Lear and tragic recognition

I want to compare Gloucester and Lear for a moment or two. We’ve seen that Shakespeare has them use similar language patterns in the play – “who yet is no dearer” does not really indicate that he loves either of his sons. So, a comparison of them in the play seems important and apt.

I’ll skip ahead in the “Gloucester” story to the section that I think is most important for my own darker purposes:

Glou. All dark and comfortless! Where's my son Edmund?
Edmund, enkindle all the sparks of nature
To quit this horrid act.
Reg. Out, treacherous villain!
Thou call'st on him that hates thee. It was he
That made the overture of thy treasons to us;
Who is too good to pity thee.
Glou. O my follies! Then Edgar was abus'd.
Kind gods, forgive me that, and prosper him! III, vii, 86-93

Here we have Gloucester at the moment of maximum suffering, and it is here at the moment during which he suffers most, that he learns the truth. This is the expected tragic recognition scene.

The question in this play The Tragedy of King Lear is where is the comparable scene for Lear. Does Lear ever come to the sort of full knowledge that allows him to see himself and others clearly as Gloucester does here (ironically in his physical blindness)? This is what is requisite for the tragic. Can it be found in the play?

Let’s look at another speech by Gloucester:

Glou. The King is mad. How stiff is my vile sense,
That I stand up, and have ingenious feeling
Of my huge sorrows! Better I were distract.
So should my thoughts be sever'd from my griefs,
And woes by wrong imaginations lose
The knowledge of themselves. IV, vii, 284-289

This defines the clear-sighted tragic hero, who comes to his clear-sightedness too late, who is horrified at his own “huge sorrows”, and at Lear’s. But Gloucester sees Lear’s madness as what comforts him, what keeps him from knowing. Does Lear develop such clear-sighted, sane, self knowledge, as Gloucester indicates is opposed to madness?

• Does Lear ever come to know how he has wronged Cordelia, the improper incestuous relationship he’d wanted?
• Does Lear ever come to know his responsibility in the Goneril and Regan part of the plot?
• Does Lear ever know himself?

From the first scene of the play, this last question is an issue – Regan says “he hath ever but slenderly known himself.” His lack of self knowledge is manifested in other ways here too – it’s translated into an inability to judge in many ways: Lear’s intention in I, i, is “that future strife may be prevented now.” But what does he do that could prevent future strife?

a) he proposes an unequal division of the kingdom
b) publicly humiliates his daughters – withholds their dowries
c) Clearly publicly favours Cordelia over his other two daughters
d) Banishes her, and Kent

His action is bad, and leads inevitably to the actions of the rest of the play. There’s an inevitability here that’s part of what separates the comic and the tragic in Shakespeare.

In the comedies, characters intend something, something else happens, characters make mistakes, misjudgments, but are given another chance to set things right, to make things turn out properly. In tragedies there is an inevitability to the actions and consequences, and the consequences are irreversible. Lear intends one thing, the consequences are other. Period. Macbeth can’t change the consequences of his action; even knowing them fully, he can’t avoid them.

Lear can’t judge well from the start, then. But does he learn?? Go through the play and see what his speeches reveal. 5 major scenarios where Lear comments on the action of the play:

1. Act 1 scenes 4 and 5 – concerning Goneril
2. Act 2 scene 4 – concerning Regan
3. Act 3 scenes 2, 4, and 6 – In the storm – the reason in madness bits
4. Act 4, scenes 6 and 7 – after the storm
5. Act 5, scene 3 – the attitude to Cordelia at the end of the play.

