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Each edition includes:
• Freshly edited text based on the best earlyprinted version of the play
• Full explanatory notes conveniently placed on pages facing the text of the play
• Scene-by-scene plot summaries
• A key to famous lines and phrases
• An introduction to reading Shakespeare's language
• An essay by an outstanding scholar providing a modern perspective on the play
• Illustrations from the Folger Shakespeare Library's vast holdings of rare books
Essay by Susan Snyder
The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., is home to the world's largest collection of Shakespeare's printed works, and a magnet for Shakespeare scholars from around the globe. In addition to exhibitions open to the public throughout the year, the Folger offers a full calendar of performances and programs.
tragic,ironic,extreme... Such extremes of emotional manipulation as are encountered in King Lear would antagonize me if I encountered them in an ordinary work of fiction or a film. There is such a degree of unreasonable pettiness in King Lear's attitude; there is so much gratuitous malice in the evil designs of the older daughters and the Duke of Cornwall;such despicable treachery on the part of Edmund,etc.,etc,. Obviously the play transcends melodrama through Shakespeare's marvelous use of language. Instead of seeming two-dimensional, the characters take on a larger-than-life aspect through their undiluted manifestation of such strong emotions. The dramatic devices might seem a little contrived but the dialogue and those periodic observations made about life,it seems to me, are what this play is really about. The ironic penetrating mockeries of the Fool and the tragic blend of madness and wisdom in the later Lear were, I thought very important elements which contributed in making the play a masterpiece. I don't pretend to be an authority on Shakespeare; these are just the opinions of an admirer. The Folger edition was very helpful to me in getting the meaning from old words and words whose meanings have changed.
FOLGER Shakespeare Library Edition of the Tragedy of King Lear BETTER THAN EXPECTED! I have reviewed several current editions of King Lear and other Shakespearean plays, and was somewhat disappointed in the Folger edition of King Richard III. Nevertheless, the Folger Shakespeare Library edition of King Lear appears to be both accessible and scholarly, with solid reasoning behind its balance of the First Quarto with the First Folio versions of this intense and telling tragedy which we do well to revisit now.
My first love will always be Prof. Tucker Brook's redaction in the The Tragedy Of King Lear (The Yale Shakespeare) which against the academic preferences of the time chose the First Quarto over the First Folio. The reasons given by the Late Prof. are compelling, and brought about a generation of conflated editions which combined the two versions. The Quarto came first in publication, of course, and is longer; the Folio is later and does not contain several lines present in the Quarto (I believe about three hundred) yet introduces several (perhaps one hundred) of its own.
And so we have a generation of productions which sought to combine the two. For instance we have an early recording of Paul Scofield as the King using a conflated edition and a later recording from his eighties in which only the Folio is used: King Lear (Naxos AudioBooks), following as it states the The Tragedy of King Lear (The New Cambridge Shakespeare), a strictly First Folio presentation. The greatest available recording is of course the Branagh - Gielgud production King Lear (BBC Radio Presents) which must be purchased and repeatedly heard, as it is real. Be certain to get the accompanying brochure.
Be that as it may, with this brief description of the history of this tortured text, let me state this present edition from Folger presents solid reasons for its always arbitrary choices. While stating their preference for the First Folio edition, they actually publish here a conflated version, with variant readings in a variety of brackets and poiinted parentheses, with explanations. They have produced therefore something here of great value, yet at a small price and therefore accessible to any classroom, production company or reader.
As usual the Folger diverges from the usual Critical Edition format of a third of a page of text, a strip of variorum and a third of a page of notes to the text above. Folger correctly fids more readable a diptych approach. In opening the book to the play, the reader discovers on the right hand page the text and on the left hand page notes. Further specific notes are discovered in the back.
In short (if it is not too late to write that) this book may approach any other critical edition, and passes many (let us not mention the unfortunate Joe Pearce's attempt). It presents a thorough examination of Shakespeare's life and theatre, suggestions on reading "his" language, and on reading Lear, this great tragedy for our times. A critical essay by Susan Snyder is included in the back, as well as suggestions for further readings. I find this edition in brief very useful for any new scholar of Lear, and I only wish I could now afford the new King Lear: New Critical Essays (Shakespeare Criticism), or even Critical Essays on Shakespeare's King Lear (Critical Essays on British Literature), and the rest.
A tragic action without possible return! King Lear`s fatality cannot be invocated as a divine curse. When Lear renounces to be at charge of his kingdom wrought with the ferocity of his soldiers and irrigated with the blood of his troops, begins his own fall, because you cannot be king without a kingdom.
The nature denied Lear the possibility of a male inheritor, so under the perspective of his imminent death, decides to bet in the unpredictable roulette of the emotions a test of love to find out which one of his daughters loves him more.
Betrayal and deception because his favourite daughter replies him with flippancy and without any signal of sincere gratitude. This fact will untie his repressed anger, proceeding to disinherit her. This is the decisive spark that will ignite the stage in the primary plot.
