace, Kent:

Come not between the dragon and his wrath.

I loved her most, and thought to set my rest^124

To Cordelia

On her kind nursery.— Hence, and avoid^125 my sight!—

So be my grave my peace, as here I give

Her father’s heart from her. Call France. Who stirs?127

Call Burgundy.— Cornwall and Albany,

[Exit Attendant]

With my two daughters’ dowers digest^129 the third.

Let pride, which she calls plainness, marry her^130.

I do invest you jointly with my power,

Pre-eminence, and all the large effects^132

That troop with^133 majesty. Ourself by monthly course,

With reservation of^134 an hundred knights

By you to be sustained^135, shall our abode

Make with you by due turn: only we shall retain

The name and all th’addition to a king: the sway^137,

Revenue, execution of the rest,

Belovèd sons, be yours, which to confirm,

This coronet part between you.

Gives them coronet to break in half

KENT    Royal Lear,

Whom I have ever honoured as my king,

Loved as my father, as my master followed,

As my great patron thought on in my prayers—

LEAR    The bow is bent and drawn, make from the shaft^145.

KENT    Let it fall rather, though the fork^146 invade

The region of my heart: be Kent unmannerly

When Lear is mad. What wouldst thou^148 do, old man?

Think’st thou that duty shall have dread to speak

When power to flattery bows? To plainness honour’s bound

When majesty falls to folly. Reserve thy state^151,

And in thy best consideration^152 check

This hideous rashness. Answer my life my judgement^153:

Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least,

Nor are those empty-hearted whose low sounds

Reverb no hollowness^156.

LEAR    Kent, on thy life, no more.

KENT    My life I never held but as pawn^158

To wage^159 against thine enemies, ne’er fear to lose it,

Thy safety being motive.

LEAR    Out of my sight!

KENT    See better, Lear, and let me still remain

The true blank^163 of thine eye.

LEAR    Now, by Apollo^164—

KENT    Now, by Apollo, king,

Thou swear’st thy gods in vain.

LEAR    O, vassal! Miscreant^167!

Puts his hand on his sword or attacks Kent

ALBANY AND CORDELIA Dear sir, forbear^168.

KENT    Kill thy physician, and thy fee bestow^169

Upon the foul disease^170. Revoke thy gift,

Or whilst I can vent clamour from my throat,

I’ll tell thee thou dost evil.

LEAR    Hear me, recreant^173, on thine allegiance hear me!

That^174 thou hast sought to make us break our vows,

Which we durst never yet, and with strained^175 pride

To come betwixt our sentences^176 and our power,

Which nor our nature nor our place^177 can bear,

Our potency made good^178, take thy reward:

Five days we do allot thee for provision

To shield thee from disasters^180 of the world,

And on the sixth to turn thy hated back

Upon our kingdom: if on the next day following

Thy banished trunk^183 be found in our dominions,

The moment is thy death. Away! By Jupiter^184,

This shall not be revoked.

KENT    Fare thee well, king: sith^186 thus thou wilt appear,

Freedom lives hence and banishment is here.—

To Cordelia

The gods to their dear shelter take thee, maid,

That justly think’st, and hast most rightly said.—

To Goneril and Regan

And your large speeches may your deeds approve^190,

That good effects may spring from words of love.

Thus Kent, O princes, bids you all adieu.

He’ll shape his old course^193 in a country new.

Exit

Flourish. Enter Gloucester with France and Burgundy, Attendants

CORDELIA    Here’s France and Burgundy, my noble lord.

LEAR    My lord of Burgundy,

We first address toward you, who with this king

Hath rivalled for our daughter: what in the least^197

Will you require in present dower^198 with her,

Or cease your quest of love?

BURGUNDY    Most royal majesty,

I crave no more than hath your highness offered,

Nor will you tender^202 less.

LEAR    Right noble Burgundy,

When she was dear to us, we did hold her so^204,

But now her price is fallen. Sir, there she stands:

If aught within that little seeming substance^206,

Or all of it, with our displeasure pieced^207,

And nothing more, may fitly like^208 your grace,

She’s there, and she is yours.

BURGUNDY    I know no answer.

LEAR    Will you, with those infirmities she owes^211,

Unfriended, new-adopted to our hate,

Dowered with our curse and strangered^213 with our oath,

Take her or leave her?

BURGUNDY    Pardon me, royal sir:

Election makes not up^216 in such conditions.

LEAR    Then leave her, sir, for by the power that made me,

To France

I tell you^218 all her wealth.— For you, great king,

I would not from your love make such a stray^219

To match you where I hate, therefore beseech you

T’avert your liking a more worthier way

Than on a wretch whom nature is ashamed

Almost t’acknowledge hers.

FRANCE    This is most strange,

That she whom even but now was your object^225,

The argument of your praise, balm^226 of your age,

The best, the dearest, should in this trice^227 of time

Commit a thing so monstrous to dismantle^228

So many folds of favour. Sure her offence

Must be of such unnatural degree

That monsters it, or your fore-vouched^231 affection

Fall into taint, which to believe of her^232

Must be a faith that reason without miracle

Should never plant in me.

CORDELIA    I yet beseech your majesty —

If for I want^236 that glib and oily art

To speak and purpose not^237, since what I will intend

I’ll do’t before I speak — that you make known

It is no vicious blot, murder, or foulness^239,

No unchaste action or dishonoured step

That hath deprived me of your grace and favour,

But even for want of that for which^242 I am richer:

A still-soliciting^243 eye and such a tongue

That I am glad I have not, though not to have it

Hath lost me in your liking.

LEAR    Better thou hadst

Not been born than not t’have pleased me better.

FRANCE    Is it but this? A tardiness in nature^248,

Which often leaves the history^249 unspoke

That it intends to do? My lord of Burgundy,

What say you to the lady? Love’s not love

When it is mingled with regards that stands^252

Aloof from th’entire point. Will you have her?

She is herself a dowry.

To Lear

BURGUNDY    Royal king,

Give but that portion which yourself proposed,

And here I take Cordelia by the hand,

Duchess of Burgundy.

LEAR    Nothing: I have sworn: I am firm.

To Cordelia

BURGUNDY    I am sorry, then, you have so lost a father

That you must lose a husband.

CORDELIA    Peace be with Burgundy.

Since that respect and fortunes^263 are his love,

I shall not be his wife.

FRANCE    Fairest Cordelia, that art most rich being poor,

Most choice forsaken^266, and most loved despised,

Thee and thy virtues here I seize upon^267:

Takes her hand

Be it lawful^268, I take up what’s cast away.

Gods, gods! ’Tis strange that from their^269 cold’st neglect

My love should kindle to inflamed^270 respect.—

Thy dowerless daughter, king, thrown to my chance^271,

Is queen of us, of ours and our fair France:

Not all the dukes of wat’rish^273 Burgundy

Can buy this unprized^274 precious maid of me.—

Bid them farewell, Cordelia, though unkind^275.

Thou losest here, a better where^276 to find.

LEAR    Thou hast her, France: let her be thine, for we

Have no such daughter, nor shall ever see

That face of hers again. Therefore be gone

Without our grace, our love, our benison^280.

Come, noble Burgundy.

Flourish. Exeunt. [France and the sisters remain]

FRANCE    Bid farewell to your sisters.

CORDELIA    The jewels of our father, with washèd^283 eyes

Cordelia leaves you. I know you what you are,

And like a sister am most loath to call

Your faults as they are named^286. Love well our father:

To your professèd bosoms I commit^287 him,

But yet, alas, stood I within his grace,

I would prefer^289 him to a better place.

So farewell to you both.

REGAN    Prescribe not us our duty.

GONERIL    Let your study^292

Be to content your lord who hath received you

At fortune’s alms. You have obedience scanted^294,

And well are worth the want that you have wanted^295.

CORDELIA    Time shall unfold what plighted cunning^296 hides:

Who covers faults, at last with shame derides^297.

Well may you prosper.

FRANCE    Come, my fair Cordelia.

Exit France and Cordelia

GONERIL    Sister, it is not little I have to say of what most nearly^300

appertains to us both. I think our father will hence tonight.

REGAN    That’s most certain, and with you: next month with

us.

GONERIL    You see how full of changes his age is: the

observation we have made of it hath not been little. He

always loved our sister most, and with what poor judgement

he hath now cast her off appears too grossly^307.

REGAN    ’Tis the infirmity of his age: yet he hath ever^308 but

slenderly^309 known himself.

GONERIL    The best and soundest of his time hath been but^310

rash. Then must we look^311 from his age to receive not alone the

imperfections of long-engrafted condition, but therewithal^312

the unruly waywardness that infirm and choleric^313 years

bring with them.

REGAN    Such unconstant starts^315 are we like to have from him

as this of Kent’s banishment.

GONERIL    There is further compliment^317 of leave-taking

between France and him. Pray you let us sit together^318: if our

father carry authority with such disposition^319 as he bears, this

last surrender of his will but offend^320 us.

REGAN We shall further think of it.

GONERIL    We must do something, and i’th’heat^322.

Exeunt

Act 1 Scene 2

running scene 2

Enter Bastard [Edmund]

With a letter

EDMUND    Thou, nature, art my goddess: to thy law

My services are bound. Wherefore^2 should I

Stand in^3 the plague of custom and permit

The curiosity of nations^4 to deprive me

For that I am some twelve or fourteen moonshines^5

Lag of a brother? Why bastard? Wherefore base^6?

When my dimensions are as well compact^7,

My mind as generous, and my shape as true^8,

As honest madam’s issue^9? Why brand they us

With base? With baseness? Bastardy? Base, base?

Who in the lusty stealth of nature take^11

More composition and fierce quality^12

Than doth within a dull, stale, tirèd bed,

Go to th’creating a whole tribe of fops^14

Got^15 ’tween a sleep and wake? Well then,

Legitimate Edgar, I must have your land:

Our father’s love is to the bastard Edmund

As^18 to th’legitimate — fine word, ‘legitimate’ —

Well, my legitimate, if this letter speed^19

And my invention^20 thrive, Edmund the base

Shall to th’legitimate^21. I grow, I prosper:

Now, gods, stand up for bastards!

Enter Gloucester

GLOUCESTER    Kent banished thus? And France in choler parted^23?

And the king gone tonight? Prescribed^24 his power,

Confined to exhibition^25? All this done

Upon the gad^26? Edmund, how now? What news?

Hides the letter

EDMUND    So please your lordship, none.

GLOUCESTER    Why so earnestly seek you to put up^28 that letter?

EDMUND    I know no news, my lord.

GLOUCESTER    What paper were you reading?

EDMUND    Nothing, my lord.

GLOUCESTER    No? What needed, then, that terrible dispatch^32 of it

into your pocket? The quality of nothing hath not such need

to hide itself. Let’s see: come, if it be nothing I shall not need

spectacles.

EDMUND    I beseech you, sir, pardon me: it is a letter from my

brother that I have not all o’er-read; and for^37 so much as I

have perused, I find it not fit for your o’erlooking^38.

GLOUCESTER    Give me the letter, sir.

EDMUND    I shall offend either to detain or give it: the contents,

as in part I understand them, are to blame.

Edmund gives the letter

GLOUCESTER    Let’s see, let’s see.

EDMUND    I hope for my brother’s justification he wrote this

but as an essay or taste^44 of my virtue.

GLOUCESTER    Reads ‘This policy and reverence of age^45 makes the

world bitter to the best of our times, keeps our fortunes^46 from

us till our oldness cannot relish them. I begin to find an idle^47

and fond^48 bondage in the oppression of aged tyranny, who

sways, not as it hath power, but as it is suffered^49. Come to me,

that of this I may speak more. If our father would sleep till I

waked him, you should enjoy half his revenue for ever and

live the beloved of your brother, Edgar.’

Hum! Conspiracy! ‘Sleep till I wake him, you should enjoy

half his revenue.’ My son Edgar? Had he a hand to write this?

A heart and brain to breed it in? When came you to this?

Who brought it?

EDMUND    It was not brought me, my lord; there’s the cunning

of it: I found it thrown in at the casement of my closet^58.

GLOUCESTER    You know the character^59 to be your brother’s?

EDMUND    If the matter^60 were good, my lord, I durst swear it

were his, but in respect of that I would fain^61 think it were not.

GLOUCESTER    It is his.

EDMUND    It is his hand, my lord, but I hope his heart is not in

the contents.

GLOUCESTER    Has he never before sounded you in this business?

EDMUND    Never, my lord: but I have heard him oft maintain it

to be fit that, sons at perfect age and fathers declined^67, the

father should be as ward to the son, and the son manage his

revenue.

GLOUCESTER    O villain, villain! His very opinion in the letter!

Abhorred villain! Unnatural, detested, brutish villain! Worse

than brutish! Go, sirrah, seek him: I’ll apprehend^72 him.

Abominable^73 villain, where is he?

EDMUND    I do not well know, my lord. If it shall please you to

suspend your indignation against my brother till you can

derive from him better testimony of his intent, you should

run a certain course, where, if you violently proceed^77 against

him, mistaking his purpose, it would make a great gap in

your own honour and shake in pieces the heart of his

obedience. I dare pawn down^80 my life for him, that he hath

writ this to feel^81 my affection to your honour, and to no other

pretence^82 of danger.

GLOUCESTER    Think you so?

EDMUND    If your honour judge it meet^84, I will place you where

you shall hear us confer of this, and by an auricular^85

assurance have your satisfaction^86, and that without any

further delay than this very evening.

GLOUCESTER    He cannot be such a monster. Edmund, seek him

out: wind me into him, I pray you: frame^89 the business after

your own wisdom. I would unstate myself to be in a due^90

resolution.

EDMUND    I will seek him, sir, presently: convey^92 the business as

I shall find means and acquaint you withal^93.

GLOUCESTER    These late^94 eclipses in the sun and moon portend no

good to us: though the wisdom of nature^95 can reason it thus

and thus, yet nature finds itself scourged by the sequent^96

effects: love cools, friendship falls off, brothers divide: in

cities, mutinies; in countries, discord; in palaces, treason;

and the bond cracked ’twixt son and father. This villain of

mine comes under the prediction: there’s son against father.

The king falls from bias of nature^101: there’s father against

child. We have seen the best of our time: machinations,

hollowness, treachery, and all ruinous disorders follow us

disquietly to our graves. Find out this villain, Edmund: it^104

shall lose thee nothing. Do it carefully.— And the noble and

true-hearted Kent banished! His offence, honesty! ’Tis

strange.

Exit

EDMUND    This is the excellent foppery^108 of the world, that when

we are sick in fortune — often the surfeits^109 of our own

behaviour — we make guilty of our disasters^110 the sun, the

moon^111 and stars, as if we were villains on necessity, fools by

heavenly compulsion, knaves, thieves and treachers^112 by

spherical predominance^113, drunkards, liars and adulterers

by an enforced obedience of planetary influence, and all that

we are evil in, by a divine thrusting on: an admirable evasion^115

of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish^116 disposition on the

charge of a star! My father compounded^117 with my mother

under the dragon’s tail and my nativity was under Ursa^118

Major, so that it follows I am rough^119 and lecherous. I should

have been that I am had the maidenliest^120 star in the

firmament twinkled on my bastardizing^121.

Enter Edgar

Pat he comes like the catastrophe of the old comedy: my cue^122

is villainous melancholy, with a sigh like Tom o’Bedlam^123.—

O, these eclipses do portend these divisions! Fa, sol, la, mi^124.

EDGAR    How now, brother Edmund, what serious

contemplation are you in?

EDMUND    I am thinking, brother, of a prediction I read this^127

other day, what should follow these eclipses.

EDGAR    Do you busy yourself with that?

EDMUND    I promise you, the effects he writes of succeed^130

unhappily^131. When saw you my father last?

EDGAR    The night gone by.

EDMUND    Spake you with him?

EDGAR    Ay, two hours together.

EDMUND    Parted you in good terms? Found you no displeasure

in him by word nor countenance^136?

EDGAR    None at all.

EDMUND    Bethink yourself wherein you may have offended

him, and at my entreaty forbear^139 his presence until some little

time hath qualified^140 the heat of his displeasure, which at this

instant so rageth in him that with the mischief of your^141

person it would scarcely allay^142.

EDGAR    Some villain hath done me wrong.

EDMUND    That’s my fear. I pray you have a continent^144

forbearance till the speed of his rage goes slower: and, as I

say, retire with me to my lodging, from whence I will fitly^146

bring you to hear my lord speak. Pray ye go.

Gives a key

There’s my key: if you do stir abroad^148, go armed.

EDGAR    Armed, brother?

EDMUND    Brother, I advise you to the best: I am no honest

man if there be any good meaning^151 toward you: I have told

you what I have seen and heard, but faintly, nothing like the

image and horror^153 of it. Pray you away.

EDGAR    Shall I hear from you anon^154?

Exit

EDMUND    I do serve^155 you in this business.—

A credulous father and a brother noble,

Whose nature is so far from doing harms

That he suspects none: on whose foolish honesty

My practices^159 ride easy. I see the business.

Let me, if not by birth, have lands by wit^160:

All with me’s meet that I can fashion fit^161.

Exit

Act 1 Scene 3

running scene 3

Enter Goneril and Steward [Oswald]

GONERIL    Did my father strike my gentleman for chiding^1 of his

fool?

OSWALD    Ay, madam.

GONERIL    By day and night he wrongs me: every hour

He flashes^5 into one gross crime or other

That sets us all at odds. I’ll not endure it.

His knights grow riotous, and himself upbraids us

On every trifle. When he returns from hunting

I will not speak with him: say I am sick.

If you come slack^10 of former services

You shall do well: the fault of it I’ll answer^11.

Horns within

OSWALD    He’s coming, madam: I hear him.

GONERIL    Put on what weary negligence you please,

You and your fellows: I’d have it come to question^14:

If he distaste^15 it, let him to my sister,

Whose mind and mine, I know, in that are one.

Remember what I have said.

OSWALD    Well, madam.

GONERIL    And let his knights have colder looks among you:

what grows of it, no matter: advise your fellows so. I’ll write

straight to^21 my sister, to hold my course. Prepare for dinner.

Exeunt

Act 1 Scene 4

running scene 3 continues

Enter Kent

Disguised

KENT    If but as will I^1 other accents borrow,

That can my speech defuse^2, my good intent

May carry through itself to that full issue^3

For which I razed my likeness^4. Now, banished Kent,

If thou canst serve where thou dost stand condemned,

So may it come thy master whom thou lov’st,

Shall find thee full of labours.

Horns within. Enter Lear and Attendants [his Knights]

LEAR    Let me not stay^8 a jot for dinner: go get it ready.—

[Exit a Knight]

To Kent

How now, what art thou?

KENT    A man, sir.

LEAR    What dost thou profess? What wouldst thou^11 with

us^12?

KENT    I do profess to be no less than I seem; to serve him

truly that will put me in trust, to love him that is honest, to

converse with him that is wise and says little, to fear

judgement, to fight when I cannot choose and to eat no fish^16.

LEAR    What art thou?

KENT    A very honest-hearted fellow, and as poor as the

king.

LEAR    If thou be’st as poor for a subject as he’s for a king,

thou art poor enough. What wouldst thou?

KENT    Service.

LEAR    Who wouldst thou serve?

KENT    You.

LEAR    Dost thou know me, fellow?

KENT    No, sir, but you have that in your countenance

which I would fain call master.

LEAR    What’s that?

KENT    Authority.

LEAR    What services canst thou do?

KENT    I can keep honest counsel, ride, run, mar a curious^31

tale in telling it, and deliver a plain message bluntly: that

which ordinary men are fit for, I am qualified in, and the best

of me is diligence.

LEAR    How old art thou?

KENT    Not so young, sir, to love a woman for singing, nor

so old to dote on her for anything^37: I have years on my back

forty-eight.

LEAR    Follow me, thou shalt serve me: if I like thee no

worse after dinner, I will not part from thee yet.— Dinner,

ho, dinner! Where’s my knave^41? My fool? Go you and call my

fool hither.

[Exit another Knight]

Enter Steward [Oswald]

You, you, sirrah, where’s my daughter?

OSWALD    So^44 please you—

Exit

LEAR    What says the fellow there? Call the clotpoll^45 back.—

[Exit another Knight]

Where’s my fool? Ho, I think the world’s asleep.—

[Enter a Knight]

How now? Where’s that mongrel?

KNIGHT    He says, my lord, your daughter is not well.

LEAR    Why came not the slave^49 back to me when I called

him?

KNIGHT    Sir, he answered me in the roundest^51 manner, he

would not.

LEAR    He would not?

KNIGHT    My lord, I know not what the matter is, but to my

judgement your highness is not entertained^55 with that

ceremonious affection as you were wont^56: there’s a great

abatement of kindness appears as well in the general^57

dependants as in the duke himself also and your daughter.

LEAR    Ha? Say’st thou so?

KNIGHT    I beseech you pardon me, my lord, if I be mistaken,

for my duty cannot be silent when I think your highness

wronged.

LEAR    Thou but rememb’rest me of mine own conception^63:

I have perceived a most faint^64 neglect of late, which I have

rather blamed as mine own jealous curiosity than as a very^65

pretence and purpose of unkindness. I will look further

into’t. But where’s my fool? I have not seen him this two

days.

KNIGHT    Since my young lady’s going into France, sir, the

fool hath much pined away.

LEAR    No more of that, I have noted it well.— Go you and

tell my daughter I would speak with her.—

[Exit a Knight]

Go you, call hither my fool.—

[Exit another Knight]

Enter Steward [Oswald]

O, you sir, you, come you hither, sir. Who am I, sir?

OSWALD    My lady’s father.

LEAR    ‘My lady’s father’? My lord’s knave: you whoreson

dog, you slave, you cur^77!

OSWALD    I am none of these, my lord, I beseech your pardon.

LEAR    Do you bandy^79 looks with me, you rascal?

Strikes him

OSWALD    I’ll not be strucken^80, my lord.

KENT    Nor tripped neither, you base football^81 player.

Trips him

LEAR    I thank thee, fellow: thou serv’st me and I’ll love

thee.

KENT    Come, sir, arise, away! I’ll teach you differences^84:

away, away! If you will measure your lubber’s^85 length again,

tarry: but away, go to^86. Have you wisdom? So.

Pushes Oswald out

LEAR    Now, my friendly knave, I thank thee.

Gives money

There’s earnest^88 of thy service.

Enter Fool

FOOL    Let me hire him too: here’s my

coxcomb^90.

Offers Kent his cap

LEAR    How now, my pretty^91 knave, how dost thou?

To Kent

FOOL    Sirrah, you were best take my coxcomb.

LEAR    Why, my boy?

FOOL    Why? For taking one’s part that’s out of favour: nay,

an thou canst not smile as the wind sits^95, thou’lt catch cold

shortly. There, take my coxcomb. Why, this fellow has

banished two on’s^97 daughters and did the third a blessing

against his will: if thou follow him, thou must needs^98 wear

my coxcomb.— How now, nuncle? Would^99 I had two

coxcombs and two daughters.

LEAR    Why, my boy?

FOOL    If I gave them all my living^102, I’d keep my coxcombs

myself. There’s mine: beg another of thy daughters.

LEAR    Take heed, sirrah: the whip.

FOOL    Truth’s a dog must to kennel: he must be whipped

out when the Lady Brach^106 may stand by th’fire and stink.

LEAR    A pestilent gall^107 to me!

FOOL    Sirrah, I’ll teach thee a speech.

LEAR    Do.

FOOL    Mark^110 it, nuncle:

Have more than thou showest,

Speak less than thou knowest,

Lend less than thou owest^113,

Ride more than thou goest^114,

Learn more than thou trowest^115,

Set less than thou throwest^116;

Leave thy drink and thy whore,

And keep in-a-door,

And thou shalt have more^119

Than two tens to a score^120.

KENT    This is nothing, fool.

To Lear

FOOL    Then ’tis like the breath of an unfee’d^122

lawyer: you gave me nothing for’t.— Can you make no use^123

of nothing, nuncle?

LEAR    Why, no, boy: nothing can be made out of nothing.

To Kent

FOOL    Prithee tell him, so much the rent of his land

comes to: he will not believe a fool.

LEAR    A bitter fool!

FOOL    Dost thou know the difference, my boy, between a

bitter fool and a sweet one?

LEAR    No, lad, teach me.

FOOL    Nuncle, give me an egg and I’ll give thee two

crowns.

LEAR    What two crowns^134 shall they be?

FOOL    Why, after I have cut the egg i’th’middle and eat up

the meat, the two crowns of the egg. When thou clovest^136 thy

crowns i’th’middle and gav’st away both parts, thou bor’st

thine ass on thy back o’er the dirt: thou hadst little wit in thy

bald crown when thou gav’st thy golden one away. If I speak

like myself^140 in this, let him be whipped that first finds it so:

Sings

Fools had ne’er less grace^141 in a year,

For wise men are grown foppish^142

And know not how their wits to wear,

Their manners are so apish^144.

LEAR    When were you wont to be so full of songs, sirrah?

FOOL    I have used it^146, nuncle, e’er since thou mad’st thy

daughters thy mothers: for when thou gav’st them the rod^147

and put’st down thine own breeches,

Sings

Then they for sudden joy did weep,

And I for sorrow sung,

That such a king should play bo-peep^151

And go the fool among^152.

Prithee, nuncle, keep a schoolmaster that can teach thy fool

to lie: I would fain^154 learn to lie.

LEAR    An^155 you lie, sirrah, we’ll have you whipped.

FOOL    I marvel^156 what kin thou and thy daughters are:

they’ll have me whipped for speaking true, thou’lt have me

whipped for lying, and sometimes I am whipped for holding

my peace. I had rather be any kind o’thing than a fool. And

yet I would not be thee, nuncle: thou hast pared^160 thy wit

o’both sides and left nothing i’th’middle. Here comes one

o’the parings.

Enter Goneril

LEAR    How now, daughter? What makes that frontlet^163 on?

You are too much of late i’th’frown.

FOOL    Thou wast a pretty fellow when thou hadst no need

to care for her frowning: now thou art an O without a figure^166.

I am better than thou art now: I am a fool, thou art

To Goneril

nothing.— Yes, forsooth^168, I will hold my tongue, so

your face bids me, though you say nothing.

Sings

Mum, mum,

He that keeps nor crust nor crumb^171,

Weary of all, shall want some^172.

Points to Lear

That’s a shelled peascod^173.

GONERIL    Not only, sir, this your all-licensed^174 fool,

But other of your insolent retinue

Do hourly carp^176 and quarrel, breaking forth

In rank^177 and not-to-be endured riots, sir.

I had thought by making this well known unto you

To have found a safe^179 redress, but now grow fearful,

By what yourself too late^180 have spoke and done.

That you protect this course and put it on^181

By your allowance, which if you should, the fault

Would not scape censure, nor the redresses sleep^183

Which in the tender of a wholesome weal^184

Might in their working do you that offence,

Which else were shame, that then necessity

Will call discreet proceeding.

FOOL    For you know, nuncle,

The hedge-sparrow fed the cuckoo^189 so long,

That it’s had it head bit off by it young^190.

So, out went the candle, and we were left darkling^191.

To Goneril

LEAR    Are you our daughter?

GONERIL    I would you would make use of your good wisdom —

Whereof I know you are fraught^194 — and put away

These dispositions^195 which of late transport you

From what you rightly are.

FOOL    May not an ass know when the cart draws the horse?

Whoop, Jug^198! I love thee.

LEAR    Does any here know me? This is not Lear.

Does Lear walk thus? Speak thus? Where are his eyes?

Either his notion weakens, his discernings^201

Are lethargied — Ha! Waking?202 ’Tis not so?

Who is it that can tell me who I am?

FOOL    Lear’s shadow^204.

LEAR    Your name, fair gentlewoman?

GONERIL    This admiration, sir, is much o’th’savour^206

Of other your new pranks. I do beseech you

To understand my purposes aright:

As you are old and reverend, should^209 be wise.

Here do you keep a hundred knights and squires,

Men so disordered, so debauched and bold^211,

That this our court, infected with their manners,

Shows like a riotous inn: epicurism^213 and lust

Makes it more like a tavern or a brothel

Than a graced palace. The shame itself doth speak^215

For instant remedy. Be then desired^216

By her, that else will take the thing she begs,

A little to disquantity your train^218,

And the remainders, that shall still depend^219

To be such men as may besort^220 your age,

Which know themselves and you^221.

LEAR    Darkness and devils!—

To a Servant

Saddle my horses, call my train together.—

To Goneril

Degenerate^224 bastard! I’ll not trouble thee.

Yet have I left a daughter.

GONERIL    You strike my people, and your disordered rabble

Make servants of their betters.

Enter Albany

To Albany

LEAR    Woe that^228 too late repents!— Is it your will?

To a Servant

Speak, sir.— Prepare my horses.

Ingratitude, thou marble-hearted fiend,

More hideous when thou show’st thee in a child

Than the sea-monster!

ALBANY    Pray, sir, be patient.

To Goneril

LEAR    Detested kite^234, thou liest.

My train are men of choice and rarest parts^235,

That all particulars of duty know

And in the most exact regard support^237

The worships of their name. O, most small fault,

How ugly didst thou in Cordelia show!

Which, like an engine^240, wrenched my frame of nature

From the fixed place, drew from my heart all love,

And added to the gall^242. O Lear, Lear, Lear!

Hits his head

Beat at this gate, that let thy folly in,

And thy dear judgement out!— Go, go, my people.

ALBANY    My lord, I am guiltless as I am ignorant

Of what hath moved^246 you.

LEAR    It may be so, my lord.—

Hear, nature, hear, dear goddess, hear!

Suspend thy purpose if thou didst intend

To make this creature fruitful:

Into her womb convey sterility,

Dry up in her the organs of increase^252,

And from her derogate^253 body never spring

A babe to honour her: if she must teem^254,

Create her child of spleen^255, that it may live

And be a thwart disnatured^256 torment to her:

Let it stamp wrinkles in her brow of youth,

With cadent tears fret^258 channels in her cheeks,

Turn all her mother’s pains and benefits^259

To laughter and contempt, that she may feel

How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is

To have a thankless child!— Away, away!

Exit

Perhaps with Kent and Knights

ALBANY    Now, gods that we adore, whereof comes this?

GONERIL    Never afflict yourself to know more of it,

But let his disposition have that scope

As dotage^266 gives it.

Enter Lear

LEAR    What, fifty of my followers at a clap^267?

Within a fortnight?

ALBANY    What’s the matter, sir?

To Goneril

LEAR    I’ll tell thee:— Life and death! I am ashamed

That thou hast power to shake my manhood thus,

That these hot tears, which break from me perforce^272,

Should make thee worth them. Blasts^273 and fogs upon thee!

Th’untented^274 woundings of a father’s curse

Pierce every sense about thee! Old fond^275 eyes,

Beweep this cause again, I’ll pluck ye out

And cast you, with the waters that you loose^277,

To temper clay^278. Ha? Let it be so.

I have another daughter,

Who, I am sure, is kind and comfortable^280:

When she shall hear this of thee, with her nails

She’ll flay thy wolvish visage^282. Thou shalt find

That I’ll resume the shape which thou dost think

I have cast off for ever.

Exeunt [Lear, perhaps with Kent and Knights]

GONERIL    Do you mark that?

ALBANY    I cannot be so partial^286, Goneril,

To the great love I bear you—

GONERIL    Pray you, content^288.— What, Oswald, ho!—

To Fool

You, sir, more knave than fool, after your master.

FOOL    Nuncle Lear, nuncle Lear, tarry, take the fool with

thee.

Sings

A fox, when one has caught her,

And such a daughter

Should sure to the slaughter,

If my cap would buy a halter^295:

So the fool follows after.

Exit

GONERIL    This man hath had good counsel. A hundred knights?

’Tis politic^298 and safe to let him keep

At point a hundred knights: yes, that^299 on every dream,

Each buzz, each fancy^300, each complaint, dislike,

He may enguard^301 his dotage with their powers

And hold our lives in^302 mercy.— Oswald, I say!

ALBANY    Well, you may fear too far.

GONERIL    Safer than trust too far:

Let me still^305 take away the harms I fear,

Not fear still to be taken^306. I know his heart.

What he hath uttered I have writ my sister:

If she sustain him and his hundred knights

When I have showed th’unfitness—

Enter Steward [Oswald]

How now, Oswald?

What, have you writ that letter to my sister?

OSWALD    Ay, madam.

GONERIL    Take you some company and away to horse:

Inform her full of my particular fear,

And thereto add such reasons of your own

As may compact^315 it more. Get you gone,

And hasten your return.—

[Exit Oswald]

No, no, my lord,

This milky gentleness and course of yours

Though I condemn not, yet, under pardon^318,

You are much more at task^319 for want of wisdom

Than praised for harmful mildness.

ALBANY    How far your eyes may pierce I cannot tell:

Striving to better, oft we mar what’s well.

GONERIL    Nay, then—

ALBANY    Well, well, th’event^324.

Exeunt

Act 1 Scene 5

running scene 3 continues

Kent disguised as Caius

Enter Lear, Kent, Gentleman and Fool

To Kent

LEAR    Go you before^1 to Gloucester with these letters.

Acquaint my daughter no further with anything you know

than comes from her demand out of^3 the letter. If your

diligence be not speedy, I shall be there afore you.

KENT    I will not sleep, my lord, till I have delivered your

letter.

Exit

FOOL    If a man’s brains were in’s heels, were’t not in

danger of kibes^8?

LEAR    Ay, boy.

FOOL    Then, I prithee be merry: thy wit shall not go slip-10

shod.

LEAR    Ha, ha, ha!

FOOL    Shalt^13 see thy other daughter will use thee kindly, for

though she’s as like this as a crab’s^14 like an apple, yet I can tell

what I can tell.

LEAR    What canst tell, boy?

FOOL    She will taste as like this as a crab does to a crab.

Thou canst tell why one’s nose stands i’th’middle on’s^18 face?

LEAR    No.

FOOL    Why, to keep one’s eyes of either side’s^20 nose, that

what a man cannot smell out he may spy into.

LEAR    I did her^22 wrong—

FOOL    Canst tell how an oyster makes his shell?

LEAR    No.

FOOL    Nor I neither; but I can tell why a snail has a house.

LEAR    Why?

FOOL    Why, to put’s head in, not to give it away to his

daughters and leave his horns without a case.

LEAR    I will forget my nature. So kind a father!— Be my

horses ready?

FOOL    Thy asses are gone about ’em. The reason why the^31

seven stars are no more than seven is a pretty^32 reason.

LEAR    Because they are not eight.

FOOL    Yes, indeed: thou wouldst make a good fool.

LEAR    To take’t again^35 perforce. Monster ingratitude!

FOOL    If thou wert my fool, nuncle, I’d have thee beaten

for being old before thy time.

LEAR    How’s that?

FOOL    Thou shouldst not have been old till thou hadst

been wise.

LEAR    O, let me not be mad, not mad, sweet heaven!

Keep me in temper^42: I would not be mad!—

To Gentleman

How now, are the horses ready?

GENTLEMAN Ready, my lord.

LEAR    Come, boy.

FOOL    She that’s a maid^46 now, and laughs at my departure,

Shall not be a maid long, unless things^47 be cut shorter.

Exeunt

Act 2 Scene 1

running scene 4

Enter Bastard [Edmund] and Curan, severally

EDMUND    Save thee^1, Curan.

CURAN    And you, sir. I have been with your father, and given

him notice that the Duke of Cornwall and Regan his duchess

will be here with him this night.

EDMUND    How comes that?

CURAN    Nay, I know not. You have heard of the news

abroad: I mean the whispered ones, for they are yet but ear-7

kissing arguments?

EDMUND    Not I: pray you, what are they?

CURAN    Have you heard of no likely wars toward^10 ’twixt the

dukes of Cornwall and Albany?

EDMUND    Not a word.

CURAN    You may do then in time. Fare you well, sir.

Exit

EDMUND    The duke be here tonight? The better — best!

This weaves itself perforce^15 into my business.

My father hath set guard to take^16 my brother,

And I have one thing, of a queasy question^17,

Which I must act. Briefness and fortune, work!—

Enter Edgar

Appears above and then enters below

Brother, a word: descend, brother, I say!

My father watches^20: O sir, fly this place.

Intelligence^21 is given where you are hid;

You have now the good advantage of the night.

Have you not spoken gainst the Duke of Cornwall?

He’s coming hither, now, i’th’night, i’th’haste^24,

And Regan with him: have you nothing said^25

Upon his party gainst the Duke of Albany?

Advise yourself^27.

EDGAR    I am sure on’t, not a word.

EDMUND    I hear my father coming, pardon me:

Draws

In cunning^30 I must draw my sword upon you:

Edgar draws

Draw, seem to defend yourself. Now quit you^31 well.

Yield: come before my father.— Light, ho, here!—

Fly, brother.— Torches, torches!— So, farewell.

Exit Edgar

Wounds his arm

Some blood drawn on me would beget opinion^34

Of my more fierce^35 endeavour: I have seen drunkards

Do more than this in sport.— Father, father!

Stop, stop! No help?

Enter Gloucester and Servants with torches

GLOUCESTER    Now, Edmund, where’s the villain?

EDMUND    Here stood he in the dark, his sharp sword out,

Mumbling of wicked charms, conjuring the moon^40

To stand auspicious mistress^41—

GLOUCESTER    But where is he?

EDMUND    Look, sir, I bleed.

GLOUCESTER    Where is the villain, Edmund?

EDMUND    Fled this way, sir. When by no means he could—

GLOUCESTER    Pursue him, ho! Go after.

[Exeunt Servants]

By no means what?

EDMUND Persuade me to the murder of your lordship,

But that I told him the revenging gods

Gainst parricides did all the thunder bend^50,

Spoke with how manifold and strong a bond

The child was bound to th’father; sir, in fine^52,

Seeing how loathly opposite^53 I stood

To his unnatural purpose, in fell^54 motion

With his preparèd sword, he charges home^55

My unprovided body, latched^56 mine arm;

And when he saw my best alarumed^57 spirits,

Bold in the quarrel’s right, roused to th’encounter^58,

Or whether ghasted^59 by the noise I made,

Full^60 suddenly he fled.

GLOUCESTER    Let him fly far:

Not in this land shall he remain uncaught,

And found — dispatch^63. The noble duke my master,

My worthy arch and patron^64, comes tonight:

By his authority I will proclaim it,

That he which finds him shall deserve our thanks,

Bringing the murderous coward to the stake^67:

He that conceals him, death.

EDMUND    When I dissuaded him from his intent

And found him pight to do it, with curst^70 speech

I threatened to discover^71 him: he replied,

’Thou unpossessing^72 bastard, dost thou think,

If I would stand against thee, would the reposal^73

Of any trust, virtue, or worth in thee

Make thy words faithed^75? No: what should I deny —

As this I would, though thou didst produce

My very character^77 — I’d turn it all

To thy suggestion, plot, and damnèd practice^78,

And thou must make a dullard of the world^79,

If they not thought the profits^80 of my death

Were very pregnant and potential spirits^81

Tucket within

To make thee seek it.’

GLOUCESTER    O, strange and fastened^83 villain!

Would he deny his letter, said he?

Hark, the duke’s trumpets! I know not where^85 he comes.

All ports^86 I’ll bar: the villain shall not scape:

The duke must grant me that. Besides, his picture^87

I will send far and near, that all the kingdom

May have due note of him, and of my land,

Loyal and natural boy, I’ll work the means^90

To make thee capable^91.

Enter Cornwall, Regan and Attendants

CORNWALL    How now, my noble friend? Since I came hither —

Which I can call but now — I have heard strangeness.

REGAN    If it be true, all vengeance comes too short

Which can pursue th’offender. How dost, my lord?

GLOUCESTER    O, madam, my old heart is cracked, it’s cracked!

REGAN    What, did my father’s godson seek your life?

He whom my father named? Your Edgar?

GLOUCESTER    O, lady, lady, shame would have it hid!

REGAN    Was he not companion with the riotous knights

That tended upon^101 my father?

GLOUCESTER I know not, madam: ’tis too bad, too bad.

EDMUND    Yes, madam, he was of that consort^103.

REGAN    No marvel, then, though he were ill affected^104:

’Tis they have put him on^105 the old man’s death,

To have th’expense^106 and waste of his revenues.

I have this present evening from my sister

Been well informed of them, and with such cautions

That if they come to sojourn at my house,

I’ll not be there.

CORNWALL    Nor I, assure thee, Regan.—

Edmund, I hear that you have shown your father

A child-like office^113.

EDMUND    It was my duty, sir.

To Cornwall

GLOUCESTER    He did bewray his practice^115 and received

This hurt you see striving to apprehend him.

CORNWALL    Is he pursued?

GLOUCESTER    Ay, my good lord.

CORNWALL    If he be taken, he shall never more

Be feared of doing harm: make your own purpose,120

How in my strength you please. For^121 you, Edmund,

Whose virtue and obedience doth this instant

So much commend itself, you shall be ours^123:

Natures of such deep trust we shall much need:

You we first seize on^125.

EDMUND    I shall serve you, sir, truly, however else.

GLOUCESTER    For him I thank your grace.

CORNWALL    You know not why we came to visit you?

REGAN    Thus out of season, threading dark-eyed^129 night:

Occasions, noble Gloucester, of some prize^130,

Wherein we must have use of your advice:

Our father he hath writ, so hath our sister,

Of differences^133, which I best thought it fit

To answer from^134 our home: the several messengers

From hence attend dispatch^135. Our good old friend,

Lay comforts to your bosom, and bestow

Your needful counsel to our businesses,

Which craves the instant use^138

GLOUCESTER    I serve you, madam:

Your graces are right welcome.

Exeunt. Flourish

Act 2 Scene 2

running scene 5

Enter Kent and Steward [Oswald], severally

Kent disguised as Caius

OSWALD    Good dawning^1 to thee, friend: art of this house?

KENT    Ay^2.

OSWALD    Where may we set^3 our horses?

KENT    I’th’mire^4.

OSWALD    Prithee, if thou lov’st me, tell me^5.

KENT    I love thee not.

OSWALD    Why then, I care not for thee.

KENT    If I had thee in Lipsbury pinfold^8, I would make thee

care for me.

OSWALD    Why dost thou use^10 me thus? I know thee not.

KENT    Fellow, I know thee.

OSWALD    What dost thou know me for^12?

KENT    A knave, a rascal, an eater of broken meats^13, a base,

proud, shallow, beggarly, three-suited, hundred-pound^14,

filthy, worsted-stocking knave, a lily-livered, action-taking^15,

whoreson, glass-gazing, super-serviceable finical^16 rogue:

one-trunk-inheriting slave: one that wouldst be a bawd^17 in

way of good service, and art nothing but the composition^18 of

a knave, beggar, coward, pander^19, and the son and heir of a

mongrel bitch: one whom I will beat into clamorous

whining if thou deny’st the least syllable of thy addition^21.

OSWALD    Why, what a monstrous fellow art thou thus to rail^22

on one that is neither known of thee nor knows thee!

KENT    What a brazen-faced varlet^24 art thou to deny thou

knowest me! Is it two days since I tripped up thy heels and beat

thee before the king? Draw^26, you rogue, for though it be night,

yet the moon shines: I’ll make a sop o’th’moonshine^27 of you,

you whoreson cullionly barber-monger^28. Draw.

Draws his sword

OSWALD    Away! I have nothing to do with thee.

KENT    Draw, you rascal: you come with letters against the

king, and take vanity the puppet^31’s part against the royalty of

her father: draw, you rogue, or I’ll so carbonado^32 your

shanks: draw, you rascal, come your ways^33.

OSWALD    Help, ho! Murder! Help!

KENT    Strike, you slave! Stand, rogue, stand, you neat^35

slave, strike!

Beats him

OSWALD    Help, ho! Murder! Murder!

Enter Bastard [Edmund], Cornwall, Regan, Gloucester, Servants

EDMUND    How now, what’s the matter? Part!

KENT    With you, Goodman boy^39, if you please: come, I’ll

flesh ye^40: come on, young master.

GLOUCESTER    Weapons? Arms? What’s the matter here?

CORNWALL    Keep peace, upon your lives: he dies that strikes

again. What is the matter?

REGAN    The messengers from our sister and the king.

CORNWALL    What is your difference^45? Speak.

OSWALD    I am scarce in breath, my lord.

KENT    No marvel, you have so bestirred your valour^47. You

cowardly rascal, nature disclaims in thee: a tailor made thee^48.

CORNWALL    Thou art a strange fellow — a tailor make a man?

KENT    A tailor, sir: a stone-cutter or a painter could not

have made him so ill^51, though they had been but two years

o’th’trade.

CORNWALL    Speak yet, how grew your quarrel?

OSWALD    This ancient ruffian, sir, whose life I have spared at

suit of his grey beard^55—

KENT    Thou whoreson zed, thou unnecessary letter^56!— My

lord, if you will give me leave, I will tread this unbolted^57

villain into mortar and daub the wall of a jakes^58 with him.—

Spare my grey beard, you wagtail^59?

CORNWALL    Peace, sirrah!

You beastly^61 knave, know you no reverence?

KENT    Yes, sir, but anger hath a privilege^62.

CORNWALL    Why art thou angry?

KENT    That such a slave as this should wear a sword,

Who wears no honesty^65. Such smiling rogues as these,

Like rats, oft bite the holy cords a-twain^66

Which are too intrinse t’unloose, smooth^67 every passion

That in the natures of their lords rebel^68,

Being oil to fire^69, snow to the colder moods,

Revenge, affirm, and turn their halcyon beaks^70

With every gall and vary^71 of their masters,

Knowing naught, like dogs, but following.—

To Oswald

A plague upon your epileptic visage^73!

Smile you my speeches, as^74 I were a fool?

Goose, if I had you upon Sarum^75 plain,

I’d drive ye cackling home to Camelot^76.

CORNWALL    What, art thou mad, old fellow?

GLOUCESTER    How fell you out? Say that.

KENT    No contraries hold more antipathy

Than I and such a knave.

CORNWALL    Why dost thou call him knave? What is his fault?

KENT    His countenance likes^82 me not.

CORNWALL    No more, perchance, does mine, nor his, nor hers—

KENT    Sir, ’tis my occupation^84 to be plain:

I have seen better faces in my time

Than stands on any shoulder that I see

Before me at this instant.

CORNWALL    This is some fellow

Who, having been praised for bluntness, doth affect

A saucy roughness, and constrains the garb^90

Quite from his nature. He cannot flatter, he:

An honest mind and plain, he must speak truth!

An they will take it, so: if not, he’s plain^93.

These kind of knaves I know, which in this plainness

Harbour more craft and more corrupter^95 ends

Than twenty silly ducking observants^96

That stretch their duties nicely^97.

KENT    Sir, in good faith, in sincere verity^98,

Under th’allowance of your great aspect^99,

Whose influence^100, like the wreath of radiant fire

On flickering Phoebus’ front^101—

CORNWALL    What mean’st by this?

KENT    To go out of my dialect^103, which you discommend so

much. I know, sir, I am no flatterer: he that beguiled^104 you in a

plain accent was a plain knave, which for my part I will not

be, though I should win your displeasure to entreat me to’t^106.

To Oswald

CORNWALL    What was th’offence you gave him?

OSWALD    I never gave him any.

It pleased the king his master very late

To strike at me, upon his misconstruction^110:

When he, compact^111 and flattering his displeasure,

Tripped me behind, being^112 down, insulted, railed,

And put upon him such a deal of man^113

That worthied him^114, got praises of the king

For him attempting who was self-subdued^115:

And, in the fleshment of this dread exploit^116,

Drew on me here again.

KENT    None of these rogues and cowards^118

But Ajax is their fool.

CORNWALL    Fetch forth the stocks^120!—

You stubborn ancient knave, you reverent braggart^121,

We’ll teach you.

KENT    Sir, I am too old to learn.

Call not your stocks for me: I serve the king,

On whose employment I was sent to you:

You shall do small respects, show too bold malice^126

Against the grace^127 and person of my master,

Stocking his messenger.

CORNWALL    Fetch forth the stocks! As I have life and honour,

There shall he sit till noon.

REGAN    Till noon? Till night, my lord, and all night too.

KENT    Why, madam, if I were your father’s dog

You should not use^133 me so.

REGAN    Sir, being his knave, I will.

Stocks brought out

CORNWALL    This is a fellow of the self-same colour^135

Our sister speaks of. Come, bring away^136 the stocks!

GLOUCESTER    Let me beseech your grace not to do so:

The king his master needs must take it ill

That he so slightly valued in his messenger,

Should have him thus restrained.

CORNWALL    I’ll answer^141 that.

REGAN    My sister may receive it much more worse

To have her gentleman abused, assaulted.

Kent put in the stocks

CORNWALL    Come, my lord, away.

Exeunt. [Gloucester and Kent remain]

GLOUCESTER    I am sorry for thee, friend: ’tis the duke’s pleasure^145,

Whose disposition all the world well knows

Will not be rubbed^147 nor stopped. I’ll entreat for thee.

KENT    Pray do not, sir. I have watched^148 and travelled hard:

Some time I shall sleep out, the rest I’ll whistle.

A good man’s fortune may grow out at heels^150.