1. Concerning Goneril:

Woe that too late repents!-O, sir, are you come?
Is it your will? Speak, sir!-Prepare my horses.
Ingratitude, thou marble-hearted fiend,
More hideous when thou show'st thee in a child
Than the sea-monster!
Alb. Pray, sir, be patient.
Lear. [to Goneril] Detested kite, thou liest!
My train are men of choice and rarest parts,
That all particulars of duty know
And in the most exact regard support
The worships of their name.-O most small fault,
How ugly didst thou in Cordelia show!
Which, like an engine, wrench'd my frame of nature
From the fix'd place; drew from my heart all love
And added to the gall. O Lear, Lear, Lear!
Beat at this gate that let thy folly in [Strikes his head.]
And thy dear judgment out! (I, iv, 266-279)

Lear’s charge against Goneril is “ingratitude”. She’s not grateful for what he’s done. This impies, of course, that she should be grateful, that he’s been correct and bountiful to her. He repeats essentially the same charge a few lines later “that she may feel / How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is / To have a thankless child!” 294-296

In this same section, he says of Cordelia: “O most small fault, / How ugly didst thou in Cordelia show!” But is it fault at all that she shows?

Then later, in I, v, the following quotations: “So kind a father” “monster ingratitude”. It’s a vision of himself as blameless, as simply kind. That’s not the Lear I saw in I, i.

2. concerning Regan

Lear leaves Goneril, and goes for comfort and support from Regan. It’s easy to feel that Lear is in the right exclusively, it’s easy to identify and sympathize with him:

Regan. …Therefore I pray you
That to our sister you do make return;
Say you have wrong'd her, sir.
Lear. Ask her forgiveness?
Do you but mark how this becomes the house:
'Dear daughter, I confess that I am old. [Kneels.]
Age is unnecessary. On my knees I beg
That you'll vouchsafe me raiment, bed, and food.' (II, iv, 149-153)

Look at how Lear views the Goneril scenes we’ve just been looking at. He discounts the possibility of his having any sort of fault here. His vision of himself is of a king father who has simply grown old.

Then, the following from the same scene:

Lear. …Thou better know'st
The offices of nature, bond of childhood,
Effects of courtesy, dues of gratitude.
Thy half o' th' kingdom hast thou not forgot,
Wherein I thee endow'd. (II, iv, 176-179)

The first lines echo Cordelia’s answer to Lear in I, i. Her answer saw “bond” in terms of “love” “honour” and “duty” to obey. He sees “bond” as “courtesy” and “gratitude.” So for him it’s still the same complaint. I gave you half the kingdom; you should be grateful. I’ve done, that is, my duty according to my bond, no more no less. I suggested that he doesn’t see his bond with Cordelia properly – that it’s incestuous. Here, it’s clear he doesn’t see his bond with the other sisters properly either.

Lear’s final speech in II, iv is one of self reflection:

You see me here, you gods, a poor old man,
As full of grief as age; wretched in both.
If it he you that stirs these daughters' hearts
Against their father, fool me not so much
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. (II, iv, 271-282)

It’s still the same old Lear.

3. In the storm:

However, next come the storm scenes, the scenes of external storm and internal torment. This is most often viewed as the turning point, that Lear’s madness is purgative, that it allows him to see clearly – it’s the “reason in madness” idea, that in a state of madness, one sometimes reveals truth. IF something like this happens, it doesn’t do so very quickly! III, ii opens with a speech invoking the storm to wipe out ingratitude:

And thou, all-shaking thunder,
Strike flat the thick rotundity o' th' world,
Crack Nature's moulds, all germains spill at once,
That makes ingrateful man! (III, ii, 6-9)

It’s still ingratitude then – that’s what he sees the events of Acts I and II as displaying and meaning. Go on a few lines to around 17: “I tax not you, you elements, with inkindness, / I never gave you kingdom, called you children, / You owe me no subscription.” These lines suggest again his incapacity to see himself as in any way responsible. He has done everything properly in his view.
With this as the pervasive, unwavering version of the events of the play as seen by Lear, how are we to respond to the lines, “I am a man / More sinned against than sinning.”? This is often seen as Lear’s initial recognition of his own sinfulness. But it seems to me, given the pattern, it only means that they are sinners. It allows the possibility that he hasn’t sinned at all.
One possibility of seeing Lear coming into “knowledge” is in the following from III, iv, 32-33 – “O, I have ta’en / Too little care of this.” But surely the play is not about “this” (poor naked sufferers in the storm) in any major way. This isn’t a response to what we’ve seen in the first two acts of the play. So, if Lear does learn something here, it’s not what he needs to learn in the play. And in this very scene, when Lear refers to the important events in the play, it’s the same old story, the whole thing summed up just a few lines earlier – “filial ingratitude”, and then (around line 19) “O Regan, Goneril / Your kind old father, whose frank heart gave all -- / O, that way madness lies.” That final bit “that way madness lies” is correct. That is madness, viewing the play as Lear does here is madness, but it has been how he’s viewed it from the start. And he continues to as well: “unkind daughters/ discarded fathers”, “those pelican daughters” (Pelicans were thought to feed on their parents’ blood).

