King Lear abbreviated

Synopsis


Lear is the King of Britain, somehow finding himself in a position to be king around 845 B.C. No longer young, having three daughters and two sons-in-law, he has decided to divide his kingdom into three parts, giving one part to each daughter. As the play begins, Lear tests his daughters, asking each one to let him know how each loves him “most.” Goneril and Regan, the two older daughters, let him know that he means just about everything to them. But Cordelia, his youngest and who Lear calls “our joy,” tells him she plans to split her love between him and her future husband. (Daughter to Father, Act 1, Scene 1) Lear, infuriated with her for not telling him she loves him fully, lashes out at her, calling her “my sometime daughter.” He decides to withhold her portion of the kingdom, her dowry, deciding to divide her third between her two sisters. The Earl of Kent overplays his hand, complaining profusely. The king banishes him from Britain. Goneril says in effect that the king is delusional. The King of France soon enters and welcomes Lear’s offer that the dowerless Cordelia may become his wife and France’s queen. Cordelia and the King of France leave for France.

Goneril is married to Albany; Regan to Cornwall. In this play, Shakespeare uses severe comparisons in a number of ways to draw written pictures of how kind and then how unkind people can be one to another. Edgar, Kent, Cordelia, Gloucester and Albany represent some of the best characteristics that humanity has to offer; some of the others the worst.

The Earl of Gloucester, an aide and long time friend of Lear’s, has two sons, the younger being Edmund who is insecure over his “base” or illegitimate birth. Edmund deviously plans to turn his father against his older son Edgar, Edmund’s one year older brother. (Deviousness, Act 1, Scene 2) Talking to himself, Edmund tells us that it should be easy to take advantage of the two of them, his father being innocent, naive and gullible and his brother being so noble. Edmund lets his father see a letter he has forged, written as if it were from Edgar; a letter that falsely details Edgar’s plan to kill their father, and for him and Edmund to split the inheritance. Seeing the letter, the too-accepting Gloucester immediately turns on Edgar, not questioning Edmund’s fabricated story. (Father to Son, Act 1, Scene 2)

Meanwhile, Lear and his entourage leave with plans to live with Goneril, his oldest daughter, but he soon irritates her, striking her steward Oswald over a minor matter. (Anger, Act 1, Scene 3) The banished Earl of Kent, now disguised, risking his life by not leaving the country, persuades Lear to hire him as a servant. (Pleading, Act 1, Scene 4) All the while Lear’s Fool is telling the king what a fool he is. (Insight, Act 1, Scene 4) Goneril tells her father that he is no longer welcome in her home and must leave; must leave because his entourage of a hundred knights have been too rowdy and have disrupted her household, and because he has mistreated Oswald. Kent and the Fool join Lear and his knights as they leave for Regan’s estate, Regan being Lear’s middle daughter. Separately, Goneril has had Oswald write to Regan to advise her of how she sees the situation.

Meanwhile, the trusting Edgar greets his deceiving brother Edmund, and Edmund immediately tells him that their father is very angry with him. Separately, Edmund has been cozying up to Lear’s daughter Regan and her husband Cornwall. Meanwhile, Edgar, having been talked into a fictitious duel with Edmund, exits the stage when Edmund says “I hear my father coming” and “Fly, brother. Torches, torches!” (Deviousness, Act 2, Scene 1) A furious Gloucester, believing everything Edmund has been telling him, yells “Let him fly far! Not in this land shall he remain uncaught, and found.” He tells everyone “that he which finds him (Edgar) shall deserve our thanks, bringing the murderous coward to the stake.” Edgar soon returns to the play disguised as a madman-beggar. (Introspection, Act 2, Scene 3)