Give you good morrow^151.

GLOUCESTER    The duke’s to blame in this: ’twill be ill taken.

Exit

KENT    Good king, that must approve the common saw^153,

Thou out of heaven’s benediction com’st^154

To the warm sun.

Pulls out a letter

Approach, thou beacon to this under globe^156,

That by thy comfortable^157 beams I may

Peruse this letter. Nothing almost sees miracles^158

But misery. I know ’tis from Cordelia,

Who hath most fortunately been informed

Of my obscurèd course^161, and shall find time

From this enormous state^162, seeking to give

Losses their remedies. All weary and o’erwatched^163,

Take vantage^164, heavy eyes, not to behold

This shameful lodging.

Fortune, goodnight: smile once more, turn thy wheel^166!

Sleeps

Enter Edgar

EDGAR    I heard myself proclaimed^167,

And by the happy^168 hollow of a tree

Escaped the hunt. No port is free, no place

That guard and most unusual vigilance

Does not attend my taking^171. Whiles I may scape,

I will preserve myself, and am bethought^172

To take the basest and most poorest shape

That ever penury in contempt of man^174

Brought near to beast: my face I’ll grime with filth,

Blanket my loins, elf^176 all my hairs in knots,

And with presented^177 nakedness outface

The winds and persecutions of the sky.

The country gives me proof and precedent

Of Bedlam^180 beggars, who with roaring voices

Strike in their numbed and mortifièd^181 arms

Pins, wooden pricks^182, nails, sprigs of rosemary,

And with this horrible object, from low^183 farms,

Poor pelting^184 villages, sheepcotes, and mills,

Sometimes with lunatic bans^185, sometime with prayers,

Enforce their charity. Poor Turlygod, poor Tom^186!

That’s something yet: Edgar I nothing am^187.

Exit

Enter Lear, Fool and Gentleman

LEAR    ’Tis strange that they^188 should so depart from home

And not send back my messengers.

GENTLEMAN    As I learned,

The night before there was no purpose in them

Of this remove.

Wakes

KENT    Hail to thee, noble master!

LEAR    Ha? Mak’st thou this shame thy pastime?

KENT    No, my lord.

FOOL    Ha, ha, he wears cruel^196 garters. Horses are tied by

the heads, dogs and bears by th’neck, monkeys by th’loins,

and men by th’legs: when a man’s over-lusty at legs^198, then he

wears wooden nether-stocks^199.

LEAR    What’s he that hath so much thy place^200 mistook

To^201 set thee here?

KENT    It is both he and she:

Your son^203 and daughter.

LEAR    No.

KENT    Yes.

LEAR    No, I say.

KENT    I say, yea.

LEAR    By Jupiter, I swear, no.

KENT    By Juno^209, I swear, ay.

LEAR    They durst not do’t:

They could not, would not do’t: ’tis worse than murder

To do upon respect^212 such violent outrage.

Resolve me with all modest haste which way^213

Thou might’st deserve or they impose this usage^214,

Coming from us^215.

KENT    My lord, when at their home

I did commend^217 your highness’ letters to them,

Ere I was risen from the place that showed

My duty kneeling, came there a reeking post^219,

Stewed^220 in his haste, half breathless, panting forth

From Goneril his mistress salutations,

Delivered letters, spite of intermission^222,

Which presently^223 they read: on those contents

They summoned up their meiny, straight^224 took horse,

Commanded me to follow and attend^225

The leisure of their answer, gave me cold looks:

And meeting here the other messenger,

Whose welcome I perceived had poisoned mine —

Being the very fellow which of late

Displayed so saucily against^230 your highness —

Having more man than wit about me, drew^231.

He raised the house with loud and coward cries:

Your son and daughter found this trespass worth

The shame which here it suffers.

FOOL    Winter’s not gone yet if the wild geese fly that way^235.

Sings

Fathers that wear rags

Do make their children blind^237,

But fathers that bear bags^238

Shall see their children kind.

Fortune, that arrant^240 whore,

Ne’er turns the key^241 to th’poor.

But, for all this, thou shalt have as many dolours^242 for thy

daughters as thou canst tell^243 in a year.

LEAR    O, how this mother^244 swells up toward my heart!

Hysterica passio^245, down, thou climbing sorrow:

Thy element’s below^246!— Where is this daughter?

KENT    With the earl, sir, here within.

LEAR    Follow me not: stay here.

Exit

GENTLEMAN    Made you no more offence but what you speak of?

KENT    None. How chance the king comes with so small a

number?

FOOL    An thou had’st been set i’th’stocks for that

question, thou’dst well deserved it.

KENT    Why, fool?

FOOL    We’ll set thee to school to an ant to teach thee^255

there’s no labouring i’th’winter. All that follow their noses

are led by their eyes but blind men, and there’s not a nose

among twenty but can smell him that’s stinking^258. Let go thy

hold when a great wheel runs down a hill lest it break thy

neck with following: but the great one that goes upward, let

him draw thee after. When a wise man gives thee better

counsel, give me mine again^262: I would have none but knaves

follow it, since a fool gives it.

Sings

That sir^264 which serves and seeks for gain,

And follows but for form^265,

Will pack^266 when it begins to rain,

And leave thee in the storm.

But I will tarry, the fool will stay,

And let the wise man fly:

The knave turns fool that runs away,

The fool no knave, perdy^271.

Enter Lear and Gloucester

KENT    Where learned you this, fool?

FOOL    Not i’th’stocks, fool.

LEAR    Deny^274 to speak with me? They are sick, they are weary,

They have travelled all the night? Mere fetches^275,

The images of revolt and flying off^276.

Fetch me a better answer.

GLOUCESTER    My dear lord,

You know the fiery quality of the duke,

How unremovable and fixed he is

In his own course.

LEAR    Vengeance, plague, death, confusion^282!

Fiery? What quality? Why, Gloucester, Gloucester,

I’d speak with the Duke of Cornwall and his wife.

GLOUCESTER    Well, my good lord, I have informed them so.

LEAR    Informed them? Dost thou understand me, man?

GLOUCESTER    Ay, my good lord.

LEAR    The king would speak with Cornwall: the dear father

Would with his daughter speak, commands, tends^289, service.

Are they informed of this? My breath and blood!

Fiery? The fiery duke? Tell the hot duke that —

No, but not yet: maybe he is not well.

Infirmity doth still neglect all office^293

Whereto our health is bound: we are not ourselves

When nature, being oppressed^295, commands the mind

To suffer with the body. I’ll forbear,

And am fallen out with my more headier will^297,

To take the indisposed and sickly fit

Sees Kent

For the sound man. Death on my state^299! Wherefore

Should he sit here? This act persuades me

That this remotion^301 of the duke and her

Is practice only. Give me my servant forth^302.

Go tell the duke and’s^303 wife I’d speak with them,

Now, presently: bid them come forth and hear me,

Or at their chamber-door I’ll beat the drum

Till it cry sleep to death.

GLOUCESTER    I would have all well betwixt you.

Exit

LEAR    O me, my heart, my rising heart! But, down!

FOOL    Cry to it, nuncle, as the cockney^309 did to the eels when

she put ’em i’th’paste alive: she knapped ’em o’th’coxcombs^310

with a stick and cried ‘Down, wantons^311, down!’ ’Twas her

brother that, in pure kindness to his horse, buttered his hay^312.

Enter Cornwall, Regan, Gloucester, Servants

LEAR    Good morrow to you both.

CORNWALL    Hail to your grace!

Kent here set at liberty

REGAN    I am glad to see your highness.

LEAR    Regan, I think you are. I know what reason

I have to think so: if thou shouldst not be glad,

I would divorce me from thy mother’s tomb,

To Kent

Sepulch’ring an adult’ress^319.— O, are you free?

Some other time for that.— Belovèd Regan,

Thy sister’s naught^321: O Regan, she hath tied

Sharp-toothed unkindness, like a vulture^322, here.

Points to his heart

I can scarce speak to thee. Thou’lt not believe

With how depraved a quality — O Regan!

REGAN I pray you, sir, take patience: I have hope

You less know how to value her desert^326

Than she to scant her duty.

LEAR    Say? How is that?

REGAN    I cannot think my sister in the least

Would fail her obligation: if, sir, perchance

She have restrained the riots of your followers,

’Tis on such ground and to such wholesome end

As clears her from all blame.

LEAR    My curses on her!

REGAN    O, sir, you are old:

Nature in you stands on the very verge^336

Of her confine: you should be ruled and led

By some discretion that discerns your state^338

Better than you yourself. Therefore, I pray you,

That to our sister you do make return:

Say you have wronged her.

LEAR    Ask her forgiveness?

Do you but mark how this becomes the house^343:

Dear daughter, I confess that I am old;

Kneels

Age is unnecessary^345. On my knees I beg

That you’ll vouchsafe me raiment^346, bed and food.

REGAN    Good sir, no more: these are unsightly tricks:

Return you to my sister.

Rises

LEAR    Never, Regan:

She hath abated^350 me of half my train,

Looked black upon me, struck me with her tongue

Most serpent-like upon the very heart.

All the stored vengeances of heaven fall

On her ingrateful top^354! Strike her young bones,

You taking^355 airs, with lameness—

CORNWALL    Fie, sir, fie!

LEAR    You nimble lightnings, dart your blinding flames

Into her scornful eyes! Infect her beauty,

You fen-sucked fogs drawn by the powerful sun^359

To fall and blister!

REGAN    O the blest gods! So will you wish on me

When the rash mood is on.

LEAR    No, Regan, thou shalt never have my curse:

Thy tender-hafted^364 nature shall not give

Thee o’er to harshness. Her eyes are fierce, but thine

Do comfort and not burn. ’Tis not in thee

To grudge my pleasures, to cut off my train,

To bandy hasty words, to scant my sizes^368,

And, in conclusion, to oppose the bolt^369

Against my coming in: thou better know’st

The offices of nature^371, bond of childhood,

Effects^372 of courtesy, dues of gratitude:

Thy half o’th’kingdom hast thou not forgot,

Wherein I thee endowed.

Tucket within

REGAN    Good sir, to th’purpose^375.

LEAR    Who put my man i’th’stocks?

Enter Steward [Oswald]

CORNWALL    What trumpet’s that?

REGAN    I know’t my sister’s: this approves^378 her letter,

To Oswald

That she would soon be here.— Is your lady come?

LEAR    This is a slave, whose easy-borrowed^380 pride

Dwells in the sickly grace^381 of her he follows.—

Out, varlet, from my sight!

CORNWALL    What means your grace?

Enter Goneril

LEAR    Who stocked my servant? Regan, I have good hope

Thou didst not know on’t^385. Who comes here? O heavens,

If you do love old men, if your sweet sway^386

Allow^387 obedience, if you yourselves are old,

Make it your cause, send down, and take my part!—

To Goneril

Art not ashamed to look upon this beard^389?—

O Regan, will you take her by the hand?

Regan and Goneril join hands

GONERIL    Why not by th’hand, sir? How have I offended?

All’s not offence that indiscretion^392 finds

And dotage terms so.

LEAR    O sides^394, you are too tough!

Will you yet hold?— How came my man i’th’stocks?

CORNWALL    I set him there, sir: but his own disorders^396

Deserved much less advancement^397.

LEAR    You? Did you?

REGAN    I pray you, father, being weak, seem so.

If till the expiration of your month,

You will return and sojourn with my sister,

Dismissing half your train, come then to me:

I am now from home, and out of that provision

Which shall be needful for your entertainment^404.

LEAR    Return to her? And fifty men dismissed?

No, rather I abjure^406 all roofs, and choose

To wage against the enmity o’th’air^407,

To be a comrade with the wolf and owl,

Necessity’s^409 sharp pinch! Return with her?

Why, the hot-blooded France, that dowerless took

Our youngest born, I could as well be brought

To knee his throne and, squire-like, pension^412 beg

To keep base life afoot^413. Return with her?

Persuade me rather to be slave and sumpter^414

To this detested groom^415.

Points at Oswald

GONERIL    At your choice, sir.

LEAR    I prithee, daughter, do not make me mad.

I will not trouble thee, my child, farewell:

We’ll no more meet, no more see one another.

But yet thou art my flesh, my blood, my daughter —

Or rather a disease that’s in my flesh,

Which I must needs call mine: thou art a boil,

A plague-sore, or embossèd carbuncle^423,

In my corrupted blood^424. But I’ll not chide thee:

Let shame come when it will, I do not call it:

I do not bid the thunder-bearer shoot,

Nor tell tales of thee to high-judging Jove.

Mend^428 when thou canst, be better at thy leisure:

I can be patient, I can stay with Regan,

I and my hundred knights.

REGAN    Not altogether so:

I looked not for^432 you yet, nor am provided

For your fit welcome. Give ear, sir, to my sister,

For those that mingle reason with your passion^434

Must be content to think you old, and so —

But she knows what she does.

LEAR    Is this well spoken?

REGAN    I dare avouch^438 it, sir: what, fifty followers?

Is it not well? What should you need of more?

Yea, or so many, sith that both charge and danger^440

Speak gainst so great a number? How in one house

Should many people under two commands

Hold amity? ’Tis hard, almost impossible.

GONERIL    Why might not you, my lord, receive attendance

From those that she calls servants, or from mine?

REGAN    Why not, my lord? If then they chanced to slack ye^446,

We could control^447 them. If you will come to me —

For now I spy a danger — I entreat you

To bring but five-and-twenty: to no more

Will I give place or notice^450.

LEAR    I gave you all—

REGAN    And in good time you gave it^452.

LEAR    Made you my guardians, my depositaries^453,

But kept a reservation^454 to be followed

With such a number. What, must I come to you

With five-and-twenty? Regan, said you so?

REGAN    And speak’t again, my lord: no more with me.

LEAR    Those wicked creatures yet do look well-favoured^458

When others are more wicked: not being the worst

To Goneril

Stands in some rank of praise^460.— I’ll go with thee:

Thy fifty yet doth double five-and-twenty,

And thou art twice her love.

GONERIL    Hear me, my lord:

What need you five-and-twenty, ten, or five,

To follow in a house where twice so many

Have a command to tend you?

REGAN    What need one?

LEAR    O, reason not the need! Our basest beggars^468

Are in the poorest thing superfluous:

Allow not^470 nature more than nature needs,

Man’s life is cheap as beast’s. Thou art a lady;

If only to go warm were gorgeous^472,

Why, nature needs not what thou gorgeous wear’st^473,

Which scarcely keeps thee warm. But for true need —

You heavens, give me that patience, patience I need!

You see me here, you gods, a poor old man,

As full of grief as age, wretched in both.

If it be you that stirs these daughters’ hearts

Against their father, fool me not so much^479

To bear it tamely: touch me with noble anger,

And let not women’s weapons, water drops,

Stain my man’s cheeks! No, you unnatural hags,

I will have such revenges on you both,

That all the world shall — I will do such things —

What they are yet I know not, but they shall be

The terrors of the earth! You think I’ll weep:

No, I’ll not weep: I have full cause of weeping,

Storm and tempest

But this heart shall break into a hundred thousand flaws^488,

Or ere^489 I’ll weep. O fool, I shall go mad!

Exeunt [Lear, Gloucester, Kent and Fool]

CORNWALL    Let us withdraw: ’twill be a storm.

REGAN    This house is little: the old man and’s^491 people

Cannot be well bestowed^492.

GONERIL    ’Tis his own blame hath put himself from rest^493

And must needs taste his folly.

REGAN    For his particular^495, I’ll receive him gladly,

But not one follower.

GONERIL    So am I purposed.

Where is my lord of Gloucester?

Enter Gloucester

CORNWALL    Followed the old man forth: he is returned.

GLOUCESTER    The king is in high rage.

CORNWALL    Whither is he going?

GLOUCESTER    He calls to horse, but will^502 I know not whither.

CORNWALL    ’Tis best to give him way^503: he leads himself.

GONERIL    My lord, entreat him by no means to stay.

GLOUCESTER    Alack, the night comes on, and the high winds

Do sorely ruffle^506, for many miles about

There’s scarce a bush.

REGAN    O, sir, to wilful men

The injuries that they themselves procure^509

Must be their schoolmasters. Shut up your doors:

He is attended with a desperate train^511,

And what they may incense him to, being apt

To have his ear abused^513, wisdom bids fear.

CORNWALL    Shut up your doors, my lord, ’tis a wild night.

My Regan counsels well: come out o’th’storm.

Exeunt

Act 3 Scene 1

running scene 6

Storm still. Enter Kent and a Gentleman, severally^3

KENT    Who’s there, besides foul weather?

GENTLEMAN    One minded like the weather, most unquietly^2.

KENT    I know you. Where’s the king?

GENTLEMAN    Contending^4 with the fretful elements;

Bids the wind blow the earth into the sea

Or swell the curlèd waters ’bove the main^6,

That things might change or cease.

KENT    But who is with him?

GENTLEMAN    None but the fool, who labours to out-jest^9

His heart-struck injuries^10.

KENT    Sir, I do know you,

And dare, upon the warrant of my note^12

Commend a dear thing to you^13. There is division —

Although as yet the face of it is covered

With mutual cunning — ’twixt Albany and Cornwall,

Who have — as who have not, that their great stars^16

Throned and set high? — servants, who seem no less^17,

Which are to France the spies and speculations^18

Intelligent of^19 our state. What hath been seen,

Either in snuffs and packings^20 of the dukes,

Or the hard rein which both of them hath borne^21

Against the old kind king, or something deeper,

Whereof perchance these are but furnishings^23.

GENTLEMAN    I will talk further with you.

KENT    No, do not.

For confirmation that I am much more

Than my out-wall^27, open this purse and take

Gives a purse

What it contains. If you shall see Cordelia —

Gives a ring

As fear not but you shall — show her this ring,

And she will tell you who that fellow^30 is

That yet you do not know. Fie on this storm!

I will go seek the king.

GENTLEMAN    Give me your hand. Have you no more to say?

KENT    Few words, but, to effect^34, more than all yet:

That when we have found the king — in which your pain^35

That way, I’ll this — he that first lights on him

Holla^37 the other.

Exeunt [separately]

Act 3 Scene 2

running scene 6 continues

Storm still. Enter Lear and Fool

LEAR    Blow winds and crack your cheeks! Rage, blow,

You cataracts and hurricanoes^2, spout

Till you have drenched our steeples, drown the cocks^3!

You sulphurous and thought-executing fires^4,

Vaunt-couriers^5 of oak-cleaving thunderbolts,

Singe my white head! And thou, all-shaking thunder,

Strike flat the thick rotundity o’th’world!

Crack nature’s moulds, all germens^8 spill at once

That makes ingrateful man!

FOOL    O, nuncle, court holy-water^10 in a dry house is better

than this rain-water out o’door. Good nuncle, in, ask thy

daughters’ blessing: here’s a night pities neither wise men

nor fools.

LEAR    Rumble thy bellyful! Spit fire! Spout rain!

Nor rain, wind, thunder, fire, are my daughters.

I tax not you, you elements, with^16 unkindness:

I never gave you kingdom, called you children;

You owe me no subscription^18. Then let fall

Your horrible pleasure: here I stand, your slave,

A poor, infirm, weak and despised old man:

But yet I call you servile ministers^21,

That will with two pernicious^22 daughters join

Your high-engendered battles gainst a head^23

So old and white as this. O, ho, ’tis foul^24!

FOOL    He that has a house to put’s^25 head in has a good

head-piece^26:

Sings

The codpiece that will house^27

Before the head has any^28,

The head and he shall louse^29,

So beggars marry many^30.

The man that makes his toe^31

What he his heart should make

Shall of a corn^33 cry woe,

And turn his sleep to wake.

For there was never yet fair woman, but she made mouths^35

in a glass.

Enter Kent

Disguised as Caius

LEAR    No, I will be the pattern of all patience:

I will say nothing.

KENT    Who’s there?

FOOL    Marry, here’s grace and a codpiece^40: that’s a wise

man and a fool.

KENT    Alas, sir, are you here? Things that love night

Love not such nights as these: the wrathful skies

Gallow the very wanderers of the dark^44

And make them keep their caves. Since I was man,

Such sheets of fire, such bursts of horrid thunder,

Such groans of roaring wind and rain, I never

Remember to have heard: man’s nature cannot carry

Th’affliction nor the fear.

LEAR    Let the great gods,

That keep this dreadful pudder^51 o’er our heads,

Find out their enemies now. Tremble, thou wretch,

That hast within thee undivulgèd crimes

Unwhipped of^54 justice: hide thee, thou bloody hand,

Thou perjured, and thou simular^55 of virtue

That art incestuous: caitiff^56, to pieces shake,

That under covert and convenient seeming^57

Has practised on^58 man’s life: close pent-up guilts,

Rive your concealing continents and cry^59

These dreadful summoners grace. I am a man

More sinned against than sinning.

KENT    Alack, bare-headed?

Gracious my lord, hard by here is a hovel:

Some friendship will it lend you gainst the tempest.

Repose you there while I to this hard house^65 —

More harder than the stones whereof ’tis raised,

Which even but now, demanding^67 after you,

Denied me to come in — return and force

Their scanted^69 courtesy.

LEAR    My wits begin to turn.

Come on, my boy: how dost, my boy? Art cold?

I am cold myself.— Where is this straw, my fellow^72?

The art of our necessities is strange^73,

And can make vile things precious. Come, your hovel.—

Poor fool and knave, I have one part in my heart

That’s sorry yet for thee.

Sings

FOOL    He that has and a little tiny wit^77,

With hey, ho, the wind and the rain,

Must make content with his fortunes fit^79,

Though the rain it raineth every day.

LEAR    True, boy.— Come, bring us to this hovel.

Exeunt [Lear and Kent]

FOOL    This is a brave night to cool a courtesan^82.

I’ll speak a prophecy ere I go:

When priests are more in word than matter^84;

When brewers mar^85 their malt with water;

When nobles are their tailors’ tutors^86;

No heretics burned, but wenches’ suitors^87;

When every case in law is right^88;

No squire in debt, nor no poor knight;

When slanders do not live in tongues;

Nor cutpurses come not to throngs^91;

When usurers tell their gold i’th’field^92,

And bawds^93 and whores do churches build,

Then shall the realm of Albion^94

Come to great confusion^95:

Then comes the time, who^96 lives to see’t,

That going shall be used with feet^97.

This prophecy Merlin^98 shall make, for I live before his time.

Exit

Act 3 Scene 3

running scene 7

Carrying torches

Enter Gloucester and Edmund

GLOUCESTER    Alack, alack, Edmund, I like not this unnatural

dealing. When I desired their leave that I might pity^2 him,

they took from me the use of mine own house, charged me

on pain of perpetual displeasure neither to speak of him,

entreat for him, or any way sustain him.

EDMUND    Most savage and unnatural.

GLOUCESTER    Go to^7; say you nothing. There is division between

the dukes, and a worse matter than that. I have received a

letter this night — ’tis dangerous to be spoken — I have

locked the letter in my closet^10. These injuries the king now

bears will be revenged home; there is part of a power^11 already

footed. We must incline to the king: I will look^12 him and

privily relieve^13 him. Go you and maintain talk with the duke,

that my charity be not of^14 him perceived: if he ask for me, I

am ill and gone to bed: if I die for it — as no less is threatened

me — the king my old master must be relieved. There is

strange things toward^17, Edmund: pray you be careful.

Exit

EDMUND    This courtesy forbid thee^18 shall the duke

Instantly know, and of that letter too:

This seems a fair deserving^20 and must draw me

That which my father loses: no less than all.

The younger rises when the old doth fall.

Exit

Act 3 Scene 4

running scene 8

Enter Lear, Kent and Fool

Kent disguised as Caius

KENT    Here is the place, my lord. Good my lord, enter:

The tyranny of the open night’s too rough

For nature^3 to endure.

Storm still

LEAR    Let me alone.

KENT    Good my lord, enter here.

LEAR    Will’t break my heart?

KENT    I had rather break mine own. Good my lord, enter.

LEAR    Thou think’st ’tis much that this contentious storm

Invades us to the skin so: ’tis to thee,

But where the greater malady^10 is fixed

The lesser is scarce felt. Thou’dst shun a bear,

But if thy flight lay toward the roaring sea

Thou’dst meet the bear i’th’mouth. When the mind’s free^13,

The body’s delicate^14: the tempest in my mind

Doth from my senses take all feeling else

Save what beats there. Filial ingratitude!

Is it not as^17 this mouth should tear this hand

For lifting food to’t? But I will punish home^18.

No, I will weep no more. In such a night

To shut me out? Pour on, I will endure.

In such a night as this? O Regan, Goneril,

Your old kind father, whose frank^22 heart gave all —

O, that way madness lies: let me shun that:

No more of that.

KENT    Good my lord, enter here.

LEAR    Prithee go in thyself: seek thine own ease:

This tempest will not give me leave to ponder

On things would hurt me more. But I’ll go in.—

To the Fool

In, boy, go first.—

You houseless poverty—

Nay, get thee in.— I’ll pray, and then I’ll sleep.

Exit [Fool]

Kneels

Poor naked wretches, wheresoe’er you are,

That bide^32 the pelting of this pitiless storm,

How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides^33,

Your lopped and windowed^34 raggedness, defend you

From seasons such as these? O, I have ta’en

Too little care of this! Take physic, pomp^36,

Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,

That thou mayst shake the superflux^38 to them

And show the heavens more just.

Enter Edgar and Fool

Within the hovel

EDGAR    Fathom and half, fathom and half^40! Poor Tom!

FOOL    Come not in here, nuncle, here’s a spirit^41. Help me,

help me!

KENT    Give me thy hand. Who’s there?

FOOL    A spirit, a spirit: he says his name’s poor Tom.

KENT    What art thou that dost grumble^45 there i’th’straw?

Come forth.

Edgar comes out, disguised as a mad beggar

EDGAR    Away! The foul fiend follows me! Through the sharp

hawthorn blow the winds. Hum! Go to thy bed and warm

thee.

LEAR    Did’st thou give all to thy daughters? And art thou

come to this?

EDGAR    Who gives anything to poor Tom? Whom the foul^52

fiend hath led through fire and through flame, through ford

and whirlpool, o’er bog and quagmire, that hath laid knives^54

under his pillow, and halters in his pew, set ratsbane^55 by his

porridge, made him proud of heart, to ride on a bay^56 trotting-horse

over four-inched bridges, to course his own shadow for^57

a traitor. Bless thy five wits! Tom’s a-cold. O, do de, do de^58, do

de. Bless thee from whirlwinds, star-blasting and taking^59! Do

poor Tom some charity, whom the foul fiend vexes: there^60

could I have him now — and there — and there again, and

there.

Storm still

LEAR    Has his daughters brought him to this pass^63?

Couldst thou save nothing? Wouldst thou give ’em all?

FOOL    Nay, he reserved a blanket^65, else we had been all

shamed.

LEAR    Now, all the plagues that in the pendulous^67 air

Hang fated o’er men’s faults^68 light on thy daughters!

KENT    He hath no daughters, sir.

LEAR    Death, traitor! Nothing could have subdued nature^70

To such a lowness but his unkind daughters.

Is it the fashion that discarded fathers

Should have thus little mercy on their flesh^73?

Judicious punishment! ’Twas this flesh begot

Those pelican^75 daughters.

EDGAR    Pillicock sat on Pillicock-hill: alow, alow, loo, loo^76!

FOOL This cold night will turn us all to fools and madmen.

EDGAR Take heed o’th’foul fiend: obey^78 thy parents, keep thy

word’s justice, swear not, commit not^79 with man’s sworn

spouse, set not thy sweetheart on proud array^80. Tom’s a-cold.

LEAR    What hast thou been?

EDGAR A servingman, proud in heart and mind, that

curled my hair, wore gloves^83 in my cap, served the lust of my

mistress’ heart, and did the act of darkness with her: swore

as many oaths as I spake words, and broke them in the sweet

face of heaven: one that slept in^86 the contriving of lust, and

waked to do it: wine loved I dearly, dice^87 dearly, and in woman

out-paramoured the Turk: false of heart, light of ear^88, bloody

of hand: hog in sloth, fox in stealth, wolf in greediness, dog

in madness, lion in prey. Let not the creaking of shoes nor^90

the rustling of silks betray thy poor heart to woman: keep

thy foot out of brothels, thy hand out of plackets, thy pen^92

from lenders’ books, and defy the foul fiend. Still through the

hawthorn blows the cold wind, says suum, mun, nonny^94,

Dolphin my boy, boy sessa! Let him trot by^95.

Storm still

LEAR    Thou wert better in a grave than to answer^96 with thy

uncovered body this extremity of the skies. Is man no more

than this? Consider him well. Thou ow’st the worm no silk,

the beast no hide, the sheep no wool, the cat no perfume^99. Ha?

Here’s three on’s are sophisticated^100. Thou art the thing itself:

unaccommodated^101 man is no more but such a poor bare,

forked animal as thou art. Off, off, you lendings^102! Come,

unbutton here.

Tears off his clothes

Enter Gloucester with a torch

FOOL    Prithee, nuncle, be contented: ’tis a naughty^104 night

to swim in. Now a little fire in a wild field were like an old

lecher’s heart, a small spark, all the rest on’s body cold. Look,

here comes a walking fire^107.

EDGAR    This is the foul Flibbertigibbet: he begins at curfew^108

and walks till the first cock: he gives the web and the pin^109,

squints^110 the eye and makes the hare-lip, mildews the white

wheat, and hurts the poor creature of earth.

Chants?

Swithold footed thrice the old^112,

He met the nightmare and her nine-fold^113;

Bid her alight,

And her troth plight^115,

And, aroint^116 thee, witch, aroint thee!

KENT    How fares your grace?

LEAR    What’s^118 he?

KENT    Who’s there? What is’t you seek?

GLOUCESTER    What are you there? Your names?

EDGAR    Poor Tom, that eats the swimming frog, the toad,

the tadpole, the wall-newt and the water^122, that in the fury of

his heart, when the foul fiend rages, eats cow-dung for

salads, swallows the old rat and the ditch-dog^124, drinks the

green mantle of the standing pool, who is whipped^125 from

tithing^126 to tithing, and stocked, punished and imprisoned,

who hath had three suits to his back, six shirts^127 to his body:

Horse to ride, and weapon to wear,

But mice and rats and such small deer^129

Have been Tom’s food for seven long year.

Beware my follower. Peace, Smulkin^131, peace, thou fiend!

GLOUCESTER    What, hath your grace no better company?

EDGAR    The prince of darkness is a gentleman: Modo he’s^133

called, and Mahu.

To Lear

GLOUCESTER    Our flesh and blood, my lord, is grown so vile^135,

That it doth hate what gets^136 it.

EDGAR    Poor Tom’s a-cold.

GLOUCESTER    Go in with me: my duty cannot suffer

T’obey in all your daughters’ hard commands:

Though their injunction be to bar my doors

And let this tyrannous night take hold upon you,

Yet have I ventured to come seek you out

And bring you where both fire and food is ready.

LEAR    First let me talk with this philosopher.—

To Edgar

What is the cause of thunder?

KENT    Good my lord, take his offer: go into th’house.

LEAR    I’ll talk a word with this same learnèd Theban^147.—

To Edgar

What is your study?

EDGAR    How to prevent^149 the fiend and to kill vermin.

They talk apart

LEAR    Let me ask you one word in private.

To Gloucester

KENT    Importune^151 him once more to go, my lord:

His wits begin t’unsettle^152.

GLOUCESTER    Canst thou blame him?

Storm still

His daughters seek his death. Ah, that good Kent!

He said it would be thus, poor banished man!

Thou sayest the king grows mad: I’ll tell thee, friend,

I am almost mad myself. I had a son,

Now outlawed from my blood^158: he sought my life

But lately, very late. I loved him, friend:

No father his son dearer. True to tell thee,

The grief hath crazed my wits. What a night’s this!—

To Lear

I do beseech your grace—

LEAR    O, cry you mercy^163, sir.—

To Edgar

Noble philosopher, your company.

EDGAR    Tom’s a-cold.

To Edgar

GLOUCESTER    In, fellow, there, into th’hovel: keep thee warm.

LEAR    Come let’s in all.

KENT    This way, my lord.

LEAR    With him;

I will keep still^170 with my philosopher.

To Gloucester

KENT    Good my lord, soothe^171 him: let him take the fellow.

To Kent

GLOUCESTER    Take him you on^172.

To Edgar

KENT    Sirrah, come on: go along with us.

LEAR    Come, good Athenian^174.

GLOUCESTER    No words, no words: hush.

EDGAR    Child Rowland to the dark tower came^176,

His word was still: fie, foh and fum,177

I smell the blood of a British man.

Exeunt

Act 3 Scene 5

running scene 9

Enter Cornwall and Edmund

CORNWALL    I will have my revenge ere I depart his^1 house.

EDMUND    How, my lord, I may be censured, that nature^2 thus

gives way to loyalty, something fears^3 me to think of.

CORNWALL    I now perceive it was not altogether your brother’s

evil disposition made him seek his death, but a provoking^5

merit set a-work by a reprovable badness in himself.

EDMUND    How malicious is my fortune — that I must repent

to be^8 just! This is the letter which he spoke of Shows a letter

which approves him an intelligent party^9 to the advantages of

France. O heavens! That this treason were not, or not I the

detector!

CORNWALL    Go with me to the duchess.

EDMUND    If the matter of this paper be certain, you have

mighty business in hand.

CORNWALL    True or false, it hath made thee Earl of Gloucester.

Seek out where thy father is, that he may be ready for our

apprehension^17.

Aside

EDMUND    If I find him comforting the king, it will stuff

his suspicion^19 more fully.— I will persevere in my course of

loyalty, though the conflict be sore between that and my

blood.

CORNWALL    I will lay trust upon thee, and thou shalt find a dear

father in my love.

Exeunt

Act 3 Scene 6

running scene 10

Enter Kent and Gloucester

GLOUCESTER    Here is better than the open air, take it thankfully. I

will piece out^2 the comfort with what addition I can: I will not

be long from you.

Exit

KENT    All the power of his wits have given way to his

impatience^5: the gods reward your kindness!

Enter Lear, Edgar and Fool

Edgar disguised as Poor Tom

EDGAR    Frateretto calls me, and tells me Nero is an angler^6 in

the lake of darkness^7. Pray, innocent, and beware the foul

fiend.

FOOL    Prithee, nuncle, tell me whether a madman be a

gentleman or a yeoman^10?

LEAR    A king, a king!

FOOL    No, he’s a yeoman that has a gentleman to^12 his son,

for he’s a mad^13 yeoman that sees his son a gentleman before

him.

LEAR To have a thousand^15 with red burning spits

Come hizzing in upon ’em^16—

EDGAR    Bless thy five wits!

KENT    O pity! Sir, where is the patience now

That you so oft have boasted to retain?

Aside

EDGAR    My tears begin to take his part so much

They mar my counterfeiting^21.

LEAR     The little dogs and all,

Trey, Blanch and Sweetheart^23, see, they bark at me.

EDGAR   Tom will throw his head at them. Avaunt^24, you curs!

Be thy mouth or black or^25 white,

Tooth that poisons^26 if it bite,

Mastiff, greyhound, mongrel grim^27,

Hound or spaniel, brach or him^28,

Or bobtail tyke or trundle-tail^29,

Tom will make him weep and wail:

For, with throwing thus my head,

Dogs leapt the hatch^32, and all are fled.

Do de, de, de. Sessa! Come, march to wakes^33 and fairs and

market towns. Poor Tom, thy horn^34 is dry.

LEAR    Then let them anatomize^35 Regan: see what breeds

about her heart. Is there any cause in nature that make

To Edgar

these hard hearts?— You, sir, I entertain^37 for one of

my hundred; only I do not like the fashion of your garments:

you will say they are Persian^39; but let them be changed.

Enter Gloucester

At a distance

KENT    Now, good my lord, lie here and rest awhile.

LEAR    Make no noise, make no noise: draw the curtains^41.

So, so, we’ll go to supper i’th’morning.

Sleeps

FOOL    And I’ll go to bed at noon.

To Kent

GLOUCESTER    Come hither, friend: where is the king my master?

KENT    Here, sir, but trouble him not: his wits are gone.

GLOUCESTER    Good friend, I prithee take him in thy arms;

I have o’erheard a plot of death upon him:

There is a litter^48 ready, lay him in’t

And drive toward Dover^49, friend, where thou shalt meet

Both welcome and protection. Take up thy master:

If thou shouldst dally half an hour, his life,

With thine and all that offer to defend him,

Stand in assurèd loss. Take up, take up,

They carry Lear

And follow me, that will to some provision^54

Give thee quick conduct. Come, come, away.

Exeunt

Act 3 Scene 7

running scene 11

Enter Cornwall, Regan, Goneril, Bastard [Edmund] and Servants

To Goneril

CORNWALL    Post^1 speedily to my lord your husband;

Gives a letter

show him this letter: the army of France is

landed.— Seek out the traitor Gloucester.

[Exeunt some Servants]

REGAN    Hang him instantly.

GONERIL    Pluck out his eyes.

CORNWALL    Leave him to my displeasure. Edmund, keep you our

sister^7 company: the revenges we are bound to take upon

your traitorous father are not fit for your beholding. Advise^8

the duke where you are going, to a most festinate^9

preparation: we are bound to the like. Our posts^10 shall be swift

and intelligent^11 betwixt us. Farewell, dear sister: farewell, my

lord of Gloucester^12.

Enter Oswald

How now? Where’s the king?

OSWALD    My lord of Gloucester hath conveyed him hence:

Some five- or six-and-thirty of his knights,

Hot questrists^17 after him, met him at gate,

Who, with some other of the lord’s^18 dependants,

Are gone with him toward Dover, where they boast

To have well-armèd friends.

CORNWALL    Get horses for your mistress.

GONERIL    Farewell, sweet lord, and sister.

Exeunt [Goneril, Edmund and Oswald]

CORNWALL    Edmund, farewell.—

Go seek the traitor Gloucester,

Pinion him^25 like a thief, bring him before us.

[Exeunt other Servants]

Though well we may not pass upon his life^26

Without the form of justice, yet our power

Shall do a court’sy^28 to our wrath, which men

May blame but not control.

Enter Gloucester and Servants

Who’s there? The traitor?

REGAN    Ingrateful fox! ’Tis he.

CORNWALL    Bind fast his corky^31 arms.

GLOUCESTER    What means your graces?

Good my friends, consider you are my guests:

Do me no foul play, friends.

CORNWALL    Bind him, I say.

Servants bind him

REGAN    Hard, hard. O, filthy traitor!

GLOUCESTER    Unmerciful lady as you are, I’m none.

CORNWALL    To this chair bind him.— Villain, thou shalt find—

Regan plucks his beard

GLOUCESTER    By the kind gods, ’tis most ignobly done

To pluck me by the beard.

REGAN    So white^41, and such a traitor?

GLOUCESTER    Naughty^42 lady,

These hairs which thou dost ravish^43 from my chin

Will quicken^44 and accuse thee. I am your host:

With robbers’ hands my hospitable favours^45

You should not ruffle^46 thus. What will you do?

CORNWALL    Come, sir, what letters had you late from France?

REGAN    Be simple answered^48, for we know the truth.

CORNWALL    And what confederacy have you with the traitors

Late footed^50 in the kingdom?

REGAN    To whose hands you have sent the lunatic king? Speak.

GLOUCESTER    I have a letter guessingly^52 set down,

Which came from one that’s of a neutral heart,

And not from one opposed^54.

CORNWALL    Cunning.

REGAN    And false.

CORNWALL    Where hast thou sent the king?

GLOUCESTER    To Dover.

REGAN    Wherefore to Dover? Wast thou not charged at peril^59—

CORNWALL    Wherefore to Dover? Let him answer that.

GLOUCESTER    I am tied to th’stake and I must stand the course^61.

REGAN    Wherefore to Dover?

GLOUCESTER    Because I would not see thy cruel nails

Pluck out his poor old eyes, nor thy fierce sister

In his anointed^65 flesh stick boarish fangs.

The sea, with such a storm as his bare head

In hell-black night endured, would have buoyed^67 up

And quenched the stellèd^68 fires:

Yet, poor old heart, he holp the heavens to rain^69.

If wolves had at thy gate howled that stern^70 time,

Thou shouldst have said ‘Good porter, turn the key^71.’

All cruels else subscribe^72: but I shall see

The wingèd vengeance^73 overtake such children.

CORNWALL    See’t shalt thou never. Fellows^74, hold the chair.—

Upon these eyes of thine I’ll set my foot.

GLOUCESTER    He that will think to live till he be old,

Cornwall grinds out his eye

Give me some help! O cruel! O you gods!

REGAN    One side will mock another: th’other too.

CORNWALL    If you see vengeance—

SERVANT    Hold your hand, my lord:

I have served you ever since I was a child,

But better service have I never done you

Than now to bid you hold.

REGAN    How now, you dog?

To Regan

SERVANT    If you did wear a beard upon your chin,

I’d shake it on this quarrel.— What do you mean^86?

They draw and fight

CORNWALL    My villain^87?

SERVANT    Nay, then, come on, and take the chance of anger^88.

To a Servant

REGAN    Give me thy sword. A peasant stand up thus?

Kills him

SERVANT    O, I am slain! My lord, you have one eye left

To see some mischief on him^91. O!

Dies

CORNWALL    Lest it see more, prevent it. Out, vile jelly!

Puts out

Gloucester’s other eye

Where is thy lustre now?

GLOUCESTER    All dark and comfortless. Where’s my son Edmund?

Edmund, enkindle all the sparks of nature^95

To quit^96 this horrid act.

REGAN    Out^97, treacherous villain!

Thou call’st on him that hates thee: it was he

That made the overture^99 of thy treasons to us,

Who is too good to pity thee.

GLOUCESTER    O, my follies! Then Edgar was abused^101.

Kind gods, forgive me that, and prosper him!

REGAN    Go thrust him out at gates, and let him smell

His way to Dover.

Exit [a Servant] with Gloucester

How is’t, my lord? How look you?105

CORNWALL    I have received a hurt: follow me, lady.—

Turn out that eyeless villain: throw this slave

Upon the dunghill.— Regan, I bleed apace^108:

Untimely^109 comes this hurt. Give me your arm.

Exeunt

Act 4 Scene 1

running scene 12

Enter Edgar Disguised as Poor Tom

EDGAR    Yet better thus, and known to be contemned^1,

Than still contemned and flattered^2. To be worst,

The lowest and most dejected thing of fortune,

Stands still in esperance^4, lives not in fear:

The lamentable change is from the best^5,

The worst returns to laughter. Welcome, then,

Thou unsubstantial air that I embrace!

The wretch that thou hast blown unto the worst

Owes nothing to thy blasts.

Enter Gloucester and an Old Man

But who comes here? My father, poorly led^10?

World, world, O world!

But that thy strange mutations^12 make us hate thee,

Life would not yield to age^13.

OLD MAN    O, my good lord, I have been your tenant and your

father’s tenant these fourscore^15 years.

GLOUCESTER    Away, get thee away! Good friend, be gone:

Thy comforts can do me no good at all,

Thee they may hurt^18.

OLD MAN    You cannot see your way.

GLOUCESTER    I have no way and therefore want no eyes:

I stumbled when I saw. Full oft ’tis seen

Our means secure us, and our mere defects^22

Prove our commodities^23. O dear son Edgar,

The food of thy abusèd^24 father’s wrath!

Might I but live to see thee in my touch,

I’d say I had eyes again!

OLD MAN    How now? Who’s there?

Aside

EDGAR    O gods! Who is’t can say, ‘I am at the worst’?

I am worse than e’er I was.

OLD MAN    ’Tis poor mad Tom.

Aside

EDGAR    And worse I may be yet: the worst is not^31

So long as we can say ‘This is the worst.’

OLD MAN    Fellow, where goest?

GLOUCESTER    Is it a beggar-man?

OLD MAN    Madman and beggar too.

GLOUCESTER    He has some reason^36, else he could not beg.

I’th’last night’s storm I such a fellow saw,

Which made me think a man a worm: my son

Came then into my mind and yet my mind

Was then scarce friends with him. I have heard more since.

As flies to wanton^41 boys are we to th’gods:

They kill us for their sport.

Aside

EDGAR    How should this be?

Bad is the trade^44 that must play fool to sorrow,

Ang’ring itself and others.— Bless thee, master!

GLOUCESTER    Is that the naked fellow?

OLD MAN    Ay, my lord.

GLOUCESTER    Get thee away: if for my sake

Thou wilt o’ertake us hence a mile or twain

I’th’way toward Dover, do it for ancient love^50,

And bring some covering for this naked soul,

Which I’ll entreat to lead me.

OLD MAN    Alack, sir, he is mad.

GLOUCESTER    ’Tis the time’s plague^54, when madmen lead the blind.

Do as I bid thee, or rather do thy pleasure:

Above the rest^56, be gone.

OLD MAN    I’ll bring him the best ’pparel^57 that I have,

Come on’t what will^58.

Exit

GLOUCESTER    Sirrah, naked fellow—

Aside

EDGAR    Poor Tom’s a-cold.— I cannot daub it^60 further.

GLOUCESTER    Come hither, fellow.

Aside

EDGAR    And yet I must.— Bless thy sweet eyes, they bleed.

GLOUCESTER    Know’st thou the way to Dover?

EDGAR    Both stile and gate, horseway and footpath. Poor

Tom hath been scared out of his good wits: bless thee, good

man’s son, from the foul fiend!

GLOUCESTER    Here, take this purse, thou whom the heav’ns’ plagues

Gives a purse

Have humbled to all strokes^68: that I am wretched

Makes thee the happier^69: heavens, deal so still.

Let the superfluous and lust-dieted^70 man,

That slaves your ordinance^71, that will not see

Because he does not feel, feel your pow’r quickly^72,

So distribution should undo excess,

And each man have enough. Dost thou know Dover?

EDGAR    Ay, master.

GLOUCESTER    There is a cliff, whose high and bending^76 head

Looks fearfully in the confinèd^77 deep:

Bring me but to the very brim^78 of it

And I’ll repair the misery thou dost bear

With something rich about me^80: from that place

I shall no leading need.

EDGAR    Give me thy arm:

Poor Tom shall lead thee.

Exeunt

Act 4 Scene 2

running scene 13

Enter Goneril, Bastard [Edmund] and Steward [Oswald]

GONERIL    Welcome, my lord^1: I marvel our mild husband

Not met us on the way.— Now, where’s your master?

OSWALD    Madam, within, but never man so changed.

I told him of the army^4 that was landed,

He smiled at it: I told him you were coming,

His answer was ‘The worse’: of Gloucester’s treachery

And of the loyal service of his son

When I informed him, then he called me ‘sot’8

And told me I had turned the wrong side out^9.

What most he should dislike seems pleasant to him;

What like, offensive.

To Edmund

GONERIL    Then shall you go no further.

It is the cowish^13 terror of his spirit,

That dares not undertake^14: he’ll not feel wrongs

Which tie him to an answer. Our wishes on the way^15

May prove effects. Back, Edmund, to my brother^16:

Hasten his musters and conduct his powers^17.

I must change names at home and give the distaff^18

Into my husband’s hands. This trusty servant

Shall pass between us: ere long you are like^20 to hear —

If you dare venture in your own behalf —

A mistress’s^22 command. Wear this; spare speech.

Gives a favor

Decline your head: this kiss, if it durst speak,

Kisses him

Would stretch thy spirits^24 up into the air.

Conceive^25, and fare thee well.

EDMUND    Yours in the ranks of death^26.

Exit

GONERIL    My most dear Gloucester!

O, the difference of man and man!

To thee a woman’s services^29 are due:

My fool usurps^30 my body.

OSWALD    Madam, here comes my lord.

Exit

Enter Albany

GONERIL    I have been worth the whistle^32.

ALBANY    O Goneril,33

You are not worth the dust which the rude^34 wind

Blows in your face.

GONERIL    Milk-livered^36 man,

That bear’st a cheek for blows, a head for wrongs,

Who hast not in thy brows an eye discerning^38

Thine honour from thy suffering.

ALBANY    See thyself, devil!

Proper deformity seems not in the fiend^41

So horrid as in woman.

GONERIL    O vain^43 fool!

Enter a Messenger

MESSENGER    O, my good lord, the Duke of Cornwall’s dead,

Slain by his servant, going to put out

The other eye of Gloucester.

ALBANY    Gloucester’s eyes?

MESSENGER    A servant that he bred, thrilled with remorse^48,

Opposed against the act, bending^49 his sword

To his great master, who, threat-enraged^50,

Flew on him and amongst them felled him dead,

But not without that harmful stroke which since

Hath plucked him after^53.

ALBANY    This shows you are above,

You justices, that these our nether^55 crimes

So speedily can venge^56. But, O, poor Gloucester!

Lost he his other eye?

MESSENGER    Both, both, my lord.—

Gives a letter

This letter, madam, craves a speedy answer:

’Tis from your sister.

Aside

GONERIL    One way I like this well:

But being widow, and my Gloucester with her,

May all the building in my fancy pluck^63

Upon my hateful life: another way,

The news is not so tart^65.— I’ll read, and answer.

[Exit]

ALBANY    Where was his son when they did take his eyes?

