The Fool and Cordelia: Opposing Influences on King Lear.
While Cordelia is banished from Lear’s sight the Fool remains serving to a large extent as the representative of the pole opposed to reason and in Cordelia’s absence, as its most effective voice the fact that Cordelia and the Fool never appear on the stage together- added to the fact that all female parts on the Elizabathan stage were in any case played by males- suggests that their.
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King Lear - Discuss the role of the fool in King Lear and his function in the unfolding of the plot. King Lear', the Fool is a character of dramatic importance in the play. The Fool helps the reader, and in Shakespeare's time would help the audience, to understand what lies beneath the surface of certain actions or verses.
Cordelia genuinely loves her father, but her refusal to flatter him leads to the tragedy that unfolds. Cordelia's tears at the news of her father's treatment prove her compassion and establish that she is, indeed, the opposite of her sisters. Cordelia has no desire for revenge, nor any need to make her father suffer for having misjudged her.
King Lear is first presented in the first scene as an egocentric man who is ignorant of the many flaws in his personality. Lear has formed himself a personality and defined himself as an individual and utterly refuses to give up this vision of himself, one can only imagine the figure that Lear must have once been considering the absolute dominance and control that he exerts over the others.
This is the same with the fool. The fool must somehow like Lear, as he is constantly with him entertaining him. If Lear is so vain and rash, then there is a good chance that the fool will never wanted to accompany Lear in the first place.
An interesting principle is the ways Shakespeare presents Edgar in the play “King Lear”. Edgar is the genuine child of Gloucester and his illegitimate sibling Edmund, wishes to take his dad’s land, so he says to his daddy that Edgar is preparing to eliminate him, and tells Edgar to get away.