In the secondary but no least important dramatic tie, Gloucester will believe in Edmund's eloquence and juridical device supported by a false letter in which Edgar claims unsaid ambitions. Gloucester will lose himself at the moment he has preferred to believe his illegitimate son instead his legitimate Edgar.
Betrayal and distrust; jealous and rivalries; perversion and immorality will convey to all these personages into a fatidic whirlwind of predictable consequences.
All tragedy traduces and reaffirms the aspiration of the human being to enhance himself through an act of unexpected valour, to acquire a new level of his grandness in front of the obstacles, the unknown that finds in the world as well as the society of his time. Andre Bonnard
One of the most important works of this colossus of the dramaturgy. A must - read.
All's cheerless, dark and deadly Lear starts his tragedy with a lie. He has divided his kingdom into one larger and two smaller equal parts and promises to give the larger part to that of his daughters who vows the strongest love for him. Yet after Goneril speaks he immediately awards her one of the smaller parts, instead of listening to her sisters and then deciding the fate of the largest bounty. He thus negates his word and turns the auction into a formality for his pre-arranged plan of giving Cordelia the largest part and her sisters the two smaller parts. The whole scene is crass and the king is doubly crass (once for the auction, once more for the lie). He gives his word on the auction on line 52, breaks it on line 69 and forgets about his lie on line 193 where he rages at Kent for urging him to renege on his allegedly never broken word.
Lear starts his tragedy a crazy man. Cordelia's attempt at expressing that she "obeys, loves and most honors" the king only earns her being disowned half a page later. This precipitous fall from being the favorite daughter slated to receive the largest part of the kingdom to the one who "better ... hadst not been born" is incredible.
Most of all, this is a tragedy of detachment. Lear and Cornwall obviously do not have a relationship with their children and know nothing about their children's true feelings for them. Lear does not hear Cordelia and Gloucester does not try to hear Edgar out. Both have to face devastating atrocities before they see their children for who they are. "To willful men the injuries that they themselves procure must be their schoolmasters". They both suffer when they feel unloved by their offspring, they both die before they can enjoy their children's love. The suffering of the two old men is unrelenting, and in this sense "Lear" is as heartbreaking as "Macbeth" is macabre and "Othello" is insidious.
The balance of power, 4:4 (Cordelia, Fool, Kent and Edgar against Gonereil, Reagan, Edgar and Cornwall, with Lear and Glocester in the middle and Albany largely on the fence), is tilted towards the higher ranked evil four. In a game of chess, the former four would have been pawns, knights and bishops and the latter queens and rooks. In the end, Kent and Edgar, a knight and a pawn, save the day.
And yet, the end of the play offers no redemption. The two old men are dead. All those devoted to them are either dead or despondent. The Fool, his spirit giving out as he urged Lear to go back to the two evil daughters and ask their blessing, disappears from the play without a grace. Kent is preparing to follow Lear into the world of shadows. Cordelia is murdered and Edgar predicts an uninspiring future for himself and the young that remain. There is no consolation for dead or living.
The tragedy of Lear. I recently re-read KING LEAR prior to attending The Denver Theatre Company's performance of this play. Shakespeare (1564-1616) wrote this emotionally-moving tragedy between 1603 and 1606, and it was performed for the first time in 1606. With its insights into the nature of human suffering and kinship, and its theme of human blindness, it is regarded as one of Shakespeare's greatest tragedies.
KING LEAR is based on the legend of King Leir, a king of pre-Roman Britain. It tells the story of King Lear's decision to abdicate the throne and divide his kingdom among his three daughters, Goneril, Regan and Cordelia. In a moment of vanity, Lear decides to divide his lands according to how much each daughter demonstrates her love for him. Because Cordelia refuses to engage such a contest of flattery with her elder sisters, Lear divides his kingdom between Goneril and Regan, banishing Cordelia. Despite her disinheritance, the King of France marries her. Soonafter abdicating his throne, Lear discovers that Goneril and Regan's feelings for him have grown cold. Meanwhile, Goneril and Regan also have a falling out with one another while defending Cordelia's army from France, sent to restore Lear to his throne. Goneril poisons Regan, then stabs herself.
In a subplot, involving the Earl of Gloucester two sons, Edmund concocts false stories about his legitimate half-brother, Edgar, who is forced into exile. Edmund then aligns himself with Goneril and Regan, and his father is blinded by Regan's husband. Edgar, disguised as a lunatic, finds his blinded father out wandering in a storm, trying to find his the way to Dover.
In Dover, Lear, who has gone raving mad, is reunited with Gloucester, Edgar, and Cordelia before the battle between Britain and France. When the French lose, Edmund orders the execution of Lear and Cordelia. Edgar, still in disguise, reveals himself to Edmund before killing his evil half brother. Although Edmund stays the execution of Lear and Cordelia, unfortunately, the reprieve comes too late as Lear enters the scene carrying Cordelia's dead body in his arms. Then he dies.
As a tragedy, KING LEAR is appealing for its nihilistic conclusion that human existence is essentially meaningless, and that life is devoid of a true morality.
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