MESSENGER    Come with my lady hither.

ALBANY    He is not here.

MESSENGER    No, my good lord, I met him back^69 again.

ALBANY    Knows he the wickedness?

MESSENGER    Ay, my good lord: ’twas he informed against him,

And quit the house on purpose that their punishment

Might have the freer course.

ALBANY    Gloucester, I live

To thank thee for the love thou showed’st the king

And to revenge thine eyes.— Come hither, friend:

Tell me what more thou know’st.

Exeunt

Act 4 Scene 3

running scene 14

Enter with Drum and Colours Cordelia, Gentleman and Soldiers

CORDELIA    Alack, ’tis he: why, he was met even now

As mad as the vexed^2 sea, singing aloud,

Crowned with rank fumiter and furrow weeds^3,

With burdocks, hemlock, nettles, cuckoo-flowers^4,

Darnel, and all the idle^5 weeds that grow

In our sustaining corn. A sentry send forth;

Search every acre in the high-grown field

And bring him to our eye.—

[Exit a Soldier]

What can man’s wisdom^8

In the restoring his bereavèd^9 sense?

He that helps him take all my outward worth^10.

GENTLEMAN    There is means, madam:

Our foster-nurse of nature is repose^12,

The which he lacks: that to provoke in him^13

Are many simples operative, whose power

Will close the eye of anguish.

CORDELIA    All blest secrets,

All you unpublished virtues^17 of the earth,

Spring with my tears! Be aidant and remediate^18

In the good man’s distress! Seek, seek for him,

Lest his ungoverned rage^20 dissolve the life

That wants the means^21 to lead it.

Enter Messenger

MESSENGER    News, madam:

The British powers are marching hitherward.

CORDELIA    ’Tis known before: our preparation^24 stands

In expectation of them. O dear father,

It is thy business that I go about:

Therefore great France^27

My mourning and importuned^28 tears hath pitied.

No blown^29 ambition doth our arms incite,

But love, dear love, and our aged father’s right:

Soon may I hear and see him!

Exeunt

Act 4 Scene 4

running scene 15

Enter Regan and Steward [Oswald]

REGAN    But are my brother’s powers set forth?

OSWALD    Ay, madam.

REGAN    Himself in person there?

OSWALD    Madam, with much ado^4:

Your sister is the better soldier.

REGAN    Lord Edmund spake not with your lord at home?

OSWALD    No, madam.

REGAN    What might import^8 my sister’s letter to him?

OSWALD    I know not, lady.

REGAN    Faith, he is posted^10 hence on serious matter.

It was great ignorance^11, Gloucester’s eyes being out,

To let him live: where he arrives he moves

All hearts against us. Edmund, I think, is gone,

In pity of his misery, to dispatch

His nighted life: moreover, to descry^15

The strength o’th’enemy.

OSWALD    I must needs after^17 him, madam, with my letter.

REGAN    Our troops set forth tomorrow. Stay with us:

The ways^19 are dangerous.

OSWALD    I may not, madam:

My lady charged my duty^21 in this business.

REGAN    Why should she write to Edmund? Might not you

Transport her purposes by word? Belike^23,

Some things I know not what. I’ll love thee^24 much,

Let me unseal the letter.

OSWALD    Madam, I had rather—

REGAN    I know your lady does not love her husband,

I am sure of that: and at her late being here

She gave strange oeillades and most speaking^29 looks

To noble Edmund. I know you are of her bosom^30.

OSWALD    I, madam?

REGAN    I speak in understanding. Y’are^32, I know’t.

Therefore I do advise you, take this note^33.

My lord is dead: Edmund and I have talked,

And more convenient^35 is he for my hand

Than for your lady’s: you may gather more^36.

If you do find him, pray you give him this,

Gives a token or a letter

And when your mistress hears thus much from you,

I pray desire her call her wisdom to her^39.

So, fare you well.

If you do chance to hear of that blind traitor,

Preferment falls on him that cuts him off.

OSWALD    Would I could meet^43, madam, I should show

What party I do follow.

REGAN    Fare thee well.

Exeunt

Act 4 Scene 5

running scene 16

Enter Gloucester and Edgar

Edgar dressed like a peasant

GLOUCESTER    When shall I come to th’top of that same hill^1?

EDGAR    You do climb up it now: look how we labour.

GLOUCESTER    Methinks the ground is even.

EDGAR    Horrible steep.

Hark, do you hear the sea?

GLOUCESTER    No, truly.

EDGAR    Why, then, your other senses grow imperfect

By your eyes’ anguish.

GLOUCESTER    So may it be, indeed:

Methinks thy voice is altered and thou speak’st

In better phrase and matter^11 than thou didst.

EDGAR    You’re much deceived: in nothing am I changed

But in my garments.

GLOUCESTER    Methinks you’re better spoken.

EDGAR    Come on, sir, here’s the place: stand still. How fearful

And dizzy ’tis to cast one’s eyes so low!

The crows and choughs that wing the midway^17 air

Show scarce so gross^18 as beetles: halfway down

Hangs one that gathers samphire^19, dreadful trade!

Methinks he seems no bigger than his head.

The fishermen that walk upon the beach

Appear like mice, and yond tall anchoring bark^22

Diminished to her cock^23, her cock, a buoy

Almost too small for sight. The murmuring surge,

That on th’unnumbered idle pebble^25 chafes,

Cannot be heard so high. I’ll look no more,

Lest my brain turn and the deficient^27 sight

Topple^28 down headlong.

GLOUCESTER    Set me where you stand.

EDGAR    Give me your hand: you are now within a foot

Of th’extreme verge: for all beneath the moon

Would I not leap upright^32.

GLOUCESTER    Let go my hand.

Here, friend’s^34 another purse: in it a jewel

Gives a purse

Well worth a poor man’s taking: fairies and gods

Prosper it^36 with thee! Go thou further off:

Bid me farewell, and let me hear thee going.

EDGAR    Now fare ye well, good sir.

GLOUCESTER    With all my heart.

Aside

EDGAR    Why I do trifle^40 thus with his despair

Is done to cure it.

Kneels

GLOUCESTER    O you mighty gods!

This world I do renounce, and in your sights

Shake patiently my great affliction off:

If I could bear it longer, and not fall

To quarrel with your great opposeless^46 wills,

My snuff and loathèd part of nature^47 should

Burn itself out. If Edgar live, O, bless him!—

Now, fellow, fare thee well.

He falls forward

EDGAR    Gone, sir: farewell.—

Aside

And yet I know not how conceit^51 may rob

The treasury of life, when life itself

Yields^53 to the theft: had he been where he thought,

By this^54 had thought been past. Alive or dead?—

Ho, you sir! Friend! Hear you, sir! Speak!—

Aside

Thus might he pass^56 indeed: yet he revives.—

What^57 are you, sir?

GLOUCESTER    Away, and let me die.

EDGAR    Hadst thou been aught^59 but gossamer, feathers, air —

So many fathom down precipitating^60 —

Thou’dst shivered^61 like an egg: but thou dost breathe,

Hast heavy substance, bleed’st not, speak’st, art sound.

Ten masts at each^63 make not the altitude

Which thou hast perpendicularly fell:

Thy life’s a miracle. Speak yet again.

GLOUCESTER    But have I fall’n or no?

EDGAR    From the dread summit of this chalky bourn^67.

Look up a-height: the shrill-gorged^68 lark so far

Cannot be seen or heard: do but look up.

GLOUCESTER    Alack, I have no eyes.

Is wretchedness deprived that benefit,

To end itself by death? ’Twas yet some comfort

When misery could beguile^73 the tyrant’s rage

And frustrate his proud will.

EDGAR    Give me your arm.

Helps him up

Up, so. How is’t? Feel you your legs? You stand.

GLOUCESTER    Too well, too well.

EDGAR    This is above all strangeness.

Upon the crown o’th’cliff what thing was that

Which parted from you?

GLOUCESTER    A poor unfortunate beggar.

EDGAR    As I stood here below, methought his eyes

Were two full moons: he had a thousand noses,

Horns whelked^84 and waved like the enragèd sea.

It was some fiend: therefore, thou happy father^85,

Think that the clearest gods, who make them honours^86

Of men’s impossibilities, have preserved thee.

GLOUCESTER    I do remember now: henceforth I’ll bear

Affliction till it do cry out itself

‘Enough, enough’ and die. That thing you speak of,

I took it for a man: often ’twould say

‘The fiend, the fiend’: he led me to that place.

EDGAR    Bear free^93 and patient thoughts.

Enter Lear

Dressed with weeds

But who comes here?

The safer sense will ne’er accommodate^94

His master thus.

LEAR    No, they cannot touch^96 me for crying: I am the king

himself.

EDGAR    O thou side-piercing sight!

LEAR    Nature’s above art in that respect. There’s your

press-money. That fellow handles his bow like a crow-keeper^100.

Draw me a clothier’s yard^101. Look, look, a mouse! Peace, peace,

this piece of toasted cheese will do’t. There’s my gauntlet^102: I’ll

prove it on a giant. Bring up the brown bills. O, well flown,103

bird! I’th’clout, i’th’clout: hewgh! Give the word^104.

EDGAR    Sweet marjoram^105.

LEAR    Pass.

GLOUCESTER    I know that voice.

LEAR    Ha? Goneril with a white beard? They flattered me

like a dog and told me I had the white hairs in my beard ere^109

the black ones were there. To say ‘Ay’ and ‘No’ to everything

that I said ‘Ay’ and ‘No’ to was no good divinity^111. When the

rain came^112 to wet me once and the wind to make me chatter,

when the thunder would not peace^113 at my bidding, there I

found ’em, there I smelt ’em out. Go to, they are not men

o’their words: they told me I was everything: ’tis a lie, I am

not ague-proof^116.

GLOUCESTER    The trick^117 of that voice I do well remember:

Is’t not the king?

LEAR    Ay, every inch a king.

When I do stare, see how the subject quakes.

I pardon that man’s life. What was thy cause^121?

Adultery?

Thou shalt not die: die for adultery? No.

The wren goes to’t^124 and the small gilded fly

Does lecher^125 in my sight. Let copulation thrive,

For Gloucester’s bastard son was kinder to his father

Than were my daughters got^127 ’tween the lawful sheets.

To’t, luxury, pell-mell, for I lack soldiers^128.

Behold yond simp’ring dame,

Whose face between her forks presages snow^130,

That minces virtue and does shake the head^131

To hear of pleasure’s name:

The fitchew nor the soilèd^133 horse goes to’t

With a more riotous^134 appetite. Down from the waist

They are centaurs^135, though women all above:

But to the girdle do the gods inherit^136,

Beneath is all the fiends’:

There’s hell, there’s darkness, there is the sulphurous^138 pit:

burning, scalding, stench, consumption^139. Fie, fie, fie! Pah,

pah! Give me an ounce of civet, good apothecary^140, sweeten

my imagination: there’s money for thee.

GLOUCESTER    O, let me kiss that hand!

LEAR    Let me wipe it first: it smells of mortality^143.

GLOUCESTER    O, ruined piece of nature! This great world

Shall so^145 wear out to nought. Dost thou know me?

LEAR    I remember thine eyes well enough. Dost thou

squinny at me? No, do thy worst, blind Cupid^147: I’ll not love.

Read thou this challenge, mark but the penning^148 of it.

GLOUCESTER    Were all thy letters suns, I could not see.

Aside

EDGAR    I would not take this from report^150: it is,

And my heart breaks at it.

LEAR    Read.

GLOUCESTER    What, with the case^153 of eyes?

LEAR O, ho, are you there with me? No eyes in your head,

nor no money in your purse? Your eyes are in a heavy case^155,

your purse in a light, yet you see how this world goes.

GLOUCESTER    I see it feelingly^157.

LEAR    What, art mad? A man may see how this world goes

with no eyes. Look with thine ears: see how yond justice^159 rails

upon yond simple^160 thief. Hark, in thine ear: change places,

and handy-dandy^161, which is the justice, which is the thief?

Thou hast seen a farmer’s dog bark at a beggar?

GLOUCESTER    Ay, sir.

LEAR    And the creature run from the cur? There thou

mightst behold the great image of authority: a dog’s obeyed^165

in office.

Thou rascal beadle^167, hold thy bloody hand!

Why dost thou lash that whore? Strip thy own back:

Thou hotly lusts to use her in that kind^169

For which thou whip’st her. The usurer hangs the cozener^170.

Through tattered clothes great vices do appear:

Robes and furred gowns hide all. Place sins with gold^172,

And the strong lance of justice hurtless^173 breaks:

Arm it^174 in rags, a pigmy’s straw does pierce it.

None does offend, none, I say, none: I’ll able ’em^175.

Take that of me, my friend, who have the power

To seal th’accuser’s lips. Get thee glass eyes,

And like a scurvy politician^178 seem

To see the things thou dost not. Now, now, now, now^179.

Pull off my boots: harder, harder: so.

Aside

EDGAR    O, matter and impertinency^181 mixed! Reason in madness!

LEAR    If thou wilt weep my fortunes, take my eyes.

I know thee well enough: thy name is Gloucester.

Thou must be patient; we came crying hither^184.

Thou know’st the first time that we smell the air

We wail and cry. I will preach to thee: mark.

GLOUCESTER    Alack, alack the day!

LEAR    When we are born, we cry that we are come

To this great stage of fools. This a good block^189:

It were a delicate^190 stratagem to shoe

A troop of horse with felt: I’ll put’t in proof^191,

And when I have stol’n upon these son-in-laws,

Then kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill!

Enter a Gentleman [with Attendants]

GENTLEMAN    O, here he is: lay hand upon him.— Sir,

Your most dear daughter—

LEAR    No rescue? What, a prisoner? I am even

The natural fool^197 of fortune. Use me well,

You shall have ransom. Let me have surgeons:

I am cut to th’brains.

GENTLEMAN    You shall have anything.

LEAR    No seconds^201? All myself?

Why, this would make a man a man of salt^202

To use his eyes for garden water-pots,

I will die bravely^204, like a smug bridegroom. What?

I will be jovial^205. Come, come, I am a king,

Masters^206, know you that?

GENTLEMAN    You are a royal one, and we obey you.

LEAR    Then there’s life in’t. Come, an you get it, you shall

get it by running. Sa, sa, sa, sa^209.

Exit

Running, Attendants follow

GENTLEMAN    A sight most pitiful in the meanest wretch,

Past speaking of in a king! Thou hast a daughter

Who redeems nature from the general curse^212

Which twain^213 have brought her to.

EDGAR    Hail, gentle^214 sir.

GENTLEMAN    Sir, speed you^215: what’s your will?

EDGAR    Do you hear aught, sir, of a battle toward^216?

GENTLEMAN    Most sure and vulgar^217: everyone hears that

Which can distinguish sound.

EDGAR    But, by your favour^219,

How near’s the other army?

GENTLEMAN    Near and on speedy foot: the main descry^221

Stands on the hourly thought.

EDGAR    I thank you, sir: that’s all.

GENTLEMAN    Though that the queen on special cause^224 is here,

Her army is moved on.

Exit

EDGAR    I thank you, sir.

GLOUCESTER    You ever-gentle gods, take my breath from

me:

Let not my worser spirit^229 tempt me again

To die before you please!

EDGAR    Well pray you, father.

GLOUCESTER    Now, good sir, what are you?

EDGAR    A most poor man, made tame to fortune’s blows,

Who, by the art of known and feeling sorrows^234,

Am pregnant to good pity^235. Give me your hand:

Takes his arm

I’ll lead you to some biding^236.

GLOUCESTER    Hearty thanks:

The bounty and the benison^238 of heaven

To boot, and boot^239.

Enter Steward [Oswald]

OSWALD    A proclaimed prize! Most happy^240!

That eyeless head of thine was first framed flesh^241

To raise my fortunes. Thou old unhappy traitor,

Draws

Briefly thyself remember^243: the sword is out

That must destroy thee.

GLOUCESTER    Now let thy friendly hand

Edgar interposes

Put strength enough to’t.

OSWALD    Wherefore, bold peasant,

Darest thou support a published^248 traitor? Hence,

Lest that th’infection of his fortune take

Like hold on thee. Let go his arm.

EDGAR    ‘Chill not let go, zir, without vurther ’casion^251.

OSWALD    Let go, slave, or thou diest!

EDGAR    Good gentleman, go your gait^253, and let poor volk

pass. An ’chud ha’ bin zwaggered out of my life, ’twould not^254

ha’ bin zo long as ’tis by a vortnight. Nay, come not near

th’old man: keep out, che vor ye, or I’se^256 try whether your

costard or my ballow^257 be the harder. ’Chill be plain with you.

OSWALD    Out, dunghill!

They fight

EDGAR    ’Chill pick your teeth, zir: come, no matter vor your foins^259.

OSWALD    Slave, thou hast slain me. Villain, take my purse:

If ever thou wilt thrive, bury my body

And give the letters which thou find’st about me

To Edmund, Earl of Gloucester: seek him out

Upon the English party^264. O, untimely death! Death!

He dies

EDGAR    I know thee well: a serviceable^265 villain,

As duteous to the vices of thy mistress

As badness would desire.

GLOUCESTER    What, is he dead?

EDGAR    Sit you down, father: rest you.

Let’s see these pockets: the letters that he speaks of

May be my friends. He’s dead: I am only sorry

He had no other deathsman^272. Let us see.

Opens the letter

Leave^273, gentle wax, and manners, blame us not:

To know our enemies’ minds we rip their hearts:

Their papers is more lawful.

Reads the letter

‘Let our reciprocal vows be remembered. You have many

opportunities to cut him off: if your will want not^277, time and

place will be fruitfully offered. There is nothing done^278 if he

return the conqueror: then am I the prisoner, and his bed my

jail, from the loathed warmth whereof deliver me, and

supply the place for your labour^281. Your — wife, so I would say

— affectionate servant^282, Goneril.’

O, undistinguished space of woman’s will^283!

A plot upon her virtuous husband’s life,

And the exchange my brother! Here in the sands

Thee I’ll rake up, the post unsanctified^286

Of murderous lechers: and in the mature time^287

With this ungracious paper strike^288 the sight

Of the death-practised^289 duke: for him ’tis well

That of thy death and business I can tell.

GLOUCESTER    The king is mad: how stiff^291 is my vile sense,

That I stand up and have ingenious^292 feeling

Of my huge sorrows. Better I were distract^293,

So should my thoughts be severed from my griefs,

Drum afar off

And woes by wrong imaginations^295 lose

The knowledge of themselves.

EDGAR    Give me your hand:

Far off, methinks, I hear the beaten drum.

Come, father, I’ll bestow you with a friend.

Exeunt

Act 4 Scene 6

running scene 17

Enter Cordelia, Kent and Gentleman

Kent still disguised

CORDELIA    O thou good Kent, how shall I live and work

To match thy goodness? My life will be too short,

And every measure fail me^3.

KENT    To be acknowledged, madam, is o’erpaid^4.

All my reports go with the modest truth^5,

Nor more nor clipped^6, but so.

CORDELIA    Be better suited^7:

These weeds^8 are memories of those worser hours,

I prithee put them off.

KENT    Pardon, dear madam,

Yet to be known shortens my made intent^11:

My boon I make it, that you know me not^12

Till time and I think meet^13.

CORDELIA    Then be’t so, my good lord.— How does the king?

GENTLEMAN    Madam, sleeps still.

CORDELIA    O you kind gods,

Cure this great breach in his abusèd nature!

Th’untuned and jarring senses, O, wind up^18

Of this child-changèd^19 father!

GENTLEMAN    So please your majesty

That we may wake the king: he hath slept long.

CORDELIA    Be governed by your knowledge, and proceed

I’th’sway of your own will. Is he arrayed^23?

Enter Lear in a chair carried by Servants

GENTLEMAN    Ay, madam: in the heaviness of sleep

We put fresh garments on him.

Be by, good madam, when we do awake him:

I doubt of his temperance^27.

CORDELIA    O my dear father! Restoration hang

Kisses him

Thy medicine on my lips and let this kiss

Repair those violent harms that my two sisters

Have in thy reverence^31 made!

KENT    Kind and dear princess!

CORDELIA    Had you not been their father, these white flakes^33

Did challenge pity of^34 them. Was this a face

To be opposed against the jarring winds?

Mine enemy’s dog though he had bit me

Should have stood that night against my fire,

And wast thou fain^38, poor father,

To hovel thee with swine and rogues forlorn^39

In short^40 and musty straw? Alack, alack!

’Tis wonder that thy life and wits at once^41

Had not concluded all^42.— He wakes: speak to him.

GENTLEMAN Madam, do you: ’tis fittest.

CORDELIA How does my royal lord? How fares your majesty?

LEAR    You do me wrong to take me out o’th’grave:

Thou art a soul in bliss^46, but I am bound

Upon a wheel of fire, that^47 mine own tears

Do scald like molten lead.

CORDELIA Sir, do you know me?

LEAR    You are a spirit, I know: where did you die?

CORDELIA Still, still, far wide^51!

GENTLEMAN    He’s scarce awake: let him alone awhile.

LEAR    Where have I been? Where am I? Fair daylight?

I am mightily abused^54. I should ev’n die with pity

To see another thus. I know not what to say.

I will not swear these are my hands. Let’s see:

I feel this pinprick. Would I were assured^57

Of my condition!

Kneels?

CORDELIA O, look upon me, sir,

And hold your hand in benediction o’er me:

You must not kneel.

Stops him from kneeling?

LEAR    Pray, do not mock me:

I am a very foolish fond^63 old man,

Fourscore and upward, not an hour more nor less,

And to deal plainly,

I fear I am not in my perfect mind.

Methinks I should know you and know this man,

Yet I am doubtful, for I am mainly ignorant

What place this is, and all the skill I have

Remembers not these garments, nor I know not

Where I did lodge last night. Do not laugh at me,

For, as I am a man, I think this lady

To be my child Cordelia.

CORDELIA    And so I am, I am.

Weeps

LEAR    Be your tears wet? Yes, faith. I pray, weep not:

If you have poison for me, I will drink it.

I know you do not love me, for your sisters

Have, as I do remember, done me wrong:

You have some cause, they have not.

CORDELIA    No cause, no cause.

LEAR    Am I in France?

KENT    In your own kingdom, sir.

LEAR    Do not abuse me.

GENTLEMAN    Be comforted, good madam: the great rage^84,

You see, is killed in him. Desire him to go in:

Trouble him no more till further settling^86.

CORDELIA    Will’t please your highness walk?

LEAR    You must bear with me. Pray you now, forget and forgive:

I am old and foolish.

Exeunt

Act 5 Scene 1

running scene 18

Enter with Drum and Colours Edmund, Regan, Gentlemen and Soldiers

To a Gentleman

EDMUND    Know of the duke if his last purpose^1 hold,

Or whether since he is advised by aught^2

To change the course: he’s full of alteration

And self-reproving: bring his constant pleasure^4.

[Exit Gentleman]

REGAN    Our sister’s man is certainly miscarried^5.

EDMUND    ’Tis to be doubted^6, madam.

REGAN    Now, sweet lord,

You know the goodness I intend upon you:

Tell me but truly — but then speak the truth —

Do you not love my sister?

EDMUND    In honoured^11 love.

REGAN    But have you never found my brother’s way

To the forfended place^13?

EDMUND    No, by mine honour, madam.

REGAN    I never shall endure her^15: dear my lord,

Be not familiar^16 with her.

EDMUND    Fear not. She and the duke her husband!

Enter with Drum and Colours Albany, Goneril, Soldiers

ALBANY    Our very loving sister, well be-met.

Sir, this I heard: the king is come to his daughter,

With others whom the rigour of our state^20

Forced to cry out^21.

REGAN    Why is this reasoned^22?

GONERIL    Combine together^23 gainst the enemy,

For these domestic and particular broils^24

Are not the question here.

ALBANY    Let’s then determine

With th’ancient of war^27 on our proceeding.

REGAN    Sister, you’ll go with us?

GONERIL    No.

REGAN    ’Tis most convenient^30: pray, go with us.

Aside

GONERIL    O, ho, I know the riddle^31.— I will go.

Exeunt both the armies. [Albany remains]

Enter Edgar

Disguised

EDGAR    If e’er your grace had speech with man so poor,

Hear me one word.

ALBANY    I’ll overtake you^34.— Speak.

EDGAR Before you fight the battle, ope this letter^35:

Gives a letter

If you have victory, let the trumpet sound^36

For him that brought it. Wretched though I seem,

I can produce a champion^38 that will prove

What is avouchèd there. If you miscarry^39,

Your business of the world hath so an end,

And machination^41 ceases. Fortune loves you.

ALBANY    Stay till I have read the letter.

EDGAR    I was forbid it.

When time shall serve, let but the herald cry^44

And I’ll appear again.

Exit

ALBANY    Why, fare thee well: I will o’erlook^46 thy paper.

Enter Edmund

EDMUND    The enemy’s in view: draw up your powers^47.

Offers a paper

Here is the guess of their true strength and forces

By diligent discovery^49, but your haste

Is now urged on you.

ALBANY    We will greet the time^51.

Exit

EDMUND    To both these sisters have I sworn my love,

Each jealous^53 of the other, as the stung

Are of the adder. Which of them shall I take?

Both? One? Or neither? Neither can be enjoyed

If both remain alive. To take the widow

Exasperates, makes mad her sister Goneril,

And hardly shall I carry out my side^58,

Her husband being alive. Now then, we’ll use

His countenance^60 for the battle, which being done,

Let her who would be rid of him devise

His speedy taking off^62. As for the mercy

Which he intends to Lear and to Cordelia,

The battle done and they within our power,

Shall never see his pardon, for my state^65

Stands on me to defend, not to debate.

Exit

Act 5 Scene 2

running scene 19

Alarum within. Enter, with Drum and Colours, Lear, Cordelia and Soldiers over the stage and exeunt. Enter Edgar and Gloucester

EDGAR    Here, father^1, take the shadow of this tree

For your good host^2. Pray that the right may thrive.

If ever I return to you again,

I’ll bring you comfort.

GLOUCESTER    Grace go with you, sir!

Exit [Edgar]

Alarum and retreat within

Enter Edgar

EDGAR    Away, old man! Give me thy hand, away!

King Lear hath lost, he and his daughter ta’en^7:

Give me thy hand, come on.

GLOUCESTER    No further, sir: a man may rot even here.

EDGAR    What, in ill thoughts again? Men must endure

Their going hence, even as their coming hither:

Ripeness^12 is all: come on.

GLOUCESTER    And that’s true too.

Exeunt

Act 5 Scene 3

running scene 20

Enter in conquest, with Drum and Colours, Edmund, Lear and Cordelia as prisoners, Soldiers, Captain

EDMUND    Some officers take them away: good guard^1,

Until their greater pleasures^2 first be known

That are to censure^3 them.

To Lear

CORDELIA We are not the first

Who with best meaning^5 have incurred the worst.

For thee, oppressèd king, I am cast down^6:

Myself could else out-frown false fortune’s frown.

Shall we not see these daughters and these sisters?

LEAR    No, no, no, no! Come, let’s away to prison.

We two alone will sing like birds i’th’cage:

When thou dost ask me blessing, I’ll kneel down

And ask of thee forgiveness: so we’ll live,

And pray, and sing, and tell old tales, and laugh

At gilded butterflies, and hear poor rogues^14

Talk of court news, and we’ll talk with them too —

Who loses and who wins, who’s in, who’s out —

And take upon’s the mystery of things^17,

As if we were God’s spies: and we’ll wear out^18

In a walled prison packs and sects^19 of great ones

That ebb and flow by th’moon^20.

EDMUND    Take them away.

LEAR    Upon such sacrifices^22, my Cordelia,

The gods themselves throw incense^23. Have I caught thee?

He that parts us shall bring a brand from heaven^24

And fire us hence like foxes. Wipe thine eyes:

The good years shall devour them, flesh and fell^26,

Ere they shall make us weep: We’ll see ’em starved^27 first. Come.

Exeunt [Lear and Cordelia, guarded]

EDMUND    Come hither, captain, hark.

Gives a paper

Take thou this note, go follow them to prison.

One step I have advanced thee: if thou dost

As this instructs thee, thou dost make thy way

To noble fortunes. Know thou this: that men

Are as the time is; to be tender-minded^33

Does not become^34 a sword. Thy great employment

Will not bear question^35: either say thou’lt do’t

Or thrive by other means.

CAPTAIN    I’ll do’t, my lord.

EDMUND    About it, and write happy^38 when th’hast done.

Mark, I say, instantly, and carry^39 it so

As I have set it down.

Exit Captain

Flourish. Enter Albany, Goneril, Regan, Soldiers

ALBANY    Sir, you have showed today your valiant strain^41,

And fortune led you well. You have the captives

Who were the opposites^43 of this day’s strife:

I do require them of you, so to use^44 them

As we shall find their merits and our safety

May equally determine.

EDMUND    Sir, I thought it fit

To send the old and miserable king to some retention^48

Whose age had charms in it, whose title^49 more,

To pluck the common bosom^50 on his side

And turn our impressed lances in our eyes^51

Which do command them. With him I sent the queen^52,

My reason all the same, and they are ready

Tomorrow, or at further space, t’appear

Where you shall hold your session^55.

ALBANY    Sir, by your patience^56,

I hold you but a subject of^57 this war,

Not as a brother.

REGAN    That’s as we list^59 to grace him.

Methinks our pleasure might have been demanded^60

Ere you had spoke so far. He led our powers,

Bore the commission^62 of my place and person,

The which immediacy^63 may well stand up

And call itself your brother.

GONERIL    Not so hot:

In his own grace^66 he doth exalt himself

More than in your addition^67.

REGAN    In my rights,

By me invested, he compeers^69 the best.

ALBANY    That were the most^70 if he should husband you.

REGAN    Jesters do oft prove prophets.

GONERIL    Holla^72, holla!

That eye that told you so looked but asquint^73.

REGAN    Lady, I am not well, else I should answer

To Edmund

From a full-flowing stomach^75.— General,

Take thou my soldiers, prisoners, patrimony^76:

Dispose of them, of me: the walls^77 is thine:

Witness the world^78 that I create thee here

My lord and master.

GONERIL    Mean you to enjoy^80 him?

ALBANY    The let-alone^81 lies not in your good will.

EDMUND    Nor in thine, lord.

ALBANY    Half-blooded^83 fellow, yes.

To Edmund

REGAN    Let the drum strike and prove my title thine.

ALBANY    Stay yet, hear reason. Edmund, I arrest thee

On capital treason, and, in^86 thy arrest,

This gilded serpent. For^87 your claim, fair sister,

I bar it^88 in the interest of my wife:

’Tis she is subcontracted^89 to this lord,

And I, her husband, contradict your banns^90.

If you will marry, make your loves to^91 me,

My lady is bespoke^92.

GONERIL    An interlude^93!

ALBANY    Thou art armed, Gloucester: let the trumpet sound:

If none appear to prove upon thy person

Thy heinous, manifest, and many treasons,

There is my pledge: I’ll make it^97 on thy heart,

Throws down a glove

Ere I taste bread, thou art in nothing^98 less

Than I have here proclaimed thee.

REGAN    Sick, O, sick!

Aside

GONERIL    If not, I’ll ne’er trust medicine^101.

EDMUND    There’s my exchange: what^102 in the world he’s

That names me traitor, villain-like he lies.

Throws down a glove

Call by the trumpet: he that dares approach,

On him, on you — who not? — I will maintain

My truth and honour firmly.

Enter a Herald

ALBANY    A herald, ho!

To Edmund

Trust to thy single virtue^108, for thy soldiers,

All levied in my name, have in my name

Took their discharge.

REGAN    My sickness grows upon me.

ALBANY    She is not well: convey her to my tent.—

[Exit Regan, led]

Come hither, herald. Let the trumpet sound

And read out this.

A trumpet sounds

HERALD    Reads ‘If any man of quality or degree^115 within the

lists^116 of the army will maintain upon Edmund, supposed Earl

of Gloucester, that he is a manifold traitor, let him appear by

the third sound of the trumpet: he is bold in his defence.’

First trumpet

HERALD    Again!

Second trumpet

HERALD    Again!

Third trumpet

Trumpet answers within

Enter Edgar armed

His helmet visor down

ALBANY    Ask him his purposes, why he appears

Upon this call o’th’trumpet.

HERALD    What are you?

Your name, your quality, and why you answer

This present summons?

EDGAR    Know, my name is lost

By treason’s tooth bare-gnawn and canker-bit^127:

Yet am I noble as the adversary

I come to cope^129.

ALBANY    Which is that adversary?

EDGAR    What’s he that speaks for Edmund Earl of Gloucester?

EDMUND    Himself: what say’st thou to him?

EDGAR    Draw thy sword,

That, if my speech offend a noble heart,

Thy arm may do thee justice: here is mine.

Draws

Behold, it is my privilege —

The privilege of mine honours —137

My oath and my profession. I protest^138,

Maugre thy strength, place^139, youth and eminence,

Despise thy victor sword and fire-new^140 fortune,

Thy valour and thy heart, thou art a traitor:

False to thy gods, thy brother and thy father,

Conspirant^143 gainst this high illustrious prince,

And from th’extremest upward^144 of thy head

To the descent^145 and dust below thy foot

A most toad-spotted^146 traitor. Say thou no,

This sword, this arm and my best spirits are bent^147

To prove upon thy heart whereto I speak,

Thou liest.

EDMUND    In wisdom I should ask thy name,

But since thy outside looks so fair and warlike,

And that thy tongue some say^152 of breeding breathes,

What safe and nicely^153 I might well delay

By rule of knighthood, I disdain and spurn.

Back do I toss these treasons to thy head,

With the hell-hated lie^156 o’erwhelm thy heart,

Which, for they yet glance by^157 and scarcely bruise,

This sword of mine shall give them instant way^158,

Where they shall rest forever. Trumpets, speak!

Draws

Alarums. Fights

Edmund falls

ALBANY    Save him^160, save him!

GONERIL    This is practice^161, Gloucester:

By th’law of war thou wast not bound to answer

An unknown opposite: thou art not vanquished,

But cozened and beguiled^164.

ALBANY    Shut your mouth, dame^165,

Or with this paper shall I stop it.— Hold, sir.—

To Goneril

Thou worse than any name, read thine own evil.

No tearing, lady: I perceive you know^168 it.

Shows her the letter

GONERIL    Say, if I do, the laws are mine, not thine:

Who can arraign^170 me for’t.

Exit

ALBANY    Most monstrous! O, know’st thou this paper?

EDMUND    Ask me not what I know.

ALBANY    Go after her: she’s desperate: govern^173 her.

[Exit a soldier]

EDMUND    What you have charged me with, that have I done,

And more, much more: the time will bring it out:

To Edgar

’Tis past and so am I.— But what art thou

That hast this fortune on^177 me? If thou’rt noble,

I do forgive thee.

EDGAR    Let’s exchange charity^179.

I am no less in blood than thou art, Edmund:

If more, the more th’hast^181 wronged me.

Removes his helmet

My name is Edgar, and thy father’s son.

The gods are just, and of our pleasant^183 vices

Make instruments to plague us:

The dark and vicious place where thee he got^185

Cost him his eyes.

EDMUND    Th’hast spoken right: ’tis true,

The wheel^188 is come full circle: I am here.

To Edgar

ALBANY    Methought thy very gait did prophesy^189

A royal nobleness: I must embrace thee.

Let sorrow split my heart if ever I

Did hate thee or thy father!

EDGAR Worthy prince, I know’t.

ALBANY Where have you hid yourself?

How have you known the miseries of your father?

EDGAR    By nursing them, my lord. List^196 a brief tale,

And when ’tis told, O, that my heart would burst!

The bloody proclamation^198 to escape

That followed me so near — O, our lives’ sweetness!

That we the pain of death would hourly die^200

Rather than die at once! — taught me to shift

Into a madman’s rags, t’assume a semblance^202

That very dogs disdained: and in this habit^203

Met I my father with his bleeding rings^204,

Their precious stones new lost, became his guide,

Led him, begged for him, saved him from despair^206,

Never — O, fault! — revealed myself unto him

Until some half-hour past, when I was armed.

Not sure, though hoping, of this good success^209,

I asked his blessing, and from first to last

Told him our pilgrimage: but his flawed^211 heart —

Alack, too weak the conflict to support —

’Twixt two extremes of passion, joy and grief,

Burst smilingly.

EDMUND    This speech of yours hath moved me,

And shall perchance do good: but speak you on:

You look as you had something more to say.

ALBANY If there be more, more woeful, hold it in,

For I am almost ready to dissolve^219,

Hearing of this.

Enter a Gentleman

With a bloody knife

GENTLEMAN    Help, help, O, help!

EDGAR    What kind of help?

ALBANY    Speak, man.

EDGAR    What means this bloody knife?

GENTLEMAN    ’Tis hot, it smokes^225:

It came even from the heart of — O, she’s dead!

ALBANY    Who dead? Speak, man.

GENTLEMAN    Your lady, sir, your lady; and her sister

By her is poisoned: she confesses it.

EDMUND    I was contracted to them both: all three

Now marry in an instant.

EDGAR    Here comes Kent.

Enter Kent

ALBANY    Produce the bodies, be they alive or dead:

Goneril and Regan’s bodies brought out

This judgement of the heavens, that makes us tremble,

Sees Kent

Touches us not with pity.— O, is this he?—

To Kent

The time will not allow the compliment^236

Which very manners urges.

KENT    I am come

To bid my king and master aye^239 goodnight:

Is he not here?

ALBANY    Great thing^241 of us forgot!

Speak, Edmund, where’s the king? And where’s Cordelia?—

See’st thou this object^243, Kent?

Points to the bodies

KENT    Alack, why thus?

EDMUND    Yet Edmund was beloved:

The one the other poisoned for my sake

And after slew herself.

ALBANY    Even^248 so. Cover their faces.

EDMUND    I pant for life: some good I mean to do,

Despite of mine own nature. Quickly send —

Be brief in it — to th’castle, for my writ^251

Is on the life of Lear and on Cordelia:

Nay, send in time.

ALBANY    Run, run, O, run!

EDGAR    To who, my lord? Who has the office^255?

To Edmund

Send thy token of reprieve.

EDMUND    Well thought on: take my sword,

Give it the captain.

To a Gentleman

EDGAR    Haste thee, for thy life.

[Exit Gentleman]

EDMUND    He hath commission from thy wife and me

To hang Cordelia in the prison and

To lay the blame upon her own despair,

That she fordid^263 herself.

Edmund is borne off

ALBANY    The gods defend her! Bear him hence awhile.

Enter Lear with Cordelia in his arms

Gentleman and others following

LEAR    Howl, howl, howl! O, you are men of stones:

Had I your tongues and eyes, I’d use them so

That heaven’s vault should crack. She’s gone for ever!

I know when one is dead and when one lives:

She’s dead as earth. Lend me a looking-glass:

If that her breath will mist or stain the stone^270,

Why, then she lives.

KENT    Is this the promised end^272?

EDGAR    Or image of that horror?

ALBANY    Fall and cease!274

LEAR    This feather stirs: she lives! If it be so,

It is a chance which does redeem all sorrows

That ever I have felt.

Kneels

KENT    O my good master!

LEAR    Prithee, away.

EDGAR ’Tis noble Kent, your friend.

LEAR    A plague upon you, murderers, traitors all!

I might have saved her: now she’s gone for ever!—

Cordelia, Cordelia! Stay a little. Ha?

What is’t thou say’st?— Her voice was ever soft,

Gentle and low, an excellent thing in woman.—

I killed the slave^286 that was a-hanging thee.

GENTLEMAN    ’Tis true, my lords, he did.

LEAR    Did I not, fellow?

I have seen the day, with my good biting falchion^289

I would have made him skip: I am old now,

And these same crosses^291 spoil me.— Who are you?

Mine eyes are not o’th’best: I’ll tell you straight^292.

KENT    If fortune brag of two she loved and hated^293,

One of them we behold.

LEAR    This is a dull sight^295. Are you not Kent?

KENT    The same,

Your servant Kent: where is your servant Caius^297?

LEAR    He’s a good fellow, I can tell you that:

He’ll strike, and quickly too. He’s dead and rotten.

KENT    No, my good lord, I am the very man—

LEAR    I’ll see that straight^301.

KENT    That from your first of difference and decay^302

Have followed your sad steps.

LEAR    You are welcome hither.

KENT    Nor no man else^305: all’s cheerless, dark and deadly.

Your eldest daughters have fordone^306 themselves,

And desperately^307 are dead.

LEAR Ay, so I think.

ALBANY    He knows not what he says, and vain is it^309

That we present us to him.

Enter a Messenger

EDGAR    Very bootless^311.

MESSENGER    Edmund is dead, my lord.

ALBANY    That’s but a trifle here.

You lords and noble friends, know our intent:

What comfort to this great decay^315 may come

Shall be applied. For us, we will resign^316,

During the life of this old majesty,

To Edgar and Kent

To him our absolute power:— you, to your rights

With boot and such addition^319 as your honours

Have more than merited. All friends shall taste

The wages of their virtue, and all foes

The cup of their deservings.— O, see, see^322!

LEAR    And my poor fool^323 is hanged! No, no, no life?

Why should a dog, a horse, a rat have life,

And thou no breath at all? Thou’lt come no more,

Never, never, never, never, never!

Pray you undo this button: thank you, sir^327.

Do you see this? Look on her, look, her lips,

Look there, look there!

He dies

EDGAR    He faints! My lord, my lord!

KENT    Break, heart, I prithee, break.

EDGAR    Look up, my lord.

KENT    Vex not his ghost^333: O, let him pass! He hates him

That would upon the rack^334 of this tough world

Stretch him out longer^335.

EDGAR    He is gone, indeed.

KENT    The wonder is he hath endured so long:

He but usurped^338 his life.

ALBANY    Bear them from hence. Our present business

Is general woe.—

To Kent and Edgar

Friends of my soul, you twain

Rule in this realm, and the gored state sustain^342.

KENT    I have a journey^343, sir, shortly to go:

My master calls me, I must not say no.

EDGAR    The weight of this sad time we must obey:

Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say.

The oldest hath borne most: we that are young

Shall never see so much nor live so long.

Exeunt with a dead march

TEXTUAL NOTES

Q = First Quarto text of 1608

F = First Folio text of 1623

F2 = a correction introduced in the Second Folio text of 1632

Ed = a correction introduced by a later editor

SD = stage direction

SH = speech heading (i.e. speaker’s name)

List of parts = Ed

EDMUND sometimes spelled Edmond, often referred to in directions and speech headings as Bastard

1.1.30 SD one … then = Q. Not in F 33 lord = F. Q = Liege 36 fast = F. Q = first 37 age = F. Q = state 38 Conferring = F. Q = Confirming strengths = F. Q = yeares 38–43 while … now = F. Not in Q 47–48 Since … state = F. Not in Q 57 found = F. Q = friend 62–63 and … rivers = F. Not in Q 66 of Cornwall = F. Q = to Cornwell, speake 77 ponderous = F. Q = richer 81 conferred = F. Q = confirm’d 82 our … love = F. Q = the last, not least in our deere loue 84 interessed = Ed. F = interest draw = F. Q = win 87 SH LEAR Nothing? … Nothing. = F. Not in Q 103 sisters = F. Q = sisters, to loue my father all. 110 mysteries = F2. F = miseries. Q = mistresse night = F. Q = might 118 shall … bosom = F. Q = Shall 136 shall = F. Q = still 151 falls = F. Q = stoops Reserve thy state = F. Q = Reuerse thy doome 158 pawn = F. Q = a pawne 159 ne’er = F. Q = nor 164 SH LEAR = Q. F = Kear. 165 SH KENT = Q. F = Lent. 167 Miscreant = F. Q = recreant 168 SH ALBANY … forbear. = F. Not in Q SH CORDELIA some editors expand F’s Cor. to Cornwall 170 gift = F. Q = doome 175 strained = F. Q = straied 176 sentences = F corrected. F uncorrected, Q = sentence 179 Five = F. Q = Foure 180 disasters = F. Q = diseases 181 sixth = F. Q = fift 182 next = Ed. F, Q = tenth 187 Freedom = F. Q = Friendship 194 SH CORDELIA = F (corrected). Some editors expand to Cornwall. Q = Glost. 213 Dowered = F. Q = Couered 225 object = F. Q = best obiect 234 Should = F. Q = Could 237 will = F. Q = well 238 make known = F. Q = may know 248 but = F. Q = no more but 252 regards = F. Q = respects 255 king = F. Q = Leir 263 respect and fortunes = F. Q = respects / Of fourtune 270 my = F. Q = thy 286 Love = F. Q = vse 291 SH REGAN = F (Regn). Q = Gonorill 292 SH GONERIL = F. Q = Regan 295 want = F. Q = worth 296 plighted = F. Q = pleated 297 with shame derides = F. Q = shame them derides 306 not been = Q. F = beene 319 sit = F. Q = hit

1.2.1 SH EDMUND = Ed. F, Q = Bast. (throughout) 13 tirèd = F. Q = lyed 18 fine word, ‘legitimate’ = F. Not in Q 21 to th’legitimate = F. Sometimes emended to top the legitimate 24 Prescribed = F. Q = subscribd 38 o’erlooking = F. Q = liking 53 wake = F. Q = wakt 55 you to this = F. Q = this to you 67 declined = F. Q = declining 80 that … writ = F. Q = he hath wrote 81 other = F. Q = further 99–104 This … graves = F. Not in Q 106–7 honesty! ’Tis strange = F. Q = honest, strange strange 111 stars = F. Q = the starres 113 spherical = F. Q = spirituall 117 a star = F. Q = Starres 119 I should = F. Q = Fut, I should. 120 maidenliest spelled maidenlest in F and Q 121 bastardizing = F. Q = bastardy 122 Pat = F. Q = Edgar; and out 123 sigh … o’Bedlam = F. Q = sith like them of Bedlam 124 Fa … mi. = F. Not in Q 130 writes = F. Q = writ 146–49 I … brother? = F. Not in Q 150 I am = F. Q = go arm’d, I am

1.3.0 SD Steward = F. Q = Gentleman 3 SH OSWALD = Ed. F = Ste. Q = Gent. (throughout) 14 I’d = F. Sometimes emended to I’ll 15 distaste = F. Q = dislike 17 have said = F. Q = tell you 20 so. = F. Q = so. I would breed from hence occasions, and I shall, That I may speak: 21 course. Prepare = F. Q = very course, goe prepare

1.4.1 will = F. Q = well 6 So … thy = F. Q = thy 7 SD Horns … Attendants = F. Q = Enter Lear 43 SD Enter Steward appears one line later in F 49 SH KNIGHT = F (spelled Knigh here and on two other occasions in Act 1 scene 4). Q = Kent daughter = Q. F = Daughters 51 SH KNIGHT = F. Q = seruant (throughout) 57 of kindness appears = F. Q = apeer’s 66 purpose = F. Q = purport 73 SD Enter Steward placed one line later in F 78 these = F. Q = this your pardon = F. Q = you pardon me 80 strucken = F. Q = struck 86 Have … So = F. Q = you haue wisedome 93 SH LEAR Why, my boy? = F. Q = Kent. Why Fool? 102 all my = F. Q = any 106 the Lady Brach = F. Q = Ladie oth’e brach 107 gall = F. Q = gull 110 nuncle = F. Q = vncle 121 SH KENT = F. Q = Lear 130 one = F. Q = foole 141 grace = F. Q = wit 143 And = F. Q = They to = F. Q = doe 152 fool = F. Q = fooles 164 You = F. Q = Methinks you 166 frowning = F. Q = frowne 171 nor crust = F. Q = neither crust nor crumb = Q. F = not crum 173 shelled spelled sheal’d in F, sheald in Q 188 know = F. Q = trow 193 I = F. Q = Come sir, I your = F. Q = that 195 transport = F. Q = transforme 199 This = F. Q = why this 201 weakens, his = F. Q = weaknes, or his 202 Ha! Waking? = F. Q = sleeping or wakeing; ha! sure 204 SH FOOL Lear’s shadow. = F. Assigned to Lear in Q 206 This admiration, sir = F. Q = Come sir, this admiration 215 graced = F. Q = great 227 SD Albany = F. Q = Duke (throughout) 228 Woe = F. Q = We 229 Speak … my = F. Q = that wee prepare any 233 SH ALBANY Pray … patient. = F. Not in Q 234 liest = F. Q = list 235 My = F. Q = list my are = F. Q = and 246 Of … you. = F. Not in Q 258 cadent = F. Q = accent 262 Away, away! = F. Q = goe, goe, my people? 264 more of it = F. Q = the cause 273 thee worth them = F. Q = the worst 274 Th’untented = F. Q uncorrected = the vntender 275 Pierce = F. Q uncorrected = peruse thee! Old = F. Q = the old 277 loose = F. Q = make 278–79 Ha? … daughter = F. Q = yea, i’st come to this? yet haue I left a daughter 282 flay spelled flea in F and Q 285 that = F. Q = that my Lord 288–89 Pray … sir = F. Q = Come sir no more, you 297–309 SH GONERIL This … SD Enter Steward = F. Q = Gon. What Oswald, ho. 309 How now, Oswald? = F. Q = Oswald. Here Madam. 310 What = F. Q = Gon. What 318 condemn = F. Q = dislike 319 at task = F. Q uncorrected = alapt. Q corrected = attaskt 322 better, oft = F. Q = better ought

1.5.0 SD Enter … Fool = F. Q = Enter Lear. 18 tell = F. Q = not tell 42–43 Keep … now, = F. Q = I would not be mad, keepe me in temper, I would not be mad, 44 SH GENTLEMAN = F. Q = Seruant.