Meanwhile at Gloucester’s castle, Kent and Oswald get into a sword fight. Cornwall, Regan’s husband, enters, stops the fight, puts Kent in the stocks, and exits. The next morning an angry Lear and his Fool find Kent confined to the stocks and free him. (Insight, Act 2, Scene 4) In an argument with Regan, Lear lets her know he’ll not return to Goneril’s, she wanting to reduce his number of followers, believing he’ll get Regan’s sympathy. (Anger, Act 2, Scene 4) But, infuriating him further, Regan suggests he reduce his train of followers from a hundred to fifty or perhaps to none. (Father to Daughter, Act 2, Scene 4) Accompanied by the Fool and Gloucester, Lear leaves Regan’s home in a rage. They have no where to go. The king is homeless. A serious storm develops. Separately, the disguised good-guy Kent sends a ring with a Gentleman with instructions to get the ring to Cordelia; the ring to be a signal that her father needs her help. (Request, Act 3, Scene 1) Lear irrationally cries-out at the storm. Kent enters, encouraging Lear and his friends to seek shelter in a hovel, which they do, finding it occupied by Edgar, continuing to be disguised as the madman-beggar, calling himself “Poor Tom.” It’s been a long trip down for King Lear.

Meanwhile, Edmund, learning from his father that the French have landed in Britain, falsely tells Cornwall that his father, Gloucester, is not to be trusted, claiming he has provided intelligence to the French. Cornwall in turn tells him that he will be rewarded, and that his father will be punished.

Back in the hovel, Edgar, reinforcing his madman-beggar image, enters into a fantasy dialog with Lear, a dialog that includes a mock trail, arraigning Goneril. Edgar cringes at the king’s deterioration. All the while the weather is awful. (Introspection, Act 3, Scene 6) Meanwhile, Cornwall calls for Gloucester’s arrest, claiming he’s a traitor. The king’s older daughters suggest Gloucester be severely punished. Gloucester enters, he being on his way to Dover to seek help from Cordelia and the French king. He is soon captured by Cornwall’s men. Cornwall has him bound to a chair and forces out his eyes. A servant, distraught over the mistreatment of this old, gentle and loyal man, draws his sword, wounding Cornwall. In turn, Regan stabs the servant in the back, killing him. A now blind Gloucester learns that it was his son Edmund who had falsely claimed he was providing intelligence to the French.

Blind Gloucester and an Old Man are on stage as Edgar enters. Gloucester asks Edgar to lead him to the edge of the cliffs at Dover, totally unaware that he is his son. Edgar does. Meanwhile, Goneril flirts with Edmund, giving him a kiss. He exits as her husband Albany enters. Albany and Goneril argue, he calling her “vile;” she calling him “milk-livered.” They learn Cornwall has died as a result of the wound from the servant’s sword. Albany learns that Gloucester has lost his eyes. Meanwhile, Cordelia, along with a Doctor and the Gentleman who delivered the ring, is now in Britain searching for her father. Regan jealously senses Goneril’s interest in Edmund, feeling she, now a widow, is the more “convenient” to link up with him. Goneril, continuing to be upset with her husband, Albany, considering him, as she says “milk-livered,” extends her interest in Edmund, further upsetting Regan.

Meanwhile, Edgar has led Gloucester near to the edge of the Cliffs at Dover, but not too near. Wanting to fall over the cliffs and die, Gloucester kneels and falls harmlessly. Now disguised as a peasant, Edgar calls him father, telling Gloucester it’s a miracle he survived the fall. A disoriented Lear enters. (Inspiration, Act 4, Scene 6) Gloucester and Edgar become even more disheartened after listening to Lear, Lear’s mind about gone. The Gentleman enters telling Lear his daughter is looking for him. Lear runs off. Oswald enters, sees Gloucester and draws his sword. Protecting his blind father, Edgar takes up a sword and duels with Oswald. Oswald falls and dies. Edgar finds a letter in Oswald’s pocket from Goneril to Edmund. Sweetheart Cordelia finds and comforts her father. (Daughter to Father, Act 4, Scene 7) They learn Cornwall has died. Separately, Regan shifts her anger from her sister to Edmund; upset with the attention he is paying Goneril. (Introspection, Act 5, Scene 1) Edmund denies any interest in Goneril. Continuing to be disguised as a peasant, Edgar enters and gives Albany the letter to Edmund from Goneril. Lear and Cordelia are captured. Edgar suggests his father move to a better location. Gloucester responds, “No further,” and soon dies.