Lear’s view of himself as faultless in the play continues in III, vi. In the mock trial scene, Lear gives evidence against his daughters to Edgar and the Fool, concluding with the horrible image of dissecting Regan to see what has gone wrong with her.

4. After the storm

What about after the storm? Is any of the following really “knowing”

Ha! Goneril with a white beard? They flatter'd me like a dog,
and told me I had white hairs in my beard ere the black ones
were there. To say 'ay' and 'no' to everything I said! 'Ay' and
'no' too was no good divinity. When the rain came to wet me
once, and the wind to make me chatter; when the thunder would
not peace 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. (IV, vi, 98-107)

How close to what really happened is this? When Lear says, very poignantly but without knowing he speaks to Gloucester “Gloucester’s bastard son / Was kinder to his father than my daughters” – this SURELY is not knowing!!

What sort of knowing is revealed in the speech to which Edgar responds “reason in madness”? This would seem to be a central speech:

Lear. What, art mad? A man may see how the world goes with no eyes.
Look with thine ears. See how yond justice rails upon yond
simple thief. Hark in thine ear. Change places and, handy-dandy,
which is the justice, which is the thief? Thou hast seen a
farmer's dog bark at a beggar?
Glou. Ay, sir.
Lear. And the creature run from the cur? There thou mightst behold
the great image of authority: a dog's obeyed in office.
Thou rascal beadle, hold thy bloody hand!
Why dost thou lash that whore? Strip thine own back.
Thou hotly lusts to use her in that kind
For which thou whip'st her. The usurer hangs the cozener.
Through tatter'd clothes small vices do appear;
Robes and furr'd gowns hide all. Plate sin with gold,
And the strong lance of justice hurtless breaks;
Arm it in rags, a pygmy's straw does pierce it.
None does offend, none-I say none! I'll able 'em.
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, seem
To see the things thou dost not. Now, now, now, now!
Pull off my boots. Harder, harder! So.
Edg. O, matter and impertinency mix'd!
Reason, in madness! (IV, vi, 152-175)

Read the speech by Lear. It’s about the inability to know, the inability to judge. Moreover, it’s a world where everyone is criminal. This speech can be many things, but it is NOT a speech demonstrating Lear knowing anything.

5. attitude to Cordelia at the end of the play…

Even when he’s reunited with Cordelia, it doesn’t seem to me that Lear has learned anything at all. He’s the same character:

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.
Cor. No cause, no cause. (IV, vii, 70-75)

Can he be more mistaken, or mistaken in more ways? Is it true that Cordelia does not love Lear? Is it true that the sisters have “no cause” to have stopped loving Lear?

Lear hasn’t changed. Moreover, he’s the same character in the more disturbing context of the nature of the relationship he envisions between himself and Cordelia:

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
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,
As if we were God's spies; and we'll wear out,
In a wall'd prison, packs and sects of great ones
That ebb and flow by th' moon.
Edm. Take them away.
Lear. Upon such sacrifices, my Cordelia,
The gods themselves throw incense. Have I caught thee?
He that parts us shall bring a brand from heaven
And fire us hence like foxes. Wipe thine eyes.
The goodyears shall devour 'em, flesh and fell,
Ere they shall make us weep! We'll see 'em starv'd first.
Come. (V, iii, 8-25)

It’s a reaffirmation. Lear reasserts the desire he had in the first scene, to live with Cordelia, here by withdrawing with her from the world. And with that, we’re right back to Act I, Scene i. There is not development. Lear cannot, then, be called a tragic hero. No wonder Cordelia cries here!