2.1.2 you = Q. F = your 8–9 ear-kissing = F. Q = eare-bussing 18 act … work = F. Q = aske breefnes … helpe 29–30 pardon … I= F. Q = pardon me in crauing, I 37 SD Enter … torches = F. Q = Enter Glost. 40 Mumbling = F. Q = warbling 41 stand = F. Q = stand’s 49 revenging = F. Q = reuengiue 50 the thunder = F. Q = their thunders 56 latched = F. Q = lancht 57 And = F. Q = but 60 Full = F. Q = but 67 coward = F. Q = caytife 73 would the reposal = F. Q = could the reposure 75 should I = F. Q = I should 78 practice = F. Q = pretence 81 spirits = F. Q = spurres 83 O, strange = F. Q = Strong 84 said he? = F. Q = I neuer got him, 85 where = F. Q = why 91 SD Enter … Attendants = F. Q = Enter the Duke of Cornwall 93 strangeness = F. Q = strange newes 101 tended = F. Q = tends 106 th’expense … of = F. Q uncorrected = these—and wast of this. Q corrected = the wast and spoyle of 115 bewray = F. Q = betray 129 threading = F. Q = threatening 130 prize = F. Q corrected = poyse 133 differences = F. Q uncorrected = defences best = F. Q corrected = lest thought = Q. F = though 134 home = F. Q uncorrected = hand 137 businesses = F. Q = busines

2.2.1 dawning = F. Q corrected = euen. Q uncorrected = deuen 15 worsted-stocking = Q corrected. F = woosted-stocking. Q uncorrected = wosted stocken 16 whoreson = F. Q = knaue, a whorson super-serviceable finical = F. Q = supersinicall 20 clamorous spelled clamours in F 25 since = F. Q = ago since 27 you = F. Q = draw, you 39 if = F. Q = and 51 they = F. Q = hee 51–52 years o’th’trade = F. Q = houres at the trade 53 SH CORNWALL = F. Q = Glost. 61 know you = F. Q = you haue 66 the holy = F. Q = those 67 too intrinse = Ed. F = t’intrince 69 fire = F. Q = stir the = F. Q = their 70 Revenge = F. Ed = Reneage 71 gall = F. Q = gale 72 dogs = F. Q = dayes 74 Smile spelled Smoile in F, smoyle in Q 77 What = F. Ed = Why 81 fault = F. Q = offence 92 An … plain = F. Q = he must be plaine 98 faith, in = F. Q = sooth, or in 101 flickering = Q (flitkering). F = flicking 111 compact = F. Q = coniunct 116 fleshment = F. Q = flechuent dread = Q. F = dead 121 ancient = F. Q corrected = miscreant. Q uncorrected = ausrent 129 Stocking = F. Q corrected = stopping. Q uncorrected= stobing. 139 he = F. Q = hee’s 145 duke’s = Q. F = Duke 148 travelled spelled trauail’d in F and Q 153 saw = F. Q uncorrected = say 158 miracles = F. Q corrected = my wracke. Q uncorrected = my rackles 160 most = F. Q uncorrected = not 164 Take = F. Q uncorrected = Late heavy spelled heanie in F 170 unusual spelled vnusall in F 176 hairs = F. Q = haire 181 arms = F. Q = bare arms 180 Pins = F. Q uncorrected = Pies 183 farms = F. Q = seruice 185 Sometimes = F. Q = Sometime 187 SD Enter … Gentleman = F. Q = Enter King 190 SH GENTLEMAN = F. Q = Knight (throughout) 192 this = F. Q = his 194 thy = Q. F = ahy 197 heads = F. Q = heeles 198 man’s = Q. F = man 208–9 By … ay = F. Q = No no, they would not./ Kent. Yes they haue 214 impose = F. Q = purpose 220 panting = Q. F = painting 223 those = F. Q = whose 224 meiny = F. Q = men 235–43 SH FOOL Winter’s … a year. = F. Not in Q 245 Hysterica spelled Historica in F and Q 250 the = Q. F = the the 251 number = F. Q = traine 258 twenty = F. Q = a 100 260 upward = F. Q = vp the hill 262 have = Q. F = hause 264 serves and seeks = F. Q = serues 275 have … the = F. Q = traueled hard to; travelled spelled travail’d in F fetches = F. Q = Iustice 285–86 SH GLOUCESTER Well … man? = F. Not in Q 288 father = F. Q uncorrected = fate 289 commands, tends, = F. Q corrected = commands her. Q uncorrected = come and tends 290–91 Are … Fiery? = F. Not in Q 310 knapped = F. Q = rapt 316 you = Q. F = your 318 mother’s tomb = Q corrected. F = Mother Tombe. Q uncorrected = mothers fruit 328–33 SH LEAR Say? … blame. = F. Not in Q 337 her = Q. F = his 360 blister = F. Q = blast her pride 384 SH LEAR = F. Q = Gon. stocked = F. Q = struck 410 hot-blooded = F uncorrected. F corrected = hot-bloodied. Q = hot bloud in 422 boil spelled Byle in F 468 need = F. Q = deed 471 is = F. Q = as. Sometimes emended to is as 480 tamely = F. Q = lamely 488 flaws = F. Q = flowes 497 SH GONERIL = F. Q = Duke 499 SH CORNWALL = F. Q = Reg. 501–2 SH CORNWALL Whither … horse = F. Not in Q 503 SH CORNWALL = F. Q = Re. 505 high = F. Q = bleak

3.1.1 Who’s there, besides = F. Q = Whats here beside 12 note = F. Q = Arte 16–23 Who … furnishings = F. See “Quarto passages that do not appear in the Folio,” p. 134, for alternative lines in Q 30 that = F. Q = your 35–6 in … this = F. Q = Ile this way, you that

3.2.8 all = F. Ed = an germens spelled germaines in F 12 wise … fools = F. Q = wise man nor foole 16 tax = F. Q = taske 22 will … join = F. Q = haue … ioin’d 42 are = F. Q = sit 49 fear = F. Q = force 55 of = F. Q = man of 59 concealing continents = F. Q = concealed centers 67 you = F. Q = me 76 That’s sorry = F. Q = That sorrowes 77 little tiny = Ed. F = little-tyne. Q = little tine 80 Though = F. Q = for 81 True, boy = F. Q = True my good boy 82–98 SH FOOL This … time. = F. Not in Q

3.3.0 SD Edmund = F. Q = the Bastard with lights. 4 perpetual = F. Q = their 12 footed = F. Q = landed 15 if = F. Q = though 17 strange things = F. Q = some strange thing

3.4.8 contentious = F. Q corrected = tempestious. Q uncorrected = crulentious 9 skin so: = F corrected. F uncorrected = skin: so: 12 thy = Q. F = they roaring = F. Q uncorrected = raging 18 home = F. Q = sure 19–20 In … endure = F. Not in Q 22 all = F. Q = you all 29–30 In … sleep = F. Not in Q 32 storm = F. Q = night 34 lopped = F. Q = loopt 40 SH EDGAR Fathom … Tom! = F. Not in Q 48 blow the winds = F. Q = blowes the cold wind Hum! … bed = F. Q = goe to thy cold bed 50 Did’st … thy = F. Q = Hast thou giuen all to thy two 53 through fire = Q. F = though Fire and through flame = F. Not in Q ford = Q. F = Sword 58 Bless = Q. F = Blisse 58–59 O … de.= F. Not in Q 59 Bless = Q. F = blisse 63 Has = F. Q = What. Ed = What, have 64 Wouldst = F. Q = didst 68 light = F. Q = fall 79 word’s justice = F. Q = words justly 87 I dearly = F. Q = I deeply 94 says … nonny = F. Q = hay no on ny 95 boy, boy = F. Q = boy, my boy, sessa = Ed. F = Sesey. Q = cease 96 a = F. Q = thy 101–2 lendings! … here = F. Q corrected = lendings, come on. Q uncorrected = leadings, come on bee true 106 on’s = F. Q = in 108 foul = F. Q = foul fiend 109 till the = Q. F = at 110 squints = F. Q corrected = squemes. Q uncorrected = queues 114 alight = F. Q = O light 126 stocked, punished = F. Q = stock-punisht 127 hath had three = Q. F = hath three 131 Smulkin = F. Q = snulbug 135 my … vile = F. Q = is growne so vild my Lord 147 same = F. Q = most 163 you = F. Ed = your 176 tower came = F. Q = towne come

3.5.10 were not = F. Q = were

3.6.12–14 SH FOOL No … him. = F. Not in Q 21 They = F. Q = Theile 27 mongrel grim, 28 Hound = Ed. F = Mongrill, Grim, / Hound. Q = mungril, grim-hound him = F (Hym). Sometimes emended to lym 29 tyke = Q (tike). F = tight 33 Do … Sessa! = F. Q = loudla doodla 37 these hard hearts = F. Q = this hardnes 39 Persian = F. Q = Persian attire 40 and rest awhile = F. Q = awhile 42 So, so, we’ll = F. Q = so, so, so, / Weele i’th’morning = F. Q = i’th’morning so, so, so 43 SH FOOL And … noon = F. Not in Q 53 Take up, take up = F. Q corrected = Take vp the King. Q uncorrected = Take vp to keepe

3.7.3 traitor = F. Q = vilaine 8 Advise = Q. F = Aduice 9 festinate spelled festiuate in F and festuant in Q 37 none = F. Q = true 48 answered = F. Q = answerer 60 answer = F. Q = first answere 62 Dover? = F. Q = Dover, sir? 65 stick = F. Q = rash 66 as his bare = F. Q corrected = on his lowd. Q uncorrected = of his lou’d 67 buoyed = F. Q corrected = bod. Q uncorrected = layd 69 rain = F. Q = rage 70 howled that stern = F. Q = heard that dearne 95 enkindle = F. Q = vnbridle

4.1.6–10 Welcome … comes = F. Q = Who’s 10 poorly led = F. Q corrected = parti, eyd 15 these fourscore years = F. Q = this forescore 19 You = F. Q = Alack sir, you 42 kill = F. Q = bitt 48 Get thee away = F. Q = Then, prethee, get thee gon 49 hence = F. Q = here 60 daub = F. Q = dance 62 And … Bless = F. Q = Blesse 65–6 thee … son= F. Q = the good man 71 slaves = F. Q = stands 73 undo = F. Q = under 77 fearfully = F. Q = firmely

4.2.10 most … dislike = F. Q = hee should most desire 13 terror = F. Q uncorrected = curre 16 Edmund = F. Q = Edgar 18 names = F. Q = armes 28 O … man! = F. Not in Q 30 My fool = F. Q corrected = A Foole. Q uncorrected = My foote body = F. Q corrected = bed 32 whistle = F. Q corrected= whistling 41 seems = F. Q corrected = shewes 44 SH MESSENGER = F. Q = Gent. 48 thrilled = F. Q = thrald 50 threat-enraged = F. Q = thereat inraged 55 justices = F. Q corrected = Iustisers. Q uncorrected = your Iustices 65 tart = F. Q = tooke

4.3.0 SD Gentleman = Ed. F = Gentlemen. Q = Doctor 2 vexed = F. Q = vent 3 fumiter = Ed. F = Fenitar. Q = femiter 4 burdocks = Ed. F = Hardokes. Q = hor-docks 6 sentry spelled Centery in F, centurie in Q send = F. Q = sent 10 helps = F. Q = can help 19 distress = Q. F = desires 28 importuned = F. Q = important 29 incite = F. Q = in sight

4.4.6 lord = F. Q = lady 13 Edmund = F. Q = and now 16 o’th’enemy = F. Q = at’h army 17 madam … letter = F. Q = with my letters 18 troops set = F. Q = troope sets 24 Some things = F. Q = Some thing 29 oeillades spelled Eliads in F, aliads in Q 43 meet = F. Q = meet him should = F. Q = would

4.5.0 SD Edgar = F. Q = Edmund 1 I = F. Q = we 21 walk = Q. F = walk’d 48 bless him = F. Q = blesse 67 summit = F. Q = summons 76 How is’t? Feel = F. Q = how feele 84 whelked spelled wealk’d in F enragèd = F. Q = enridged 86 make them = F. Q = made their 96 crying = F. Q = coyning 102 piece of toasted = F. Q = tosted 104 I’th’clout, i’th’clout: hewgh = F. Q = in the ayre, hagh 108 Goneril … beard? = F. Q = Gonorill, ha Regan, 116 ague-proof = F. Q = argue-proofe 127 were = Ed. Not in F, Q 139 consumption = F. Q = consumation 140 civet … sweeten = F. Q = Ciuet, good Apothocarie, to sweeten 143 Let me = F. Q = Here 148 this = F. Q = that 149 thy = F. Q = the see = F. Q = see one 160 change places, and = F. Not in Q 165 dog’s obeyed = F. Q = dogge, so bade 171 tattered clothes great = F. Q = tottered raggs, smal 172–77 Place … lips = F. Not in Q; Place sins = F. Ed. = Plate sin 179 Now … now. = F. Q = no now 186 wail spelled wawle in F, wayl in Q 190 shoe = F. Q = shoot 191 felt = F. Q = fell I’ll … proof = F. Not in Q 194 hand … Sir= F. Q = hands upon him sirs 198 surgeons = F. Q = a churgion 203 water-pots = F. Q = water-pots, Ay, and laying autumn’s dust. / Gent. Good sir— / Lear. 204 smug bridegroom = F. Q = bridegroome 206 Masters = F. Q = my maisters 208 Come = F. Q = nay 209 Sa … sa. = F. Not in Q 211 a daughter = F. Q = one daughter 218 sound = F. Q = sence 221 speedy foot = F. Q = speed fort 233 tame to = F. Q = lame by 238 bounty … benison = F. Q uncorrected = bornet and beniz 239 To … boot = F. Q corrected = to boot, to boot. Q uncorrected = to saue thee 242 old = F. Q = most 256 I’se spelled ice in F 257 ballow = F. Q corrected = bat. Q uncorrected = battero 264 English = F. Q = British 270 these = F. Q = his the = F. Q = These 271 sorry = F. Q = sorrow 282 affectionate servant, Goneril = F. Q = your affectionate seruant and for your own Venter, Gonorill 283 will = F. Q = wit 294 severed = F. Q = fenced

Act 4 Scene 6 = Ed. F = Scna Septima

4.6.0 SD Gentleman = F. Q = Doctor 18 jarring = F. Q = hurrying 24 SH GENTLEMAN = F. Q assigns this and the next line to the Doctor, and the following two lines to a Gentleman 27 of = F. Q = not of temperance. = F. Q = temperance. / Cord. Very well. / Doct. Please you draw neere, louder the musicke there, 35 opposed = F. Q = exposd jarring = F. Q = warring 36 enemy’s = F. Q = iniurious 49 do … me? = F. Q = know me. 64 not … less = F. Not in Q 85 killed = F. Q = cured him. = F. Q = him and yet it is danger to make him euen ore the time hee has lost

5.1.3 alteration = F. Q uncorrected = abdication 11 In = F. Q = I, 17 not = F. Q = me not 19 Sir … heard = F. Q = For … heare 24 and particular broils = F. Q = dore particulars 27 proceeding. = F. Q = proceeding. / Bast. I shall attend you presently at your tent. 41 And machination ceases = F. Not in Q loves = F. Q = loue 48 Here = F. Q = Hard guess = F. Q = quesse true = F. Q = great

5.2.1 tree = F. Q = bush 14 SH GLOUCESTER And … too. = F. Not in Q.

5.3.2 first = F. Q = best 26 good years = F. Q = goode 40 down. = F. Q = down. / Cap. I cannot draw a cart, nor eate dride oats, / If it bee mans worke ile do’t. 48 send = F. Q uncorrected = saue retention = F. Q uncorrected = retention and appointed guard 49 had = F. Q = has 60 might = F. Q = should 63 immediacy = F. Q = imediate 67 addition = F. Q = aduancement 70 SH ALBANY = F. Q = Gon. 77 Dispose … thine: = F. Not in Q 84 SH REGAN = F. Q = Bast. thine = F. Q = good 86 thy arrest = F. Q = thine attaint 87 sister = Q. F = sister 88 bar = Ed. F = bare 91 loves = F. Q = loue 94 let … sound: = F. Not in Q 95 person = F. Q = head 97 make = F. Q = proue 101 medicine = F. Q = poyson 116 lists = F. Q = hoast 117 by = F. Q = at 120 SH HERALD = F. Q = Edmund 128–29 Yet … cope = F. Q = yet are I mou’t / Where is the aduersarie I come to cope with all 136–37 my … honours — = F. Q = the priuiledge of my tongue, 140 Despise = F. Q = Despite 143 Conspirant = F. Q = Conspicuate 145 below thy foot = F. Q = beneath thy feet 147 are = F. Q = As 152 tongue = F. Q = being 153 What … delay = F. Not in Q 154 rule = F. Q = right 155 Back = F. Q = Heere 156 hell-hated lie o’er-whelm = F. Q = hell hatedly, oreturnd 157 scarcely = Q. F = scarely 162 war = F. Q = armes wast = F. Q = art 166 stop … sir= F. Q = stople it 167 name = F. Q = thing 172 SH EDMUND = F. Q = Gon. 183 vices = F. Q = vertues 184 plague = F. Q = scourge 200 we = F. Q = with 207 fault = F. Q = Father 211 our = F. Q = my 222 SH EDGAR = F. Q = Alb. 223 SH ALBANY Speak, man. = F. Not in Q 224 SH EDGAR = F. Q assigns line to Albany 226 O, she’s dead! = F. Not in Q 227 Who … man. = F. Q = Who man, speake? 229 confesses = F. Q = hath confest 234 judgement = F. Q = Iustice 235 is this = F. Q = tis 265 you = Q. F = your 281 you, murderers, traitors = F. Q = your murderous traytors 287 SH GENTLEMAN = F. Q = Cap. 290 him = F. Q = them 295 This … sight. = F. Not in Q 298 you that = F. Q = that 302 first = F. Q = life 309 says = F. Q = sees 327 sir. = F. Q = sir, O, o, o, o. 328–29 Do … there! = F. Not in Q 331 SH KENT = F. Q = Lear 342 realm = F. Q = kingdome 345 SH EDGAR = F. Q = Duke

QUARTO PASSAGES THAT DO

NOT APPEAR IN THE FOLIO

Lines are numbered continuously, for ease of reference.

Following 1.2.88:

EDMUND    Nor is not, sure^1.

GLOUCESTER    To his father, that so tenderly and entirely loves him.

Heaven and earth!

Following 1.2.130:

as of unnaturalness^4 between the child and the parent,

death, dearth, dissolutions of ancient amities, divisions^5 in

state, menaces and maledictions^6 against king and nobles,

needless diffidences, banishment of friends, dissipation of^7

cohorts, nuptial breaches^8, and I know not what.

EDGAR    How long have you been a sectary astronomical^9?

EDMUND    Come, come,

Following 1.3.16:

Not to be overruled. Idle^11 old man,

That still would manage those authorities

That he hath given away! Now by my life

Old fools are babes again, and must be used^14

With checks as flatteries, when they are seen abused^15.

Following 1.4.131:

FOOL That lord that counselled thee to give away thy land,

Come place him here by me, do thou for him stand^17,

The sweet and bitter fool will presently^18 appear:

The one in motley^19 here, the other found out there.

LEAR    Dost thou call me fool, boy?

FOOL    All thy other titles thou hast given away, that thou

wast born with.

KENT    This is not altogether fool^23 my lord.

FOOL    No, faith, lords and great men will not let me, if I

had a monopoly out, they would have part on’t^25: and ladies

too, they will not let me have all the fool to myself, they’ll be

snatching^27.

Following 1.4.204:

I would learn that, for by the marks^28 of sovereignty,

knowledge, and reason, I should be false^29 persuaded I had

daughters.

FOOL    Which they will make an obedient father.

Following 2.2.137:

His fault is much, and the good king, his master,

Will check him for’t: your purposed low correction^33

Is such as basest and ’temnest^34 wretches

For pilf’rings and most common trespasses^35

Are punished with.

Following 3.1.7:

tears his white hair,

Which the impetuous blasts with eyeless^38 rage

Catch^39 in their fury, and make nothing of,

Strives in his little world of man to out-scorn,

The to-and-fro-conflicting wind and rain:

This night wherein the cubdrawn bear would couch^42,

The lion and the belly-pinchèd^43 wolf

Keep their fur dry, unbonneted^44 he runs,

And bids what will take all^45.

Replaces 3.1.16–23:

But true it is, from France there comes a power^46

Into this scattered^47 kingdom, who already

Wise in our negligence, have secret feet^48

In some of our best ports, and are at point^49

To show their open banner.

Now to you:

If on my credit^52 you dare build so far

To make your speed to Dover, you shall find

Some that will thank you, making just report^54

Of how unnatural and bemadding^55 sorrow

The king hath cause to ’plain^56.

I am a gentleman of blood^57 and breeding,

And from some knowledge and assurance^58,

Offer this office^59 to you.

Following 3.6.16:

EDGAR    The foul fiend bites my back.

FOOL    He’s mad that trusts in the tameness of a wolf, a

horse’s health, a boy’s love, or a whore’s oath.

LEAR    It shall be done, I will arraign them straight^63,

To Edgar

Come sit thou here most learnèd justice^64.—

To the Fool

Thou, sapient^65 sir sit here.

No, you she foxes—

EDGAR    Look where he stands and glares. Want’st thou eyes^67

at trial, madam?

Come o’er the bourn^69, Bessy, to me—

Sings

FOOL Her boat hath a leak^70,

And she must not speak^71

Why she dares not come over^72 to thee.

EDGAR    The foul^73 fiend haunts poor Tom in the voice of a

nightingale, Hopdance^74 cries in Tom’s belly for two white

herring,

Croak not black angel^76, I have no food for thee.

KENT    How do you sir? Stand you not so amazed^77,

Will you lie down and rest upon the cushings^78?

LEAR    I’ll see their trial first, bring in their evidence.—

To Edgar

Thou robèd man of justice, take thy place—

To the Fool

And thou, his yoke-fellow of equity^81,

To Kent

Bench by his side:— you are o’th’commission^82,

Sit you too.

EDGAR    Let us deal justly.

Sleepest or wakest thou, jolly shepherd?

Thy sheep be in the corn,

And for one blast of thy minikin^87 mouth,

Thy sheep shall take no harm.

Purr^89, the cat is grey.

LEAR    Arraign her first, ’tis Goneril. I here take my oath

before this honourable assembly, she kicked the poor king

her father.

FOOL    Come hither, mistress. Is your name Goneril?

LEAR    She cannot deny it.

FOOL    Cry you mercy, I took you for a joint-stool^95.

LEAR    And here’s another whose warped looks^96 proclaim

What store her heart is made on^97: stop her there!

Arms, arms, sword, fire! Corruption in the place!

False justicer, why hast thou let her scape^99?

Following 3.6.55:

KENT    Oppressed^100 nature sleeps:

This rest might yet have balmed thy broken sinews^101,

Which, if convenience^102 will not allow,

To Fool

Stand in hard cure^103.— Come help to bear thy master:

Thou must not stay behind.

Exeunt. [Edgar remains]

EDGAR    When we our betters see bearing our woes^105,

We scarcely think our miseries our foes.

Who alone suffers, suffers most i’th’mind^107,

Leaving free things and happy shows^108 behind,

But then the mind much sufferance doth o’erskip^109,

When grief hath mates, and bearing^110 fellowship:

How light and portable^111 my pain seems now,

When that which makes me bend, makes the king bow^112:

He childed as I fathered^113. Tom away!

Mark the high noises and thyself bewray^114

When false opinion, whose wrong thoughts defile thee,

In thy just proof^116 repeals and reconciles thee.

What will hap more tonight, safe scape the king^117:

Lurk^118, lurk.

Exit

Following 3.7.109:

SERVANT    I’ll never care what wickedness I do,

If this man come to good.

SECOND SERVANT    If she live long,

And in the end meet the old course of death^122,

Women will all turn monsters.

FIRST SERVANT    Let’s follow the old earl, and get the Bedlam^124

To lead him where he would^125: his madness

Allows itself to^126 anything.

SECOND SERVANT    Go thou: I’ll fetch some flax and whites of eggs^127

To apply to his bleeding face. Now heaven help him!

Following 4.1.66:

Five fiends have been in poor Tom at once: of lust, as

Obidicut, Hobbididence, prince of dumbness, Mahu of^130

stealing, Modo of murder, Flibbertigibbet of mopping and^131

mowing, who since possesses chambermaids and waiting-

women. So, bless thee, master.

Following 4.2.35:

I fear your disposition:

That nature, which contemns i’th’origin^135

Cannot be bordered certain^136 in itself.

She that herself will sliver and disbranch^137

From her material sap perforce^138 must wither

And come to deadly use^139.

GONERIL    No more, the text^140 is foolish.

ALBANY    Wisdom and goodness to the vile seem vile:

Filths savour but^142 themselves. What have you done?

Tigers, not daughters, what have you performed?

A father, and a gracious^144 agèd man,

Whose reverence even the head-lugged^145 bear would lick,

Most barbarous, most degenerate, have you madded^146. Could

my good brother suffer^147 you to do it?

A man, a prince, by him so benefited!

If that the heavens do not their visible spirits^149

Send quickly down to tame^150 the vile offences, it will come,

Humanity must perforce prey on itself,

Like monsters of the deep.

Following 4.2.39:

that not know’st

Fools do those villains pity who are punished^154

Ere they have done their mischief. Where’s thy drum?

France spreads his banners in our noiseless^156 land,

With plumèd helm, thy state begins threat^157,

Whilst thou, a moral^158 fool, sits still and cries

‘Alack, why does he so?’

Following 4.2.43:

ALBANY    Thou changèd and self-covered^160 thing, for shame

Bemonster not thy feature. Were’t my fitness^161

To let these hands obey my blood^162,

They are apt enough to dislocate and tear

Thy flesh and bones: howe’er^164 thou art a fiend,

A woman’s shape doth shield thee.

GONERIL    Marry, your manhood mew^166—

Enter a Gentleman

ALBANY    What news?

Following 4.2.77:

Enter Kent and a Gentleman

KENT    Why the King of France is so suddenly gone back^168,

know you no reason?

GENTLEMAN    Something he left imperfect^170 in the state, which

since his coming forth is thought of, which imports^171 to the

kingdom so much fear and danger that his personal return

was most required and necessary.

KENT    Who hath he left behind him general?

GENTLEMAN    The Marshal of France, Monsieur La Far.

KENT    Did your letters pierce the queen to any

demonstration of grief?

GENTLEMAN    Ay, sir, she took them, read them in my presence,

And now and then an ample tear trilled^179 down

Her delicate cheek: it seemed she was a queen over

Her passion^181, who, most rebel-like,

Sought to be king o’er her.

KENT    O, then it moved her.

GENTLEMAN    Not to a rage: patience and sorrow strove

Who should express her goodliest^185. You have seen

Sunshine and rain at once: her smiles and tears

Were like a better way: those happy smilets^187,

That played on her ripe lip seem not to know

What guests were in her eyes, which, parted thence,

As pearls from diamonds dropped. In brief,

Sorrow would be a rarity most beloved,

If all could so become it^192.

KENT    Made she no verbal question?

GENTLEMAN    Faith, once or twice she heaved the name of ‘father’

Pantingly forth, as if it pressed her heart:

Cried ‘Sisters, sisters! Shame of ladies, sisters!

Kent, father, sisters! What, i’th’storm, i’th’night?

Let pity not be believed^198!’ There she shook

The holy water from her heavenly eyes,

And clamour moistened her: then away she started^200

To deal with grief alone.

KENT    It is the stars,

The stars above us, govern our conditions,

Else one self mate and make^204 could not beget

Such different issues^205. You spoke not with her since?

GENTLEMAN    No.

KENT    Was this before the king returned?

GENTLEMAN    No, since.

KENT    Well, sir, the poor distressèd Lear’s i’th’town;

Who sometime, in his better tune^210, remembers

What we are come about, and by no means

Will yield to see his daughter.

GENTLEMAN    Why, good sir?

KENT    A sovereign shame so elbows^214 him: his own unkindness,

That stripped her from his benediction, turned her

To foreign casualties^216, gave her dear rights

To his dog-hearted daughters: these things sting

His mind so venomously, that burning shame

Detains him from Cordelia.

GENTLEMAN    Alack, poor gentleman!

KENT    Of Albany’s and Cornwall’s powers you heard not?

GENTLEMAN    ’Tis so, they are afoot^222.

KENT    Well, sir, I’ll bring you to our master Lear,

And leave you to attend him: some dear cause^224

Will in concealment wrap me up awhile.

When I am known aright, you shall not grieve^226

Lending me this acquaintance. I pray you go

Along with me.

Exeunt

Following 4.6.27:

CORDELIA    Very well.

DOCTOR    Please you, draw near.— Louder the music there!

Following 4.6.35:

To stand against the deep dread-bolted^231 thunder,

In the most terrible and nimble stroke

Of quick cross lightning? To watch — poor perdu^234!—

With this thin helm^234?

Following 4.6.89:

GENTLEMAN    Holds it true, sir, that the Duke of Cornwall was so

slain?

KENT    Most certain, sir.

GENTLEMAN    Who is conductor of his people^238?

KENT    As ’tis said, the bastard son of Gloucester.

GENTLEMAN    They say Edgar, his banished son, is with the Earl of

Kent in Germany.

KENT    Report^242 is changeable. ’Tis time to look about: the

powers of the kingdom approach apace^243.

GENTLEMAN    The arbitrament^244 is like to be bloody. Fare you well,

sir.

KENT    My point and period will be throughly wrought^246,

Or^247 well or ill, as this day’s battle’s fought.

Exit

Following 5.1.13:

EDMUND    That thought abuses^248 you.

REGAN    I am doubtful that you have been conjunct^249

And bosomed with her, as far as we call hers^250

Following 5.1.17:

GONERIL    I had rather lose the battle than that sister

Should loosen him and me.

Following 5.1.21:

Where I could not be honest^253,

I never yet was valiant. For^254 this business,

It touches us as^255 France invades our land,

Not bolds the king, with^256 others whom I fear,

Most just and heavy causes make oppose^257.

EDMUND    Sir, you speak nobly.

Following 5.3.55:

At this time

We sweat and bleed: the friend hath lost his friend;

And the best quarrels, in the heat, are cursed^261

By those that feel their sharpness:

The question of Cordelia and her father

Requires a fitter place.

Following 5.3.220:

EDGAR    This would have seemed a period^265

To such as love not sorrow, but another,266

To amplify too much, would make much more,

And top extremity.

Whilst I was big in clamour^269, came there in a man,

Who, having seen me in my worst estate^270,

Shunned my abhorred society, but then finding

Who ’twas that so endured, with his strong arms

He fastened on my neck^273 and bellowed out

As^274 he’d burst heaven, threw me on my father,

Told the most piteous tale of Lear and him

That ever ear received, which in recounting

His grief grew puissant and the strings of life^277

Began to crack: twice then the trumpets sounded,

And there I left him ’tranced^279.

ALBANY    But who was this?

EDGAR    Kent, sir, the banished Kent, who in disguise

Followed his enemy king^282 and did him service

Improper for^283 a slave.

TEXTUAL NOTES

Q = First Quarto text of 1608

Q2 = a correction introduced in the Second Quarto text of 1619

Ed = a correction introduced by a later editor

SH = Speech heading (i.e. speaker’s name)

1 SH EDMUND = Ed. Q = Bast. (throughout) 25 on’t = Q. Q2 = an’t ladies = Q (corrected). Q (uncorrected) = lodes 34 basest and ’temnest = Q (corrected). Q (uncorrected) = belest and contaned 67 Want’st = Q2. Q = wanst 69 bourn = Ed. Q = broome 91 she kicked = Ed. Q = kickt 95 joint-stool = Q2. Q = ioyne stoole 97 on = Ed. Q = an 125 madness = Q (corrected). Q (uncorrected) = rogish madnes 131 Flibbertigibbet spelled Stiberdigebit in Q 131–32 mopping and mowing = Ed. Q = Mobing, & Mohing 151 Humanity = Q (corrected). Q (uncorrected) = Humanly 157 threat spelled thereat in Q (corrected) state begins threat = Q (corrected). Q (uncorrected) = slayer begin threats 166 mew = Q (corrected). Q (uncorrected) = now 178 Ay, sir, = Ed. Q = I say 184 strove = Ed. Q = streme

SCENE-BY-SCENE ANALYSIS

ACT 1 SCENE 1

Relationships between key characters are established. Several themes are introduced: power/authority, deception, nature, kinship, sanity, and sight.

Lines 1–33: Kent and Gloucester discuss Lear. Edmund is introduced. Gloucester insists that Edmund is as dear to him as his older, legitimate, son, Edgar, and claims that “the whoreson must be acknowledged.” The bawdy language used to describe Edmund’s conception undermines the good intentions behind this.

Lines 34–193: A trumpet flourish emphasizes the ceremonial, public nature of events from this point. Instructing Gloucester to fetch France and Burgundy, Lear reveals his “darker purpose”—to allocate a piece of kingdom to each of his three daughters, intending the “largest bounty” to whoever “doth love [him] most.” This reveals Lear’s inability to separate public and domestic and highlights his perception of emotions as subject to pecuniary measurement. Tensions exist between his love of power and his portrayal of himself as an old man who wishes to “Unburdened crawl toward death.”

Goneril’s speech is effusive but ambiguous, as she declares that she loves her father “more than word can wield the matter.” Regan is similarly flattering but ambiguous, telling Lear to “prize” her at Goneril’s “worth,” as she is “made of that self-mettle” as her sister. Cordelia’s asides show her dilemma—she is torn between genuine love for her father and reluctance or inability to voice this before the court. She is offered “a third more opulent” than her sisters—unlike Gloucester, Lear does not even suggest he values his daughters equally. In contrast to her sisters, Cordelia’s response is simply “Nothing.” Lear encourages her to say more, because “Nothing will come of nothing,” a concept that is explored throughout the play. Lear disinherits Cordelia, and Kent’s attempts to speak up for her fuel his anger.

Retaining a hundred knights, Lear divides his kingdom between Goneril and Regan, intending to live with each of them for alternate months. Kent intervenes, showing respect for Lear, but suggesting that he is not thinking clearly and urging him to “check / This hideous rashness.” Lear banishes Kent.

Lines 194–281: Lear explains to the King of France and Duke of Burgundy that Cordelia’s “price is fallen.” She is no longer “dear” to him, a word that highlights his belief that love is quantifiable. Burgundy cannot decide, so Lear offers his daughter to France but says he would not want him to marry a “wretch” that “Nature is ashamed” of. France asks what Cordelia’s “monstrous” offense is and she asks Lear to make it clear that it is lack of the “glib and oily art” of false speech. Burgundy says that he will take her with her original dowry. Echoing Cordelia, Lear declares that this is “Nothing,” so Burgundy declines. France sees Cordelia’s virtues and comments that “unprized precious” Cordelia is “most rich, being poor,” highlighting France and Lear’s differing perceptions of “worth,” and challenging Lear’s assertion that “Nothing will come of nothing.”

Lines 282–299: Leaving with France, Cordelia says goodbye “with washèd eyes,” suggesting tears but also clear perception of her sisters’ characters.

Lines 300–323: Goneril and Regan discuss Lear’s “poor judgement” and the “changes” and “infirmity” of his old age, but Regan observes that “he hath ever but slenderly known himself.” Goneril expresses concern about Lear’s desire for authority. Regan agrees that they must “think” about this, but Goneril says that they “must do something,” highlighting a subtle difference between them.

ACT 1 SCENE 2

Lines 1–22: Edmund is angry that he will not inherit. He protests about the label “base” and argues that he is as good as “honest madam’s issue”—better, even, because there was passion in his conception. He reveals his designs on Edgar’s inheritance.

Lines 23–107: Edmund conceals a letter from Gloucester in a way that draws attention to it. He tells Gloucester it is “Nothing,” but then pretends that it is from Edgar. Gloucester reads its contents, which suggest that Edgar and Edmund should murder Gloucester and split the inheritance. Edmund manipulates Gloucester, who is easily persuaded that Edgar is an “unnatural” villain. Edmund pretends to plead on Edgar’s behalf and arranges that Gloucester will overhear a conversation between them. Gloucester exits, blaming all the problems in family and state on “These late eclipses in the sun and moon.”

Lines 108–161: Edmund is scornful of those who believe that destiny is decided by the stars and blame their “evil” on “a divine thrusting on,” thus raising a debate between free will and fate, as he claims that the stars have no influence on his personality or fortune. Edgar interrupts and Edmund changes behavior on “cue,” suggesting his directorial role in the action. He persuades Edgar that Gloucester is angry with him and suggests that they avoid meeting. Giving Edgar the key to his lodging, he promises to help.

ACT 1 SCENE 3

Goneril and her steward Oswald discuss Lear’s irrational temper. She gives instructions to say that she is ill and cannot see Lear and that the servants are to ignore him.

ACT 1 SCENE 4

Lines 1–89: Kent is disguised, but while his appearance has changed, his nature has not—he is still an “honest-hearted fellow.” Not recognizing him, Lear employs Kent and asks Oswald for Goneril, but is ignored. One of Lear’s knights says that Oswald refuses to come back, that Goneril is unwell, and points out that Lear has been neglected recently. When Oswald reappears, he is disrespectful and Lear loses his temper. Kent trips Oswald up and insults him, earning Lear’s thanks.

Lines 90–174: Lear’s Fool delivers a series of jokes, riddles, nonsense, and rhymes. These have comic effect, but they are also ambiguous, providing perceptive comment on Lear’s circumstances and reinforcing some key themes such as cruelty, division, and folly. In the Quarto text, Kent comments that “This is not altogether fool my lord.”

Lines 175–297: Goneril lists her grievances. Lear’s temper and language become wilder, suggesting the growing disquiet of his mind. The interjections of the Fool, combining nonsense and wisdom, contribute to the growing disorder. Albany ineffectually attempts to calm Lear, who curses Goneril with either sterility or the future birth of a “child of spleen.” He leaves. Goneril ignores Albany, showing where the power lies in their relationship. Lear returns, having discovered that Goneril has reduced his train of knights by fifty. Despite uncontrollable anger, his tears suggest weakness. He decides to go to Regan, saying she will “flay” Goneril’s “wolfish visage”—an example of the animal imagery associated with the two sisters.

Lines 298–325: Goneril claims it is unwise to allow Lear to enforce the whims of his old age, and calls Oswald to take a letter to Regan. She criticizes Albany for his “milky gentleness.”

ACT 1 SCENE 5

Lear sends letters to Gloucester with Kent, then struggles against madness as he talks to his Fool.

ACT 2 SCENE 1

Lines 1–91: Edmund urges Edgar to escape, suggesting that Cornwall believes Edgar is plotting against him, and that Gloucester is in pursuit. Edmund directs Edgar’s flight, pretending that he is helping, but convincing Gloucester’s party that he is trying to stop him. He wounds his own arm and tells Gloucester that Edgar stabbed him when he refused to help Edgar. Gloucester tells “Loyal and natural” Edmund that he will make him his heir.

Lines 92–140: Gloucester confirms Cornwall and Regan’s queries about Edgar. Cornwall praises Edmund, takes him into his service, then begins to explain their arrival. Regan interrupts, showing her dominance, and claims that she wanted Gloucester’s advice on letters from Lear and Goneril.

ACT 2 SCENE 2

Lines 1–144: Outside Gloucester’s castle, Oswald claims not to know the disguised Kent, who insults and beats him. While Cornwall attempts to establish how the quarrel started, Kent continues to insult Oswald, who explains that Kent (who calls himself “Caius”) is in Lear’s service. Cornwall comments on Kent’s plain-spoken nature, but ironically assumes that his “plainness / Harbour[s] more craft and more corrupter ends” and places him in the stocks. In the Quarto text, Gloucester argues stocks are for “basest and “temnest wretches” and it is insulting to Lear to punish his messenger in them.

Lines 145–166: Gloucester apologizes and says that he will plead for Kent’s release, but Kent says not to. Kent’s soliloquy reveals that he has a letter from Cordelia.

Lines 167–187: Edgar intends to disguise himself as a mad beggar from Bedlam. Edgar’s soliloquy and the following sequence are sometimes edited and played as separate scenes, but the action continues uninterrupted in that Kent remains onstage asleep in the stocks.

Lines 188–271: Lear will not believe that Regan and Cornwall have put Kent in the stocks—it is an “outrage” “upon respect.” Fighting his rising anger, Lear goes to confront them. The Fool comments on Kent’s folly in continuing to serve Lear.

Lines 272–383: Enraged that Regan and Cornwall will not speak with him, Lear sends Gloucester to summon them. His language reflects his growing disturbance, which he fights to suppress—“my rising heart! But, down!” When they arrive, Lear pours out his grievances against Goneril. Regan responds in a reasoned but insulting manner, saying that Lear is old and needs to be “ruled and led,” and suggests that he ask Goneril’s forgiveness. Lear’s pride and anger rise, but he thinks Regan will acknowledge the “dues of gratitude” that he has bought with “half o’th’kingdom.”

Lines 384–515: Goneril and Regan unite against Lear, gradually reducing his number of knights—a symbol of his power—until he has nothing. He reminds them of what they owe him—“I gave you all.” When Regan asks whether Lear needs even one follower, he replies “O, reason not the need! Our basest beggars / Are in the poorest thing superfluous: / Allow not nature more than nature needs, / Man’s life is cheap as beast’s.” The encounter of king and beggar, the question of “superfluity,” and the stripping down from courtly accoutrements to raw nature are at the core of the play. Lear asks the heavens for patience, but the growing storm reflects his turbulent mind and he leaves in “high rage” to go out onto the heath. Goneril, Regan, and Cornwall tell Gloucester to shut his doors against Lear and the storm.

ACT 3 SCENE 1

In this act, the relatively brief and fast-paced scenes move between different locations and characters. This, combined with the evocation of the storm, creates a sense of chaos that mirrors the breakdown of Lear’s reason and kingdom.

Kent learns that Lear is on the heath in the storm with the Fool. He reveals that the French have spies in the courts of Cornwall and Albany, between whom dissension is growing. Kent gives the Gentleman a ring to show to Cordelia as confirmation of his true identity.

ACT 3 SCENE 2

Lear’s disordered speech reflects his mental state as he invokes nature to destroy mankind and “Strike flat the thick rotundity o’th’world.” In his chaotic speeches there are recurrent references to children, ingratitude, and justice as he blames his daughters for his situation. The Fool encourages Lear to shelter, commenting that the “night pities neither wise men nor fools,” drawing attention to the blurred distinctions between wisdom and folly, sanity and insanity. Lear rages about justice, still denying any responsibility and asserting that he is “a man / More sinned against than sinning.” Kent persuades him to take shelter in a nearby hovel while he begs Goneril and Regan for shelter. Alone, the Fool speaks a rhymed “prophecy” that perhaps transcends the context of the play, warning against the injustices and corruption of “Albion” (Britain).

ACT 3 SCENE 3

Gloucester has been refused permission to help Lear and has lost control of his castle. He reveals that Edmund has a letter concerning Cornwall and Albany locked in his closet, and that he intends to help Lear. He asks Edmund to tell Cornwall that he is ill, to prevent his assistance of Lear being discovered. Once alone, Edmund reveals his intention to betray Gloucester.

ACT 3 SCENE 4

Lines 1–103: Kent tries to persuade Lear to enter the hovel out of the storm, but Lear is more concerned with the “tempest” in his mind and remains outside, dwelling on “Poor naked wretches” who, “houseless” and “unfed,” have no defense against the elements. In a moment of brief self-awareness he declares: “O, I have ta’en / Too little care of this!” The Fool is frightened out of the hovel by Edgar, in disguise as the near-naked “Poor Tom.” In a pitiful and ironic contrast to the genuine insanity of Lear, “Tom” feigns madness through fragmented speech. Like the Fool’s nonsense, however, there are recognizable themes, pertinent to the play, such as lust, devilishness, and nakedness. Lear continues to dwell on his troubles, insisting that “Nothing” but “unkind daughters” could have “subdued nature / To such a lowness” in Tom. Asking “Is man no more than this?,” Lear removes his clothes, approaching the raw condition of “the thing itself: unaccommodated man.”

Lines 104–178: In a confused conversation that evokes the external storm and the “tempest” inside Lear’s head, Gloucester and Kent attempt to persuade Lear to enter Gloucester’s castle. Tom interjects with “insane” comments that focus on demons and witchcraft, but are taken by Lear to be the words of a “philosopher” and “learnèd Theban.” Ironically, Gloucester talks of Edgar and “poor banished” Kent.

ACT 3 SCENE 5

Edmund has betrayed Gloucester. Cornwall swears that he will have revenge and rewards Edmund by giving him his father’s title. Edmund pretends to be distressed at having to betray Gloucester, but plans to make it worse by discovering him “comforting the king.”

ACT 3 SCENE 6

Gloucester shows Kent, Lear, Tom, and the Fool into a farmhouse adjoining his castle. The dialogue is fragmented as Lear continues to focus on injustice, the Fool continues to produce sense in nonsense, and Edgar acts his part as madman. Kent’s voice of reason is unable to prevail. In a Quarto-only sequence, Lear insists on holding a “trial” of Goneril and Regan, seeing them before him in his madness. With Tom and the Fool as judges, this episode highlights the distorted nature of justice so far in the play. Edgar’s pity for Lear makes it hard to sustain his “counterfeiting,” and after Gloucester leads the others away, he rejects his disguise.

ACT 3 SCENE 7

Cornwall sends Goneril to tell Albany that France has landed, instructing Edmund to accompany her. Oswald informs Cornwall that Lear has gone to Dover. Gloucester is brought for questioning. Regan cruelly encourages the servant to bind Gloucester “hard” and disrespectfully plucks his beard. He admits that he sent Lear to Dover to protect him from Regan’s “cruel nails” and Goneril’s “boarish fangs.” Cornwall puts out one of Gloucester’s eyes. A servant tries to help Gloucester, but as Cornwall fights him, Regan seizes a sword—a symbol of her “unwomanly” power—and stabs the servant. Cornwall takes Gloucester’s other eye as Regan reveals that it was Edmund who betrayed him. Gloucester thus gains metaphorical “sight” as he is literally blinded. Regan orders Gloucester to be put out onto the heath to “smell / His way to Dover.” She leads the mortally injured Cornwall away. In the Quarto text, the remaining servants discuss Regan’s lack of womanly feeling, offer first aid to Gloucester and vow to get “the Bedlam” (Tom) to lead him to Dover.

ACT 4 SCENE 1

Edgar argues that even the “most dejected thing of fortune” can still have hope, but then he sees his blinded father and realizes he is “worse than e’er.” Gloucester shows self-awareness when he says that he “stumbled” when he saw, and ironically talks of his “dear son Edgar.” Gloucester blames the gods, to whom men are “As flies,” and who “kill us for their sport.” The old man leading Gloucester recognizes “Poor Tom” and Edgar realizes that he must remain disguised and “play fool to sorrow.” Gloucester wishes Tom to lead him to Dover, despite the old man’s protests, arguing that “ ’Tis the time’s plague, when madmen lead the blind.” Edgar’s pity for Gloucester means that he struggles to maintain his deception. Gloucester asks to be taken to the edge of Dover’s cliffs.

ACT 4 SCENE 2

Lines 1–31: Goneril wonders why Albany did not meet her. Oswald informs her that Albany has changed—he “smiled” to hear of the French army’s arrival and said “The worse” at Goneril’s return. He refuses to believe Gloucester’s treachery or Edmund’s loyalty. Goneril sends Edmund back, blaming Albany’s change on his “cowish terror.” She gives him a love token and kisses him, telling him to wait for “A mistress’s command.”

Lines 32–77: Albany and Goneril quarrel. In a Quarto-only sequence, Albany shows new strength as he berates Goneril for her treatment of her father, calling her and Regan “Tigers, not daughters”; she accuses him of cowardice, describing him as “a moral fool.” In the Folio’s edited version of their exchange, Goneril calls her husband a “Milk-livered man.” A messenger brings news of Cornwall’s death and Gloucester’s blinding; he delivers Goneril a letter from Regan. Albany is horrified and swears revenge on Edmund for his betrayal of Gloucester. Goneril shows mixed feelings at Cornwall’s death—Regan is less powerful as a widow, but she is also free to marry Edmund.

ACT 4 SCENE 3

In a Quarto-only scene, Kent and a Gentleman inform the audience that France has returned to his kingdom, leaving Cordelia in England. Kent asks for Cordelia’s reaction to his letter. The natural imagery—“Sunshine and rain at once: her smiles and tears”—shows her goodness and contrasts with the darker images of nature associated with Goneril and Regan. Kent comments that the differences between the sisters can only be accounted for by “the stars above” who “govern our conditions,” recalling the comments made about fate and free will by Gloucester and Edmund in Act 1 Scene 2. Lear is in Dover but refuses to see Cordelia because of his “burning shame” at his treatment of her.

