Download Why does Shakespeare create a subplot with sons rather than

King Lear & the Feminists
The primary focus of King Lear is the loss of power and loss of control of an old man
who falls from being an absolute monarch to a confused refugee.
Everything about Lear is focused on accentuating this fall
Lear is a monarch because that means he had absolute power.
Lear is a man because that means he is worse-equipped to deal with powerlessness1.
Lear is old because that means that change is more confusing for him and he is less
adaptable.
He loses power to daughters because that means that the transfer of power is more
ambiguous (if he had one male heir, the transition would be straightforward2).
Moreover, all his children are daughters because same-sex siblings are more
naturally rivals. The same is true for Gloucester’s sons. If the children were
mixtures of brothers and sisters they would tend to moderate each other’s
tendencies.
Lear has to reinvent all the relationships in his life:
Until now, he relates to people through his power as king,
- he must learn to deal with3 people as an ‘unaccommodated man’.
Lear tries to use the sister’s rivalry both in the love test and in the dispute over his
retinue.
- The love test is calculated to provoke rivalry, resentment and jealousy.
- It is to the sisters’ credit4 that they do not fall into this trap but use Lear’s game
against him.
We know that Shakespeare’s primary focus is not on the daughters because he creates a
subplot with sons rather than5 daughters to make the parent-child conflict universal,
not simply the troubles6 of a king.
not only “look how awful women with power are”.
The repetition also suggests a pattern, a divine order.
Women do not naturally or normally hold power in the world portrayed,
- nor do bastards and commoners.
This is simply a reflection of Shakespeare’s world, not misogynist propaganda.
Exceptionally, women did hold power.
- In Shakespeare’s lifetime Mary Queen of Scots did so disastrously and Elizabeth I did
so better than most English monarchs.
King Lear was written a couple of years after the death of Elizabeth I.
Shakespeare never had anything negative to say about her.
powerlessness – helplessness, vulnerability
straightforward – simple, uncomplicated
3 to deal with (deal-dealt-dealt) – interact with
4 it is to the sisters’ credit – it is a good reflection on the sisters’ characters
5 rather than – as opposed to, instead of
6 troubles – problems
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2
A Misogynist Play?
By the end of the play every single female character is dead.
Some of the underlying7 values of King Lear are deeply offensive for women.
Goneril and Regan are portrayed as savage8 animals and part of their crime9 is to adopt
the behaviour10 of men.
- They are sexually predatory and ambitious.
However, the play suggests that all three daughters are the product of their father’s
behaviour10 towards them, so Lear must accept some responsibility for them.
- He has brutalized and neglected his elder daughters.
Lear wishes to be completely dependent on his daughters – like a child – in his dotage11
and to have complete control over them.
Lear is sympathetic to Tom and wonders12 if it was Tom’s daughters who drove him to
his predicament (Act II, Scene iv).
- but beneath Tom is Edgar, who has suffered the fate13 Lear wished on Cordelia.
The King asks: Hast thou14 given all to thy15 two daughters? / And art thou come to this?16
and then declares: “Nothing could have subdued17 nature / To such a lowness18 but19 his
unkind20 daughters.”
When in fact what has “subdued nature to such lowness” is an unkind – or at least
gullible21 – father!
underlying – fundamental, basic
savage – ferocious, vicious
9 crime – (false friend) illegal act, (in this case) sin, immoral act
10 behaviour – conduct, ways
11 dotage – old age, declining years
12 to wonder – ask oneself
13 fate – (in this case) circumstances
14 hast thou – (archaic) have you
15 thy – (archaic) your
16 art thou come to this? – (archaic) is this what has happened to you as a result?
17 to subdue – degrade
18 lowness – destitution
19 but – (in this case) except from, apart from
20 unkind – cruel
21 gullible – credulous
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Cordelia
Kathleen McLuskie says that Cordelia is a typical Shakespearean woman “absent,
silent or dead”.
This is a ridiculous assertion and shows a scant22 knowledge of Shakespeare’s plays.
