Character Development in King Lear
The characters of a story are what make up the story, the plot, the themes, the parallels all revolve around them and their condition. In every story, lay or novel, most of the characters go through a certain step-by-step process of self development, illustrated by the themes, which contributes greatly to the story as a whole, by concluding it or highlight the moral of the story and the messages the author is trying to convey. Such character development is very evident in Shakespeare's "King Lear" In "King Lear" the central character, King Lear himself goes through a process of self-development as the tragedy of Lear begins to unfold in the very beginning of the play. The themes surrounding this characters development are self-knowledge; the recurring images of sight and blindness, identity and consciousness and the variety of literary techniques used by Shakespeare to portray these themes are imagery, symbolism and irony.
The character of Lear starts deteriorating after he hands over his kingdom to his daughters, and expels Cordelia from the kingdom. " Lear is also unable to "see" the insincerity and hypocrisy in the love of his other two daughters, Goneril and Regan. Another part of the play which is also ironic to the process of his developing as a character as a whole is, when he rips his clothes, this ripping of the clothes symbolises his ripping away his identity as well as the stripping and loss of his status-something he had already lost to his daughters, the ripping also symbolises the return to the more human self, from a life of luxuries to being the parallel of a poor beggar who has "nothing. King Lear in the play often questions his own identity-"Is this Lear?" "Where are his eyes?" In these lines Lear questions himself as if he has forgotten who he is, forgotten his identity, his status, which is ironic to his self-development stage. It also illustrates the fact that, man often tends to get carried away by his emotions and realizes his mistakes and the flaws in his nature when it is finally too late. It is ironic how everyone except Lear sees the truth of the matter and how everyone recognizes his lack of self-knowledge, in the quest of which Lear develops his character-"Yet he hath ever but slenderly known himself. " The once sightless Lea has now started to see. In Act 4 Lear meets the Earl of Gloucester at Dover, Gloucester's condition reflects Lear's and it is at that point that that reflection makes Lear realize his mistakes and come to a complete stage of self consciousness and self knowledge, culminating his process of character development. Lear finally realizes his past mistakes at the nadir of his life "I hath ta'en too little care of this. " In this line Lear's own daughter, Regan recognizes the fact that her father does not know himself. Kent beseeching Lear to "see better," introduces the audience to his metaphorical blindness. This process contributes to the play as a whole in making "King Lear" a successful tragedy, through portraying the human condition of suffering and being the protagonist. When the Earl of Kent sees this he recognizes the truth in Cordelia's love and implores Lear to "see better. " In other words, he was asking Lear to look beyond his vanity, monarchical arrogance and inner pride and be able to identify the truth.
Common topics in this essay:
King Lear,
Earl Kent,
,
Dover Gloucester's,
king lear,
character development,
cordelia's love,
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