The Folio text moves straight to a scene in which Cordelia marches onstage at the head of her army, informing the audience that Lear has been sighted, still mad, crowned with wildflowers and weeds. Cordelia sends soldiers to find him. A Gentleman (Doctor in Quarto) says that sleep will help Lear and that there are medicinal herbs that will achieve this—a benevolent image of nature that contrasts with the violent storm. A messenger brings news that the British are marching toward them and Cordelia makes it clear that France’s armies are not fighting for “blown ambition”—unlike Goneril and Regan—but for love of Lear.

ACT 4 SCENE 4

Albany’s army has set out, although Oswald says that it took “much ado” for Albany himself to join them and that Goneril “is the better soldier.” Oswald has a letter from Goneril to Edmund that Regan wishes to read, but Oswald refuses. Regan expresses concern at Goneril’s interest in Edmund and argues that he is better suited to her, because she is a widow. She asks Oswald to remind Goneril of this and tells him there is a reward for whoever kills Gloucester.

ACT 4 SCENE 5

Lines 1–93: Edgar persuades Gloucester that they are at a cliff top. Gloucester comments that Edgar’s “voice is altered.” With truthful irony, Edgar responds that he is changed in nothing but his garments. Gloucester delivers a suicide speech and then throws himself forward. Edgar pretends to have found him at the bottom of the cliff, claiming that it is a miracle he survived the fall. He asks who was with Gloucester at the cliff’s head, suggesting that “It was some fiend,” but that he has been spared by the gods. Gloucester resolves to “bear / Affliction.”

Lines 94–209: Lear appears dressed in flowers and talking nonsense, still fixated on his daughters. Gloucester recognizes his voice, but Lear does not recognize him, taking him for “Goneril with a white beard.” In a pitifully ironic exchange Lear claims to remember Gloucester’s eyes and demands that he read an imaginary challenge. Lear excoriates women for their sexual indulgence. He shows “reason in madness” as he talks of justice and how it is useless against sin that is plated “with gold.” Lear runs away from Cordelia’s attendants.

Lines 210–299: Edgar is leading Gloucester to safety, but Oswald finds them and tries to kill Gloucester. Under yet another persona, Edgar fatally wounds Oswald, who begs him to deliver a letter to Edmund. Edgar reads the letter from Goneril, urging Edmund to kill Albany so that she may marry him. Edgar buries Oswald, keeps the letter to show Albany, and leads Gloucester away.

ACT 4 SCENE 6

Cordelia thanks Kent and asks him to change out of his disguise. Kent replies that he has a reason to remain as he is. A Gentleman (Doctor in Quarto) asks Cordelia’s permission to wake Lear. Cordelia kisses Lear and laments her sisters’ treatment of him. When he wakes, she addresses him with respect fitting for a “royal lord.” Lear is disorientated and humbled, in contrast to his earlier pride, and calls himself a “foolish fond old man.” He recognizes Cordelia and assumes that she hates him, acknowledging that she has “some cause.” She refutes this and leads him away. Kent reveals that Edmund is leading Cornwall’s army.

ACT 5 SCENE 1

Lines 1–31: Edmund describes Albany’s “alteration” and “self-reproving.” Regan questions Edmund about Goneril and accuses him of adultery with her. Edmund denies this as Albany and Goneril arrive, bringing news that Lear and Cordelia are reunited. Albany is divided between his role as a leader who must defend his country and his personal reluctance to fight Lear. Goneril and Regan are both reluctant to leave Edmund alone with the other.

Lines 32–66: Disguised, Edgar hands Albany the letter and leaves. Edmund informs Albany that “The enemy’s in view.” Alone, Edmund contemplates the two sisters, coldly observing that “Neither can be enjoyed / If both remain alive.” He resolves to let Goneril kill Albany if he survives the battle and swears that there will be no mercy for Lear and Cordelia.

ACT 5 SCENE 2

Edgar leaves Gloucester in safety and goes to fight for Lear. He returns to report that Lear and Cordelia have been defeated and captured. Gloucester wishes to remain where he is to be captured or to die, but Edgar says that men must “endure” until their appointed time.

ACT 5 SCENE 3

Lines 1–114: Cordelia thinks that they will see her sisters now they are captives, but Lear does not wish to, constructing a fantasy where he and Cordelia will live happily and safely in prison. Edmund orders them to be taken away and gives the captain instructions to kill them. Albany, Goneril, and Regan arrive, and Albany praises Edmund’s “valiant strain,” asking for the captives. Edmund says that he has sent Lear away so that he will not “pluck the common bosom on his side.” Albany reproves Edmund for taking authority, but Regan claims that he has proved himself Albany’s “brother” by leading her armies. Goneril and Regan begin to fight over Edmund and Regan claims him as her “lord and master.” Albany arrests Edmund for treason and ironically bars Regan’s claim on Edmund as he is “subcontracted” to Goneril. As Albany challenges Edmund, Regan is taken ill, poisoned by Goneril. The trumpet sounds to summon a champion for Albany who will maintain that Edmund, supposed Earl of Gloucester, is “a manifold traitor.”

Lines 115–264: Edgar answers the summons but does not identify himself, except that he is “as noble” as Edmund. They fight and Edmund is mortally wounded, but Goneril argues that he is not defeated because he was not bound to fight “An unknown opposite.” Albany demonstrates the shift in power between them as he tells her to “Shut [her] mouth” and produces her letter to Edmund. Goneril flees. Edmund admits the charges and wishes to know his killer, as he will forgive him if he is noble. Edgar reveals his identity and says that they should “exchange charity.” He argues that “The gods are just,” perhaps a response to Gloucester’s lament in Act 4 Scene 1. Edgar relates how Gloucester died on being told of the true identity of the man who has led him in his blindness: his heart was too weak to support the extremes of “joy and grief” provoked by the knowledge. A messenger brings news that Goneril has poisoned Regan and stabbed herself. Their bodies are brought onstage as Kent arrives, seeking Lear. Edmund resolves to do “some good” before dying and reveals that Lear and Cordelia are condemned to death, and that Cordelia’s hanging will be made to look like suicide. He sends his sword as a “token of reprieve” and is carried out.

Lines 265–348: Howling, Lear carries in Cordelia’s body. He tries to revive her, ignoring Kent’s attempts to speak to him, and reveals that he killed the executioner, remembering “the day” that he “would have made [them] skip,” a brief return to his previous, regal self before he disintegrates once more. He dies believing that he sees Cordelia breathe, and Kent begs his own heart to break. Edmund’s death is reported and Albany asks Kent and Edgar to rule and sustain “the gored state,” but Kent refuses, feeling death is near. Despite Albany’s assertion that “All friends shall taste / The wages of their virtue, and all foes / The cup of their deservings,” any sense of justice, human or divine, seems scant, and the play’s resolution is bleak.

KING LEAR IN

PERFORMANCE:

THE RSC AND BEYOND

The best way to understand a Shakespeare play is to see it or ideally to participate in it. By examining a range of productions, we may gain a sense of the extraordinary variety of approaches and interpretations that are possible—a variety that gives Shakespeare his unique capacity to be reinvented and made “our contemporary” four centuries after his death.

We begin with a brief overview of the play’s theatrical and cinematic life, offering historical perspectives on how it has been performed. We then analyze in more detail a series of productions staged over the last half-century by the Royal Shakespeare Company. The sense of dialogue between productions that can only occur when a company is dedicated to the revival and investigation of the Shakespeare canon over a long period, together with the uniquely comprehensive archival resource of promptbooks, program notes, reviews, and interviews held on behalf of the RSC at the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust in Stratford-upon-Avon, allows an “RSC stage history” to become a crucible in which the chemistry of the play can be explored.

Finally, we go to the horse’s mouth. Modern theater is dominated by the figure of the director. He or she must hold together the whole play, whereas the actor must concentrate on his or her part. The director’s viewpoint is therefore especially valuable. Shakespeare’s plasticity is wonderfully revealed when we hear directors of highly successful productions answering the same questions in very different ways.

FOUR CENTURIES OF

KING LEAR:

AN OVERVIEW

The first Lear was Richard Burbage, the leading actor with Shakespeare’s company, the King’s Men. He was described by an anonymous elegist listing his best-known roles as “Kind Lear.”1 Little is known otherwise of the earliest performances. The Fool is thought to have been played by Robert Armin, the company’s leading comic actor after the departure of Will Kempe. A talented singer and musician, Armin was noted for his witty paradoxical fooling. Some scholars have, however, suggested that Armin may have played Edgar, since Tom o’Bedlam speaks a kind of fool’s language and Armin was equally capable of the multiple role changes that the character puts himself through. This casting would have opened up the possibility for a boy actor to double the roles of Cordelia and the Fool, who never appear on stage together. Such doubling would give added poignancy to the line “And my poor fool is hanged,” but it remains counterintuitive to suppose that Armin was cast in any role other than that of the Fool.

There is a record of a court performance at Whitehall on St. Stephen’s night, 26 December 1606. It was a bold choice to play the mad king and the image of a “dog obeyed in office” before the court. A play of “king Lere” was performed at Gowthwaite Hall in Yorkshire in 1610. This was probably Shakespeare’s version, not the old Leir play (which recently scholarship has ascribed to Thomas Kyd, author of the highly successful Spanish Tragedy). A company of English actors in Dresden in 1626 played the “Tragoedia von Lear, König in Engelandt,” probably also Shakespeare’s version.

The play was revived briefly after the Restoration of the monarchy in 1660 and subsequent reopening of the theaters, but in 1681 Nahum Tate staged a production using a text that he himself had adapted. In his dedicatory epistle Tate emphasized the idea of the rough and unfinished nature of Shakespeare’s work. It was a “heap of jewels” that needed to have order, regularity, and polish applied to it for its true beauty to be revealed. Tate simplified language, plot, and character, eliminating the Fool and much of the play’s complexity. He included a love story between Edgar and Cordelia, together with a confidante for Cordelia, Arante. The play’s happy ending concludes with Lear restored, handing his throne over to Edgar and Cordelia. Tate’s Lear and various revised forms of the adaptation, including one by David Garrick, replaced the original on stage, except possibly in Dublin, where the Smock Alley promptbooks are based on Shakespeare’s printed text. The authentically Shakespearean original was not performed on the London stage again, save for a handful of performances by Edmund Kean in the early nineteenth century, until Macready’s restored (if heavily cut) production of 1838.

2. William Charles Macready as Lear in 1838, with the dead Cordelia: until this revival, the stage was dominated by Nahum Tate’s reworking with a happy ending in which Cordelia survives and marries Edgar.

Thomas Betterton had been Tate’s Lear. David Garrick, the most celebrated actor-manager of the eighteenth century, restored parts of Shakespeare’s text in his own production at Drury Lane but retained Tate’s ending. His performance was acclaimed for its pathos and humanity. In his diary James Boswell records: “I was fully moved, and I shed abundance of tears.”2 The Shakespearean editor George Steevens, after confessing his view that “Tate’s alteration … had considerably improved the great original,” went on to extol the virtues of Garrick’s acting: “Were we to inquire in what particular scene Mr. Garrick is preeminently excellent it would be a difficult circumstance to point it out.” He did, though, single out Garrick’s “mode of speaking the curse at the end of the first act of the play.” In his view Garrick “gives it additional energy, and it is impossible to hear him deliver it without an equal mixture of horror and admiration.”3 John Philip Kemble (Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, 1788) played Lear with his tragedian sister, Sarah Siddons, as Cordelia. The critic and poet Leigh Hunt was disappointed: “He personated the king’s majesty perfectly well, but not the king’s madness … he is always stiff, always precise, and he will never, as long as he lives, be able to act any thing mad unless it be a melancholy mad statue.”4

During the Regency period, when old King George III was mad, the London theater managers tactfully abstained from staging the play. Soon after the king’s death in 1820, the fiery Romantic actor Edmund Kean played the role at Drury Lane later to mixed reviews. The London Times objected that the storm scene “was less effective than many others” chiefly because it was “exhibited with so much accuracy that the performer could scarcely be heard amidst the confusion,” but the reviewer was better pleased by the fifth act in which “there was scarcely a dry eye in the theatre.”5 William Hazlitt felt that “Mr. Kean chipped off a bit of the character here and there: but he did not pierce the solid substance, nor move the entire mass.”6 Hazlitt reviewed Junius Brutus Booth’s production at Covent Garden in the same year more favorably: “There was no feebleness, and no vulgarity in any part of Mr. Booth’s acting, but it was animated, vigorous, and pathetic throughout.”7

When Macready, who had played Edmund to Booth’s Lear, restored Shakespeare’s text in his Covent Garden production of 1838, the Fool, reintroduced for the first time in more than a hundred and fifty years, was played by a young woman, Priscilla Horton. Macready set the play in a pagan Saxon Britain replete with Druidic stone circles. Critics were generally enthusiastic:

Mr. Macready’s Lear, remarkable before for a masterly completeness of conception, is heightened by this introduction of the Fool to a surprising degree. It accords exactly with the view he seeks to present of Lear’s character.… Mr. Macready’s representation of the father at the end, broken down to his last despairing struggle, his heart swelling gradually upwards till it bursts in its closing sigh, completed the only perfect picture that we have of Lear since the age of Betterton.8

It may be asked how someone writing a century and a half after the event could have known that Betterton’s was a “perfect picture” of Lear, but the point here is to stress how much the characterization of Lear gains from the restoration of his foil, the Fool.

Samuel Phelps produced the play at Sadler’s Wells in 1845 using simpler staging and a fuller version of the text than that of Macready, which had remained heavily cut despite the rejection of Tate. The naturalism of Phelps’ performance was praised but the storm was thought excessive: “It is not imitation, but realization.”9 Charles Kean staged a successful production at the Princess’s Theater in 1858. Set in Anglo-Saxon Britain, it boasted a strong supporting cast including Kate Terry as Cordelia. Meanwhile in New York, Edwin Booth, son of Junius Brutus, revived the play using Shakespeare’s text, giving a performance described by William Winter as “the fond father and the broken old man. It was the great heart, shattered by cruel unkindness, that he first, and most of all, displayed.”10 The great Italian actor Tommaso Salvini, also won praise for his performances at Boston’s Globe Theatre in 1882 and London’s Covent Garden in 1884, despite the fact that he spoke in Italian while the rest of the cast spoke in English, a proceeding that the novelist Henry James described as “grotesque, unpardonable, abominable.”11 Henry Irving’s elaborately staged production at the Lyceum in 1892 was set in a Britain of Roman ruins with Druidic priests and Viking warriors. Using a heavily cut text that reduced the play’s violence and sexuality, Irving emphasized Lear’s age and paternalism in a performance that attracted mixed notices, although Ellen Terry’s Cordelia was widely praised.

At the end of the nineteenth century directors such as William Poel and Harley Granville Barker promoted the simple staging of Shakespeare’s plays, attempting to recreate the conditions of the Elizabethan playhouse, with its fast continuous action in contrast to the spectacular staging of the Victorians, which involved lengthy scene changes. In his Prefaces to Shakespeare (1927), Granville Barker argued vigorously against critical prejudice toward the play in performance and insisted on its theatrical viability, a judgment borne out by the many productions since. The twentieth and twenty-first centuries have produced a number of distinguished Lears but have also concentrated on more balanced productions that give greater weight and opportunity to lesser roles.

John Gielgud first played Lear in Harcourt Williams’ production at the Old Vic in 1931 at the age of twenty-six. Despite his obvious talent, critics thought him too young for the part. In 1940 Gielgud had a second opportunity to play the part, again at the Old Vic, in a production set in early modern Europe, based on the ideas of Granville Barker, who oversaw the early rehearsals and personally coached Gielgud. In an essay of 1963 Gielgud claimed that the ten days in which Barker worked with the company “were the fullest in experience that I have ever had in all my years upon the stage.”12 The production was a success, although the noted critic James Agate concluded that Gielgud’s performance was “a thing of great beauty, imagination, sensitiveness, understanding, executive virtuosity, and control. You would be wrong to say—this is not King Lear! You would be right to say that this is Lear every inch but one.”13

In 1936 the director-designer Theodore Komisarjevsky staged a memorable and radical production at the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon. There was a simple but effective set, consisting mainly of a grand staircase, illuminated by a cyclorama that changed color to reflect the mood of the scene. As the London Times review put it:

3. Expressionist design in the 1930s: the opening scene of the Komisarjevsky production.

On this simple stage of steps and platforms, where every movement is sharp and significant and the light-borne colour keeps pace with the changing character of the scene, Mr. Randle Ayrton has complete freedom to act Lear.14

A decade later Laurence Olivier played Lear at the Old Vic as “a whimsical old tyrant who takes this way of dividing his kingdom simply as a jest, until the joke turns serious because Cordelia refuses to play.”15 His performance was not to all tastes but Alec Guinness as the Fool was widely praised. Sir Donald Wolfit, an old-style actor-manager, toured his own production between 1947 and 1953—Ronald Harwood’s experience as Wolfit’s backstage dresser inspired his play The Dresser (1980).

Gielgud played Lear for a third time in 1950, in a production which he co-directed with Anthony Quayle. Although his performance had developed in a number of ways, it was still largely influenced by his work with Granville Barker. He played the part again in 1955 in a production directed by George Devine and designed by Isamu Noguchi. This time Gielgud aimed for psychological realism in his performance but it was generally agreed that while the stylized set worked, the heavy costumes were problematic.

4. John Gielgud as Lear in the hovel (1950 production), with Fool and Poor Tom in the foreground, the disguised Kent behind.

In 1956 Orson Welles directed and starred in a production at the New York City Center. Falling and breaking one ankle and spraining the other during rehearsals, Welles, undeterred, played the part in a wheelchair, pushed around by the Fool. In 1959 Charles Laughton played Lear in a production at the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre, directed by Glen Byam Shaw. Critics were divided, especially about Laughton’s conception of the role. One of them, Alan Brien, complained that Laughton developed “from boyishness to senility without even an intervening glimpse of maturity.”16

Three years later Peter Brook directed his groundbreaking production starring Paul Scofield (discussed in detail below). There have been numerous distinguished productions since: in 1968 Trevor Nunn directed with Eric Porter playing Lear; in 1974 Buzz Goodbody directed a pared-down version for the RSC’s small studio theater, The Other Place; in 1976 Trevor Nunn directed Donald Sinden as Lear; in 1979 Peter Ustinov played Lear in a production directed by Robin Phillips at Stratford, Ontario; Adrian Noble’s 1982 production with Michael Gambon is discussed below. In 1989 Jonathan Miller directed Eric Porter at the Old Vic; 1990 saw the Renaissance Theatre company’s production, directed by Kenneth Branagh with Richard Briers as Lear and Emma Thompson as the Fool; in the same year Nicholas Hytner directed John Wood at Stratford; in 1993 Noble directed the play at Stratford again, this time with Robert Stephens as Lear (discussed below). In 1997 in the (London) National’s intimate Cottesloe studio, Richard Eyre directed a production (his swan-song as artistic director) with Ian Holm playing Lear—a highly acclaimed production that was later recorded for television; in the same year Peter Hall directed Alan Howard at the Old Vic; and in 1999 Yukio Ninagawa directed Nigel Hawthorne for the RSC; in 2001 Julian Glover played Lear in Barry Kyle’s production at the Globe and the following year Jonathan Kent directed Oliver Ford-Davies at the Almeida, a performance much admired for its intelligence; Jonathan Miller again directed the play, this time for the 2002 Stratford Festival, Ontario, with Christopher Plummer in the lead; in 2004 Bill Alexander directed Corin Redgrave in a production that used a full conflated text and ran for nearly four hours; in 2007 the RSC’s Complete Works Festival in which all Shakespeare’s plays were performed closed with Trevor Nunn’s production at the Courtyard Theatre with Ian McKellen as King Lear (see interview with Nunn, below). Powerful small-scale productions include a touring one by Kaboodle Theatre Company (1991–94), which made very strong use of a mix of Oriental-imperial costumes and modernity (a feisty Cordelia in Doc Martens boots).

The tradition of adapting the play has been continued in the theater with versions such as Edward Bond’s radical rewriting, Lear (1972) and the Women’s Theatre Group and Elaine Feinstein’s feminist Lear’s Daughters, as well as Jane Smiley’s novel, A Thousand Acres (1997). On film, there were early silent versions in America and Italy (1909–10). A number of stage productions have been filmed, including Peter Brook’s, shot in a stark black-and-white style that intensified the existential bleakness of his stage version. Grigori Kozintsev (1970) produced a beautiful, deeply moving version featuring the sufferings of Russian peasants. It was based on a translation by Boris Pasternak and used haunting music by Dmitri Shostakovich. Akira Kurosawa’s Ran (1985), set in feudal Japan, substantially reworked Shakespeare’s play so as to eliminate Gloucester but incorporate the subplot material in a version in which Lear’s daughters become his married sons. It played a major part in stimulating renewed western interest in epic eastern cinema.

AT THE RSC

Lears for Our Time

Our own century seems better qualified to communicate and respond to the full range of experience in King Lear than any previous time, save possibly Shakespeare’s own.17

In post–Second World War England, King Lear has been performed more times than in its entire prior performance history. The play speaks with special power to the contemporary psyche. In a violent age when atrocities, murders, poverty, and acts of self-destruction are commonly seen on television, the violence in the play, and its concerns about human rights, seem particularly apposite. However, Lear is so vast in its conception that, as well as societal concerns, it deals with very fundamental philosophical thoughts about what it is to be human in a godless world, or in a world where faith plays little part in the absurdity of human behavior.

Jan Kott’s influential book entitled Shakespeare Our Contemporary (1964) was of great inspiration to late-twentieth-century directors. His thoughts about King Lear as a play about “the disintegration of the world” prompted a landmark production of the play by Peter Brook, which would alter the way the play was conceived and the characters performed to this day:

In the 1950s it became apparent that the world might destroy itself through accidental nuclear warfare, and the plays of Samuel Beckett achieved international fame: Waiting for Godot (1953) showed a world of absurdity, Endgame (1957) a world without meaning at all. Soon afterward the Polish critic Jan Kott wrote an influential essay, “King Lear, or Endgame,” which viewed Shakespeare through the spectacles or blinkers of Beckett and emphasized the element of grotesque tragicomedy in the play.18

Brook was also heavily influenced by the dramatic theories of Bertolt Brecht, with his desire to “alienate” the audience by breaking down the illusions of realism. Brecht’s influence was especially evident in the bare staging of Lear. Two large flats at either side of the stage moved in and out at angles to create internal and external spaces. The storm was created by three large rusty thunder sheets with a vibrating motor behind creating a hint of rumbling thunder. The lighting was deliberately bright and constant, only dimming for the storm scene and Gloucester’s blinding. Everything was seen with clarity, leaving no room for the dramatic signaling that darkness evokes. There was no background music. Brook firmly believed that Lear should be staged with no music at all. Music almost always controls our emotional reaction to a scene, and Brook was particularly keen to block any easy audience response.

J. C. Trewin described the set:

Visually we are taken to a terrifying world, a place of abstract symbols, a rust-flaking world, harsh and primitive. There are tall, coarse gray-white screens; metal shapes that might have been dredged from the sea-bed: things ancient, scaled with rust. As the night moves on, the stage grows barer and barer until nothing is left but the screens, and Lear and Gloucester play out their colloquy on a bleak infinity of stage; two voices at the world’s end.19

Brook wanted this Lear to be a Lear of its time. He designed the production himself and wanted to create a totally believable society, both barbaric and sophisticated. It is notable that this production took place just after the Cuban missile crisis. He wished to create a nihilistic vision, to remove the sympathetic responses of the audience and blur the lines between good and evil in the play. As a result of this he was accused of distorting Shakespeare’s tragedy to enhance his own directorial viewpoint.

Brook’s interpretation meant that productions of Lear would never be the same after this point. Indeed, there have been very few productions since that have not followed his lead in some regard, whether their focus be political, metaphysical, or domestic.

Critics and directors of the Left have been quick to seize on Lear’s demand that the ruling class expose themselves “to feel what wretches feel, / That thou mayst shake the superflux to them” and Gloucester’s wish that “distribution should undo excess, / And each man have enough” as evidence of the play’s critique of existing political structures, and much recent criticism has discussed King Lear as a political drama reflecting the ideological concerns that were to divide England during the seventeenth century.20

This trend in recent criticism has been reflected in performance. Set pre-First World War, the RSC’s 1976 production made reference to the conditions of those disenfranchised by war. One page of the program featured hundreds of faces of workhouse children; on another there was a bleak landscape with two figures in the distance, presumably working a land that yields little or nothing. In this production Donald Sinden’s acclaimed performance as Lear

5. “What, art mad? A man may see how this world goes with no eyes”: the bleakness of Peter Brook’s 1962 production with Paul Scofield (left) as Lear and Alan Webb as the blinded Gloucester.

chronicles the process by which suffering turns self-pity and self-love into outward versions of themselves. In practice this means that Lear learns to identify with the poor and downtrodden, classes never far from the drab, pockmarked, nineteenth century face of this production. Indeed, the three-man directorate of Trevor Nunn, John Barton and Barry Kyle … do all they can to bring period penury to our attention, gratuitously introducing a troupe of vagrants to trot round the stage between scenes, and transforming Michael Williams’s Fool into a bald scrofulous relic, a seedily eccentric song-and-dance man who might have stumbled out of Bleak House … determined to stress that Lear is a social as well as an elemental play.21

The setting for the 2004 production directed by Bill Alexander was of a postwar world in which the country was in a flux of insecurity, distinctly modern in feel but without reference to a specific time:

This Lear appears at times to be set in a crumbling mental home, backed by the scaffolding and half-destroyed brick walls of Tom Piper’s bleak setting. It suggests that a nuclear bomb has already fallen on Lear’s kingdom and the survivors are left wandering about trying to work out—post-Apocalypse—who they are and what has happened and above all where the hell they are supposed to be going next.… There is a bizarre timelessness here—so that in a post-Victorian world, when the old King comes on dressed like a mad deserter from the First World War, there is no real surprise, just the feeling that Alexander and his cast have had yet another disturbing thought about the many insights into madness and identity-crisis offered in the play.22

Of the setting, designer Tom Piper explained:

Bill [Alexander] felt very strongly that you can’t set this play in one particular place, it has to be an invented world, so we’re aiming to create parallel worlds: the Victorian married with strange bits of technology.… I wanted to include a broken element, to convey a sense of a world that could be in decay or on the edge of industrialisation.23

Corin Redgrave, a noted left-wing campaigner as well as a member of a distinguished acting dynasty, played Lear in this production. He saw the play as “modern, topical and relevant because it so vividly portrays a country divided by an almost impassable fault-line between those who have enough and those who don’t. Any attempt I make to build up an idea of Lear the man, Lear the ruler, is still very strongly influenced by that thinking.”24

Again, although not overtly political in the actors’ focus, Adrian Noble’s 1993 production infused the political implication of Lear’s decision into the setting:

This production turned the map into paper flooring whose divisions the Fool (a gag over his mouth emphasizing his obvious outrage) was made to mark with red paint. It was then gradually reduced to tatters until the ground beneath, which was covered with a great blood-red stain, was wholly revealed.25

There are numerous references in King Lear to the stars, gods, and the fates. Setting the play in a non-Christian era endows the play with an adaptable metaphysical stance that has international appeal. In 1999, Japanese director Yukio Ninagawa of the Sainokuni Shakespeare Company undertook a joint production with the RSC. This production focused on the elemental nature of the play, the dark forces of nature that emerge from the void created by Lear’s misjudgments:

This is a hauntingly but savagely beautiful production. Yukio Horio’s set is dominated by a huge black wooden walkway sloping gently toward you and widening into an immense platform. At the back the walkway seems to disappear into black darkness, whence the actors emerge like mythological figures, both real and remote. All this suggests the structure of the classical Noh stage, where the curtained entrance also leads somewhere indeterminate: a primeval darkness that holds no moral secrets … this reinforces the uncomfortable Shakespearian vision of a world where you are left without the consolation or guidance of a moral order.26

The handling of the storm scene was particularly controversial. Boulders of various sizes were choreographed to drop onto the stage as Lear raged against the storm. Most audience members and reviewers were more concerned about the safety of the actors than the director’s vision, which “conjures a world in which Nature’s moulds are cracked.”27

The breakdown in family relationships is, of course, central to King Lear and modern directors have often used this as an accessible focal point in productions. Initially produced as a touring production for schools, Buzz Goodbody’s small cast chamberpiece version of Lear in 1974

was performed by a cast of nine, with one musician playing gong, trumpet, snare and kettle drum. An all-purpose servant was added, while one sub-plot was cut (losing Albany, Cornwall, Oswald, and the French King).… The acting area was empty, except for a few props, like a rug and banners which unfurled when Lear appeared.… Scenes were set simply, using props and, as with the storm, music and lights, which at key moments in the production underscored the director’s point.… Lear was not seen as epic in terms of great public scenes of wide-open spaces peopled with a huge cast.… Its focus was on two families, in which the personal as well as the age differences played a more important part than is usually recognised.28

In this powerful, intimate production, “the play as a whole became an intense study of private griefs of their two families, with Kent and the Fool both reduced to appalled outsiders, helplessly looking on.”29

Described by critic Irving Wardle as “an all-too-familiar story of family life,”30 Nicholas Hytner’s 1990 production also turned Lear into a tale of dysfunctional family neurosis. He encoded his very cerebral reading in the set design of David Fielding, creating an enclosed space for the staging of Lear that took the form of a cube:

Open on one side with its outer walls painted to look like heavy steel, the cube simply revolves and stops, to present a succession of interiors and exteriors. Sometimes it will stop with a corner pointing toward the audience so that actors can stand out of sight of each other while Shakespearian eavesdropping can take place. In the storm scene, it will revolve continuously—the idea being that, as a metaphor for the world of the play (as well as Lear’s mental world), it is spinning out of control.31

The effect of the cube was to reduce the scale of the play—something apparently deliberate in the director’s interpretation. Psychological and domestic, Lear’s world became both a mental ward and the interior of his mind, a controlled civilized space allowed to go mad through neglect and misjudgment. John Wood’s very human and neurotic Lear went on an inner and outer journey of physical suffering and mental awareness: “We are left with an interpretation which is as much medical as moral. The geriatric ward slugs it out with the psychiatric wing. There is little sense of hubris on the one hand, or of concentrated evil on the other.”32 The emphasis on Lear’s genuine insanity stemming from the family reflected the wider world of the play and the state of Britain. Michael Billington described it as “an exploration of the insane contradictions of a world where the gods are seen as both just and wantonly cruel, where Nature is both purifying and destructive.”33

Fools and Madmen

Real and assumed madness play an essential part in the plot of King Lear. In a program note by Michael MacDonald, author of a historical study called Mystical Bedlam: Madness, Anxiety and Healing in Seventeenth Century England (1983), Adrian Noble’s 1993 production was contextualized by means of the suggestion that the audience

is presented with three kinds of madness: real in Lear himself, assumed in Tom/Edgar, and professional in the Fool. To its original audience, in a population largely uneducated, unable to distinguish between epilepsy, demonic possession and a skilful beggar on the make, the spectacle of an old man and a half-naked creature railing at the weather and babbling about demons would not have been especially unusual: like the unemployed and other vagrants the countryside teemed with, they were a fact of life.34

Lear is very rarely played as being driven mad exclusively by the cruelty that is inflicted on him, but is often portrayed as being dangerously unhinged from the start. In Nicholas Hytner’s production,

the early household scenes are honeycombed with … micro-sequences, which take you inside Lear’s head, showing his hunger for affection, his need to play the strong man, his short attention span, and his helpless descents into blind rage. These are an embarrassment to the court and they give the sisters every pretext for saying something to keep the old man happy. But it is only when they try to draw the line that you really see what they have had to put up with. At the suggestion that he should shed a few knights, all hell breaks loose in the Albany dining room, with Lear emptying his gun into the ceiling, crushing Goneril to the ground like a blubbering child, clearing the space for carnage by hanging the Fool on a coat-hook: and finally vanishing into the night leaving his shaken hosts facing each other down a long table for their solitary dinner.35

Very clearly a man with no control over his own emotions, John Wood’s Lear was also an emotional vandal to his daughters, and his influence could be seen in their learned behavior.

In Buzz Goodbody’s 1974 production, to be a sane man in a cruel world was to be part of that cruelty. Lear’s madness became the transitional stage from cruelty to humanity:

Tony Church did not play Lear as a virtuoso acting part, but as a down-to-earth king, a patriarch who got his pleasure from hunting. He is out in the cold because of who he is—not a mighty monarch fallen from grace, but an old man on the point of death, facing himself and his life.… When he is “sane,” he represents the cruel world, arbitrary and aggressive, and only when he is “mad” does he embody human values.36

In the stunning visual sequence that started Adrian Noble’s 1982 production, lunacy not only led to virtue but was linked to it through the characters of the Fool and Cordelia:

On Lear’s throne the Grock-like Fool and Cordelia sit facing each other, with their necks at opposite ends of a taut halter (resembling a noose), as if lunacy and virtue were inseparable.… What follows is a delirious descent into a world of barbarism in which farce and tragedy are umbilically linked.37

Antony Sher played the Fool as “Lear’s alter-ego, the visible mark of his insanity. His Master’s Voice as he perches on his lap like a ventriloquist’s doll, the conscience of the King.”38 In the words of the reviewer in the Jewish Chronicle, “There is a strong sense in which, just as the great comic double acts are like watching a schizophrenic trying to pull himself together, Antony Sher’s red-nosed clown and Michael Gambon’s violent old man are two warring parts of one psyche.”39 The poet and critic James Fenton, writing in the London Sunday Times, pushed the point further:

Michael Gambon’s Lear was a man all too willing to cast off his role as king, and his relationship to the Fool pointed to this uneasiness.

Lear’s foolishness and his love for his Fool are the points of departure for the interpretation. In all his madness, his anger and his suffering, we do not forget this. Indeed, I wonder if Lear has ever fooled around so enthusiastically.

Imagine a production in which the King, though condemned to kingship, would clearly love to have been a comedian, while the Fool, although unable to stop jesting, is transfixed by the horror of his true perception of the tragedy. This is the version which Adrian Noble has directed.… This is not the Fool of criticism, not an A-level “assess-the significance-of-the-Fool” fool. This is your genuine professional fool. Inside whom is a man in a panic, the Cassandra of the play, whose raving prophesies terrify the prophet himself.40

Sher described how in rehearsals they came up with a solution to the disappearance of the Fool after the arrival of Tom o’Bedlam.41 During the mock trial scene the Fool picked up a pillow to represent Regan. On the words “anatomize her,” Lear stabbed the pillow in a frenzy of rage. In his insane and violent outburst he fatally stabbed the Fool accidentally. With all the attention on Lear leaving the hovel, the others did not realize what had happened. The Fool slumped down dead into a barrel in which he stood.

The emphasis put on the Fool in this production (the program cover featured a fool’s face with a red nose that appeared to be an amalgam of Lear and the Fool), along with Sher’s magnificent performance, led many critics to feel that the play became unbalanced, losing impetus in the final acts after the Fool was killed.

At the end of the hovel scene Edgar has replaced the Fool as Lear’s spiritual mentor. Lear takes Edgar off in one direction as the Fool exits in another. According to director Adrian Noble,

That happens accidentally. He doesn’t plan that.… For some reason he decides to take on the sins of others … in exactly the same way as a pilgrim, monk or nun … dedicate their lives in a particular way that enables other people to have a richer spiritual life. It is a gift of humanity to God. This is exactly the same thing with Edgar.42

Lear’s journey into his own fooldom takes him from the enclosed mental space of the court out into the world and the secrets of humanity, to emotions denied and hidden from him by dint of his position in society. This awakening by the Fool and Poor Tom leads to a political and spiritual epiphany that is life-changing and possibly world-changing. Many directors have seen the following lines—often quoted in their program notes—as the core of the play:

Poor naked wretches, wheresoe’er you are,

That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm,

How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides,

Your lopped and windowed raggedness, defend you

From seasons such as these? O, I have ta’en

Too little care of this! Take physic, pomp,

Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,

That thou mayst shake the superflux to them

And show the heavens more just.

The political dimensions of King Lear are most clearly evidenced in the king’s interaction with the mad beggar. Edgar, the abused son, and Poor Tom, the forgotten citizen of Lear’s England, embody both familial and national neglect. Edgar’s disguise as Bedlam beggar is also crucial to Lear’s spiritual journey. In Noble’s second production of the play for the RSC in 1993:

[Lear’s] growing obsession with this emblem of “unaccommodated man” causes the displacement of the Fool … was brilliantly visualized in the image of Ian Hughes clinging forlornly to Poor Tom’s hand at the end of a human chain that Gloucester led across the stage.43

Visually Edgar has variously appeared as a Caliban-type figure, the poor bare-forked animal spouting obscenities but in need of the world’s pity, as Christ-like with a crown of thorns, bloodied and suffering for the world’s sins, or alternatively as demonic, as in the RSC’s 1982 production when “Jonathan Hyde’s Edgar as a virtually naked Poor Tom [burst] through the splintering floor like some infernal demon born on to Lear’s ‘great stage of fools’.”44 “It was the modern equivalent of the entrance of a devil from the pit of Hell, and Tom’s demonic side, which actors so often miss as they go for shivering pathos, was established at once.”45

Thrown to the wilderness by his family, Edgar evolves from “worm” to potential king. His suffering appears as a barbaric initiation rite designed by the toughest of gods. It is a trial of cruelty fitting for the evil world that is unleashed in the play.

The Absence of Humanity

King Lear is a play rich with vicious bestial images, all symbolic of the barbaric capabilities of man and woman. Goneril, for instance, is described as having a “wolfish visage.” Edward Topsell’s Historie of Foure-footed Beastes (1607) mixed scientific fact, folklore, and classical allusions to animals and mythological creatures, giving them often exotic and fantastic attributes. It describes the customary attributes associated with the wolf in animal lore: treachery, deceit, hypocrisy, ravenousness, and cruelty. These associations gave Shakespeare’s audience an accurate idea of Goneril’s character and her subsequent behavior. However, for modern directors, “Another interpretative decision that must be faced … is whether to accept the moral polarity of Lear’s daughters as a fact of the story or to suggest more naturalistic reasons for their behavior.”46

In recent years patriarchal repression and child abuse of one form or another have often been regarded as the defining reasons for evil in children. Lear has accordingly been portrayed as physically and mentally abusive or neglectful, demanding, cantankerous, a bully who has created so much pent-up anger in his two elder daughters that it erupts when they are given the opportunity to release their feelings without recrimination; that is to say, when they are in power.

In the influential 1962 production, Peter Brook portrayed Lear’s knights as rowdy and destructive, while Irene Worth’s Goneril was self-contained and cool, remonstrating with Lear in measured tones, speaking as somebody with cause to complain. Some critics thought such a treatment a distortion of the text, but most modern directors have followed this interpretation to some degree. Though it helps to humanize Goneril, it does make the descent into evil very difficult to portray.

Janet Dale, who played the part in 1993, admitted that “I am trying to play her with a conscience, but I suspect the lines won’t support it.” Rather than an outright evil woman, she wished to portray her as a woman “of moral degeneration.”47

By focusing on the psychology of these extremely dysfunctional families, the violence in Nicholas Hytner’s 1990 production became rooted in explainable terms:

The production is about confused people destroyed by their incomprehensible emotions or, as with Wood’s massively erratic Lear, struggling through new ones.… The effects of long abuse are evident in his daughters. Alex Kingston’s Cordelia has become rebellious, bloody-minded and rejects Lear almost more than he does her. Estelle Kohler’s Goneril and Sally Dexter’s Regan, seem still to want the love of this old, impossible man.… It is fashionable nowadays to allow us to see the “bad” daughters’ point of view, but rarely as strongly as here. Both of them seem badly in need of Valium, psychoanalysis, or both. They are frustrated, exhausted, at the end of a tether which finally breaks, liberating all that suppressed anger and barely contained madness. Their evils proliferate, but they, like Goneril and Regan themselves, are ultimately Lear’s fault.48

Order opens up to reveal chaos. And the same pattern is visible in erratic human behaviour. Lear, having cursed Goneril with sterility, rushes back to embrace her. Astonishingly, Regan first conspires in the blinding of Gloucester and then tenderly asks him, rather than her wounded husband, “How dost my lord?” Mr. Hytner ushers us into a morally topsy-turvy universe in which good and evil frequently cohabit within the same person.49

One cannot escape the fact that what Regan and Goneril do is evil and unnatural. In Buzz Goodbody’s 1974 production, which cut the role of Cornwall, “Regan put out Gloucester’s eyes unaided, with a broach.”50 Modern stagings of the blinding scene nearly always show Regan’s active participation in the mutilation of Gloucester. Emily Raymond, who played Goneril in 2004, felt that Goneril and Regan “had a brutal upbringing—[with] smacks of physical violence and mental abuse. I think Lear probably took his daughters to hangings and taught them the brutal way to deal with traitors—you don’t hang them, you pluck out their eyes and let them live, to serve as a deterrent to others.”51

What impact does it have to turn the violence and evil in Lear into something psychological instead of metaphysical? Does the implication that it is somehow the “natural” result of a bad, neglected upbringing diminish the epic nature of the play and the horrific impact of the sisters’ monstrous acts? Lear’s world is thrown out of order by his inability to be an adequate father and king. James I, in his publication The True Law of Free Monarchies, underlined the divine right of kings and the duty of all monarchs to treat their subjects as a caring father would do his children. Lear’s misunderstanding of his role as a fixed point in the natural order of things and his irresponsibility in relation to his position in society unleash unnatural chaos.

In 1993 Adrian Noble emphasized violent cosmic forces prevalent in the play by use of an abstract but symbolic set:

When David Bradley’s superlative Gloucester, his eyes gouged out, staggers away from the scene of atrocity and from Simon Dormandy’s chillingly, psychopathic Cornwall, the focus clears at last. Noble used the Folio edition of the text, so cutting the aid of Gloucester’s servants after the blinding. The sightless Bradley gazes in the direction of a blue and white model of the globe, fixed above the stage. As he stares, a crack runs across the globe’s circumference and the sands of time begin to pour out of it. The society of King Lear, with family life collapsing in warfare and inhuman cruelty … is ominous of all civilized human life ruined and coming to an end.52

In this bleak vision,

Noble’s most original stroke is to suggest that the cruelty unleashed by Lear’s folly spreads to even the conventionally good characters. The chief beneficiary is Simon Russell Beale’s extraordinary Edgar who starts as goody-two shoes and who is turned by the horrors he has witnessed into a symbol of revenge. In this production he doesn’t just kill Oswald; he batters his face with a staff as if in retaliation for the blinding of his father. The most unplayable major role in Shakespeare suddenly acquires a specific identity: a man forever tainted by the contagion of violence.53

In his final battle with Edmund, Russell Beale as Edgar tried “to rip out the dying Edmund’s eyes in reprisal.”54 Similarly, Bill Alexander’s 2004 production included “chilling touches that alert you afresh to the barbarism of its world. For example, in the climactic duel between Edmund and Edgar, it’s only chance that stops the virtuous brother from exacting primitive ’eye for an eye’ justice”55—“In order to force Edmund to drop his arms, [Edgar] grabbed him by either side of his face and pushed his thumbs into his eyes. This reference to the blinding of Gloucester was eerily resonant.”56

Our opinion of Edgar will determine how we consider the end of the play. His spiritual journey, which echoes Lear’s, provides him with a unique understanding of humanity and the preciousness of life. But he is also a very human avenger who has to set the world right and provide hope for the future. To overbalance his character with deliberate malicious and violent action furthers a nihilistic vision of the play by removing the certainty of redemption for a lost and barbaric world. Adrian Noble in 1982 stressed this element of unredeemed cruelty. The Guardian critic Michael Billington explains:

Edgar slays Oswald by breaking his back with a staff, and the fraternal duel between Edgar and Edmund is a bare-chested, bloody, unchivalric combat that ends with Edmund’s head being dumped in water. Even at the last the characters look out into the future in a spirit of skeptical uncertainty.57

In Peter Brook’s vision of the play chaos was part of the natural order. His production emphasized the inhumanity and disinterestedness of the forces that annihilate Lear. There was no moral structure beneath the surface of civilization: “Everywhere one looks, one sees only the facades and emblems of a world and, ironically, as characters acquire sight, it enables them to see only into a void.”58

Brook removed key moments of redemption and humanity: the servants did not tend Gloucester after he has been blinded but callously bumped into him as they cleared away the stage. Edmund’s attempt to redeem himself and stop the order that will see the death of Cordelia was cut. As Lear died, his final words “Look there” were spoken as he stared ahead into nothingness. We were not left with the usual tableau of survivors grieving over Lear and Cordelia. The cast left, carrying out their dead bodies, leaving Edgar and the dead Edmund on stage alone. Edgar moved center-stage, and then went to his brother. As he dragged his brother’s corpse up toward the back of the stage a distant rumble of thunder sounded in the background, leaving the audience with the impression that worse was to follow. “[W]e that are young / Shall never see so much nor live so long” took on a genuinely apocalyptic meaning. This was an image of the horror of “the promised end” of the world.

Where Brook’s production succeeded was in making the audience grieve for humanity, or more specifically for the absence of humanity. It seemed a fitting statement for its time, and it is one that still touches us today. Lear’s speech in the hovel is central to Brook’s vision—it is not by chance that he used this quote in the program for the production’s world tour: “Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel.” Corin Redgrave, who played King Lear in 2004, also took this line:

The play investigates how, in a dying or decaying world, we can live better and be better toward one another. It can’t produce any conclusions to that because the world as Shakespeare saw it at that time was dying, just as our world as we see it is dying. Shakespeare was writing in a world which he sees going to hell on wheels and writing a text book in case the world should ever recover. So it is the most bleak of plays, but it is a very salutary play, a very necessary play … you could not possibly lose King Lear without impoverishing ourselves terribly.59

THE DIRECTOR’S CUT: INTERVIEWS WITH ADRIAN NOBLE, DEBORAH WARNER, AND TREVOR NUNN

Adrian Noble, born in 1950, arrived at the RSC from the Bristol Old Vic, where he had directed several future stars in productions of classic plays. His first production on the main stage of the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford was the acclaimed 1982 Lear, discussed here, with Michael Gambon as the king and Antony Sher as an extraordinarily powerful Fool. Two years later his Henry V sowed the seed for Kenneth Branagh’s film. Among his other major productions during his two decades at the RSC were Hamlet, again with Branagh in the title role, The Plantagenets, based on the Henry VI/Richard III tetralogy, and the two parts of Henry IV, with Robert Stephens as Falstaff. Stephens returned in 1993 to play Lear in a second production of the tragedy, also discussed here. Noble’s 1994 Midsummer Night’s Dream was made into a film. He was artistic director from 1991 to 2003, since when he has been a freelance director. His production style is characterized by strong use of colors and objects (such as umbrellas), and fluid scenic structure.

Deborah Warner, born in 1959, trained in stage management at the Central School of Speech and Drama. At the age of twenty-one she formed her own “fringe” company, Kick Theatre, imaginatively staging stripped-down productions of the classics, including King Lear (1985, discussed here), at the Edinburgh Festival. In 1987 she made her RSC debut with a rigorously simple but deeply moving Titus Andronicus, starring Brian Cox, on the intimate stages of the Swan at Stratford and The Pit at London’s Barbican. A King John in a similar style followed the next year and in 1990 she directed King Lear, again with Brian Cox, on the proscenium Lyttelton stage of the National Theatre in London (also discussed here). She has subsequently specialized in Samuel Beckett and opera, but has returned to Shakespeare with a Richard II at the National, featuring her collaborator Fiona Shaw cross-dressed in the title role, and a large-scale Julius Caesar at the Barbican.

Sir Trevor Nunn is the most successful and one of the most highly regarded of modern British theater directors. Born in 1940, he was a brilliant student at Cambridge, strongly influenced by the literary close reading of Dr. F. R. Leavis. At the age of just twenty-eight he succeeded Peter Hall as artistic director of the RSC, where he remained until 1978. He greatly expanded the range of the company’s work and its ambition in terms of venues and touring. He also achieved huge success in musical theater and subsequently became artistic director of the National Theatre in London. His productions are always full of textual insights, while being clean and elegant in design. Among his most admired Shakespearean work has been a series of tragedies with Ian McKellen in leading roles: Macbeth (1976, with Judi Dench, in the dark, intimate space of The Other Place), Othello (1989, with McKellen as Iago and Imogen Stubbs as Desdemona), and King Lear (2007, in the Stratford Complete Works Festival, on world tour, and then in London).

One of the first questions one always wonders about with King Lear is: What do you decide on as a setting for the play? We’ve seen everything from a Stonehenge-like world to contemporaneity by way of Samurai Japan. So what kind of a world did you and your designer seek to create?