- it doesn’t describe Volumnia, Lady Macbeth, Lady Capulet, Portia, Beatrix, Imogen,
Viola, Rosalind, Juliet, Kate, Margaret of Anjou, La Pucelle, etc.
McLuskie asserts23 that when Cordelia reappears in the fourth act she is an obedient
daughter.
- This is a misrepresentation.
She seeks24 reconciliation but it is Lear who kneels and begs25 forgiveness.
Is Cordelia the pathetic patriarchal puppet that some feminists suggest?
Beth Goldring has argued that in the love-test scene when ‘Cor.’ says “Deare Sir
forebeare” (i.e. “Don’t turn on Kent, my dear lord!”), this ‘Cor.’ is not Cornwall but
Cordelia.
- If so, Cordelia speaks up in defence of the man who has been defending her.
She is proud and obstinate.
Cordelia’s lack of26 eloquence is typical of the anti-machiavellian – male or female.
She is eloquent when she is speaking to her sleeping father but becomes monosyllabic
again when he wakes.
- her first impulse is to ask an attendant to speak to him in her place.
She has the realism to realize27 that if she and her father aren’t going to be taken before
her sisters this means that they are doomed28.
Some commentators see Cordelia’s death as the real tragedy of the play.
- In any case the tableau vivant at the end of the play is an interesting inversion of the
traditional pietà.
Cordelia, never raises her voice (only an army!) and is always obedient to her father
when she can be without lying29.
scant – very limited
to assert – claim, state, declare
24 to seek (seek-sought-sought) – try to achieve
25 to beg – humbly ask for
26 lack of – absence of, deficient
27 to realize – (false friend) be conscious, understand
28 to be doomed – be going to die
29 to lie (lie-lied-lied) – not tell the truth
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23
However, when Lear says this, “What is’t thou sayst? – Her voice was ever soft, Gentle
and low, an excellent thing in a woman” – he is actually30 talking to and about a
cadaver.
Is Shakespeare suggesting that – according to the values of the day – a perfect daughter
would in fact be dead?
The most poignant31 irony is that Lear, who turned a deaf ear to his true-speaking
youngest daughter when she was alive,
- now strains his ear in vain to catch the sound of her “soft, gentle and low” voice.
In any case, it’s not true: Cordelia organizes and leads a military invasion!
- notice that in King Leir, it is the King of France who leads it.
In one sense it is true that Shakespeare silences Cordelia, though not in the sense that
these feminist critics suggest:
- in King Leir Cordella talks much more, and is much less attractive because she is very
sanctimonious. Silencing Cordelia makes her more attractive for us too.
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31
actually – (false friend) in fact
poignant – touching, emotive
Goneril & Regan
Why does Shakespeare create two elder sisters not one?
Goneril almost always takes the lead32.
Regan is more passive and more moderate when she is on her own
- but in the presence of her sister she tends to take things further33 than Goneril.
Goneril and Regan are not, at first, as Edith Sitwell pointed out34,
“in their own view, nor from the world’s point of view, wicked”.
They tell themselves that
“they are but35 doing their duty36 towards their father and towards the world”.
Some commentators believe that, while Goneril is cold and calculating from the
beginning, it is Lear’s cursing of her children that drives her to evil37.
Goneril suggests blinding Gloucester but it is Regan who stays to ‘enjoy the show’.
Regan even takes a sword and kills the servant who tries to defend Gloucester.
...or she immediately and effectively revenges the murder of her husband by one of his
servants, a hideous crime in the early 17th Century.
Goneril gains a few last minute points by speaking patriotically against the French
invasion (“patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel”).
This causes some people to forget that she is an adulteress who murders her sister and
plans to murder her husband and father!
Does the film Ran, which has sons in the roles of Goneril and Regan, work? Is this
relevant?
Goneril and Regan’s eloquence is typical of machiavellian characters – male or female
– who are manipulative.
The two elder sisters are cold and calculating because they have been neglected by their
father.