Edmund enters with Lear and Cordelia as his prisoners and sends them on to prison. Lear fantasizes about joyful conversations he and his daughter can have in prison. (Father to Daughter, Act 5, Scene 3) Edmund gives the Captain a note instructing him to make sure they don’t leave the prison alive. Albany challenges Edmund to a future duel. Regan becomes sick and exits. Discarding his disguise, Edgar enters, challenging his brother Edmund. They fight and Edmund falls, seriously wounded. Goneril quietly exits. Albany embraces Edgar. (Disclosure, Act 5, Scene 3) They learn Goneril had fatally poisoned Regan and has now fatally stabbed herself. Edmund, dying, tells Edgar and Albany that he gave instructions that Cordelia be hanged. Edmund dies. A sadly confused Lear enters carrying Cordelia, now dead. Kent cautions all, saying, “He hates him that would upon the rack of this tough world stretch him out longer.” Lear soon dies. Albany tells Kent and Edgar that they must be the successor rulers of the realm and “sustain the state.” Shakespeare could have named this play: The good, the bad and the ugly. But the “good guys” are real good.


Principal Characters


Albany
Albany is married to Goneril, Lear’s oldest daughter. He is a thoughtful, considerate man, diplomatically towing a difficult line, trying to do his best to navigate the tough love route towards Lear taken by Goneril, Cornwall and Regan. His wife thinks he is too kind and soft. Shakespeare paints him as one of the good guys.

Cordelia
Cordelia, Lear’s youngest daughter, and always his favorite, so her sisters say, was left out of the distribution of her father’s kingdom for not telling him she loved him totally. She marries the King of France, becoming France’s Queen. She returns to Britain late in the play and again, as she does early in the play, plays the role of a consummate sweetheart.

Edgar
Edgar is Gloucester’s older son, one year ahead Edmund. He is Lear’s godson. It was Lear who suggested to Gloucester that he name his first son Edgar. Edgar treats his father as well as any father could ever hope to be treated by a son.

Edmund
Edmund is Gloucester’s younger and illegitimate son, crafted by Shakespeare as a totally devious soul, who treats his father, brother and the king’s daughters unnaturally badly. But in the doing, as an offset, by creating Edmund, Shakespeare causes others in the play to look real good.

Fool
The Fool is active early in the play, staying close to Lear and protecting him, relinquishing that role as a disguised Kent over time becomes Lear’s key aide. Lear and the Fool have a nice relationship even though the Fool continually and playfully mocks him. Shakespeare puts him there to remind us that it is not always easy to tell who is the fool and who is the wise man. The Fool addresses the king as “Nuncle” and gets away with it.

Gloucester
Gloucester and Lear have long been friends, but Shakespeare never develops that relationship. Gloucester is an old man and naively kind, a characteristic that subjects him to misuse by one son, but a characteristic that lets Shakespeare show us how kind a son can be to an old and naïve father.

Goneril
Goneril is Lear’s oldest daughter, recipient of one-half of his realm. Her father continues his downward descent when he angrily leaves her house, she demanding he keep less followers and treat her staff, particularly Oswald, better. She displays a tough side with both her father, Gloucester, and her husband. The duke of Albany is her husband. She later falls for Edmund.

Kent
Kent is the consummate loyalist; so loyal to Lear that when banished by the king he disguises himself “in accents and appearance” and gains employment with Lear as a servant, serving the king as a surrogate son, much as Edgar in disguise serves Gloucester, his father.

Lear
Lear is the king who graciously, but mistakenly, gives his kingdom to his daughters, an act that leaves him homeless, his older daughters rejecting him, they say, because of his conduct and entourage. He’s a well-meaning man, old, senile and confused, who needed protection, not ridicule.

Regan
Regan is Lear’s second daughter, married to Cornwall, and is really bad news. She displays little sympathy for her father when he visits her, looking as he is for a place to stay. She then suggests harsh treatment for Gloucester, her father’s good friend, when he is by his own son falsely accused of treason.

 A portrait of William Shakespeare