Noble: There are two or three driving forces in relation to the setting. First of all there is the need to create a series of credible family units, because the dynamic of the play emanates from damaged families; in particular Lear’s and Gloucester’s two parallel families. So one needs to be able to create a domesticity and parallel familial worlds. The second thing one needs to be able to explore is an epic quality, by which I mean the fact that the reality we live in fractures and splinters as the reality inside Lear’s head fractures and splinters. Shakespeare quite deliberately expresses the horrors and the madness that are happening inside the human being through the physicality of it.

In both productions I sought for a setting and a world that could fragment and start behaving in an almost independent way. With both productions the walls started splitting and almost exploded apart. In 1993 with Robert Stephens as Lear I found an image at the very end of the first act which I felt was rather telling: the moon started bleeding sand. That seemed to me an exquisitely painful image, with the moon’s very strong connection with the eye. The milk of human kindness had completely disappeared.

I found myself eschewing a completely modern, contemporary world, because it seemed to me that would quite swiftly become a highway to nowhere. In a similar way I eschewed the old Stonehenge version which seemed to me as silly as setting it in Wapping. So we found a world that probably related to Europe a hundred and fifty years ago, with greatcoats, where people still hunted, where the motor vehicle hadn’t taken over our world. Neither myself, Bob Crowley, who designed the first, or Anthony Ward, who designed the second, would I think be able to place it within fifty years of a particular date.

Warner: My interest in both my productions was to release the characters through their language and their relationships. What the play does is to take the audience into the interior of themselves. It is a mirror of the desolation of the human spirit, how lost it is, how far we fall in families and how hard sought are the conditions that prompt personal change. That’s why the setting of any given production has little connection to the key that may unlock the scenes and acts. The play has to flow through our imaginations and then it has to lodge, and that is why I used such a pared-down aesthetic so that the space is clear for that to happen. All great plays do this but each must be met in their particular. With Kick Theatre in 1985 we were in a church hall in Edinburgh with three ladders and a bucket of water for the heath scene. With the NT [National Theatre] we were on the wide open stage of the Lyttelton Theatre where different aesthetic choices needed to be made before we began. Hildegard Bechtler’s set was poetic and beautiful but bare, and the “world” was not precisely named by it. It was not the “Stone Age Lear,” or the “Third Reich Lear” but the Brian Cox, David Bradley, Ian McKellen, Susie Engel, and Clare Higgins Lear. It was actor led and actor inspired and I still believe that that is a very good way with Shakespeare. Belief in casting and the group creation of the world is what matters.

Nunn: Shakespeare says that King Lear is the king of Ancient Britain. On the other hand, Shakespeare includes scenes involving dueling with swords, there are references to a graced palace, to women wearing gorgeous clothes that scarcely keep them warm, and Gloucester refers to wearing spectacles. Shakespeare is making clear that he doesn’t mind breaking the rules as far as historical accuracy goes. It’s very likely that King Lear was performed at the Globe, or indeed at court performances, with the actors wearing a mixture of contemporary Elizabethan/Jacobean clothing, with some additional elements of cloak and robe that would indicate an earlier period.

I think Shakespeare was interested in the idea that a history play should apply acutely and precisely to the age that the audience lives in, so he was keen to have it both ways. I’ve seen Stonehenge-based productions of King Lear, and frankly it does seem very odd that Lear should make such a fuss about being out on a heath in a storm when his normal domestic condition appears to be open to the elements.

Shakespeare is presenting the huge contrast between a man who has been encouraged to believe that he is the closest thing to a god in human terms, and the man who comes to perceive he is like a beggar “no more but this.” Lear is a conduit of the gods and he’s in totally autocratic authority. His smallest whisper is converted into law, and nobody, such as Kent, can question him. So, in this production, I have elected to set the play in a seemingly nineteenth-century environment with resonances of the tsarist order in Russia and/or the Austrian autocracy of Franz Joseph. The intention is to stress that Lear’s power is total and dictatorial like a tsar or an emperor, in all matters, political and social, and that it derives from god with whom he communicates. This, I think, allows us to encompass the requirements of the social structure of the play and, what’s more, the anachronisms make complete sense. Lear’s journey takes him from that autocratic power to somebody who, in the storm, asks himself for the first time, “How do wretches survive in conditions like these, if they cannot keep warm because they have no proper clothing?” And then, wanting to embrace that houseless situation, he meets Tom o’Bedlam (who happens to be a man going through the same crisis, another man who’s been used to comfort and is now, in order to survive, turning himself into a crazed beggar), and as he studies the beggar’s naked exposure, Lear urgently wants to place himself in that condition, so he can experience being the “forked animal” for himself.

Shakespeare had long been fascinated with the philosophical idea that a king can journey through the guts of a beggar. He has used the notion of king to beggar on a number of previous occasions, but in Lear he takes it to the extreme. I think Richard II is almost a sketch for King Lear; here we have a godlike king who in the end is sobbing, “I need friends and since I am ordinary like you—how can you say I am a king?” Shakespeare takes that king to a small prison cell, and then, alone and the lord of nothing, he grants him extraordinary self-knowledge. But in King Lear, the journey of the king is to a yet more extreme destination.

Why did your Lear react so extremely to Cordelia’s refusal to play the game of quantifying her love in words (or perhaps of quantifying her love all too literally—if I marry, my father will have 50 percent of my love and my husband the other 50 percent)?

Noble: In a way you have to go back a step from that to ask yourself why Lear loves Cordelia so much more than the other two girls. There are dozens of reasons why, and I think most families could find their own reason why one child is, or appears to be, more beloved than the other. If the character in question is an obsessive like Lear then it starts getting potentially dangerous. His little girl has grown up and defies him, and he can’t deal with that at all. He can’t deal with retiring, he can’t deal with getting old, he can’t deal with not being in control anymore. And as a consequence of all these things poor Cordelia gets it in the neck. And he regrets it almost immediately. Within a day he regrets it—probably within hours.

Warner: My Lear was a spoilt Lear, a vain Lear—a man who wants to hear what he wants to hear. His foolish gung-ho confidence is to wrap and disguise his need—a desire for a public show of affection—in a party game. He makes light of something that is weighty and important to him so that nobody suspects his underlying vulnerability. He demands that his daughters play out in public something that is private, and he claims this right because the prizes are high and marvelous. However, he knows who will take which prize because the “game” is rigged—the parcels of land are already named, signed, and sealed by king and court. The whole extravagant business is a contrivance to feed his vanity, to continue to make him feel that he holds the center even in old age. We are witnessing a grotesque public massage of ego. Lear is a man used to getting what he wants, but he gets badly burnt. He discovers that love is not a commodity, that it must be given freely. It may be that he has lost sight of what love is a long time before the play begins. He’s getting the answer he wants in two cases from the very daughters he did not treat well—if their behavior later in the piece is anything to go by—and seems to barely know the character of his favorite—Cordelia—whose reaction is a huge surprise to him. There is a lot we do not know about this mysterious man, but his short-sightedness is placed on the table at the very opening of the play. Here is a man who will need to travel far to begin to gain the gift of personal insight. His friend Gloucester will literally lose his sight: blind men both.

6. Ian McKellen as Lear in Trevor Nunn’s 2007 production, in the opening scene with quasi-military “Ruritanian” regalia.

And why didn’t your Cordelia, or why couldn’t she, put her love into words?

Noble: That’s a much more difficult question to answer. It’s a young person’s thing, whereby the spoken truth is more important than making your mum and dad happy. It’s the moment of leaving home. The domestic psychological detail is very precise in the play. In Lear’s household, Cordelia is at the point of leaving home to go and get married. That’s a huge moment in every family, although it’s very often not recognized. Some daughters never leave home. They are still at home, in the thrall of their parents, when they’re seventy. Cordelia leaves home and Lear can’t deal with that. But she knows she has to do it, especially with a father like him.

Warner: Cordelia does not want to play this extravagant and obscene party game. She is young, she is shy, and she is about to be married, perhaps even the public nature of this serious business of land division is difficult for her. Anyhow, extravagant party game or not, it is the wrong moment for her to speak of her love to her father, and she certainly does not want to talk about such matters in public. When her sisters speak she is appalled by their preparedness to speak on cue, and especially so since she knows they are being dishonest. Cordelia wants to hold to her own truth. Horrified by what is happening around her, she wants to stop the game, and that is just what she does. It goes horribly wrong because she won’t play, and she advertently or inadvertently humiliates her father in public. She is young and she believes with stern clarity in the virtues of honesty, truth, and love. She is earnest—some might say overearnest in this context, and she causes an atomic explosion.

7. The opening scene in Deborah Warner’s 1990 production: a party game goes horribly wrong, with Brian Cox as Lear in wheelchair and paper crown.

Lear is both a king and a father. That often seems to be a choice that directors and actors have to make—are you going to give the primary emphasis to Lear’s journey as a king giving up his crown, or is the primary emphasis going to be on the family relationships? Or do you actually think that the essence of the play is that the two are inextricably intertwined?

Noble: Without question they are entwined. I didn’t find that a choice. It isn’t a choice that I recognize.

Warner: The father relationship is the most interesting, he is a father who happens to be a king; but since all fathers are kings then, yes, all is intertwined. There is a lot we don’t know about him, about his reign—but we know that he owns the land of his country and chooses to divide that up in such a way that will benefit his retirement most comfortably. He is a king/father heading toward retirement, a dangerous time in all families and in all monarchies.

Nunn: You won’t be surprised to hear that your “third way” alternative is the one this production goes for. Shakespeare is frighteningly brilliant at doing “family breakup.” He does it superbly—in Hamlet, for example. I would say he does it equally shockingly in The Merchant of Venice, and in Macbeth we watch a marriage coming apart at the seams. There are small insights in King Lear into how the king’s family has been pushed apart by events and attitudes. Lear is eighty years old. He has three daughters, and there is no Mrs. Lear. The older daughters are married to powerful men and live in their own palaces. The youngest daughter is only just of marriageable age. Hidden behind the play, is there a story that he was a king who had two wives?—the first wife producing two daughters, Goneril and Regan, and then after her death (as we can frequently see in modern complex family histories) there is the child of a second marriage, the late child (as far as that father is concerned) who then dominates the father’s affections. There’s sufficient evidence in the play to suggest that jealousies and rifts within the family derive from such a backstory.

But I don’t think exploration of a family feud is where Shakespeare wants matters to stop. It’s not where his focus is. Routinely at the start of rehearsals, I say we have to first uncover the theme of a Shakespeare play. If you’re a director, you must X-ray the play to find out what its bone structure is and where its vital organs are. A production shouldn’t work from the outside, it must proceed from a sense of what the internal structure is, and thereby discover how everything contained in the play is meaningful because it is contiguous to that thematic structure.

In the case of Lear, it being one of the greatest plays of Shakespeare’s maturity, the investigation is not going to be easy and the wellspring is not going to lie very close to the surface. Those who have written about Lear as Shakespeare’s study of Nature are, to my thinking, somewhere near the mark, in the sense that Shakespeare is certainly inquiring into human nature in Lear, and he often uses the term “nature” to encompass human behavior and its contradictions. But let’s take that definition of a theme just a little bit further. I would say Shakespeare is wanting to look at the human being, both sublime and ridiculous; I think he is asking, “What is the human condition?” Why do humans say to themselves they are close to being angels, aspiring toward those qualities that are spiritual and godlike? And yet, why are they, in much of their action, so close to behaving like animals? Why, as it were anthropologically, do they have animal instincts that the species appears not to be able to get rid of?

I think it’s no surprise that in this play Shakespeare doesn’t define exactly who the god or gods are. There’s a shadowy Apollo or Jupiter, and the sun is sacred, but the largely anonymous gods are referred to, as a sort of necessity for human beings to believe in, so that somehow humans can feel their actions are predestined, or governed by forces above and beyond themselves. Everything is under the control or the will of the gods.

But then, close to the center of the play, there’s a young man who says: “Thou, nature, art my goddess: to thy law / My services are bound”—a young man who seems to be saying, “I don’t believe in the gods above, it’s human nature that I am influenced by.” At the end of that first soliloquy, Edmund says, I sense almost in mockery: “Now gods, stand up for bastards.” Well, he implies, you “gods” have supposedly stood up for everybody else, it’s high time you let bastards have a go. It’s an extremely dangerous bit of comedic dramaturgy, but atheistical Edmund, creating mayhem in his world, is placed in sharp contrast to the majority who genuinely beg the gods to intervene, at times almost obsessively. And I think Shakespeare makes it clear that “the gods” don’t. Repeatedly they are deaf or callous or nonexistent. They do nothing, even when their intervention would be an affirmation of “the good” in opposition to what is evil; they don’t utter, they don’t move a muscle. Are the heavens empty?

An actor who has played Lear has said that the real difficulty in playing the part is deciding how much to let rip how soon—if you give too much to the anger in the first half you’re too exhausted for the madness in the second half, but if you have too much control to begin with, the transition into madness can seem too sudden and extreme to be convincing. Do you recognize that difficulty? And as a director, what can you do to help your Lear through it?

Noble: I think that’s very true. Most Lears I’ve talked to find the second half much easier than the first half, because the first half requires such a level of energy and a very skillful control of your resources. The truth is, it’s almost unplayable—the pain is so great, the vocal demands so much. I’ve seen people cop out of it and say I’m going to do it quite quietly, but that’s complete crap. They are selling the part and the audience short. It gets actors down a lot actually, because it magnifies your failures. The same is true for directors. It’s like Everest, it’s an unforgiving mountain, and people die on the way up, or they get badly hurt. It is like singing Wagner, and not everybody can sing Wagner.

Warner: You need all your energy and all your fight to play Lear, just as an opera singer needs theirs for Tristan, Wotan, or Siegfried. You cannot leave it too late. Brian Cox was forty-four when he played it for me. The first scene demands that the actor hit raw and engulfing fury within minutes. Throughout the opening scenes this anger is further released until it lets fly and the play climbs from there. You have to risk exhaustion to play it well. This play is not gentle on its lead actor, but where Shakespeare is brilliant and kind is in letting the evening be shared and there is, of course, the famous break at the start of the second half for a rest in the dressing room. Shakespeare always acts as helpful assistant to the director and he supports the actors by graphing and arcing their evening. Actors must follow him for their physical well-being, but they must follow what he asks for too. Real anger, real madness … or, no play.

How did your production deal with the part of the Fool and his disappearance halfway through the action?

Noble: In the first production in 1982 with Michael Gambon and Tony Sher it became quite famous. We did an improvisation in rehearsal, and I said just hold that a fraction longer, and the net result was that King Lear accidentally stabbed the Fool, and he died. I had teachers coming in to say “You have to write in your program that that is not what Shakespeare wrote!” Because it is completely logical. Just before this, there’s: “The little dogs and all, Trey, Blanch and Sweetheart, see, they bark at me” and there’s “lie here and rest awhile”; “draw the curtains.” And so we had the Fool using a cushion and Lear chasing him, and in stabbing the cushion he accidentally stabs the Fool. And then the little feathers became dogs. It was very beautiful and completely logical.

8. “The oldest hath borne most”: Robert Stephens (right) as Lear and David Bradley as Gloucester, finding a human bond in their anguish, in Adrian Noble’s 1993 production.

The Fool’s function in life is entirely tied up with the king. He’s like a soldier’s batman. There’s no logic for him to exist once the master’s dead, or mad.

Warner: My National Theatre Fool (David Bradley) died during the interval of exhaustion and cold. He went to sleep in a wheelbarrow somewhere in the dark interior of the hovel and never woke again. A sad and quiet death that went practically unnoticed. In my Kick Theatre production the actress Hilary Townley played both Cordelia and the Fool (a doubling I am sure Shakespeare intended), which solves so many issues so very easily. For example, “my poor fool is hanged” draws effortless and painful meaning from such casting.

9. Michael Gambon as Lear and Antony Sher as the Fool, with mask, in Adrian Noble’s 1982 production.

One striking feature of Shakespeare’s reworking of the old anonymous Leir play is his removal of its Christian frame of reference (that was one of the reasons why Tolstoy perversely said he preferred the old play!). The characters are always appealing to the gods but not getting the response they want. And then there is Edmund appealing to “Nature” as his goddess. What was your thinking about religion in the play?

Noble: The first time I did it I quite consciously sought a godless universe. I was very influenced by Brecht and Beckett. I sought a godless universe and a quite vengeful, spiteful universe. I made heavy cuts at the end of the play to highlight that fact.

The second time I imagined a universe that was not godless, but in which the gods sat back and refused to interfere. The choice is as much to do with the director or interpreter as the writing.

Warner: The removal of any uniting Christian frame makes this text all the more available to us now. The characters are struggling away as we are all struggling away, and have ever been struggling away for centuries. From the seventeenth century to the twenty-first, Shakespeare allows us no simple answers, and that is why productions should beware of giving them.

Nunn: Remember, in the old Leir play, the king is restored to his throne and Cordelia lives. By changing the ending, Shakespeare deliberately violates a seemingly fundamental rule of drama, namely that plays serve as a moral or cautionary influence on their audience, because they show, regardless of trial and vicissitude, that the good will triumph in the end. In King Lear we’re surely expecting just that, but Shakespeare won’t allow it. I think this is proof positive that Shakespeare’s intentions were very different from those of the old play. Shakespeare’s investigation of the extremes of human behavior, into the nature of man the species, concludes that life isn’t like a morality play. When everything in our religious and cultural history requires us to believe that ultimately the gods will intervene on the side of virtue, Shakespeare says emphatically that they don’t. It’s more than the conclusion that his play is not Christian, it’s that he moves to a conclusion that is, at the very least, agnostic.

For me, it is centrally important that there is no sense of divine justice in this tragedy. I’m wondering whether any other writer during the Elizabethan age ever ventured to question whether or not the heavens might be empty? In the early scenes, as I said, Shakespeare’s play sets up the fundamental belief in his characters that human actions are overseen by the gods. Lear seems to believe that, like him, the gods are old men, that they are intelligent, and that they’re watching, and he clearly sees himself as in privileged contact with the gods. But as the play progresses, Shakespeare shows us more people praying for the intervention of the gods, to no avail. The battle at the climax of the story will determine whether or not the “good” will triumph. Gloucester is urged by Edgar to “Pray that the right may thrive.” He does. They don’t. Finally, as it’s realized that a death sentence is on both Lear and Cordelia, Albany leads all present in a final prayer as soldiers run to the prison—“The gods defend her!” The first word of the next line is “Howl.” Cordelia is dead. No intervention. The gods aren’t mentioned again.

So yes, I think Edmund is placed before us early on as evidence of a solitary, dangerous, atheistical intelligence. Then as Lear’s journey takes him increasingly toward challenging the behavior of the gods, arriving at his epiphany in the “unaccommodated man” speech, his more fundamental questions begin. “What is the cause of thunder?” “Is there any cause in nature that makes these hard hearts?” His questions now seem to be reaching toward Darwinian rather than divine explanations, and his belief in the gods begins to evaporate.

What about Edgar? He’s quite an actor, performing in different voices, isn’t he? He’s Poor Tom, but then after that, after the cliff fall, he’s the man on the beach and after that he’s the peasant with the accent who kills Oswald—why does Edgar have all these different languages and voices and play all these different roles? Why doesn’t he much sooner just say, “Look, Dad, I’m sorry. You should be sorry, you got the wrong son, I’m the good one. You’re blind, this is me …” So many opportunities in so many different roles … until he finally gets around to telling his father the truth, by which time he’s left it so late that all Gloucester can do is die of a heart attack.

Noble: I think he takes upon himself the sins of others, in particular the sins of the father, in order to redeem himself. It’s a profoundly religious, spiritual journey that Edgar goes on and a very tough regime that he imposes upon himself. The disguises, flagellation, and infliction of misery are all part of that. Through the course of the play he cleanses himself. He’s like a character out of a George Herbert poem.

Nunn: Edgar does say, at a crucial moment of the play, at the moment where he could cease to be the Tom o’Bedlam character at last, “I cannot daub it further,” and then in the very next instant, “And yet I must.” In this production we’ve tried to identify something specific about that change of mind. There are men on Gloucester’s orders scouring the country on the hunt to capture and kill Edgar if they find him. We have a troop of those soldiers passing at that point, so Edgar’s “yet I must” is clearly justified as self-preservation, and by association the preserving of his father.

But there’s a deeper explanation that Edgar himself also provides when he takes Gloucester, who is suicidally bent, to an imaginary cliff edge. Just before the death plunge moment, Edgar has an aside to the audience, “Why I do trifle thus with his despair / Is done to cure it.” This is fundamental in Edgar’s journey. He observes that his father is now only full of resentment and hatred for the world, of believing that there was never anything worth believing in. Edgar, still clinging to his belief in divine justice, cannot allow his misguided, misled father to die a bad death or an unredeemed death. Therefore he makes it his mission to bring his father beyond suicidal thoughts to a different, reconciled set of attitudes. The gods seem to be unwilling to back up that reconciliation and continue to rain down horror, but Edgar’s changes of identity are entirely to bring his father to a better spiritual place.

There’s something of a fairytale quality to the play, isn’t there? Goneril and Regan as the ugly sisters, Cordelia as a Cinderella with an unhappy ending. But, especially since Peter Brook’s famous production and film, there’s also an approach to the play that emphasizes Lear’s unreasonable rage, the chaos caused by his riotous knights, and the sense that his daughters, Goneril especially, aren’t villains through and through.

Noble: It’s hard to really admire anybody in the play actually. You can like them all a lot, and you can feel for them a lot, but it is hard to admire anybody. You can admire Gloucester, and probably Edgar’s morality. As for the sisters, Shakespeare always writes what is needed. It can be very frustrating, especially for actresses, because it often happens with the female parts, that Shakespeare sees no point in showing you the bits of the iceberg under the water. He thinks that is a complete waste of scenes. It doesn’t mean that the bit that is revealed does not have a complete world of which it is a part. Exactly the same thing applies to Gertrude and Lady Macbeth, whereby when the function ceases to have a crucial element or a driving force, Shakespeare just stops. Lady Macbeth and Gertrude just stop. Actresses tend to think there must be a missing or lost scene, but there isn’t. Like the Fool in the second half of the play, it isn’t there because there’s no need for it. It doesn’t mean you can’t make it completely real, but you have to come at it from his time, not like a movie. The actor may have a backstory, but you can only show so much because you don’t need anymore.

Nunn: I think it would be wholly wrong for a production to suggest that Goneril and Regan are of evil disposition at the beginning of the play; but there is a degree of ambition in their behavior, and there is a degree of competition between them, and possibly there is that element of hidden resentment of how their much-the-younger sister has become the favorite of their old father.

Traditionally, late-nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century versions of Lear did indeed go very strongly for the interpretation that Lear himself was always to be seen as kind and gentle and white-haired and frail. And therefore a delightful old man goaded intolerably by two wicked sisters. When Peter Brook did his production in 1962, there was a sense that an extraordinary revolution had taken place because Brook, absolutely honest to the text, said: “Lear is behaving entirely unjustifiably, now he’s behaving appallingly, and now he’s behaving absolutely beyond the limit to the point where no father can expect to get away with that.” It was a production that tried explicitly to exonerate the sisters. I remember that, at that time, the impact of revealing Lear’s behavior as frequently unacceptable hit home very strongly. Now, of course, any production trying to propose that Lear is a close relative of Father Christmas would be laughed off the stage. The Brook view has become the standard view.

However, we do still have to explain how Goneril and Regan get to a condition of alarming ruthlessness in the second half of the play. All I will say is—especially if anybody hasn’t seen the play before—watch out for the moment when Lear utters his curse on Goneril, and particularly his curse on Goneril’s womb—a curse more bloodcurdling than I hope any lady in the audience will ever hear in her life. We all know that when dreadful things are said in rage, those words can never be unsaid. This is a major turning point of the play and causes Goneril to become vengeful, regardless of consequence.

The blinding of Gloucester is perhaps the most horrific moment in all Shakespeare. How did you stage that and did it have contemporary resonances for you? In Trevor Nunn’s 2007 production Regan behaves with sadistic glee that’s also a kind of fear—it inevitably conjured up the American soldiers in Abu Ghraib jail in Iraq. Torture in times of war is something that just doesn’t go away …

Noble: Yes, it had resonances in the sense that it confronts you with the most shocking things that humanity can do to humanity, but I almost never make references to contemporary events, because in my view it’s a blind alley. Scenes like that talk directly to the audience and their souls and hearts. You don’t need people coming on in flak jackets and dressed as Iraqis.

It is a dangerous scene for a number of reasons. It’s dangerous because the blinding is done to an old man, and secondly, it’s completely plugged in to this extraordinarily dangerous sexual relationship between Cornwall and Regan. It’s plugged in to the scheme of the play in terms of the breakdown of order and the dawn of chaos. It’s a wild, very, very unpleasant scene.

Warner: The theater is a very safe place to explore the taboo and the pornographic. That safe place of examination may be the very point of theater. As a theater director, if you have to do a blinding you want to make it as ghoulish as you can. The audience is then left working it through in the safety of the evening, and a live and engaged audience will inevitably draw contemporary parallels. All great plays have the power to do this and the greater the performances the greater that power to prompt connection. This brings us back to what I said about these plays flowing through our imaginations. Few of us experience directly something like the horror of Abu Ghraib, but the theater allows us to imagine such a reality, to process it, and to question it from every angle. The Greek theater was a public debate where the audience tested their response to the barbaric and nudged toward a legal system and the founding of modern democracy. Shakespeare’s theater took this debate into the newfound world of the seventeenth century and put up onstage every single human emotion, so that we could have a place to go where we might discuss ourselves. Sometimes one can view Shakespeare’s legacy as the complete human emotional encyclopedia. A place to go to study each and every human experience—to map ourselves in the safety of the theater.

Nunn: As you know, this is not a production that is trying to say “Here we are in the Middle East in the twenty-first century.” But it is hoping that all the things that are part of our experience now will be brought to bear on a contemporary audience watching and receiving the play.

Shakespeare’s play was almost certainly heavily censored when it was first performed. It was probably first performed at court and so it is likely that quite a number of cuts were applied to the text because statements were being made that would not be acceptable to a royal ear, and possibly shouldn’t be heard by anybody. There are a host of things that Lear says about human institutions, “justice”—“which is the justice, which is the thief?”; “authority” as in the police or governmental authority—“a dog’s obeyed in office”—getting its power from name or uniform, but not by standards of behavior. He talks about “politicians”—“Get thee glass eyes, / And like a scurvy politician seem / To see the things thou dost not.” Lear goes through a list of modern and, to our ears, highly recognizable contemporary institutions and says so many of them are corrupt and therefore worthless. But Shakespeare had the perfect reply to the censors. The man saying these terrible things is mad. Who knows, if he had not had that defense, Shakespeare might have done a spell in jail.

Over previous generations the blinding scene has been cut down or merely “suggested,” as something taking place in the dark. Such bowdlerization of Shakespeare is based on the judgment that these things are not for civilized people to watch, or hear. In the twentieth century, believing that Shakespeare should be very much like Samuel Beckett (who was so obviously greatly influenced by the play), the blinding scene became increasingly essential to the play. As we watch, Shakespeare is saying, “Face up to the fact that human beings are capable of unspeakably animal behavior toward each other.” These days, as we read of torture, of the callousness of the suicide bomber who blows up children, we ask how any group of people can say they are justified by any cause whatsoever in doing such things to another group of people? But Shakespeare tells us that it is in us. We humans do it. We do it as a species, and we must face the truth that it’s in human nature to be inhuman.

Academics get very exercised about the variants between the Quarto and Folio texts of the play—the fact that Lear has different dying words in each version, that a different person inherits the gored state at the end of each version (Albany speaks the final lines in Quarto, Edgar in Folio), and so on. Did you concern yourself with these textual matters or do you feel that the director is free to pick and mix, cut and paste, his or her own version of the play?

Noble: I think the director is free to do what he wants to do, but he must also be answerable for what he does. I’ve never been very interested in the textual variations. What I did, particularly in the first production, was skin the last three hundred or four hundred lines—I was absolutely brutal with the cuts there. And the impact of it was that, at the very moment of repentance, it was too late. There was no time to save Lear and Cordelia’s lives, because the people on stage had been chatting, talking all the time. That was all very much to do with the fact that it was a godless universe. The truth is on both occasions I created a world that seemed to me to be logical from all the different versions. I would then be responsible for that and I would stand by that.

Nunn: I don’t think that in 1968 when I first directed the play anybody was yet saying, “The Quarto and the Folio are two quite different plays.” I remember at the time consulting John Barton and arriving at a “best of both worlds” conflated text. That text became the basis of the text I used in 1976 with Donald Sinden, but then when I started out this time with Ian McKellen I did read a number of scholars who were telling me that I should be making a choice between Quarto and Folio. Alas, I found myself unwilling to lose rich and evocative material from either version, and so I worked with a slightly different conflation, but a conflation nonetheless. For me, the more important change since I first directed the play is not in scholarship, but in the simple fact that I am thirty years older now. Shakespeare’s engagement with ultimate questions about mortality, what we construct for ourselves to explain or to accept our mortality, of course speaks more potently to me now. The play, as I have said, is very hard on organized human society and institutions of every kind. There is very little Lear and Gloucester have left to believe in, before they must endure their going hence. Edgar is left to conclude the play, and I think deliberately, it is a conclusion of a man who has nothing really to say. He offers no positive, no beliefs, no journey to a better future. He is by then almost the only character left standing, and in the bleakest of all Shakespeare’s endings, he seems to know that all we can determine on is to “endure.”

SHAKESPEARE’S CAREER

IN THE THEATER

BEGINNINGS

William Shakespeare was an extraordinarily intelligent man who was born and died in an ordinary market town in the English Midlands. He lived an uneventful life in an eventful age. Born in April 1564, he was the eldest son of John Shakespeare, a glove maker who was prominent on the town council until he fell into financial difficulties. Young William was educated at the local grammar in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, where he gained a thorough grounding in the Latin language, the art of rhetoric, and classical poetry. He married Ann Hathaway and had three children (Susanna, then the twins Hamnet and Judith) before his twenty-first birthday: an exceptionally young age for the period. We do not know how he supported his family in the mid-1580s.

Like many clever country boys, he moved to the city in order to make his way in the world. Like many creative people, he found a career in the entertainment business. Public playhouses and professional full-time acting companies reliant on the market for their income were born in Shakespeare’s childhood. When he arrived in London as a man, sometime in the late 1580s, a new phenomenon was in the making: the actor who is so successful that he becomes a “star.” The word did not exist in its modern sense, but the pattern is recognizable: audiences went to the theater not so much to see a particular show as to witness the comedian Richard Tarlton or the dramatic actor Edward Alleyn.

Shakespeare was an actor before he was a writer. It appears not to have been long before he realized that he was never going to grow into a great comedian like Tarlton or a great tragedian like Alleyn. Instead, he found a role within his company as the man who patched up old plays, breathing new life, new dramatic twists, into tired repertory pieces. He paid close attention to the work of the university-educated dramatists who were writing history plays and tragedies for the public stage in a style more ambitious, sweeping, and poetically grand than anything that had been seen before. But he may also have noted that what his friend and rival Ben Jonson would call “Marlowe’s mighty line” sometimes faltered in the mode of comedy. Going to university, as Christopher Marlowe did, was all well and good for honing the arts of rhetorical elaboration and classical allusion, but it could lead to a loss of the common touch. To stay close to a large segment of the potential audience for public theater, it was necessary to write for clowns as well as kings and to intersperse the flights of poetry with the humor of the tavern, the privy, and the brothel: Shakespeare was the first to establish himself early in his career as an equal master of tragedy, comedy, and history. He realized that theater could be the medium to make the national past available to a wider audience than the elite who could afford to read large history books: his signature early works include not only the classical tragedy Titus Andronicus but also the sequence of English historical plays on the Wars of the Roses.

He also invented a new role for himself, that of in-house company dramatist. Where his peers and predecessors had to sell their plays to the theater managers on a poorly paid piecework basis, Shakespeare took a percentage of the box-office income. The Lord Chamberlain’s Men constituted themselves in 1594 as a joint stock company, with the profits being distributed among the core actors who had invested as sharers. Shakespeare acted himself—he appears in the cast lists of some of Ben Jonson’s plays as well as the list of actors’ names at the beginning of his own collected works—but his principal duty was to write two or three plays a year for the company. By holding shares, he was effectively earning himself a royalty on his work, something no author had ever done before in England. When the Lord Chamberlain’s Men collected their fee for performance at court in the Christmas season of 1594, three of them went along to the Treasurer of the Chamber: not just Richard Burbage the tragedian and Will Kempe the clown, but also Shakespeare the scriptwriter. That was something new.

The next four years were the golden period in Shakespeare’s career, though overshadowed by the death of his only son, Hamnet, age eleven, in 1596. In his early thirties and in full command of both his poetic and his theatrical medium, he perfected his art of comedy while also developing his tragic and historical writing in new ways. In 1598, Francis Meres, a Cambridge University graduate with his finger on the pulse of the London literary world, praised Shakespeare for his excellence across the genres:

As Plautus and Seneca are accounted the best for comedy and tragedy among the Latins, so Shakespeare among the English is the most excellent in both kinds for the stage; for comedy, witness his Gentlemen of Verona, his Errors, his Love Labours Lost, his Love Labours Won, his Midsummer Night Dream and his Merchant of Venice: for tragedy his Richard the 2, Richard the 3, Henry the 4, King John, Titus Andronicus and his Romeo and Juliet.

For Meres, as for the many writers who praised the “honey-flowing vein” of Venus and Adonis and Lucrece, narrative poems written when the theaters were closed due to plague in 1593–94, Shakespeare was marked above all by his linguistic skill, by the gift of turning elegant poetic phrases.

PLAYHOUSES

Elizabethan playhouses were “thrust” or “one-room” theaters. To understand Shakespeare’s original theatrical life, we have to forget about the indoor theater of later times, with its proscenium arch and curtain that would be opened at the beginning and closed at the end of each act. In the proscenium arch theater, stage and auditorium are effectively two separate rooms: the audience looks from one world into another as if through the imaginary “fourth wall” framed by the proscenium. The picture-frame stage, together with the elaborate scenic effects and backdrops beyond it, created the illusion of a self-contained world—especially once nineteenth-century developments in the control of artificial lighting meant that the auditorium could be darkened and the spectators made to focus on the lighted stage. Shakespeare, by contrast, wrote for a bare platform stage with a standing audience gathered around it in a courtyard in full daylight. The audience were always conscious of themselves and their fellow-spectators, and they shared the same “room” as the actors. A sense of immediate presence and the creation of rapport with the audience were all-important. The actor could not afford to imagine he was in a closed world, with silent witnesses dutifully observing him from the darkness.

Shakespeare’s theatrical career began at the Rose Theatre in Southwark. The stage was wide and shallow, trapezoid in shape, like a lozenge. This design had a great deal of potential for the theatrical equivalent of cinematic split-screen effects, whereby one group of characters would enter at the door at one end of the tiring-house wall at the back of the stage and another group through the door at the other end, thus creating two rival tableaux. Many of the battle-heavy and faction-filled plays that premiered at the Rose have scenes of just this sort.

At the rear of the Rose stage, there were three capacious exits, each more than ten feet wide. Unfortunately, the very limited excavation of a fragmentary portion of the original Globe site in 1989 revealed nothing about the stage. The first Globe was built in 1599 with similar proportions to those of another theater, the Fortune, albeit that the former was polygonal and looked circular, whereas the latter was rectangular. The building contract for the Fortune survives and allows us to infer that the stage of the Globe was probably substantially wider than it was deep (perhaps forty-three feet wide and twenty-seven feet deep). It may well have been tapered at the front, like that of the Rose.

The capacity of the Globe was said to have been enormous, perhaps in excess of three thousand. It has been conjectured that about eight hundred people may have stood in the yard, with two thousand or more in the three layers of covered galleries. The other “public” playhouses were also of large capacity, whereas the indoor Blackfriars theater that Shakespeare’s company began using in 1608—the former refectory of a monastery—had overall internal dimensions of a mere forty-six by sixty feet. It would have made for a much more intimate theatrical experience and had a much smaller capacity, probably of about six hundred people. Since they paid at least sixpence a head, the Blackfriars attracted a more select or “private” audience. The atmosphere would have been closer to that of an indoor performance before the court in the Whitehall Palace or at Richmond. That Shakespeare always wrote for indoor production at court as well as outdoor performance in the public theater should make us cautious about inferring, as some scholars have, that the opportunity provided by the intimacy of the Blackfriars led to a significant change toward a “chamber” style in his last plays—which, besides, were performed at both the Globe and the Blackfriars. After the occupation of the Blackfriars a five-act structure seems to have become more important to Shakespeare. That was because of artificial lighting: there were musical interludes between the acts, while the candles were trimmed and replaced. Again, though, something similar must have been necessary for indoor court performances throughout his career.

Front of house there were the “gatherers” who collected the money from audience members: a penny to stand in the open-air yard, another penny for a place in the covered galleries, sixpence for the prominent “lord’s rooms” to the side of the stage. In the indoor “private” theaters, gallants from the audience who fancied making themselves part of the spectacle sat on stools on the edge of the stage itself. Scholars debate as to how widespread this practice was in the public theaters such as the Globe. Once the audience were in place and the money counted, the gatherers were available to be extras on stage. That is one reason why battles and crowd scenes often come later rather than early in Shakespeare’s plays. There was no formal prohibition upon performance by women, and there certainly were women among the gatherers, so it is not beyond the bounds of possibility that female crowd members were played by females.

The play began at two o’clock in the afternoon and the theater had to be cleared by five. After the main show, there would be a jig—which consisted not only of dancing, but also of knockabout comedy (it is the origin of the farcical “afterpiece” in the eighteenth-century theater). So the time available for a Shakespeare play was about two and a half hours, somewhere between the “two hours’ traffic” mentioned in the prologue to Romeo and Juliet and the “three hours’ spectacle” referred to in the preface to the 1647 Folio of Beaumont and Fletcher’s plays. The prologue to a play by Thomas Middleton refers to a thousand lines as “one hour’s words,” so the likelihood is that about two and a half thousand, or a maximum of three thousand lines, made up the performed text. This is indeed the length of most of Shakespeare’s comedies, whereas many of his tragedies and histories are much longer, raising the possibility that he wrote full scripts, possibly with eventual publication in mind, in the full knowledge that the stage version would be heavily cut. The short Quarto texts published in his lifetime—they used to be called “Bad” Quartos—provide fascinating evidence as to the kind of cutting that probably took place. So, for instance, the First Quarto of Hamlet neatly merges two occasions when Hamlet is overheard, the “Fishmonger” and the “nunnery” scenes.

The social composition of the audience was mixed. The poet Sir John Davies wrote of “A thousand townsmen, gentlemen and whores, / Porters and servingmen” who would “together throng” at the public playhouses. Though moralists associated female play-going with adultery and the sex trade, many perfectly respectable citizens’ wives were regular attendees. Some, no doubt, resembled the modern groupie: a story attested in two different sources has one citizen’s wife making a postshow assignation with Richard Burbage and ending up in bed with Shakespeare—supposedly eliciting from the latter the quip that William the Conqueror was before Richard III. Defenders of theater liked to say that by witnessing the comeuppance of villains on the stage, audience members would repent of their own wrongdoings, but the reality is that most people went to the theater then, as they do now, for entertainment more than moral edification. Besides, it would be foolish to suppose that audiences behaved in a homogeneous way: a pamphlet of the 1630s tells of how two men went to see Pericles and one of them laughed while the other wept. Bishop John Hall complained that people went to church for the same reasons that they went to the theater: “for company, for custom, for recreation … to feed his eyes or his ears … or perhaps for sleep.”

Men-about-town and clever young lawyers went to be seen as much as to see. In the modern popular imagination, shaped not least by Shakespeare in Love and the opening sequence of Laurence Olivier’s Henry V film, the penny-paying groundlings stand in the yard hurling abuse or encouragement and hazelnuts or orange peel at the actors, while the sophisticates in the covered galleries appreciate Shakespeare’s soaring poetry. The reality was probably the other way round. A “groundling” was a kind of fish, so the nickname suggests the penny audience standing below the level of the stage and gazing in silent open-mouthed wonder at the spectacle unfolding above them. The more difficult audience members, who kept up a running commentary of clever remarks on the performance and who occasionally got into quarrels with players, were the gallants. Like Hollywood movies in modern times, Elizabethan and Jacobean plays exercised a powerful influence on the fashion and behavior of the young. John Marston mocks the lawyers who would open their lips, perhaps to court a girl, and out would “flow / Naught but pure Juliet and Romeo.”

THE ENSEMBLE AT WORK

In the absence of typewriters and photocopying machines, reading aloud would have been the means by which the company got to know a new play. The tradition of the playwright reading his complete script to the assembled company endured for generations. A copy would then have been taken to the Master of the Revels for licensing. The theater book-holder or prompter would then have copied the parts for distribution to the actors. A partbook consisted of the character’s lines, with each speech preceded by the last three or four words of the speech before, the so-called “cue.” These would have been taken away and studied or “conned.” During this period of learning the parts, an actor might have had some one-to-one instruction, perhaps from the dramatist, perhaps from a senior actor who had played the same part before, and, in the case of an apprentice, from his master. A high percentage of Desdemona’s lines occur in dialogue with Othello, of Lady Macbeth’s with Macbeth, Cleopatra’s with Antony, and Volumnia’s with Coriolanus. The roles would almost certainly have been taken by the apprentice of the lead actor, usually Burbage, who delivers the majority of the cues. Given that apprentices lodged with their masters, there would have been ample opportunity for personal instruction, which may be what made it possible for young men to play such demanding parts.

10. Hypothetical reconstruction of the interior of an Elizabethan playhouse during a performance.

After the parts were learned, there may have been no more than a single rehearsal before the first performance. With six different plays to be put on every week, there was no time for more. Actors, then, would go into a show with a very limited sense of the whole. The notion of a collective rehearsal process that is itself a process of discovery for the actors is wholly modern and would have been incomprehensible to Shakespeare and his original ensemble. Given the number of parts an actor had to hold in his memory, the forgetting of lines was probably more frequent than in the modern theater. The book-holder was on hand to prompt.

Backstage personnel included the property man, the tire-man who oversaw the costumes, call boys, attendants, and the musicians, who might play at various times from the main stage, the rooms above, and within the tiring-house. Scriptwriters sometimes made a nuisance of themselves backstage. There was often tension between the acting companies and the freelance playwrights from whom they purchased scripts: it was a smart move on the part of Shakespeare and the Lord Chamberlain’s Men to bring the writing process in-house.

Scenery was limited, though sometimes set pieces were brought on (a bank of flowers, a bed, the mouth of hell). The trapdoor from below, the gallery stage above, and the curtained discovery-space at the back allowed for an array of special effects: the rising of ghosts and apparitions, the descent of gods, dialogue between a character at a window and another at ground level, the revelation of a statue or a pair of lovers playing at chess. Ingenious use could be made of props, as with the ass’s head in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. In a theater that does not clutter the stage with the material paraphernalia of everyday life, those objects that are deployed may take on powerful symbolic weight, as when Shylock bears his weighing scales in one hand and knife in the other, thus becoming a parody of the figure of Justice who traditionally bears a sword and a balance. Among the more significant items in the property cupboard of Shakespeare’s company, there would have been a throne (the “chair of state”), joint stools, books, bottles, coins, purses, letters (which are brought onstage, read, or referred to on about eighty occasions in the complete works), maps, gloves, a set of stocks (in which Kent is put in King Lear), rings, rapiers, daggers, broadswords, staves, pistols, masks and vizards, heads and skulls, torches and tapers and lanterns, which served to signal night scenes on the daylit stage, a buck’s head, an ass’s head, animal costumes. Live animals also put in appearances, most notably the dog Crab in The Two Gentlemen of Verona and possibly a young polar bear in The Winter’s Tale.

The costumes were the most important visual dimension of the play. Playwrights were paid between £2 and £6 per script, whereas Alleyn was not averse to paying £20 for “a black velvet cloak with sleeves embroidered all with silver and gold.” No matter the period of the play, actors always wore contemporary costume. The excitement for the audience came not from any impression of historical accuracy, but from the richness of the attire and perhaps the transgressive thrill of the knowledge that here were commoners like themselves strutting in the costumes of courtiers in effective defiance of the strict sumptuary laws whereby in real life people had to wear the clothes that befitted their social station.

To an even greater degree than props, costumes could carry symbolic importance. Racial characteristics could be suggested: a breastplate and helmet for a Roman soldier, a turban for a Turk, long robes for exotic characters such as Moors, a gabardine for a Jew. The figure of Time, as in The Winter’s Tale, would be equipped with hourglass, scythe, and wings; Rumour, who speaks the prologue of 2 Henry IV, wore a costume adorned with a thousand tongues. The wardrobe in the tiring-house of the Globe would have contained much of the same stock as that of rival manager Philip Henslowe at the Rose: green gowns for outlaws and foresters, black for melancholy men such as Jaques and people in mourning such as the Countess in All’s Well That Ends Well (at the beginning of Hamlet, the prince is still in mourning black when everyone else is in festive garb for the wedding of the new king), a gown and hood for a friar (or a feigned friar like the duke in Measure for Measure), blue coats and tawny to distinguish the followers of rival factions, a leather apron and ruler for a carpenter (as in the opening scene of Julius Caesar—and in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, where this is the only sign that Peter Quince is a carpenter), a cockle hat with staff and a pair of sandals for a pilgrim or palmer (the disguise assumed by Helen in All’s Well), bodices and kirtles with farthingales beneath for the boys who are to be dressed as girls. A gender switch such as that of Rosalind or Jessica seems to have taken between fifty and eighty lines of dialogue—Viola does not resume her “maiden weeds” but remains in her boy’s costume to the end of Twelfth Night because a change would have slowed down the action at just the moment it was speeding to a climax. Henslowe’s inventory also included “a robe for to go invisible”: Oberon, Puck, and Ariel must have had something similar.

As the costumes appealed to the eyes, so there was music for the ears. Comedies included many songs. Desdemona’s willow song, perhaps a late addition to the text, is a rare and thus exceptionally poignant example from tragedy. Trumpets and tuckets sounded for ceremonial entrances, drums denoted an army on the march. Background music could create atmosphere, as at the beginning of Twelfth Night, during the lovers’ dialogue near the end of The Merchant of Venice, when the statue seemingly comes to life in The Winter’s Tale, and for the revival of Pericles and of Lear (in the Quarto text, but not the Folio). The haunting sound of the hautboy suggested a realm beyond the human, as when the god Hercules is imagined deserting Mark Antony. Dances symbolized the harmony of the end of a comedy—though in Shakespeare’s world of mingled joy and sorrow, someone is usually left out of the circle.

The most important resource was, of course, the actors themselves. They needed many skills: in the words of one contemporary commentator, “dancing, activity, music, song, elocution, ability of body, memory, skill of weapon, pregnancy of wit.” Their bodies were as significant as their voices. Hamlet tells the player to “suit the action to the word, the word to the action”: moments of strong emotion, known as “passions,” relied on a repertoire of dramatic gestures as well as a modulation of the voice. When Titus Andronicus has had his hand chopped off, he asks, “How can I grace my talk, / Wanting a hand to give it action?” A pen portrait of “The Character of an Excellent Actor” by the dramatist John Webster is almost certainly based on his impression of Shakespeare’s leading man, Richard Burbage: “By a full and significant action of body, he charms our attention: sit in a full theatre, and you will think you see so many lines drawn from the circumference of so many ears, whiles the actor is the centre.…”

Though Burbage was admired above all others, praise was also heaped upon the apprentice players whose alto voices fitted them for the parts of women. A spectator at Oxford in 1610 records how the audience was reduced to tears by the pathos of Desdemona’s death. The puritans who fumed about the biblical prohibition upon cross-dressing and the encouragement to sodomy constituted by the sight of an adult male kissing a teenage boy on stage were a small minority. Little is known, however, about the characteristics of the leading apprentices in Shakespeare’s company. It may perhaps be inferred that one was a lot taller than the other, since Shakespeare often wrote for a pair of female friends, one tall and fair, the other short and dark (Helena and Hermia, Rosalind and Celia, Beatrice and Hero).

We know little about Shakespeare’s own acting roles—an early allusion indicates that he often took royal parts, and a venerable tradition gives him old Adam in As You Like It and the ghost of old King Hamlet. Save for Burbage’s lead roles and the generic part of the clown, all such castings are mere speculation. We do not even know for sure whether the original Falstaff was Will Kempe or another actor who specialized in comic roles, Thomas Pope.

Kempe left the company in early 1599. Tradition has it that he fell out with Shakespeare over the matter of excessive improvisation. He was replaced by Robert Armin, who was less of a clown and more of a cerebral wit: this explains the difference between such parts as Lancelet Gobbo and Dogberry, which were written for Kempe, and the more verbally sophisticated Feste and Lear’s Fool, which were written for Armin.