- It is precisely when Lear turns on38 his favourite daughter, Cordelia, that Goneril sees
the need to control the king.
lead (n.) – (in this case) initiative
to take things further (take-took-taken) – be more extreme in one’s actions
34 to point out – indicate
35 but – (in this case) simply
36 to do one’s duty (do-did-done) – fulfil one’s obligations
37 to drive sb. to evil (drive-drove-driven) – cause sb. to be malevolent
38 to turn on – verbally attack
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Archetypes?
Goneril and Regan are not presented as representations of women with power:
- Cordelia is also a woman in power. She arrives at the head of an army!
If Goneril and Regan represent the evils of women with power, then do Cornwall and
Edmund represent the evils of men with power?
- Why assume39 that women characters archetypes but male characters individuals?
Patriarchy makes Lear’s behaviour10 possible.
- However, his rejection of Cordelia is shocking40 to Kent, Gloucester, Burgundy,
France, Goneril and Regan – it cannot therefore be considered ‘normal’ patriarchal
behaviour10.
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40
to assume – (false friend) suppose
shocking – scandalous
No Mothers
However, Coppelia Kahn takes the view that Lear goes mad when he cannot face his
feminine side: symbolized by his refusal to cry.
- In the end, he learns to cry, re-establishes a relationship with his youngest daughter on
non-patriarchal lines, and is redeemed41.
Much has been made by Freudians and Feminists of the fact that there are no mothers
in King Lear.
However, we should also bear in mind42 that women were not allowed43 to act in
Shakespeare’s time.
- their parts were played by boys whose voices had not broken.
- many of these boys would have just been beginning their training44.
It was therefore inadvisable to give them complex parts45 of adult women.
Moreover, we must remember that the absent mother comes from King Leir, which
opens just after Leir’s wife’s funeral (“the obsequies performed of our too deceased and
dearest queen”.
- So, while Shakespeare chose to keep his king a widower, that’s not the same as
changing him into a widower.
The dangers of reading too much into the absence of mothers can be gauged by
examining the absence of another social group: children
- children mostly appear in Shakespeare’s plays in order to be killed! Arthur in King
John dies falling from a tower (echoed in Game of Thrones); Maximillius in The
Winter’s Tale dies of parental neglect; MacDuff’s children are murdered in Macbeth
(admittedly, Fleance – Banquo’s son escapes from his assassins); the princes murdered
in Richard III, etc.
Now we could either conclude that Shakespeare had some infanticidal flaw to his
character or, more reasonably, assume that the only role for children is as pathetic
victims. No need for a pathetic victim? No children!
to redeem – save, vindicate, bring salvation
to bear in mind (bear-bore-borne) – take into account, consider
43 to allow – permit
44 training – preparation (as actors)
45 part – (in this case) role in a play, theatrical persona
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Metatheatre & King Lear
Metatheatre is when a play comments on the nature and limitations of theatre and uses it
as a metaphor for life.
- i.e. “All the world’s a stage”, etc.
The play has many levels of metatheatre
- Edgar gives a whole series of discrete performances as Tom o’Bedlam, a peasant and a
mysterious knight.
- Kent gives a performance as a servant.
- the Fool is a performer
- Edgar’s feigned madness is compared to Lear’s real madness – though this is only real
within the play, of course.
- Gloucester’s suicide attempt highlights the unrealistic nature of the theatre.
- Not forgetting the ‘theatrical’ trial of the daughter’s in the shack during the storm.
The whole play – to the extent that it questions the possibility of expressing real
suffering in words – can be taken as a pessimistic comment on the theatre.
When Edgar is leading his blind father he says
“You do climb up it now. Look how we labour”
Gloucester replies
“Methinks the ground is even.” (IV.v.2-3)
- of course, on the stage he is right.
Lear declares
“When we are born, we cry that we are come
To this great stage of fools.” (IV.v.178-79)
Lear: Who is it that can tell me who I am?
Fool: Lear’s Shadow.
- notice that ‘shadow’ could mean ‘actor’ (cf. last Act of A Midsummer Night’s Dream)
- breaking the dramatic illusion was one of the fools’ prerogatives in Shakespeare’s
theatre.
For an interesting view on the contemporary relevance of King Lear, watch this
November 2016 BBC documentary:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLgZEwjWAcY