King Lear Acts 4 and 5

“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 defectsProve our commodities”4.1.20-23 (82) Speaker: GloucesterSituation: Speaking to an old man, his tenant, as he makes his way blind from his castle.He now has “no way,” no path, no responsibilities. Now he recognizes his interior blindness. Notice the paradoxes. Our resources, while in prosperity, make us careless or overconfident. The word “mere” for Shakespeare means “totally” or absolutely. So, our total deficiencies are actually our advantages.Lear learns this in the course of the play when he is reduced to a frail human being in a terrifying storm. Kent, always a virtuous man, recognizes the “miracles” that someone experiencing suffering may see. Edgar, another virtuous man, assumes the guise of “Poor Tom” and exposes himself to the harsh elements in order to care for his father, so his “mere defects” prove advantageous.
“The worst is not/ So long as we can say ‘This is the worst.'” 4.1/31-32 (82) Speaker: Edgar (Aside)Situation: As he first sees his blinded fatherIf we can control language to the extent that we can make a statement about something, things can still get worse. What is unutterable, inexpressible, is the worst that could happen. This silence implied here is similar to and yet different from the silence of Cordelia in Act 1. Then, she refuses to barter her words of “love” for 1/3 of the kingdom. By remaining silent she expresses her integrity and her recognition that there are feelings and truths that cannot be expressed by words. She also shows a stubbornness in refusing to compromise that is related to Lear’s “all or nothing” approach to life. While the silence that Edgar implies would occur in the worst circumstances, the limitation of language’s ability to express all feelings and truths makes these statements similar.
“As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods.They kill us for their sport.” 4.1.41-42 (83) Speaker: GloucesterSituation: As he is led away from his castle and delivered into to care of Poor Tom (Edgar)In the same way that playful boys kill flies for fun do the gods kill us. Notice Gloucester’s paganism and fatalism, which fits in with his trust in astrology. He is on his way to commit suicide, another instance of his ignorance of his need to rely on God. (Hamlet has the same tendency until near the end of the play.) The ending of the play shows the Christian solution of mercy, forgiveness, and sacrifice as triumphing over the sort of paganism and glorification of instinct represented by the elder daughters and Edmund.
“They flatteredme like a dog; and told me I had white hairs in mybeard ere the black ones were there. To say ‘ay’and ‘no’ to every thing that I said!–‘Ay’ and ‘no’too was no good divinity. When the rain came towet me once, and the wind to make me chatter; whenthe thunder would not peace at my bidding; there Ifound ’em, there I smelt ’em out. Go to, they arenot men o’ their words: they told me I was everything; ’tis a lie, I am not ague-proof.” 4.5 .108-116 (95) Speaker: LearSituation: As Lear wanders in his madness and meets GloucesterHe describes Goneril and Regan as fawning dogs who told him that he had great wisdom even before he was old and agreed with everything he said, which was not good theology because they were insincere. (James 5:12: “Let you yea be yea and your nay,nay.”) When I was out in the storm, I began to understand them. (“Go to.” means Go to hell.) They were dishonest in telling me I was “everything.” I’m not immune to illness. The storm has taught Lear his real place in the universe. Both Lear and Gloucester make the mistake of thinking they are everything. Both are tortured by that haunting word “nothing” until they become nothing. The play moves from its first scene of everything- accommodation, comfort , luxury, security- to nothing but basic, unadorned humanity. Now Lear has a clear understanding of his lack of self-knowledge which is the cause of so much suffering.
“No cause, no cause.” 4.7.80 (105) Speaker: CordeliaSituation: When she is reunited with her fatherHere we can see that Lear is not the only one who has undergone a change. Now Cordelia has learned not to be silent. She avoids the ambiguity and supposed equivocation that has led to misunderstanding and tragedy. Her affirmation comes as a negative, which shows that something can come of nothing. Love is not a matter of pretty speeches nor of legality of “cause.” Love is a bond that transcends both rhetoric and the law, but it requires expression and communication, both voiced and unvoiced. This redemptive vision closes the 4th act and even the agonizing events to come cannot render this scene as anything but central to the lessons of the play.
“Men must endureTheir going hence, even as their coming hither;Ripeness is all: come on.” 5.2.10-12 (108) Speaker: EdgarSituation: To Gloucester after the French are defeated.Gloucester has just said he would stay where he is. “A man may rot even here.” Human beings must accept death at its time, just as birth, which are both painful experiences. To await the destined time is the most important thing, as fruit falls only when it’s ripe (playing on the idea of rotting). (This has similarities to Hamlet’s reliance on God’s will before the fencing match with Laertes.