One thing that is clear from surviving “plots” or storyboards of plays from the period is that a degree of doubling was necessary. 2 Henry VI has more than sixty speaking parts, but more than half of the characters only appear in a single scene and most scenes have only six to eight speakers. At a stretch, the play could be performed by thirteen actors. When Thomas Platter saw Julius Caesar at the Globe in 1599, he noted that there were about fifteen. Why doesn’t Paris go to the Capulet ball in Romeo and Juliet? Perhaps because he was doubled with Mercutio, who does. In The Winter’s Tale, Mamillius might have come back as Perdita and Antigonus been doubled by Camillo, making the partnership with Paulina at the end a very neat touch. Titania and Oberon are often played by the same pair as Hippolyta and Theseus, suggesting a symbolic matching of the rulers of the worlds of night and day, but it is questionable whether there would have been time for the necessary costume changes. As so often, one is left in a realm of tantalizing speculation.

THE KING’S MAN

The new king, James I, who had held the Scottish throne as James VI since he had been an infant, immediately took the Lord Chamberlain’s Men under his direct patronage. Henceforth they would be the King’s Men, and for the rest of Shakespeare’s career they were favored with far more court performances than any of their rivals. There even seem to have been rumors early in the reign that Shakespeare and Burbage were being considered for knighthoods, an unprecedented honor for mere actors—and one that in the event was not accorded to a member of the profession for nearly three hundred years, when the title was bestowed upon Henry Irving, the leading Shakespearean actor of Queen Victoria’s reign.

Shakespeare’s productivity rate slowed in the Jacobean years, not because of age or some personal trauma, but because there were frequent outbreaks of plague, causing the theaters to be closed for long periods. The King’s Men were forced to spend many months on the road. Between November 1603 and 1608, they were to be found at various towns in the south and Midlands, though Shakespeare probably did not tour with them by this time. He had bought a large house back home in Stratford and was accumulating other property. He may indeed have stopped acting soon after the new king took the throne. With the London theaters closed so much of the time and a large repertoire on the stocks, Shakespeare seems to have focused his energies on writing a few long and complex tragedies that could have been played on demand at court: Othello, King Lear, Antony and Cleopatra, Coriolanus, and Cymbeline are among his longest and poetically grandest plays. Macbeth only survives in a shorter text, which shows signs of adaptation after Shakespeare’s death. The bitterly satirical Timon of Athens, apparently a collaboration with Thomas Middleton that may have failed on the stage, also belongs to this period. In comedy, too, he wrote longer and morally darker works than in the Elizabethan period, pushing at the very bounds of the form in Measure for Measure and All’s Well That Ends Well.

From 1608 onward, when the King’s Men began occupying the indoor Blackfriars playhouse (as a winter house, meaning that they only used the outdoor Globe in summer?), Shakespeare turned to a more romantic style. His company had a great success with a revived and altered version of an old pastoral play called Mucedorus. It even featured a bear. The younger dramatist John Fletcher, meanwhile, sometimes working in collaboration with Francis Beaumont, was pioneering a new style of tragicomedy, a mix of romance and royalism laced with intrigue and pastoral excursions. Shakespeare experimented with this idiom in Cymbeline and it was presumably with his blessing that Fletcher eventually took over as the King’s Men’s company dramatist. The two writers apparently collaborated on three plays in the years 1612–14: a lost romance called Cardenio (based on the love-madness of a character in Cervantes’ Don Quixote), Henry VIII (originally staged with the title “All Is True”), and The Two Noble Kinsmen, a dramatization of Chaucer’s “Knight’s Tale.” These were written after Shakespeare’s two final solo-authored plays, The Winter’s Tale, a self-consciously old-fashioned work dramatizing the pastoral romance of his old enemy Robert Greene, and The Tempest, which at one and the same time drew together multiple theatrical traditions, diverse reading, and contemporary interest in the fate of a ship that had been wrecked on the way to the New World.

The collaborations with Fletcher suggest that Shakespeare’s career ended with a slow fade rather than the sudden retirement supposed by the nineteenth-century Romantic critics who read Prospero’s epilogue to The Tempest as Shakespeare’s personal farewell to his art. In the last few years of his life Shakespeare certainly spent more of his time in Stratford-upon-Avon, where he became further involved in property dealing and litigation. But his London life also continued. In 1613 he made his first major London property purchase: a freehold house in the Blackfriars district, close to his company’s indoor theater. The Two Noble Kinsmen may have been written as late as 1614, and Shakespeare was in London on business a little more than a year before he died of an unknown cause at home in Stratford-upon-Avon in 1616, probably on his fifty-second birthday.

About half the sum of his works were published in his lifetime, in texts of variable quality. A few years after his death, his fellow actors began putting together an authorized edition of his complete Comedies, Histories and Tragedies. It appeared in 1623, in large “Folio” format. This collection of thirty-six plays gave Shakespeare his immortality. In the words of his fellow dramatist Ben Jonson, who contributed two poems of praise at the start of the Folio, the body of his work made him “a monument without a tomb”:

And art alive still while thy book doth live

And we have wits to read and praise to give …

He was not of an age, but for all time!

SHAKESPEARE’S WORKS:

A CHRONOLOGY

1589–91

? Arden of Faversham (possible part authorship)

1589–92

The Taming of the Shrew

1589–92

? Edward the Third (possible part authorship)

1591

The Second Part of Henry the Sixth, originally called The First Part of the Contention betwixt the Two Famous Houses of York and Lancaster (element of coauthorship possible)

1591

The Third Part of Henry the Sixth, originally called The True Tragedy of Richard Duke of York (element of coauthorship probable)

1591–92

The Two Gentlemen of Verona

1591–92; perhaps revised 1594

The Lamentable Tragedy of Titus Andronicus (probably co-written with, or revising an earlier version by, George Peele)

1592

The First Part of Henry the Sixth, probably with Thomas Nashe and others

1592/94

King Richard the Third

1593

Venus and Adonis (poem)

1593–94

The Rape of Lucrece (poem)

1593–1608

Sonnets (154 poems, published 1609 with A Lover’s Complaint, a poem of disputed authorship)

1592–94/1600–03

Sir Thomas More (a single scene for a play originally by Anthony Munday, with other revisions by Henry Chettle, Thomas Dekker, and Thomas Heywood)

1594

The Comedy of Errors

1595

Love’s Labour’s Lost

1595–97

Love’s Labour’s Won (a lost play, unless the original title for another comedy)

1595–96

A Midsummer Night’s Dream

1595–96

The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet

1595–96

King Richard the Second

1595–97

The Life and Death of King John (possibly earlier)

1596–97

The Merchant of Venice

1596–97

The First Part of Henry the Fourth

1597–98

The Second Part of Henry the Fourth

1598

Much Ado About Nothing

1598–99

The Passionate Pilgrim (20 poems, some not by Shakespeare)

1599

The Life of Henry the Fifth

1599

“To the Queen” (epilogue for a court performance)

1599

As You Like It

1599

The Tragedy of Julius Caesar

1600–01

The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark (perhaps revising an earlier version)

1600–01

The Merry Wives of Windsor (perhaps revising version of 1597–99)

1601

“Let the Bird of Loudest Lay” (poem, known since 1807 as “The Phoenix and Turtle” [turtledove])

1601

Twelfth Night, or What You Will

1601–02

The Tragedy of Troilus and Cressida

1604

The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice

1604

Measure for Measure

1605

All’s Well That Ends Well

1605

The Life of Timon of Athens, with Thomas Middleton

1605–06

The Tragedy of King Lear

1605–08

? contribution to The Four Plays in One (lost, except for A Yorkshire Tragedy, mostly by Thomas Middleton)

1606

The Tragedy of Macbeth (surviving text has additional scenes by Thomas Middleton)

1606–07

The Tragedy of Antony and Cleopatra

1608

The Tragedy of Coriolanus

1608

Pericles, Prince of Tyre, with George Wilkins

1610

The Tragedy of Cymbeline

1611

The Winter’s Tale

1611

The Tempest

1612–13

Cardenio, with John Fletcher (survives only in later adaptation called Double Falsehood by Lewis Theobald)

1613

Henry VIII (All Is True), with John Fletcher

1613–14

The Two Noble Kinsmen, with John Fletcher

THE HISTORY BEHIND THE

TRAGEDIES: A CHRONOLOGY

FURTHER READING

AND VIEWING

CRITICAL APPROACHES

Booth, Stephen, King Lear, Macbeth, Indefinition and Tragedy (1983). Not for beginners, but very penetrating.

Bradley, A. C., Shakespearean Tragedy (1904). Still worth reading a century after publication.

Cavell, Stanley, “The Avoidance of Love,” in Disowning Knowledge in Seven Plays of Shakespeare (1987). A skeptical philosopher’s reading; still less for beginners, but so full of deep insight that it has claims to be among the best pieces ever written on the play.

Colie, Rosalie L., and F. T. Flahiff, Some Facets of “King Lear”: Essays in Prismatic Criticism (1974). An unusually strong collection of critical essays.

Danby, J. F., Shakespeare’s Doctrine of Nature (1949). Contexts for Edmund.

Dollimore, Jonathan, “King Lear and Essentialist Humanism,” in Radical Tragedy: Religion, Ideology and Power in the Drama of Shakespeare and His Contemporaries (1984). Inflected by neo-Marxist cultural politics.

Elton, William R., King Lear and the Gods (1966). Useful contextualization in the intellectual history of Shakespeare’s time.

Empson, William, “Fool in Lear,” in The Structure of Complex Words (1951). Superb essay on a key word.

Goldberg, S. L., An Essay on King Lear (1974). Consistently thoughtful.

Greenblatt, Stephen, “Shakespeare and the Exorcists,” in Shakespeare Negotiations: The Circulation of Social Energy in Renaissance England (1988). Inventive account of why Shakespeare used an anti-Popish treatise for the mad language of Poor Tom.

Heilman, R. B., This Great Stage: Image and Structure in King Lear (1963). Good account of image patterns.

Kermode, Frank, ed., King Lear: A Casebook (1969). Fine collection of studies from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Kott, Jan, Shakespeare Our Contemporary (1964). The chapter on King Lear as a bleak, absurd drama analogous to Samuel Beckett’s Endgame has been hugely influential; Peter Brook saw an early version, which did much to shape his 1962 production.

Mack, Maynard, King Lear in Our Time (1966). Remains valuable in our time.

Taylor, Gary, and Michael Warren, eds., The Division of the Kingdoms: Shakespeare’s Two Versions of King Lear (1983). Groundbreaking collection of essays on Quarto and Folio variants.

THE PLAY IN PERFORMANCE

Brooke, Michael, “King Lear on Screen,” www.screenonline.org.uk/tv/id/566346/index.html. Overview of film versions.

Chambers, Colin, Other Spaces: New Theatre and the RSC (1980). Includes fine account of the powerfully intimate Buzz Goodbody production.

Jackson, Russell, and Robert Smallwood, eds, Players of Shakespeare 2 (1988). Interviews with actors, including Antony Sher on playing the Fool in Adrian Noble’s production.

Leggatt, Alexander, King Lear, Shakespeare in Performance (1991). Good survey.

Ogden, James, and Arthur H. Scouten, eds, Lear from Study to Stage: Essays in Criticism (1997). Contains several illuminating essays.

Rosenberg, Marvin, The Masks of King Lear (1972). Many fascinating details of performances down the ages.

AVAILABLE ON DVD

King Lear, directed by Peter Brook (1970, DVD 2005). Bleak interpretation with magisterial performance by Paul Scofield.

King Lear (Korol Lir), directed by Grigori Kosintsev (1970, DVD 2007). Powerful Russian version.

King Lear, directed by Jonathan Miller (BBC Television Shakespeare, 1982, DVD 2004). Michael Hordern as Lear in a reworking (with fuller, perhaps overlong text) of an earlier television version by Miller, based ultimately on a stage production at Nottingham.

King Lear, directed by Michael Elliott (Channel 4 Television, 1983, DVD 2007). Laurence Olivier’s last Shakespearean performance.

Ran, directed by Akira Kurosawa (1985, DVD 2006). Epic Japanese adaptation in Samurai setting.

A Thousand Acres, directed by Jocelyn Moorhouse (1997, DVD 2006). Jessica Lange, Michelle Pfeiffer, and Jennifer Jason Leigh in a film version of a novel by Jane Smiley that transposes the story to the American Midwest and tells it from the point of view of the three daughters.

King Lear, directed by Richard Eyre (BBC2 Television 1998, DVD 2006). Filming of Eyre’s exemplary small-scale National Theatre production.

My Kingdom, directed by Don Boyd (2001, DVD 2005). Richard Harris’ last role: the Lear plot transposed to the world of a twenty-first-century Liverpool drug baron.

REFERENCES

1. Gamini Salgado, Eyewitnesses of Shakespeare: First Hand Accounts of Performances 1590–1890 (1975), p. 38.

2. James Boswell, in a diary entry on 12 May 1763, in Boswell’s London Journals: 1762–1763, ed. Frederick A. Pottle (1950), pp. 256–7.

3. George Steevens, review dated 16–18 February 1773, quoted in Shakespeare, The Critical Heritage, ed. Brian Vickers, vol. 5, 1765–1774(1979), pp. 501–2.

4. Leigh Hunt in an originally unsigned review of King Lear in The Examiner, No. 21, 22 May 1808, pp. 331–3.

5. The Times, review of King Lear, 25 April 1820.

6. William Hazlitt, in a London Magazine review of June 1820.

7. William Hazlitt, in a London Magazine review of May 1820.

8. John Forster, “The Restoration of Shakespeare’s Lear to the Stage,” The Examiner, No. 1566, 4 February 1838, pp. 69–70.

9. “Review of King Lear,” The Athenaeum, No. 1066, 1 April 1848, p. 346.

10. William Winter, “The Art of Edwin Booth: King Lear,” in his Life and Art of Edwin Booth (1893), pp. 177–85.

11. Henry James, “Tommaso Salvini,” The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. LI, No. CCCV, March 1883, pp. 377–86.

12. John Gielgud, “Granville Barker Rehearses King Lear,” in his Stage Directions (1963, repr. 1979), pp. 51–5.

13. James Agate, review of King Lear in Brief Chronicles: A Survey of the Plays of Shakespeare and the Elizabethans in Actual Performance (1943, repr. 1971), pp. 201–3.

14. The Times, review of King Lear, 21 April 1936.

15. W. A. Darlington, “Old Vic at Home,” New York Times, 13 October 1946.

16. Alan Brien, “Simulation in the Fields,” The Spectator, Vol. 203, No. 6843, 21 August 1959, pp. 223–4.

17. Maynard Mack, King Lear in Our Time (1966).

18. James Ogden, “Introduction,” in Lear from Study to Stage: Essays in Criticism, ed. James Ogden and Arthur H. Scouten (1997).

19. Illustrated London News, Vol. 241, No. 6433, 17 November 1962.

20. Stephen J. Philips, “Akira Kurosawa’s Ran,” in Lear from Study to Stage,p. 102.

21. Benedict Nightingale, New Statesman, 3 December 1976.

22. Sheridan Morley, Daily Express, 2 July 2004.

23. Tom Piper, King Lear, RSC Online Playguide, 2004.

24. Corin Redgrave, King Lear, RSC Online Playguide, 2004.

25. Benedict Nightingale, “Some Recent Productions,” in Lear from Study to Stage, p. 236.

26. John Peter, Sunday Times, 31 October 1999.

27. Michael Billington, Guardian, 30 October 1999.

28. Colin Chambers, Other Spaces: New Theatre and the RSC (1980), p. 71.

29. Nightingale, “Some Recent Productions,” p. 232.

30. Irving Wardle, Independent, 15 July 1990.

31. David Fielding, designer of the 1990 production, in interview with Lynne Truss, Independent, 8 July 1990.

32. John Gross, Sunday Telegraph, 15 July 1990.

33. Michael Billington, Guardian, 13 July 1990.

34. Note in King Lear, RSC program, 1993.

35. Irving, Independent, 15 July 1990.

36. Chambers, Other Spaces, p. 69.

37. Michael Billington, Guardian, 30 June 1982.

38. Billington, Guardian, 30 June 1982.

39. David Nathan, Jewish Chronicle, 9 July 1982.

40. James Fenton, Sunday Times, 4 July 1982.

41. Antony Sher, “The Fool in King Lear,” in Players of Shakespeare 2, ed. Russell Jackson and Robert Smallwood (1988).

42. Adrian Noble, interview for King Lear, RSC Education Pack, 1993.

43. Robert Wilcher, “King Lear,” in Shakespeare in Performance, ed. Keith Parsons and Pamela Mason (1995), p. 91.

44. Gordon Parsons, Morning Star, 5 July 1982.

45. Alexander Leggatt, King Lear, Shakespeare in Performance (1991),p. 55.

46. Wilcher, “King Lear,” p. 93.

47. Janet Dale, in RSC Education Pack, 1993.

48. Benedict Nightingale, The Times, 12 July 1990.

49. Billington, Guardian, 13 July 1990.

50. Nightingale, “Some Recent Productions,” p. 231.

51. Emily Raymond, King Lear, RSC Online Playguide, 2005.

52. Nicholas de Jongh, Evening Standard, 21 May 1993.

53. Michael Billington, Guardian, 22 May 1993.

54. Nightingale, “Some Recent Productions,” p. 239.

55. Paul Taylor, Independent, 5 July 2004.

56. Peter J. Smith, in Cahiers Élisabéthains, No. 66 (2004).

57. Billington, Guardian, 30 June 1982.

58. Charles Marowitz, “Lear Log,” Tulane Drama Review, Vol. 8, No. 2 (Winter 1963), pp. 103–21.

59. Redgrave, King Lear.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS AND

PICTURE CREDITS

Preparation of “King Lear in Performance” was assisted by a generous grant from the CAPITAL Centre (Creativity and Performance in Teaching and Learning) of the University of Warwick for research in the RSC archive at the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. The Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) funded a term’s research leave that enabled Jonathan Bate to work on “The Director’s Cut.”

Picture research by Helen Robson, Jan Sewell, and Kevin Wright. Grateful acknowledgment is made to the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust for assistance with picture research (special thanks to Helen Hargest) and reproduction fees.

Images of RSC productions are supplied by the Shakespeare Centre Library and Archive, Stratford-upon-Avon. This library, maintained by the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, holds the most important collection of Shakespeare material in the UK, including the Royal Shakespeare Company’s official archive. It is open to the public free of charge.

For more information see www.shakespeare.org.uk.

1. Robert Armin © Bardbiz Limited

2. Mr. Macready (1838). Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust

3. Directed by Theodore Komisarjevsky (1936). Reproduced by permission of the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust

4. Directed by John Gielgud and Anthony Quayle (1950). Angus McBean © Royal Shakespeare Company

5. Directed by Peter Brook (1962). Angus McBean © Royal Shakespeare Company

6. Directed by Trevor Nunn (2007). Manuel Harlan © Royal Shakespeare Company

7. Directed by Deborah Warner (1990). © Donald Cooper/Photostage

8. Directed by Adrian Noble (1993). © John Bunting

9. Directed by Adrian Noble (1982). Joe Cocks © Shakespeare Birthplace Trust

10. Reconstructed Elizabethan playhouse © Charcoalblue

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Act 1 Scene 1

1.1 Location: the royal court, Britain

1 affected favored

5 qualities … moiety their qualities are so evenly balanced that the most careful scrutiny cannot distinguish between either man’s share

8 breeding upbringing (plays on the sense of “conception”) charge cost (plays on the sense of “accusation, blame”)

9 brazed made brazen, hardened

10 conceive understand (Gloucester then plays on sense of “become pregnant”)

13 ere before

14 fault transgression/loss of scent during a hunt/vagina

15 undone plays on the sense of “not copulated with” issue outcome/child

16 proper handsome/worthy/rightful

17 by … law legitimate

17 some year about a year

18 dearer more beloved (plays on the sense of “more expensive”)

18 account estimation (plays on the financial sense)

21 whoreson i.e. bastard (here used affectionately)

27 sue entreat, seek

28 deserving to be worthy of (your esteem)

29 out away (perhaps abroad or in the house of another nobleman; it was common for a nobleman’s son to be educated in the house of another important family)

1.1 Sennet trumpet call signaling a procession

1.1 bearing a coronet carrying a small crown denoting inferior rank/wearing a wreath or garland about the head (must be of material that can be broken in half)

31 Attend wait on, look after

34 darker secret (with sinister connotations)

36 fast intent firm intention

37 business official duties/exertion/anxiety

39 son i.e. son-in-law (like Albany)

41 constant will unshakable intention

41 publish proclaim, make public

42 several dowers individual dowries

42 that so that

45 sojourn stay

48 Interest possession

50 bounty generosity/gift

51 nature … challenge natural affection, combined with merit, makes a claim

53 wield express

56 grace virtue

58 makes breath poor makes words insufficient/renders one breathless (in the attempt to express it)

58 unable inadequate

59 all … much i.e. all possible expressions of the amount of love

61 bounds territories

62 shadowy shady

62 champaigns riched rich open countryside

63 wide-skirted meads extensive meadows

67 self-mettle same temperament/same substance (“metal”)

68 prize … worth value myself in equal terms

69 deed action, performance/bond, legal document

70 that in that

72 square of sense guiding principle governing the senses/(physical or mental) region of the senses

73 alone felicitate only happy

77 ponderous weighty

78 hereditary by inheritance

80 validity value

83 vines … Burgundy Lear characterizes France and Burgundy by their assets: vineyards and cattle pastures

84 interessed admitted, given a share

84 draw attract/receive, collect/pull forth (as one “draws lots”)

92 bond duty (with connotations both of a binding legal agreement and of restrictive shackles)

93 Mend improve

94 mar spoil

96 begot conceived, fathered

96 bred raised, brought up

101 plight pledge, promise

106 untender hard/cruel (plays on the sense of “not young”)

110 Hecate Greek goddess of witchcraft and the moon

111 operation movement and astrological influence

111 orbs planets

114 Propinquity … blood close ties of kinship

116 this this time (or Lear gestures toward himself)

116 Scythian person from Scythia, an ancient region extending over much of eastern Europe and Asiatic Russia, notorious for its barbarous inhabitants

117 generation children/own people

117 messes small groups of people who eat together/portions of food, meals/disgusting concoctions/troubled, confused conditions

119 neighboured treated with hospitable kindness

120 sometime former

121 liege lord, one to whom feudal duty and service was owed

124 set my rest stake everything (card-playing term)/repose, be at ease

125 kind affectionate (in the manner of a family member)

125 nursery care

125 avoid leave

127 Who stirs? Get on with it!/Why don’t you move?

129 digest absorb, incorporate

130 plainness frankness, plain speaking

130 marry her be her dowry/get her a husband

132 large effects extensive trappings

133 troop with accompany

134 With reservation of reserving the right to have (legal language)

135 sustained maintained, supported

137 th’addition to the title and honors of

137 sway authority, rule

145 make … shaft avoid the arrow (of my anger)

146 fork barbed arrowhead

148 thou kings are almost always addressed, respectfully, as “you”; Kent is unmannerly in his use of the familiar “thou”

151 Reserve thy state retain your sovereignty

152 in … consideration with wise and careful reflection

153 Answer … judgement I’ll stake my life on my opinion

156 Reverb no hollowness do not reverberate hollowly (i.e. emptily/insincerely)

158 held regarded, valued

158 pawn a pledge, surety

159 wage deposit as security

163 blank center of a target/line of sight (Kent asks to be the means to help Lear see better)

164 Apollo Greek and Roman sun god

167 vassal servant/wretch

167 Miscreant villain (literally, “infidel, unbeliever”)

168 forbear stop, desist

169 Kill … disease i.e. Lear has got things the wrong way round

170 foul disease loathsome, festering disease/syphilis

173 recreant traitor

174 That in that, since

175 durst dared

175 strained excessive/unnatural

176 sentences pronouncements, decisions

177 nor … nor neither … nor

177 place status, rank

178 potency power

178 made good being carried into effect/shown to be valid/secured, defended

180 disasters misfortunes

183 trunk body

184 Jupiter supreme Roman god

186 sith since

190 your … approve may your actions prove the truth of your grand statements

193 shape … course behave in his usual manner

1.1 Flourish trumpet fanfare signaling the arrival of an important person

197 rivalled competed

197 in the least at the lowest

198 present dower immediately available dowry

202 tender offer

204 hold her so consider her to be dear (i.e. beloved/worth a great deal)

206 aught anything

206 little seeming substance insignificant (or physically small) thing/one who totally refuses to play a part

207 pieced augmented, increased

208 fitly like justly please

211 infirmities deficiencies

211 owes owns

213 Dowered with given as a dowry

213 strangered made a stranger, disowned

216 Election … up choice is impossible

218 tell you inform you of/enumerate

219 from … stray stray so far from your love as

225 your object your focus, the object of your sight (the apple of your eye)

226 argument theme

226 balm soothing ointment

227 trice mere moment

228 monstrous unnatural

228 dismantle strip off (the folds of the metaphorical cloth of favor)

231 monsters it it becomes monstrous

231 fore-vouched previously sworn

232 Fall into taint (must) come under suspicion

232 which … me i.e. and to believe in all reason that she had committed such a monstrous offense would require a miracle

236 for (your anger is) because

236 want lack

237 purpose not not intend to do what I say

239 foulness wickedness/moral impurity

242 for which i.e. for lack of which

243 still-soliciting constantly entreating, self-seeking

248 tardiness in nature natural slowness

249 history account (of an action)

252 regards … point irrelevant concerns

263 respect and fortunes status and wealth

266 Most choice forsaken most desirable when rejected

267 seize upon take possession of (legal term)

268 be it lawful provided it is lawful

269 their may refer to either the gods or to Lear and Burgundy

270 inflamed glowing, ardent

271 thrown … chance cast to my luck (gambling metaphor)

273 wat’rish well-watered (with rivers)/wet, feeble

274 unprized unvalued (may play on a sense of “priceless”)

275 though unkind though they are cruel (or “lacking in natural familial affection”)

276 where somewhere, place

280 grace favor (with connotations of “divinely sanctioned mercy”)

280 benison blessing

283 washèd i.e. wet with tears

286 as … named by their true names

287 your professèd bosoms i.e. the love you claim to have for him

287 commit entrust; perhaps with connotations of “confine (to prison)”

289 prefer advance, promote

292 study concern, endeavor

294 At fortune’s alms as a charitable gift from fortune

294 scanted stinted, withheld/slighted, neglected

295 are … wanted deserve to be deprived of the love you have failed to show (to others)

296 plighted cunning secret cunning/deceitful promises

297 Who … derides those who hide their faults will in the end be shamed and mocked

300 nearly closely

307 grossly obviously

308 ever always

309 slenderly slightly

310 The … rash even at his best and healthiest he was impulsive

311 look expect

312 long-engrafted condition long-implanted tendencies

312 therewithal in addition to that

313 choleric irascible, hot-tempered, impulsive/bilious; one of the four “humors” or temperaments thought to be related to an excess of bile in the constitution

315 unconstant starts unpredictable fits

317 compliment etiquette, ceremony

318 sit together i.e. get together, confer

319 carry maintain, manage

319 disposition frame of mind

320 last surrender recent yielding (of authority)

320 offend harm

322 i’th’heat immediately

Act 1 Scene 2

1.2 Location: the Earl of Gloucester’s residence

2 Wherefore why

3 Stand in endure/stand still under

4 curiosity scruples, fussiness

4 nations i.e. society

5 moonshines months

6 Lag of behind (i.e. younger than)

6 base illegitimate (also low/unworthy/dishonorable)

7 dimensions physical proportions

7 compact composed

8 generous noble

8 true well-proportioned/authentic, true to his father’s likeness

9 honest madam’s issue a legitimate child

11 Who i.e. we bastards who

11 take require/receive

12 More … quality a more complex creation and more vigorous disposition

14 fops weak fools

15 Got conceived

18 As the same as

19 speed succeed

20 invention scheme

21 to th’legitimate advance to (or “take over”) the place of the legitimate son; editors sometimes emend this to “top the legitimate”

23 choler anger

23 parted departed

24 Prescribed restricted, limited

25 exhibition an allowance, maintenance

26 gad spur of the moment

28 up away

32 terrible dispatch fearful and hasty stowing away

37 for as for

38 o’erlooking reading

44 essay or taste test

45 policy … age policy of revering the old (policy also suggests the “strategic cunning” of the elderly)

46 the … times i.e. our youth, our prime

46 fortunes inheritance

47 relish savor, enjoy

47 idle useless

48 fond foolish

49 sways rules

49 as … suffered only insofar as it is allowed to do so

58 casement window

58 closet private room

59 character handwriting

60 matter subject matter

61 in … that given the contents

61 fain willingly

67 at perfect age being mature

67 declined old/ill

72 sirrah sir (used to social inferiors and children)

72 apprehend arrest

73 Abominable often, popularly, "inhuman, unnatural" (from the incorrect belief that the word was derived from the Latin ab homine, i.e. “away from man”)

77 run … course proceed securely

77 where whereas

77 proceed perhaps with legal connotations (in keeping with apprehend and testimony)

80 pawn down pledge

81 feel test, feel out

82 pretence intention, purpose

84 meet suitable

85 auricular assurance i.e. by hearing for yourself

86 have your satisfaction resolve yourself of any doubt

89 wind … him insinuate yourself into his confidence for me

89 frame devise, arrange

90 unstate … resolution give up my rank and wealth to be resolved on this matter

92 presently immediately

92 convey manage, undertake

93 withal therewith

94 late recent

95 wisdom of nature human reason/natural science

96 scourged punished

96 sequent effects subsequent events

101 bias of nature natural inclination (a bowling image: the bias refers to the curving path taken by a weighted ball)

104 it … nothing i.e. it will advantage you

108 excellent foppery supreme foolishness

109 surfeits excesses

110 disasters misfortunes

111 on i.e. by

112 treachers traitors

113 spherical predominance the dominant influence of a particular planet at one’s birth

115 divine celestial, supernatural

115 evasion shuffling excuse

116 whoremaster i.e. lecherous, whore-using

116 goatish lustful

117 charge responsibility

117 compounded had sex

118 the dragon’s tail the constellation Draco

118 Ursa Major (constellation of) the Great Bear (or Plough)

119 rough cruel, violent

120 maidenliest most virginal

121 firmament sky, heavens

121 bastardizing conception out of wedlock

122 Pat on cue

122 catastrophe conclusion

122 comedy play

122 my cue could also mean “designated role”

123 Tom o’Bedlam i.e. a madman (from the Saint Mary of Bethlehem hospital in London, an institution for the insane)

124 divisions conflicts, discords (plays on the sense of “musical variations”)

124 Fa … mi Edmund hums a musical scale to himself

127 this the

130 succeed follow

131 unhappily unluckily, by misfortune

136 countenance bearing, demeanor/facial expression

139 forbear avoid

140 qualified cooled, lessened

141 mischief … person harm caused by your presence

142 allay abate, calm

144 have … forbearance i.e. restrain yourself and stay away from him

146 fitly at an appropriate time

148 abroad out of the house

151 meaning intention

153 image and horror horrific true picture

154 anon soon

155 serve help/trick, deceive

159 practices plots

160 wit intelligence, ingenuity

161 meet fitting

161 fashion fit shape to my purposes

Act 1 Scene 3

1.3 Location: Goneril and the Duke of Albany’s residence

1 gentleman man of gentle (i.e. noble) birth attached to a royal household

1 chiding rebuking

5 flashes breaks out

10 come slack fall short

11 answer be answerable for

14 fellows fellow servants

14 question conflict, a dispute

15 distaste dislike

21 straight straight away

21 to i.e. and tell her to

Act 1 Scene 4

1 as will I perhaps “as I intend” (but most editors opt for the Quarto “well”- i.e. “as well as being disguised”)

2 defuse confuse, disorder

3 full issue complete outcome

4 razed my likeness erased my true appearance

8 stay wait

11 What … profess? What is your occupation? (Kent shifts the sense of profess to “claim, declare”)

11 wouldst thou do you want

12 us Lear continues to use the royal plural pronoun

16 judgement i.e. God’s judgment/the judgment of fellow men

16 cannot choose have no other option

16 to eat … fish i.e. only to eat a hearty diet of meat/not to eat fish on Fridays like a Roman Catholic/not to have sex with prostitutes

31 keep honest counsel keep secrets like an honorable man/keep secrets that are honorable

31 mar … tale spoil an elaborate story

37 anything “thing” plays on the sense of “vagina”

41 knave rogue/servant

44 So if it

45 clotpoll idiot

49 slave servant/villain

51 roundest bluntest

55 entertained received, treated hospitably

56 wont accustomed (to receive)

57 general dependants servants as a whole

63 rememb’rest remind

63 conception notion, thought

64 faint slight/lazy, half-hearted

65 jealous curiosity mistrustful fastidiousness

65 very pretence real intention

77 cur dog

79 bandy exchange looks as an equal (literally, “bat to and fro” as in tennis)

80 strucken struck, beaten

81 football played by the lower classes (unlike tennis)

84 differences class distinctions

85 measure … length be knocked flat to the floor

85 lubber clumsy lout

86 tarry stay

86 go to an expression of impatient dismissal

88 earnest part-payment in advance

90 coxcomb fool’s headgear with a crest like a cock’s comb

91 pretty fine-looking/clever

95 an … sits i.e. if you cannot please those in power

97 on’s of his

98 needs necessarily

99 nuncle contraction of “mine uncle”

99 Would I wish

102 living property, possessions

106 Brach bitch

107 pestilent gall troublesome irritation

110 Mark pay attention to

113 owest own

114 goest walk

115 trowest believe

116 Set … throwest don’t stake everything on the throw of the dice

119 have … score i.e. make a profit

120 score twenty

122 unfee’d unpaid

123 use employment/profit

134 crowns coins (the sense then shifts to “eggshells,” “royal headgear,” and “head”)

136 meat edible contents

136 clovest split

140 like myself i.e. foolishly

141 grace favor, patronage

142 foppish foolish

144 apish silly

146 used it made it my custom

147 rod punishment cane

151 bo-peep a child’s game (in which an adult alternately conceals and reveals his or her face)

152 the fool among among fools

154 fain gladly

155 An if

156 marvel wonder

160 pared trimmed

163 frontlet ornamental headband/band worn round forehead at night to smooth wrinkles

166 figure accompanying digit (to make it a number higher than zero)

168 forsooth in truth

171 nor … crumb i.e. no part of the loaf

172 want some need something/experience need

173 peascod peapod

174 all-licensed licensed to speak entirely freely

176 carp complain

177 rank excessive, uncontrolled

179 safe certain

180 too late all too recently

181 course behavior

181 put it on encourage it

183 scape escape

183 redresses sleep punishments be neglected

184 in … proceeding might offend and shame you but which, in the interests of maintaining a healthy state, must be deemed a prudent course of action

189 cuckoo young cuckoo, hatched from an egg its mother had laid in another bird’s nest

190 it’s had it it had its

190 it young the young cuckoo

191 darkling in darkness

194 fraught equipped (literally “freighted”)

195 dispositions moods

198 Jug a form of “Joan,” often used as a generic name for a prostitute

201 notion understanding

201 discernings Are lethargied power of discernment is asleep

202 Waking? Am I awake?

204 shadow reflection/ghost/shadow cast by the sun/imitator, actor

206 admiration air of wonder

206 o’th’savour of the flavor

209 should i.e. you should

211 bold presumptuous, audacious

213 epicurism gluttony/pleasure-seeking

215 graced honorable

215 speak call

216 desired requested, entreated

218 disquantity your train reduce your retinue

219 depend be your dependants, serve you

220 besort befit, suit

221 know … you i.e. know their place, and yours

224 Degenerate having lost the qualities proper to a family member

228 that to he who

234 kite bird of prey, scavenger

235 rarest parts splendid qualities

237 in … name uphold the honor of their names with the most careful consideration (or “… in every respect”)

240 engine piece of machinery

242 gall bitterness

246 moved provoked, angered

252 increase procreation

253 derogate degenerate, debased

254 teem be fertile, have children

255 spleen malice

256 thwart perverse, obstinate

256 disnatured unnatural

258 cadent falling

258 fret erode, wear

259 pains efforts (also suggests labor pains)

259 benefits kindnesses

266 dotage foolish old age

267 at a clap with one blow

272 perforce by force, uncontrollably

273 Blasts violent gusts of winds

274 Th’untented the festering (literally, not probed and cleaned surgically)

275 fond foolish/doting

277 waters … loose i.e. tears

278 temper moisten

278 clay i.e. earth, the ground

280 kind benevolent/possessed of natural familial love

280 comfortable comforting

282 visage face

286 partial biased

288 content content yourself, i.e. be quiet

295 halter hangman’s noose

298 politic prudent, shrewd

299 At point armed and ready

299 that so that

300 buzz rumor

300 fancy whim

301 enguard protect, defend

302 in at (his)

305 still always

306 taken defeated, captured

315 compact confirm, consolidate

318 under pardon if you’ll pardon my saying so

319 at task taken to task, blamed

324 th’event the outcome (will tell)

Act 1 Scene 5

1 before ahead

3 demand out of questions prompted by

8 kibes chilblains

10 wit intellect

10 slip-shod in slippers (worn for chilblains)

13 Shalt i.e. thou shalt

14 crab sour-tasting crab apple

18 on’s of his

20 side’s side of his

22 her i.e. Cordelia (though Goneril is just possible)

31 asses idiots/donkeys (i.e. Lear’s servants)

31 the seven stars the Pleiades

32 pretty ingenious

35 again back again (refers either to an intention to reclaim sovereignty, or to Goneril’s withdrawal of Lear’s privileges)

42 temper my right state of mind

46 maid virgin

47 things penises

Act 2 Scene 1

2.1 Location: the Earl of Gloucester’s residence

2.1 severally separately

1 Save thee God save thee (a common greeting)

7 abroad out there, in circulation

7 ones i.e. the news, regarded as plural

7 ear-kissing arguments rumored, whispered topics, not established truths

10 toward impending

15 perforce of necessity

16 take arrest

17 queasy question dangerous, uncertain nature

20 watches is on guard, on the lookout

21 intelligence information

24 i’th’haste in haste

25 have … Albany i.e. have you spoken in support of Cornwall and against Albany/have you spoken critically about Cornwall’s hostility to Albany

27 Advise yourself consider

30 In cunning to deceive (Gloucester; though playing on the fact that it is Edgar who is being tricked)

31 quit you acquit yourself

34 beget … endeavour give the impression that I fought more fiercely

35 fierce violent/brave/zealous

40 conjuring invoking

40 the moon i.e. Hecate, goddess of the moon and of witchcraft

41 stand auspicious mistress favor him as his patroness

50 bend direct

52 fine conclusion

53 loathly opposite deeply opposed, horrified

54 fell savage, ruthless

55 preparèd unsheathed

55 charges home makes a direct attack on

56 unprovided unprotected

56 latched caught

57 alarumed stirred, roused

58 quarrel’s right rightfulness of my cause

58 th’encounter the fight

59 ghasted frightened

60 Full very

63 found — dispatch once found, he shall be killed

64 arch and patron chief patron

67 stake i.e. place of execution

70 pight determined

70 curst angry

71 discover reveal his plans

72 unpossessing unable to take possession of land and property (illegitimate children could not legally inherit)

73 would stand against stood against, contradicted

73 reposal placing

75 faithed believed

77 character handwriting

78 suggestion incitement to evil

78 practice scheme

79 make … world think the world very stupid

80 not thought did not think

80 profits i.e. benefits to Edmund

81 pregnant … spirits fertile and powerful temptations (literally, evil spirits)

2.1 Tucket personal trumpet call, here signaling the arrival of Cornwall

83 strange unnatural

83 fastened confirmed, determined

85 where why

86 ports seaports/gates of walled towns

87 picture could also mean “description”

90 natural naturally loyal and loving to one’s family (plays on the sense of “illegitimate”)

90 work the means find a way

91 capable able to inherit

101 tended upon attended, waited on

103 consort company (often pejorative)

104 though … affected if he is ill-disposed

105 put him on incited him to

106 th’expense the spending

113 child-like i.e. obedient, loving

113 office duty/service

115 bewray inform on, expose

115 his practice Edgar’s plot

120 make … please to achieve your ends, use my means and authority in any way you wish

121 For as for

123 be ours i.e. work for us, join our household

125 seize on take possession of (legal term)

129 out of season inconveniently, unconventionally

129 threading finding a way through (sewing image)

129 dark-eyed quibbling on the idea of a needle’s eye

130 occasions events/circumstances

130 prize importance

133 differences disputes

134 from away from

135 attend dispatch wait to be dispatched

138 craves … use requires immediate action.

Act 2 Scene 2

2.2 Location: outside the Earl of Gloucester’s residence

2.2 severally separately

1 dawning it is actually before dawn; we later learn that the moon shines

2 Ay in fact, Kent is not a servant at this house; perhaps Kent opens up an opportunity to abuse Oswald

3 set put, lodge (Kent plays on the sense of “fix, make stuck”)

4 mire mud

5 if … me i.e. if you would be so kind (Kent pretends to take the expression literally)

8 Lipsbury pinfold the pound for stray animals in Lips-town (i.e. “between my teeth”)

10 use treat

12 for as

13 knave rogue (two lines later the sense shifts to “servant”)

13 broken meats scraps of food

14 three-suited servingmen were permitted to have three outfits a year

14 hundred-pound far more than a servingman’s income; possibly a contemptuous reference to those who bought knighthoods from James I for £100

15 worsted-stocking i.e. servant/unable to afford silk stockings (worsted is a woollen fabric)

15 lily-livered cowardly, with a bloodless liver (the organ thought to be the seat of strong emotions)

15 action-taking litigious

16 whoreson bastard

16 glass mirror

16 glass-gazing vain

16 super-serviceable ready to do any kind of service

16 finical fussy

17 one-trunk-inheriting owner (or heir to) no more than would fit in a single trunk

17 bawd pimp

18 service plays on the sense of “sex”

18 composition combination

19 pander go-between/pimp

21 addition attributes/title/mark of honor added to a coat of arms (ironic)

22 rail rant, heap abuse

24 varlet rogue

26 Draw draw your sword

27 sop o’th’moonshine i.e. beat you to a pulp (so that you resemble either a soggy piece of bread lying under the moon’s light, or the blancmange pudding called moonshine)

28 cullionly rascally

28 barber-monger frequenter of barbers (i.e. vain fop)

31 vanity the puppet i.e. Goneril, imagined as a puppet (or dressed-up woman) who is the personification of vanity

32 carbonado slash diagonally, like meat prepared for broiling or grilling

33 come your ways come on then

35 neat trim, foppish

39 With you i.e. I’ll fight with you

39 Goodman a man below the rank of gentleman

39 Goodman boy a contemptuous and belittling form of address (used to Edmund)

40 flesh ye initiate you (into fighting; from the practice of feeding dogs bits of freshly killed meat in order to excite them for prey)

45 difference argument

47 bestirred your valour worked up your courage (ironic)

48 disclaims in disowns

48 tailor made thee i.e. his only worth lies in his fancy clothes

51 ill badly

55 suit … beard his own request, because his old age required it

56 zed … letter “z” was regarded as unnecessary because “s” could be used instead and there was no “z” in the Latin alphabet

57 unbolted unsifted (plays on the sense of “unmanly/impotent”—a “bolt” was a term for the penis)

58 jakes privy, toilet

59 wagtail tail-wagger, obsequious person/womanizer

61 beastly brutish

62 a privilege license to express itself

65 honesty honor, integrity

66 holy cords sacred bonds (family or matrimonial ties)

66 a-twain in two

67 too intrinse t’unloose too intertwined to be disentangled

67 smooth flatter, indulge

68 rebel i.e. against reason

69 Being … fire i.e. feed the fire of their masters’ passions

70 halcyon beaks the kingfisher (halcyon) was thought to act as a weather vane if dried and hung up

71 gall irritation

71 vary change

73 epileptic visage seeing Oswald smiling away his insults, Kent compares his expression to that of an epileptic, grimacing involuntarily

74 my at my

74 as as if

75 Goose proverbially stupid bird; cackling suggests that Oswald may be laughing

75 if … Camelot i.e. if I had you at my mercy, I’d send you running home in fright; the exact nature of this reference is unclear, though, as Camelot was sometimes identified with Winchester, some suspect a jibe about a “Winchester goose” (i.e. a prostitute/venereal disease)

75 Sarum Salisbury, in Wiltshire

76 Camelot legendary city that was home to King Arthur

82 likes pleases

84 occupation habit, business

90 saucy insolent

90 constrains … nature forces the style (of speaking) away from its true purpose

93 An if

93 so so be it

93 plain honest (his excuse for his rudeness)

95 craft cunning

95 corrupter corrupt

96 ducking observants bowing attendants

97 stretch … nicely strain to perform their duties to the last detail

98 verity truth

99 th’allowance the approval

99 aspect face/planetary position (in comparing Cornwall to a powerful planet, Kent mocks a courtier’s flattery)

100 influence astrological influence

101 Phoebus the Greek and Roman sun god

101 front forehead

103 dialect usual manner of speaking

104 beguiled deceived

106 though … to’t even if I should incur your displeasure by refusing (to be a knave) when asked

110 misconstruction misinterpretation

111 compact colluding (with the king)

112 being and I being

113 deal of man great show of manliness

114 worthied him earned him honor/made him a hero

115 attempting … self-subdued attacking one who offered no resistance

116 fleshment excitement of a first success

116 dread exploit fearsome military enterprise (sarcastic)

118 None … fool there is not one of these rogues and cowards who cannot make a fool of a man like Ajax (the great Greek warrior was famously stupid; Cornwall is the subject of this dig)

120 stocks instrument of public punishment in which the offender sat with his ankles and sometimes wrists confined

121 reverent old and revered (sarcastic)

121 braggart boaster

126 bold malice impudent hostility

127 grace sovereignty

133 use treat

135 colour type

136 sister sister-in-law, i.e. Goneril

136 away here/there (Cornwall directs where the stocks are to be placed)

141 answer be responsible for

145 pleasure will

147 rubbed deflected (from bowling where the “rub” is the obstacle that disrupts the path of the ball)

148 watched gone without sleep

150 out at heels worn out (literally, coming through one’s stockings or shoes; an appropriate phrase for one whose feet are poking out of the stocks)

151 Give … morrow Good-bye

153 approve prove

153 saw saying

154 out … sun proverbial for going from good to bad; Kent means that Regan will prove worse than Goneril

156 beacon i.e. the sun

156 this under globe i.e. the earth

157 comfortable comforting, encouraging

158 Nothing … misery the miserable are almost the only people to see miracles

161 obscurèd course secret (and “disguised”) course of action/dimmed fortunes

162 From away from (i.e. in France)

162 enormous state disordered situation (or country)

163 o’erwatched worn out by lack of sleep

164 vantage advantage

166 Fortune … wheel! Fortune was traditionally depicted as a woman turning a wheel that raised humans up and cast them down

167 proclaimed publicly declared an outlaw

168 happy opportune, fortunate

171 attend my taking wait to catch me

172 am bethought have decided

174 in … man despising mankind (in particular, man’s claim to be superior to beasts)

176 elf tangle (into “elflocks” or messy knots of hair)

177 presented openly displayed

180 Bedlam the Saint Mary of Bethlehem hospital in London; a number of those who were released became beggars

181 mortifièd deadened

182 pricks spikes

183 object sight

183 low humble, lowly

184 pelting paltry, insignificant

185 bans curses

186 Turlygod unexplained; perhaps a deliberately nonsensical name

186 Poor … Tom! the sorts of cries the beggars would utter; several sixteenth-century accounts refer to beggars calling themselves “Poor Tom”

187 That’s something yet i.e. at least as Poor Tom I have some form of existence

187 Edgar … am as Edgar I do not exist/I renounce my identity as Edgar

2.2 Gentleman presumably one of Lear’s reduced retinue of knights

188 they i.e. Regan and Cornwall

196 cruel puns on “crewel” (i.e. wool used for stockings)

198 over-lusty at legs as a servant, too ready to run away (perhaps plays on the sense of “too eager for sex”)

199 nether-stocks stockings

200 place position (as Lear’s messenger)

201 To as to

203 son son-in-law

209 Juno wife of Jupiter, the supreme Roman god

212 upon respect upon consideration/against the respect due to a king and his representatives

213 Resolve make clear to, inform

213 modest moderate, reasonable

213 which way why, how

214 usage treatment

215 coming from us when you were sent by me

217 commend deliver

219 reeking steaming (with sweat)

219 post messenger

220 Stewed hot and drenched in sweat

222 spite of intermission in spite of interrupting me/in spite of his halting breath

223 presently immediately

224 meiny retinue

224 straight straight away

225 attend … answer wait until they had time to answer

230 Displayed … against openly behaved so impudently toward

231 man than wit courage than sense

231 drew drew my sword

235 Winter’s … way i.e. there is more stormy weather (trouble) on the way

237 blind i.e. to their father’s needs

238 bags moneybags

240 arrant downright/notorious

241 turns the key opens the door/provides sexual favors

242 dolours griefs (puns on “dollar,” a silver coin)

243 tell relate/count

244 mother i.e. hysteria (frequently a female affliction thought to arise from the womb or, in men, the abdomen; characterized by breathlessness and agitation)

245 Hysterica passio the Latin term for hysteria

246 element rightful environment

246 below i.e. in the womb

255 to school to i.e. to learn from

255 ant … i’th’winter i.e. the ant gathers food only in the summer when it is abundant; similarly, men work only when there is profit to be gained from a patron who is at the height of his fortunes

258 stinking i.e. with the stench of decaying fortunes

262 again back again

264 sir man

265 form appearances, outward show

266 pack pack up, be off

271 perdy by God (from the French par dieu)

274 Deny refuse

275 fetches tricks, stratagems (Lear goes on to employ the sense of “bring”)

276 flying off desertion

282 confusion destruction, overthrow

289 tends attends, awaits

293 Infirmity … bound illness always makes us neglect the duties which, when healthy, we are bound to carry out

295 oppressed overwhelmed/afflicted

297 fallen … will angry with my more headstrong impulse

299 sound healthy

299 my state royal state

301 remotion removal

302 practice deceit, cunning

302 Give … forth release my servant

303 and’s and his

309 cockney squeamish or affected woman/town-dweller not used to hardier country ways

310 i’th’paste alive alive into the pie (being too squeamish to kill them first)

310 knapped hit

310 o’th’coxcombs on the heads

311 wantons frisky creatures

312 buttered his hay another example of misguided kindness (horses dislike grease)

319 sepulch’ring entombing

319 adult’ress i.e. as you could not possibly be my daughter if you were not glad to see me

321 naught wicked/worthless

322 vulture recalls the Greek legend of Prometheus, who was punished for stealing fire from the gods by having his liver perpetually gnawed by vultures

326 You … duty you are more likely to undervalue her worth than she is to neglect her duty

336 verge … confine limit of her domain (i.e. you are near death)

338 discretion (person of) good judgment

338 state personal condition (imaged as a country; ironic glance at the sense of “kingship”)

343 becomes the house befits the royal line or family

345 unnecessary superfluous, useless

346 vouchsafe permit

346 raiment clothing

350 abated deprived

354 top head

355 taking infectious

359 fen-sucked … blister noxious vapors produced by sunshine on swampy ground were considered to be infectious and so to cause blistering

364 tender-hafted delicately framed, gently disposed

368 scant my sizes reduce my allowances (of food and drink etc.)

