“Which of you shall we say doth love us most” Act 1, Scene 1, Line 52. Through this, both King Lear’s and Gloucester’s rage and rashness can be seen, resulting in them both loosing sight of what is important. Despite this, their weak characteristics have a small influence on their tragedy and suffering. After King Lear bestows all his possessions to his daughters, rather than being grateful, Goneril and Regan’s lust for power causes them to turn on their father. In Act 2, Scene 4, Goneril and Regan diminish his retinue, disregard his authority and Goneril instructs her servants to treat King Lear with the utmost disrespect.
She is cast into exile while her sisters are appointed power over the land and they begin to rule. One of the critical betrayals within this play is the betrayal of King Lear’s daughters towards him. After obtaining their father’s kingdom, both Goneril and Regan quickly reveal themselves as unloving and uncaring as they deprive the retired king of his privileges. Due to the King’s unjust decision, he winds up not only destroying and diminishing his own authority but also, all authority in Britain.
In reaction to this disappointment Lear disowns Cordelia and gives her sisters, her share of the land. Also, because of this decision this causes Lear to go through many trials and tribulations with his legitimate daughters, who are now using their new power against him. The second plot is focused on Gloucester, who is tricked by his son Edmund, who is illegitimate, to turn on his legitimate son Edgar, which leads to Edmund receiving his title and his being exiled. While in exile, he is reunited, unknowingly with his son Edgar, who has taken one of his many disguises. In the end, both plots end with the tragic deaths of all the main characters excluding Edgar, who becomes the King and Albany.
This ultimately leaves the reader with many questions about 19th century male-female relationships and perhaps insanity. The narrator allows her husband to talk to her in a simplistic manner, almost implying that her husband considers her to be a small child and not a grown woman capable of making her own choices. It is this that decisively causes the woman to become insane. This is depicted when the narrator speaks of her husband, as she says “Then he took me in his arms and called me a blessed little goose, and said he would go down to the
Here, Nea acts without thinking and makes it sound like Sourdi will die if they don’t go to Des Moines. Nea’s decision to call Duke for help leads to Sourdi’s husband getting punched in the face. Also, this episode results in the two sisters growing further apart, which is not Nea’s intention. The mother brings some light onto Nea as a character. She tells Nea: “You not like your sister.
Throughout William Shakespeare’s play, King Lear’s daughters, Goneril and Regan, show no mercy to their former king and father. Goneril’s lack of compassion is seen by many, even those of importance to her, such as her husband, Albany. “Wisdom and goodness to the vile seem vile: / Filths savor but themselves. What have you done? / Tigers, not daughters, what have you performed?” (IV ii 42-44) Albany proclaims to his wife after being informed of how she has mistreated her father and pushed him to insanity.
Widely reputed throughout Padua to be a shrew, Katherine is foul-tempered and sharp-tongued at the start of the play, she constantly insults and degrades the men around her, and she is prone to wild displays of anger. She detests the social expectations that a woman should bow down to her husband, this attitude repels all suitors from courting her. Her father Baptista aware of this declares that his youngest daughter may not be married until Katherine is wed. Petruchio conscious of Katherine’s financial status approaches Baptista to request his daughter’s hand in marriage, knowing he won’t refuse due to the lack of suitors for Katherine. They are wed, and shortly after they return to their home Petruchio sends a meal back to the kitchen, claiming its burnt and puts Katherine to bed, enter this extract. Petruchio returns to the stage alone and announces his intentions.
King Lear says to his daughters ‘if it be you that stirs these daughters’ hearts against their father’ which shows how he feels betrayed: a feeling he may have not felt if he had not been so foolish to dismiss Cordelia for her honesty. Cordelia, however, plays a smaller role in the first few Acts of the play as she is disowned by her father and is not visited. Gonerill and Regan are both cruel father and do not have the same loyalty we get the impression as Cordelia does. Cordelia says at the beginning of the play ‘what shall Cordelia speak, love and be silent’ which shows that she loves her father however doesn’t feel she should lie about how much she loves her father. This truthfulness however lands her in a bad place as she is disowned by her father for not professing her love.
Lady Percy sees that Hotspur's preoccupation prevents him from sleeping, and she begs him to tell her what weighs so heavily on his mind. But Hotspur completely ignores her, and instead begins to speak to a servant that has just passed by about military matters (2.3.64-72). Hotspur's obsession with honor clouds his judgment and he becomes “drunk with choler” (1.3.129). He is so offended by the king refusing to ransom Mortimer that he will not listen to reason. Since he is so focused on doing the “honorable” thing, he ends up leading himself to his own defeat at Shrewsbury
He sins against his whole family and by thinking that love can be quantified. And as it turns out, Lear isn’t only separating his family but power and responsibility as well. His very unpredictable, easily aggravated temper causes him to act wrongly and irrationally towards Cordelia, his favorite daughter who, he believes has betrayed her. Lear cannot understand that anyone’s, let alone his daughter’s, love for him could be ‘nothing’. I think pride, anger and greed for power prompted Lear to make the decision of giving up the kingdom to his malicious, hateful and ungrateful daughters, Regan and Cordelia.