“Come, let’s away to prison:We two alone will sing like birds i’ the 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 laughAt gilded butterflies, and hear poor roguesTalk 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 the moon.EDMUNDTake them away.KING LEARUpon such sacrifices, my Cordelia,The gods themselves throw incense.” 5.3.9-22 (109) Lear’s lines Speaker: LearSituation: To Cordelia after their captureNow Lear has made the choice he should have made in the beginning. He has allied himself with those who, in the world’s sense, are fools, and he is prepared to accept the alienation from the world that this requires. He doesn’t even want to see his other daughters and eagerly accepts the prison that marks his withdrawal from the world’s values, for he has his own new values to sustain. He and Cordelia will sing, pray, tell stories, make fun of gaudy courtiers (“gilded butterflies”), listen to and engage in gossip about the court, and outlast all the ambitious and foolish courtiers. We will be in the world but not of the world. Even the gods will appreciate this sacrifice.
“Know thou this, that menAre as the time is: to be tender-mindedDoes not become a sword”5.3.32-34 (110) Speaker: EdmundSituation: To his captain when he hands him instructions to kill Cordelia and LearThese lines express Edmund’s ruthless personality. He believes that humans have no timeless or eternal principles. They merely go along with whatever the times call for. To be kind is not fitting for a soldier. These situation ethics prove not be as enduring as the values of charity, love, and sacrifice exemplified by Edgar.
“Let’s exchange charity.I am no less in blood than thou art, Edmund;If more, the more thou hast wrong’d me.My name is Edgar, and thy father’s son.The gods are just, and of our pleasant vicesMake instruments to plague us:The dark and vicious place where thee he gotCost him his eyes.” 5.3.179-186 (115) Speaker: EdgarSituation: After wounding EdmundLet’s forgive each other. I am of no less honorable descent than you are. There is justice here that fate has punished Gloucester for the pleasure-giving vice of sex with Edmund’s mother, which didn’t seem like a serious sin at the time, but resulted in his losing his eyes. Because Gloucester’s sin is physical (lechery), he is punished physically. (Lear’s sin is mental, misjudgment in dismembering his kingdom and misjudging his daughters, so his punishment is madness.) Notice that humans make choices that lead to these consequences rather than fate playing with humans or astrological events determining human affairs.
“The wheel is come full circle; I am here.” 5.3.188 (115) Speaker: EdmundSituation: After he is wounded by EdgarFortune’s wheel was often pictured as drawing one up to a position of power and then casting one down as it continues to turn. Edmund is “here” at the bottom of the wheel where he started. Edmund gives voice to a fatalistic, cyclic view of human history which is contrasted to another pattern associated with classical tragedy and Judeo-Christian culture, a linear view- the idea of the fortunate fall. One is reborn into knowledge. Even the audience can be reborn by catharsis. (Think of Oedipus). Progress can be made.
“Some good I mean to do,Despite of mine own nature.” 5.3.249-250 (117) Speaker: EdmundSituation: After being wounded by EdgarEdmund attempts to undo some of his evil, showing how Edgar’s nobility and the nearness to death affect even this villain. Human nature with all of its flaws which seems to rule in the first four acts is in part defeated in Act Five in favor of something like Grace.
. “And my poor fool is hang’d! 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.Do you see this? Look on her, look, her lips,Look there, look there!” 5.3.323-329 (120) Speaker: LearSituation: After Cordelia’s death and right before his own”fool”- a term of endearment for Cordelia (Some critics see this as recalling his own fool also, who disappeared earlier) Lear is overwhelmed with sorrow at the finality of Cordelia’s death. The two lines can be interpreted in two ways. A. As he nears his own death his last vision of Cordelia is that of her risen from the dead- alive- and he dies happy.B. (More popular in modern productions) In his delirium he imagines that she is alive because he cannot accept the horror of her death.
“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 youngShall never see so much, nor live so long.” 5.3.345-348 (121) Speaker: EdgarSituation: After Lear’s deathEdgar, here and throughout the play, is our representative. Here he addresses onstage and offstage audiences. Order has been restored. “We” means the audiences of any time, not just the survivors of Lear’s court or the spectators of Jacobean England. Edgar recognizes the appropriateness of their mourning and the importance of speaking what they really feel, rather than making pompous speeches. Lear and Gloucester have suffered more than this generation could ever suffer. These audience members will never live as long as these characters, beyond their onstage deaths, in the play that tells their story. (Notice that there is hope here. Edgar, the meek one, inherits all.)
July 17, 2019