369 oppose the bolt lock the door

371 offices of nature natural filial duties

372 Effects outward marks

375 to th’purpose get to the point

378 approves confirms, bears out

380 easy-borrowed easily assumed

381 sickly diseased, corrupt

381 grace favor/royalty

385 on’t of it

386 sway authority, rule

387 Allow sanctions, approves

389 beard gray beard, symbol of his age

392 indiscretion poor judgment

394 sides bodily frame, rib cage

396 disorders misconduct

397 much less advancement less favorable treatment

404 entertainment hospitable reception

406 abjure renounce

407 wage … o’th’air battle against the hostility of the open air

409 Necessity’s need’s, deprivation’s

412 knee kneel before

412 squire-like like a servant or follower

412 pension financial allowance

413 afoot going

414 sumpter packhorse, beast of burden

415 groom manservant

423 embossèd carbuncle swollen tumor

424 corrupted blood diseased lineage

428 Mend improve

432 looked not for did not expect

434 mingle … passion apply rational judgment to your impulsive behavior

438 avouch declare, affirm

440 sith that since

440 charge and danger expense and the risk of riotous behavior

446 slack ye treat you negligently

447 control discipline

450 place or notice room or acknowledgment

452 in … it it was about time you did so

453 guardians, my depositaries trustees

454 kept a reservation reserved the right

458 well-favoured good-looking

460 stands … praise is, in relative terms, worthy of some praise

468 Our … superfluous even our most wretched beggars have something, however poor, that is more than they absolutely need

470 Allow not if you do not allow

472 If … gorgeous if being sumptuously dressed simply entailed wearing sufficiently warm clothes

473 what … wear’st your magnificent clothes

479 fool … much don’t make me such a fool as

488 flaws fragments

489 Or ere before

491 and’s and his

492 bestowed lodged, accommodated

493 blame fault (that he)

493 put … rest turned himself away from repose/deprived himself of peace of mind

495 his particular him individually

502 will will go

503 give him way let him go, give him scope

506 ruffle rage, bluster

509 themselves procure bring on themselves

511 desperate train retinue of dangerous men

513 have … abused be misled by what he is told

Act 3 Scene 1

3.1 Location: somewhere out in the open, not far from the Earl of Gloucester’s residence

3 severally separately

2 minded … unquietly in the same restless and disturbed mood as the storm

4 Contending battling against/competing with

6 main mainland

9 out-jest drive out with jokes

10 heart-struck injuries injuries that strike to the heart

12 warrant … note basis of what I have observed (about you)

13 Commend … you entrust you with an important matter

16 as … high i.e. like anyone to whom fortune has given power and royal authority

17 seem no less seem to be only servants (but are really spies)

18 France the King of France

18 speculations observers

19 Intelligent of bearing information about

20 snuffs resentments

20 packings plots

21 hard rein harsh curbing (equestrian metaphor; puns on “reign”)

21 borne maintained

23 furnishings superficial trappings

27 out-wall outward appearance

30 that fellow i.e. Kent

34 to effect in importance

35 in … this to which end you employ your efforts that way while I go this way

37 Holla shout to

Act 3 Scene 2

2 cataracts floods/waterspouts

2 hurricanoes waterspouts

3 cocks weathercocks

4 thought-executing fires i.e. lightning (as swift as thought/thought-destroying)

5 Vaunt-couriers forerunners

8 nature’s moulds the molds in which nature makes living creatures

8 germens seeds

10 court holy-water courtly flattery

16 tax … with accuse … of

18 subscription allegiance

21 ministers agents

22 pernicious destructive/wicked

23 high-engendered battles battalions created in the heavens

23 head plays on the sense of “army”

24 foul wicked/bad (weather)

25 put’s put his

26 head-piece helmet/brain

27 codpiece penis (literally, appendage worn on the front of a man’s breeches to cover and emphasize the genitals)

27 house find a house for itself, i.e. have sex

28 any i.e. any shelter

29 louse get lice (in pubic and head hair)

30 So … many in this way beggars end up with a string of mistresses (or “end up not only with a woman but a quantity of lice”)

31 makes … make values most what he should value least/considers his penis (sex) more important than his heart (love/moral integrity)

33 corn may suggest a syphilitic sore

35 made … glass practiced smiling or pouting in a mirror

40 grace … codpiece royalty and a fool (fools sometimes wore exaggerated codpieces and were proverbially well-endowed)

44 Gallow gally, i.e. frighten

44 wanderers … dark nocturnal animals

51 pudder pother, tumult

54 Unwhipped of unpunished by

55 simular faker, pretender

56 caitiff villain, wretch

57 seeming false appearances, deception

58 practised on plotted against

59 Rive split open

59 continents containers

59 cry … grace beg for mercy from these terrifying summoners (officers who summoned the accused to court)

65 hard near

65 hard house pitiless household (Gloucester’s house, under the authority of Cornwall and Regan)

67 demanding (when I was) asking urgently

69 scanted withheld

72 fellow servant (but with connotations of “companion”)

73 The … strange necessity has a strange skill

77 He … day adapted from Feste’s song at the end of Twelfth Night

77 and a a very

77 wit possibly plays on the sense of “penis”

79 make … fit make his happiness fit his fortunes/be content with the fortune that he deserves

82 brave fine

82 cool i.e. cool the lust of

82 courtesan courtier’s mistress, high-class prostitute

84 in … matter more concerned with words than substance (i.e. do not practice what they preach)

85 mar spoil (i.e. water down for their own profit)

86 are … tutors i.e. teach their tailors about fashion

87 heretics religious dissenters, conventionally punished with burning at the stake

87 wenches’ suitors i.e. who are afflicted with the burning effects of syphilis

88 right just

91 cutpurses thieves who cut the strings of moneybags hanging at their victims’ waists

91 throngs crowds

92 usurers moneylenders, notorious for charging excessively high interest

92 tell … i’th’field count their money openly

93 bawds pimps

94 Albion ancient name for Britain

95 confusion destruction, overthrow

96 who whoever

97 going … feet walking will be done on foot (perhaps simply meaning “things will return to normal”)

98 Merlin in the legendary history of Britain, the reign of Lear precedes that of Arthur by centuries

Act 3 Scene 3

3.3 Location: the Earl of Gloucester’s residence

2 leave … pity permission to help, take pity on

7 Go to expression of impatient dismissal

10 closet private room/cabinet

11 home thoroughly

11 power army

12 footed ashore

12 incline to support, side with

12 look look for

13 privily relieve secretly help

14 that so that

14 of by

17 toward imminent

18 courtesy forbid thee forbidden kindness (to Lear)

20 This … deserving i.e. my action should be worth a good reward

Act 3 Scene 4

3.4 Location: outside a hovel somewhere out in the open, not far from the Earl of Gloucester’s residence

3 nature human nature

10 greater malady i.e. mental suffering

13 i’th’mouth face to face

13 free free of worry, untroubled

14 delicate sensitive

17 as as if

18 home soundly

22 frank generous

32 bide endure

33 sides bodies (with visible ribs)

34 lopped and windowed full of holes

36 physic medicine (often a purgative)

36 pomp splendor, ostentatious display (i.e. rich and powerful people)

38 superflux superfluity, excess (flux was used for a discharge of excrement from the bowels, the result of a purgative)

40 Fathom about six feet

40 Fathom and half Edgar calls as though he is measuring the depth of the water in the hovel, as a sailor might in a leaking ship

41 spirit evil spirit, demon

45 grumble mutter, mumble

52 foul wicked

54 knives … pew the devil was believed to tempt men to damnation by leaving them the means of committing suicide (even in church)

55 ratsbane rat poison

56 porridge vegetable or meat soup

56 bay reddish-brown

57 four-inched four inches wide (the devil gives one the arrogance to try and perform extremely difficult feats)

57 for as

57 course hunt

58 five wits five mental faculties (common wit, imagination, fantasy, estimation, and memory)

58 do … de the sound of chattering teeth?

59 star-blasting being afflicted by the malign influence of the stars

59 taking being infected with disease/malign influence of the stars

60 vexes torments

60 there … there perhaps Edgar snatches at parts of his body as he tries to catch lice or the devil; or he may grab or point at the air around him

63 pass state, predicament

65 reserved a blanket kept a blanket (to cover himself)

67 pendulous overhanging

68 fated … faults destined to punish men’s faults

70 subdued nature reduced human nature

73 thus … flesh refers to Edgar’s self-mutilation

75 pelican young pelicans supposedly fed on their mother’s blood; they were proverbial for filial cruelty

76 Pillicock … Pillicock-hill possibly part of an old nursery rhyme, but Pillicock is slang for penis and Pillycock-hill the female genitals

76 alow … loo possibly from “halloo” (cry to incite dogs in a hunt), perhaps an imitation of a cock’s crow, or simply a nonsensical sound

78 obey Edgar begins a paraphrased version of five of the Ten Commandments

79 commit not i.e. do not commit adultery

80 on proud array in overly fine clothes

83 gloves i.e. a mistress’ gift, displayed by being worn in one’s cap

86 slept in i.e. dreamed of

87 dice i.e. gambling

88 out-paramoured the Turk had more lovers than the Turkish Sultan, famous for his harem

88 light of ear eager to listen to gossip

90 creaking … silks i.e. the sounds of a fashionable woman walking

92 plackets openings in skirts/vaginas

92 pen … books i.e. do not sign a loan agreement

94 suum, mun presumably Edgar imitates the sounds of the wind

94 nonny often used as part of a refrain in popular songs

95 Dolphin … by perhaps Edgar addresses an imaginary horse; sessa is a cry of encouragement used in hunting or may derive from the French cessez (“stop”)

96 answer face, encounter

99 cat no perfume the secretions of the anal glands of the civet cat are used to make perfume

100 on’s of us

100 sophisticated not simple or natural

101 unaccommodated unprovided for (i.e. not wearing clothes)

102 lendings clothes that are “lent” only, not part of him

104 naughty nasty, wicked

107 walking fire i.e. Gloucester and his torch

108 Flibbertigibbet the name of a devil (all of the devils Edgar mentions are to be found in Samuel Harsnett’s 1603 Declaration of Egregious Popish Impostures)

108 curfew i.e. nightfall

109 cock cockcrow

109 web … pin cataract of the eye

110 squints causes to squint

112 old wold, downs

112 swithold probably Saint Withold, apparently a protector from harm

112 footed thrice walked three times

113 nightmare evil female spirit supposed to settle upon a sleeper’s chest, inducing bad dreams and feelings of suffocation

113 nine-fold perhaps the imps who attend her

115 her troth plight give a solemn promise (to do no more harm)

116 aroint begone (used to witches and demons)

118 What’s who’s

122 wall-newt i.e. lizard on the wall

122 water i.e. water newt

124 ditch-dog i.e. dead dog in a ditch

125 mantle scum

125 standing stagnant

125 whipped the standard punishment for vagabonds

126 tithing parish

127 three … shirts the clothing allowance of a servant

129 deer animals

131 Smulkin the name of a devil (that, according to Harsnett, took the form of a mouse)

133 The … darkness the devil

133 Modo … Mahu the names of two devils

135 flesh and blood i.e. children (Gloucester is thinking of Edgar, Goneril, and Regan)

135 vile debased, corrupted

136 gets begets, conceives

147 Theban i.e. Greek philosopher (from Thebes)

149 prevent forestall, thwart

151 Importune urge

152 t’unsettle to be disturbed

158 blood lineage, family

163 cry you mercy excuse me

170 keep still remain

171 soothe indulge, humor

172 him you on him along with you

174 Athenian i.e. Greek philosopher (from Athens)

176 Child … came perhaps a line from a lost ballad about the legendary French hero Roland (Child was the title for a young man seeking knighthood)

177 word password/customary saying

177 still always

177 fie … man the cry of the giant in the children’s tale of Jack the giant-killer

Act 3 Scene 5

3.5 Location: the Earl of Gloucester’s residence

1 his i.e. Gloucester’s

2 nature natural familial affection

3 something fears somewhat frightens

5 his i.e. Gloucester’s

5 provoking … himself Edgar’s sense of his own worth, provoked into action by Gloucester’s reprehensible badness/a provoking quality in Gloucester, which incited Edgar’s reprehensible wickedness

8 to be of being

9 approves proves

9 an intelligent party a spy, an informer

17 apprehension arrest

19 his suspicion suspicion of Gloucester

Act 3 Scene 6

3.6 Location: unspecified; presumably an outbuilding on the Earl of Gloucester’s estate

2 piece out supplement

5 impatience anger/inability to bear suffering

6 Frateretto the name of a devil; in Harsnett he is associated with a “fiddler,” which perhaps suggests Nero, the first-century Roman emperor who famously played the fiddle while Rome burned

6 angler fisherman/thief

7 lake of darkness presumably the Stygian lake of the classical underworld, but a phallic fishing rod and vaginal dark lake may also be implied; perhaps Nero’s murder of his own mother is glanced at—she reportedly asked to be stabbed in the womb as this was where her son had grown

10 yeoman land owner below the rank of gentleman

12 to as

13 mad sense now shifts to “angry”

15 a thousand i.e. a thousand devils

16 hizzing hissing

16 ’em them i.e. Goneril and Regan; the Quarto text continues at this point with an imaginary “arraignment” of Goneril (see “Quarto Passages That Do Not Appear in the Folio,” p. 132)

21 mar my counterfeiting spoil my pretense

23 Trey … Sweetheart names for bitches—even his female dogs, he imagines, have turned against him; their names may suggest Lear’s daughters (“tray” can mean “pain, affliction,” “blanch” can mean “to deceive,” “to flatter”)

24 throw his head unclear; presumably a threatening gesture of some sort

24 Avaunt begone

25 or black or either black or

26 poisons i.e. with rabies

27 grim fierce

28 brach bitch

28 him male

29 bobtail tyke small dog with a tail that has been bobbed (cut short)

29 trundle-tail dog with a long, curling tail

32 hatch lower half of a divided door

33 Do … de apparently the sound of chattering teeth again

33 Sessa! cry of encouragement used in hunting or may derive from the French cessez (“stop”)

33 wakes annual parish fairs (frequented by beggars)

34 horn beggars carried drinking horns on strings round their necks

35 anatomize dissect

37 entertain employ

39 Persian i.e. gorgeous, luxurious

41 curtains Lear imagines that he is in a curtained bed

48 litter vehicle containing a bed, here apparently drawn by horses

49 Dover port on the south coast

54 to … conduct i.e. hastily guide you to the necessary supplies for your journey

Act 3 Scene 7

3.7 Location: the Earl of Gloucester’s residence

1 Post travel swiftly

7 sister sister-in-law, i.e. Goneril

8 Advise counsel, urge

9 duke i.e. the Duke of Albany

9 festinate preparation hasty preparation of troops

10 posts messengers

11 intelligent possessed of information

12 lord of Gloucester Edmund’s new title (though when Oswald uses it, he refers to Edmund’s father)

17 questrists seekers

18 the lord’s i.e. Gloucester’s

25 Pinion him bind his arms

26 pass … justice issue a death sentence without a formal trial

28 do a court’sy bow, yield

31 corky withered, dry

3.7 plucks his beard a highly insulting gesture

41 white i.e. old, dignified

42 Naughty wicked

43 ravish seize forcibly, pluck

44 quicken come to life

45 hospitable favours welcoming (facial) features

46 ruffle treat roughly/snatch

48 Be simple answered answer straightforwardly

50 Late footed recently landed

52 guessingly without certain knowledge

54 opposed i.e. to the dukes

59 charged at peril commanded on peril of your life

61 tied to th’stake like a bear in the popular sport of bear-baiting

61 stand endure

61 course designated bout, during which the bear was attacked by dogs

65 anointed i.e. holy (having been anointed with holy oil at the coronation)

67 buoyed swelled, risen

68 stellèd starry

69 holp helped

69 holp … rain i.e. by weeping

70 stern cruel, unyielding

71 turn the key i.e. to let them in

72 All … subscribe i.e. in such circumstances, all other cruel people would sanction a kind action

73 wingèd vengeance i.e. vengeance of the gods

74 Fellows servants

86 shake … quarrel i.e. defy you (or “challenge you to a fight”) over this cause

86 What … mean? What do you think you are doing?

87 villain servant

88 chance of anger risk of what anger may bring (in a fight)

91 mischief on him injury done to him

95 sparks of nature warmth of natural filial affection

96 quit requite, avenge

97 Out expression of impatience and disgust

99 overture disclosure

101 abused wronged, maligned

105 How look you? How are you?

108 apace rapidly

109 Untimely at the wrong time (with war imminent)

3.7 Exeunt here the Quarto text has an additional sequence in which loyal servants apply a palliative to Gloucester’s eye sockets (see “Quarto Passages That Do Not Appear in the Folio,” p. 134)

Act 4 Scene 1

4.1 Location: somewhere out in the open, not far from the Earl of Gloucester’s residence

1 thus i.e. a beggar

1 contemned despised

2 contemned and flattered despised secretly though flattered to your face

4 esperance hope

5 The … laughter the most miserable kind of change is a decline in fortunes; when things are at their worst they can only get better

10 poorly led led by a poor man/led in a way unsuitable to his status

12 But were it not

12 mutations changes/fickleness

13 Life … age we would not accept old age

15 fourscore eighty

18 Thee … hurt i.e. you may be punished for helping me

22 means secure us wealth gives us false security, overconfidence

22 mere defects sheer deficiencies

23 Prove our commodities turn out to be benefits

24 abusèd deceived

31 is not has not yet arrived

36 reason rationality, sanity

41 wanton unruly/cruelly mischievous

44 trade course of action/practice

50 ancient love old affection

54 plague affliction

56 the rest all

57 ’pparel apparel, clothing

58 Come … will whatever may come of it

60 daub it put on a false face, pretend

68 strokes blows, afflictions

69 happier more fortunate

70 superfluous immoderate, extravagant, overindulgent

70 lust-dieted fed solely by pleasure

71 slaves your ordinance subjects your laws to his desires

72 feel empathize, feel compassion (sense then shifts to “experience”)

72 quickly soon/while he is alive/sharply

76 bending overhanging

77 confinèd channeled (between England and France)

78 brim edge

80 about me that I have on my person

Act 4 Scene 2

4.2 Location: outside Goneril and the Duke of Albany’s residence

1 my lord i.e. Edmund

4 army i.e. French army

8 ‘sot’ fool

9 turned … out turned inside out, got things the wrong way round (clothing metaphor)

13 cowish cowardly

14 undertake take action

15 tie … answer oblige him to respond

15 on the way i.e. that we expressed during the journey here

16 prove effects be fulfilled

16 brother brother-in-law, i.e. Cornwall

17 musters gathering of troops

17 conduct his powers escort his forces

18 change exchange

18 distaff spindle for weaving, common symbol of womanhood or wifeliness

20 like likely

4.2 favor love token

22 mistress ruler/lover

24 thy Goneril starts to use the more intimate pronoun to Edmund

24 spirits plays on sense of “penis”

25 conceive understand/imagine (with procreative connotations)

26 death plays on sense of “orgasm”

29 services sexual services

30 fool i.e. Albany

30 usurps wrongfully possesses

32 worth the whistle worth looking for (from the proverb “it is a poor dog that is not worth the whistling”)

33 Goneril … face the Quarto text has a longer dialogue in which Albany berates Goneril (see “Quarto Passages That Do Not Appear in the Folio,” p. 135)

34 rude rough

36 Milk-livered pale-livered, cowardly (cowardice was associated with lack of blood in the liver and milk with women)

38 discerning … suffering that can distinguish between what may be honorably tolerated from what must not be endured

41 Proper … woman deformity does not seem as abhorrent in a devil (to whom it is appropriate) as it does in a woman

43 vain stupid/worthless

48 bred brought up in his household

48 thrilled pierced, moved

48 remorse pity (for Gloucester)

49 Opposed opposed himself

49 bending aiming, directing

50 threat-enraged enraged by the threat

53 after i.e. to death

55 justices (divine) judges

55 nether earthly

56 venge avenge, punish

63 all … life demolish the dream (of having Edmund) that I have constructed, leaving me with the life I hate

65 tart sour

69 back going back

4.3 Location: the French camp, near Dover. The Quarto text precedes this scene with another one in which Kent and a Gentleman discuss the French king’s return to France and Cordelia’s concern for her father (see “Quarto Passages That Do Not Appear in the Folio,” pp. 137–39)

Act 4 Scene 3

4.3 Colours military banners

2 vexed angry, turbulent

3 rank fumiter abundant fumitory (a vigorously growing weed)

3 furrow weeds weeds that grow in the furrows of plowed fields

4 burdocks weeds with prickly flower heads or burs

4 hemlock plant producing a potentially lethal sedative

4 cuckoo-flowers name given to various wildflowers growing when the cuckoo calls (i.e. May/June)

5 Darnel type of grass that grows as a weed among corn

5 idle useless

8 What … wisdom what can human knowledge do

9 bereavèd stolen, lost

10 outward worth worldly goods

12 repose rest, sleep

13 that … operative there are many effective medicinal herbs that can induce that in him

17 unpublished virtues secret powers (of herbs)

18 aidant helpful

18 remediate remedial, healing

20 rage frenzy

21 wants the means i.e. lacks the sanity

24 preparation equipped military force

27 France i.e. the King of France

28 importuned importunate, pressing

29 blown swollen with pride/corrupt

Act 4 Scene 4

4.4 Location: the Earl of Gloucester’s residence

4 ado fuss

8 import mean, contain

10 posted hurried

11 ignorance folly

15 nighted darkened (literally, and in terms of his fortunes)

15 descry discover

17 after go after

19 ways roads

21 charged my duty swore me to obedience

23 Belike perhaps/probably

24 I’ll love thee Regan switches to the familiar thee to cajole him—love implies the promise of favors, sexual or otherwise

29 oeillades amorous glances

29 speaking eloquent

30 of her bosom in her confidence/sexually intimate

32 Y’are ye (you) are

33 take this note note this well

35 convenient fitting

36 gather more infer the rest

39 call … her have more sense

43 meet i.e. meet him

Act 4 Scene 5

4.5 Location: somewhere out in the open, near Dover

1 that same hill the hill I mentioned (i.e. the cliff Gloucester described at the end of Act 4 Scene 1)

11 phrase and matter style and sense

17 choughs jackdaws or other birds of the crow family

17 wing fly across

17 midway i.e. middle regions of

18 gross large

19 samphire aromatic plant used in pickling; it was picked from cliffs by men suspended on ropes

22 yond yonder, that

22 bark small ship

23 her cock (the size of) her cock boat, a small boat towed behind a ship

25 th’unnumbered idle pebble countless insignificant pebbles

27 the deficient my defective

28 Topple topple me

32 leap upright jump up in the air

34 Here, friend’s here, friend, is

36 Prosper it cause it to prosper

40 trifle play

46 opposeless irresistible

47 My … nature the smoldering wick and hated remains of my life

51 conceit imagination

53 Yields submits willingly

54 this this time, now

56 pass die

57 What who (Edgar adopts another persona)

59 aught anything

60 precipitating falling headlong

61 shivered shattered

63 at each end to end

67 bourn boundary (between land and sea)

68 a-height on high

68 shrill-gorged shrill-throated

73 beguile cheat

84 whelked twisted

85 fiend i.e. tempting him to the sin of suicide

85 happy father fortunate old man (father was a form of address for an elderly man, though Edgar plays with the literal sense)

86 clearest brightest, purest

86 make … impossibilities acquire honor for themselves by performing things that are impossible in the human world

93 free untroubled

94 The … thus were he (Lear) in his right mind, he would never permit himself to dress like this (or possibly “Gloucester’s senses will not be able to withstand seeing his master like this”)

96 touch accuse, blame/lay hands on

100 press-money money paid to military recruits when they were conscripted (Lear seems to imagine he is recruiting an army)

100 crow-keeper scarecrow/person employed to scare crows from the crops

101 Draw … yard draw your bow to its fullest extent (the length of a longbow’s arrow, which, at about thirty-six inches, was the same as the length of a cloth-seller’s measuring rod)

102 gauntlet armored glove thrown down as a challenge to a duel

103 prove it on make good my cause against

103 brown bills long-handled weapons, painted or varnished brown and topped with axe-like blades; or soldiers carrying such weapons

103 well flown, bird the language of falconry, here used to describe an arrow’s flight

104 I’th’clout cloth at the center of an archer’s target

104 hewgh perhaps Lear imitates the sound of the arrow as it flies through the air or hits the target

104 word password (continues Lear’s military fantasy)

105 Sweet marjoram Edgar invents a password that relates to Lear’s headgear and to the plant’s alleged medicinal properties in treating brain disorders

109 like a dog i.e. as if they were fawning dogs

109 had … there i.e. was wise even while I was still a child

111 divinity theology

112 me i.e. my teeth

113 peace be still

116 ague-proof immune to fever and shivering

117 trick characteristic, individual quality

121 cause charge, offense

124 goes to’t does it, has sex

125 lecher fornicate

127 got begot, conceived

128 luxury lechery, lust

128 for … soldiers i.e. more sex means more children to man his army

130 between … snow forecasts frigidity between her legs

131 minces virtue affects chastity

131 shake the head i.e. in disapproval

133 fitchew polecat/prostitute

133 soilèd fed with green fodder, so lively, skittish

134 riotous unrestrained, lustful

135 centaurs mythical creatures that were human above the waist and horse below; reputed to be lustful

136 But … girdle only as far as the waist

136 inherit possess, have power over

138 hell slang term for the vagina

138 sulphurous suggests both hell and syphilis

139 burning … consumption alludes to painful syphilitic burning, odor and decay (consumption)

140 civet perfume

140 apothecary person who prepared and sold drugs, spices, perfumes etc.

143 mortality being human/death

145 so similarly

147 squinny squint

147 Cupid Roman god of love, traditionally depicted as blind or blindfolded

148 challenge written challenge to a duel

148 penning style/handwriting

150 take … report believe it if I heard it reported

153 case sockets

155 heavy case sorrowful predicament

157 feelingly literally, through touch/with great emotion

159 justice judge

160 simple humble

161 handy-dandy take your pick (from the child’s game of guessing which clenched hand contains something)

165 a … office given authority, even a dog will be obeyed

167 beadle parish officer, responsible for punishing thieves, prostitutes, and vagabonds

169 use employ sexually

169 kind manner

170 usurer moneylender, notorious for charging excessively high interest

170 cozener cheat

172 Place … gold i.e. when sins are committed by the rich

173 hurtless harmlessly

174 it i.e. sin

175 able ’em authorize them

178 scurvy politician despicable schemer

179 Now … now perhaps comforting Gloucester, perhaps distracted by his boots

181 matter and impertinency sense and nonsense

184 hither i.e. into this world

189 block style of hat or mold for hats (perhaps Lear removes his headgear)/block from which to mount a horse/tree stump (stage may even give rise to a sense of “scaffold and executioner’s block”)

190 delicate ingenious

191 put’t in proof try it out

4.3 Gentleman perhaps the same man that Kent gave instructions to in Act 3 Scene 1

197 natural fool born fool (as opposed to a professional jester)

201 seconds supporters (as for a duel)

202 salt i.e. tears

204 die plays on the sense of “orgasm”

204 bravely handsomely

205 jovial cheerful/majestic (like Jove, king of the gods)

206 Masters sirs

209 Sa … sa hunting cry, from French ça (“that’s it,” “it’s there”)

212 nature i.e. human nature

212 general curse curse of original sin

213 twain Adam and Eve (but also suggests Goneril and Regan)

214 gentle noble

215 speed you (may God) prosper you

216 toward impending

217 vulgar widely known

219 by your favour if you would be so good

221 main … thought sight of the main army is expected hourly

224 Though that though

224 on special cause for a special reason (i.e. to find Lear)

229 worser spirit evil angel/bad side of my nature

234 known … sorrows deeply felt sorrows I have experienced

235 pregnant … pity disposed to compassion

236 biding dwelling

238 benison blessing

239 To … boot in addition, and may it benefit you

240 proclaimed prize i.e. a man with a price on his head

240 happy fortunate

241 framed flesh conceived and born

243 thyself remember recall your sins (i.e. prepare to die)

248 published proclaimed

251 ’Chill I shall

251 ’chill … ’casion I shall not let go, sir, without further occasion (cause); for his new persona, Edgar adopts a West Country accent in which he substitutes “v” for “f” and “z” for “s”

253 your gait on your way

254 An … vortnight if I could have been killed by boasting, I would not have lasted a fortnight (or “it would have been shorter by a fortnight”)

256 che vor ye I warrant you, I promise you

256 i’se I shall

257 costard head (literally, a large apple)

257 ballow cudgel

259 pick knock out with the cudgel

259 foins sword thrusts

264 party side

265 serviceable eager to serve, ready to do anything

272 deathsman executioner

273 Leave give me leave, permit me

277 will desire/lust

277 want not is not lacking

278 done achieved

281 for your labour as a reward for your efforts/as a place for sexual activity

282 servant lover

283 undistinguished space limitless scope

283 will lust

286 Thee … up I will bury you (Oswald)

286 post unsanctified unholy messenger

287 in … time when the time is ripe

288 ungracious wicked, sinful

288 strike blast/afflict

289 death-practised whose death is plotted

291 stiff stubborn

292 ingenious sensitive, intelligent

293 distract mad

295 wrong imaginations illusions

Act 4 Scene 6

4.6 Location: the French camp, near Dover

3 every … me all my efforts will be inadequate

4 o’erpaidi.e. already more than enough

5 All … truth everything I have told you is the simple truth (or possibly “may all reports of me be unexaggerated and accurate”)

6 Nor … clipped neither overstated nor abbreviated

7 suited dressed

8 weeds clothes

11 Yet … intent to have my identity known now would spoil the plan I have devised

12 My … it the favor I ask is

12 know me not do not acknowledge me

13 meet suitable

18 wind up put in tune (by tightening the pegs on a stringed instrument)

19 child-changèd changed by his children

23 I’th’sway … will as you see fit, under your own authority

23 arrayed dressed (appropriately)

27 doubt of fear for

27 temperance self-control

31 reverence i.e. position deserving respect, venerable state

33 Had you even if you had

33 flakes locks of hair

34 Did challenge would have demanded

34 of from

38 fain obliged

39 rogues forlorn destitute vagabonds

40 short i.e. broken up (and hence less comfortable)

41 at once at the same time

42 concluded all come entirely to an end

46 bliss i.e. heaven

47 wheel of fire i.e. one of hell’s tortures of the damned; recalls Ixion, who, in Greek mythology, was bound to a wheel of fire for attempting to seduce the queen of the gods

47 that so that

51 wide wide of the mark, confused

54 abused wronged, ill-treated/deluded

57 Would … condition! I wish I could be sure of what state I am in!

63 fond silly

84 rage frenzy

86 further settling his mind is more settled

Act 5 Scene 1

5.1 Location: the British camp, near Dover

5.1 Drum and Colours soldiers with military flags and a drum beating

1 Know of find out from

1 last purpose most recent intention

2 since subsequently

2 advised persuaded/warned

2 aught anything, i.e. any news

4 self-reproving self-reproach

4 constant pleasure fixed wishes

5 miscarried come to harm

6 doubted feared

11 honoured honorable

13 forfended place forbidden place, i.e. Goneril’s vagina

15 I … her I cannot stand her

16 familiar too friendly/sexually intimate

20 rigour … state harshness of our government

21 cry out i.e. protest in pain

22 Why … reasoned? Why are we discussing this?

23 Combine together i.e. let us combine our two armies

24 domestic … broils private internal squabbles

27 th’ancient of war experienced senior officers

30 convenient suitable, seemly

31 know the riddle understand your enigmatic request, see your trick (Regan wants to keep a suspicious eye on Goneril)

34 I’ll overtake you presumably Albany calls after those who have or are in the process of departing

35 ope open

35 letter i.e. the letter Oswald was carrying from Goneril to Edmund

36 sound i.e. sound a summons

38 champion one who fights in single combat

39 avouchèd declared, affirmed

39 miscarry lose the battle and die

41 machination plotting

44 cry make the proclamation

46 o’erlook read over

47 powers troops

49 discovery intelligence-gathering, reconnaissance

51 greet the time be ready when the time comes

53 jealous suspicious, mistrustful

58 hardly with difficulty

58 carry … side fulfill my side of the agreement (with Goneril)/achieve my own (power-seeking) ends

60 countenance authority

62 taking off murder

65 shall i.e. they shall

65 my … debate my position relies on action not discussion

Act 5 Scene 2

5.2 Location: not far from the battlefield, near Dover

5.2 Alarum trumpet call to arms

1 father form of address for an old man

2 host i.e. shelter

5.2 retreat trumpet call signaling retreat

7 ta’en (are) captured

12 Ripeness readiness/the right time

Act 5 Scene 3

5.3 Location: the British camp, near Dover

1 good guard guard them carefully

2 greater pleasures the wishes of more important people (i.e. Goneril, Regan, Albany)

3 censure judge, sentence

5 meaning intentions

6 cast down humbled by fortune/defeated in battle/dejected

14 gilded butterflies actual butterflies/lavishly dressed courtiers

14 poor rogues wretched fellows

17 take … things understand the secret inner workings of the world

18 God’s spies spying on the world on God’s behalf/looking at the world from a lofty vantage point, like God

18 wear out outlive

19 packs and sects cliques and factions

20 That … th’moon i.e. whose fortunes ebb and flow like the tides

22 sacrifices refers to either Cordelia’s sacrifice for Lear or their joint loss of freedom

23 throw incense i.e. like priests performing the sacrifice

24 brand … foxes alludes to the practice of smoking foxes out of their holes

26 flesh and fell flesh and skin (i.e. entirely)

27 starved dead

33 tender-minded sensitive, soft-hearted

34 become befit, suit

35 bear question permit discussion

38 write happy count yourself fortunate

39 carry manage

41 strain lineage

43 opposites opponents

44 use treat

48 retention detention, confinement

49 Whose refers to the king

49 charms bewitching spells

49 title name of king/legal entitlement (to land and power)

50 pluck … bosom draw the sympathies of the common people

51 turn … them i.e. turn our conscripted soldiers’ weapons against ourselves

52 queen i.e. Cordelia

55 session hearing in a court of justice

56 by your patience if you’ll excuse me

57 subject of subordinate in

59 list please

60 pleasure … demanded wishes might have been asked

62 commission authority

63 immediacy closeness, connection

66 grace merit

67 your addition the honors or titles you bestow on him

69 compeers equals

70 That … most i.e. he would be most fully invested with your rights

72 Holla whoa, stop

73 asquint crookedly, distortedly

75 full-flowing stomach a stomach full of anger (where stomach is used like “heart” for the seat of the passions)

76 patrimony inheritance

77 Dispose of use, deal with

77 walls Regan images herself as a fortress surrendering

78 Witness the world let the world witness

80 enjoy i.e. have sex with him as your husband

81 let-alone permission or refusal to give it

83 Half-blooded illegitimate (fellow is contemptuous)

86 in i.e. along with

87 gilded serpent i.e. Goneril

87 For as for

88 bar it prevent its advancement (legal term)

89 subcontracted engaged for a second time, entered into a contract that is subsidiary to her marriage contract with Albany

90 banns proclamation of marriage (spelled “banes” in Folio, perhaps playing on “evil-doings”)

91 make … to woo, make advances to

92 bespoke spoken for

93 interlude brief comic play (i.e. “What a farce!”)

97 pledge challenge/pledge to fight

97 make it i.e. make it good

98 nothing no way

101 medicine drugs (i.e. poison)

102 what whoever

108 single virtue unaided courage or strength

115 quality or degree noble birth or high rank

116 lists catalog of soldiers

127 canker-bit eaten away by canker-worms (grubs that feed on plants)

129 cope encounter, fight with

137 honours … profession i.e. as a knight

138 protest declare

139 Maugre despite

139 place position, rank

140 fire-new i.e. brand new, freshly minted

143 Conspirant a conspirator

144 upward top, crown

145 descent lowest part, sole

146 toad-spotted toads’ spots were believed to contain venom

147 bent resolved/tensed for action

152 say assay, evidence

153 nicely in strict keeping with the rules

156 hell-hated lie the lie I hate as much as hell

157 for they since they (the treasons)

157 by off

158 instant way an immediate passage (to your heart)

160 him probably a call to Edgar to spare Edmund’s life so that a confession can be obtained from him

161 practice trickery

164 cozened and beguiled cheated and deceived

165 dame woman

168 know recognize

170 arraign indict, bring to trial

173 govern restrain

177 fortune on good fortune to defeat

179 charity forgiveness

181 th’hast thou hast (i.e. you have)

183 pleasant pleasurable (sexually so in this case)

185 dark literally and metaphorically

185 vicious immoral

185 got begot, conceived

188 wheel wheel of fortune

189 prophesy suggest, foretell

196 List listen (to)

198 bloody proclamation i.e. the sentence of death pronounced on him

200 the … die would repeatedly suffer pain as bad as death

202 semblance outward appearance

203 habit clothing/guise, appearance

204 rings i.e. eye sockets

206 despair the spiritual hopelessness that precedes suicide

209 success outcome (in the duel with Edmund)

211 pilgrimage course of events/period of exile/spiritual journey

211 flawed cracked

219 dissolve i.e. in tears

225 smokes i.e. steams with hot blood

236 compliment etiquette (of greeting)

239 aye forever (Kent is aware he is dying)

241 Great thing vital matter

243 object sight

248 Even exactly

251 writ written order (for execution; a legal term)

255 office task, responsibility

263 fordid killed

270 stone specular stone, a crystalline substance used to make mirrors

272 promised end the death Lear expected (when he divided the kingdom)/Judgment Day, the end of the world (the sense that Edgar understands)

274 Fall and cease! either Albany calls for the end of the world, or he wishes for Lear to die and be put out of his anguish

286 slave villain/wretched servant

289 falchion curved sword

291 crosses troubles, frustrations

292 Mine … o’th’best failing sight was believed to be a sign of approaching death

292 straight in a moment

293 two … hated perhaps “two people she first loved and then hated”; it is not entirely clear who the one Kent refers to is

295 dull sight refers either to Lear’s dim eyesight or to the motionless Cordelia

297 caius the only mention of the name Kent assumed when he was in disguise

301 I’ll … straight I’ll attend to that in a moment

302 your … decay the beginning of the change and decline in your fortunes (may also suggest mental decay)

305 Nor … else completes Kent’s previous, unfinished sentence with “and no one else” as well as beginning his current one with “neither I nor anyone else (is welcome)”

306 fordone killed

307 desperately as a result of the spiritual despair that precedes suicide

309 vain … him it is useless for us to tell him who we are

311 bootless pointless

315 this great decay noble ruin, i.e. Lear

316 For as for

316 resign hand over

319 boot advantage, additions

319 addition titles, honors

322 cup painful experience (plays on the related sense of “drinking vessel”)

322 see, see something attracts Albany’s attention, presumably to Lear

323 fool i.e. Cordelia (fool was a term of endearment), but recalls Lear’s Fool as well

327 this button may refer to Cordelia’s (hoping to help her breathe) or Lear’s own (if he is once again afflicted by “the mother,” the hysteria that causes one to struggle for breath)

327 sir it is unclear whom Lear addresses here

333 ghost spirit

334 rack torture instrument that stretched the limbs

335 longer for a longer period of time/to longer physical dimensions

338 usurped stole, made illegal use of (beyond its rightful length)

342 gored wounded, bleeding

342 sustain support/keep alive

343 journey i.e. to death

Quarto Passages That Do Not Appear in the Folio

1 Nor … sure and I am sure he is not

4 unnaturalness lack of natural family feeling

5 dearth famine

5 ancient amities long-standing friendships

5 divisions breaches, disagreements

6 maledictions curses

7 diffidences doubts, mistrust

7 dissipation of cohorts dispersal of troops

8 nuptial breaches breaking of marriage vows

9 sectary astronomical devotee of astrology (in the period, astronomy and astrology were often indistinguishable from one another)

11 Not i.e. we are not

11 Idle foolish/useless

14 used handled, dealt with

15 checks as flatteries rebukes instead of flattery

15 seen abused seen to be misguided

17 stand i.e. stand in

18 presently immediately

19 motley the traditional multicolored costume of the fool

23 altogether fool entirely foolish (the Fool replies to the sense of “the only fool”)

25 on’t of it

27 snatching may imply snatching at the Fool’s genitals or phallic baton (picking up on and shifting the sense of part; fools were proverbially well-endowed)

28 marks outward signs

29 false falsely

33 check rebuke

33 low correction base punishment

34 ’temnest most despised (contemnest)

35 pilf’rings petty thefts

35 trespasses crimes

38 eyeless blind

39 Catch seize

42 cubdrawn drained of milk by her cubs, ravenous

42 couch take cover, lie in its lair

43 belly-pinchèd starving

44 unbonneted bare-headed

45 bids … all invites anyone who wishes to do so to take everything

46 power army

47 scattered divided

48 Wise in aware of/taking advantage of

48 feet footholds

49 at … show on the point of displaying

52 on … far i.e. if you trust me so far as

52 credit trustworthiness

54 making just report for making an accurate report

55 bemadding madness-provoking

56 ’plain complain, lament

57 blood noble family

58 assurance certainty

59 office task

63 arraign indict, put on trial

63 straight straight away

64 justice judge

65 sapient wise

67 Want’st thou do you lack

67 eyes may signify “spectators”

69 Come … me a snatch of popular song

69 bourn stream

70 Her … leak i.e. she is menstruating (or possibly “she has gonorrhea”)

71 speak say

72 come over i.e. for sex

73 foul possible pun on “fool”

74 Hopdance a devil associated with music (like all of the fiends Edgar mentions, taken from Samuel Harsnett’s 1603 Declaration of Egregious Popish Impostures)

76 black angel i.e. the fiend in Tom’s belly, which is causing it to rumble

77 do are

77 amazed stunned, overwhelmed

78 cushings cushions

81 yoke-fellow of equity partner in fairness

82 Bench sit on the bench

82 o’th’commission of the panel of judges

87 for … mouth i.e. if the shepherd summons his sheep back by playing his pipe

87 minikin dainty/shrill

89 Purr Harsnett mentions a devil called Purr, though devils were popularly thought to assume the shape of cats

95 Cry you mercy I beg your pardon

95 joint-stool a well-made stool

96 another i.e. Regan

96 warped looks contorted facial expression/warped wood

97 store material/tradesman’s stock

97 on of

99 False justicer corrupt judge

99 scape escape

100 Oppressed overwhelmed/afflicted

101 balmed … sinews soothed your shattered nerves

102 convenience opportunity

103 Stand … cure will be hard to heal

105 bearing our woes enduring the same suffering as us

107 Who … i’th’mind mental anguish is worst for those who suffer alone

108 free carefree

108 happy shows displays of happiness/visions of good fortune

109 sufferance suffering

109 o’erskip pass over, not notice

110 bearing endurance (of affliction)

111 portable bearable

112 bow i.e. bow down under a truly heavy weight (with suggestion of servile bowing, inappropriate to a king)

113 He … fathered his children have treated him as my father has treated me

114 high noises important rumors/what is being said among the powerful

114 bewray reveal

116 In … proof in proving you to be just

117 What … king whatever else happens tonight, may the king escape safely

118 Lurk i.e. stay out of sight

122 old … death i.e. die naturally, in old age

124 Bedlam Bedlam beggar, i.e. Poor Tom

125 where he would wherever he wants to go

126 Allows itself to enables him to do

127 flax … eggs both were conventionally used to soothe damaged eyes

130 Obidicut … Flibbertigibbet more fiends mentioned by Samuel Harsnett; “flibbertigibbet” can also mean “a gossip” or “a flighty, frivolous woman”

131 mopping and mowing grimacing, making faces

135 contemns i’th’origin despises its originator (father)

136 bordered certain safely contained

137 sliver and disbranch split and break off (like a branch from a tree)

138 material essential, substantial

138 perforce necessarily

139 come … use be destroyed (like firewood)

140 text sermon

142 savour but only enjoy, appreciate

144 gracious generous/good/(as a king) possessed of divine grace

145 reverence position deserving respect, venerable condition

145 head-lugged that has been pulled about by its head, i.e. enraged

146 madded sent mad

147 brother brother-in-law, i.e. Cornwall

147 suffer allow

149 visible spirits spirits in visible form, avenging angels

150 tame crush

154 Fools … mischief i.e. only fools pity villains (like Lear) who are punished as a preventative measure before they have done wrong

156 France the King of France

156 noiseless silent, inactive

157 plumèd helm (soldiers’) helmets adorned with feathers

157 thy … threat begins to threaten the state

158 moral moralizing

160 self-covered self-concealing

161 Bemonster … feature do not make your beauty hideous by revealing your true fiend’s face

161 Were’t my fitness if it were proper for me

162 blood anger

164 howe’er however much, although

166 Marry by the Virgin Mary

166 mew a contemptuous and belittling cat’s meow

168 back i.e. to France

170 imperfect unfinished

171 imports signifies, brings with it

179 trilled trickled

181 passion strong emotion/grief

185 goodliest best, most effectively

187 smilets little smiles, half-smiles

192 so become it grace it so well, make it seem so attractive

198 Let … believed! Put no trust in pity!

200 clamour moistened her the expression of her grief moistened her with tears

200 started hastened, went abruptly

204 mate and make husband and wife

205 issues children

210 sometime sometimes

210 tune i.e. frame of mind

214 sovereign overpowering (plays on the related literal sense of “kingly”)

214 elbows pushes, jostles

216 casualties chance, uncertainties

222 afoot on the move

224 attend wait on, look after

224 dear cause important reason

226 aright rightly, as myself

226 grieve regret

231 deep rumbling, deep-voiced

231 dread-bolted hurling terrifying thunderbolts

233 cross forked

233 watch remain awake/be on guard

234 perdu “lost one” (French), the name given to a guard placed in an extremely open, dangerous position

234 helm helmet/covering of hair

238 conductor … people commander of his forces

242 Report rumor

243 powers … kingdom British forces

243 apace rapidly

244 arbitrament deciding of the dispute

246 point … wrought the conclusion of my aims will be thoroughly brought about

247 Or either

248 abuses dishonors, wrongs

249 doubtful fearful

249 conjunct And bosomed sexually intimate

250 as … hers to the fullest extent

253 honest honorable

254 For as for

255 touches us as i.e. affects our honor insofar as

256 bolds insofar as it emboldens

256 with (who) along with

257 Most … oppose has most just and weighty grounds for hostility

261 the … sharpness i.e. in the heat of emotion even the best grounds for hostility are cursed by those who have suffered the losses and afflictions of battle (Edmund pretends to be anxious that Lear and Cordelia receive a fair trial)

265 period limit, extreme point

266 such … not those who do not love

266 another … extremity to enlarge upon another sorrowful tale (that of Kent) would increase sorrow even further and exceed all limits

269 big in clamour loud in lamentation

270 estate condition

273 fastened … neck i.e. embraced me

274 As as if

277 puissant powerful

277 strings of life i.e. heartstrings

279 ’tranced absorbed by grief/in a faint, unconscious

282 enemy king i.e. the king who had treated him as an enemy

283 Improper for unfitting even for

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шекспир уильям King Lear