King Lear: BackgroundAP English Lit

Timeline:

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1558

Elizabeth I assumes the throne

1564

Shakespeare is born. (Galileo also born.)

1605

King Lear written (1603-1606);published in 1608.

1603Queen Elizabeth dies; King James I takes the throne.

1613 1616

Shakespeare dies. (Galileo is prohibited from further scientific work.)

1598 Shakespeare’s son Hamnet dies.

Globe Theatre burns and is rebuilt

1644

Globe Theatre is demolished by Puritans.

16191st African slaves brought to Virginia

1636Harvard University established in the US

1627

Francis Bacon’s New Atlantis published (posthumously)

King Lear (written between 1603-06)Setting: Ancient BritainSource: Holinshead Chronicles --Raphael Holinshed’s The Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland (1577).

As was his general habit, Shakespeare borrowed his two plots from previous sources. Holinshed reported in his Chronicles a story that dates back as far as 1136 in which a supposedly real King Leir who ruled England around 800 BC divides his kingdom between two of his daughters, disowning the third for failing his love test, who nevertheless marries the King of France.

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Abused thereafter by the successful daughters, Leir goes to France, unites with his third daughter and her husband, and regains his throne by military force.

The story took many shapes and variations, including a history play produced before 1595 in which the daughters actually try to murder Leir.

The Edmund story came from Sidney’s Arcadia (a romance with pastoral elements). In both cases Shakespeare made radical changes.

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• On 26th December 1606, the King’s Men performed the play at court for King James. Far from dividing his kingdom, James was busily trying to unite two sovereign realms, England and Scotland, and in so doing, creating a new concept of nation, calling it Great Britain. • Even the play’s first line, ‘I thought the king had more affected the Duke of Albany than Cornwall’, had a special point when spoken before an audience that may well have included both dukes, titles King James had conferred on his sons. • The play’s resonances with the current monarch have often been troubling: during King George III’s bouts of madness the play was not performed in London.

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• Described alternately as Shakespeare’s “Everest”, and his deepest plunge into the human soul.• Questions the difference between sanity and insanity, between order and chaos.• One sentence plot summary: Lear tries to control his daughters and ends up losing them all.• Shakespeare intentionally set KL in pre-Christian Britain so that the tragic ending could not be explained away as the will of a loving God.

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Characters:

King Lear • Aging king of Britain• Used to having absolute power• Doesn’t respond well to being contradicted or challenged• Wishes to maintain the power of a king while unburdening himself of the responsibility.

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Fool

• Highly intelligent, heuses his wit to criticize Lear and plead withthe king to right the wrongs Lear has done to others and himself.

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Cordelia

• Lear’s youngest daughter• Refuses to flatter herfather; is disowned by Lear• Remains loyal to Lear and forgives him; is forgiving toward her sisters as well • Deep, quiet, reserved

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Goneril

• Lear’s ruthless oldest daughter, wife of Duke of Albany. She is aggressive and treacherous.

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Regan

• Lear’s middle daughter; wife of Duke of Cornwall. She is another archetypal villian; competes with Goneril for Edmund.

Kent

• Earl of Kent is Lear’s outspoken, loyal, and selfless companion (though he spends much of the play disguised as a peasant in order to be near Lear).• Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote, "Kent is, perhaps, the nearest to perfect goodness in all Shakespeare's characters, and yet the most individualized."

Gloucester (Glah-ster)

• The Earl of Gloucester is loyal to Lear and his story parallels Lear’s in many ways.• Misjudges his children• Capable of great bravery

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Edgar

• Older, legitimate son of Gloucester. Banished by his father, half-brother to Edmund• Dutiful, much like Cordelia• His propensity for disguises makes him a complex character

Edmund

• An outright villain, the illegitimate son of Gloucester• Bitter, bold, and wreaker of destruction

Sources:http://www.pbs.org/wnet/gperf/episodes/king-lear/background-on-king-lear/background-on-king-lear/486/

http://nfs.sparknotes.com/lear/characters.html

Fig.1 http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-wcUtbm5tqns/T2HyAbNOb3I/AAAAAAAACAc/2eQhmoa5IwM/s1600/Chronicles+1577.jpeg

Fig. 2 http://www.shakespeare-online.com/plays/kinglear/kingleirfrontpage.jpg

Fig. 3 http://mouveuno.cila.unior.it/file.php/13/Lez5/media/Slide4a_1197675953.jpg

Fig. 4 http://www-tc.pbs.org/shakespeare/images/players/king-james1.jpg

Fig. 5 http://izquotes.com/images/george-iii.jpg

Fig. 6 http://alexatkinsdesign.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/king-lear-aad-poster.png

Fig. 7 http://www-tc.pbs.org/wnet/gperf/files/2014/07/KING-LEAR_Ian-McKellen-480x270.jpg

Fig. 8 http://stephenwhitt.files.wordpress.com/2014/09/lear-and-cordelia.jpg

Fig. 9 http://mmimageslarge.moviemail-online.co.uk/25267_king-lear-1.jpg

Fig. 10 http://www.mckellen.com/images/3508.jpg