ABSTRACT
Shakespeare was in his forty-second year, at the very height of his gigantic powers, and “King Lear” one of his greatest successes. In any ordinary play the effort would be made to show Cordelia and King Lear losing their tempers with each other, and to make that mere misunderstanding the very basis of the tragedy. This “Tragedy of King Lear” is a rainbow, of which we see but half. Only a shallow judgment sees evil; for it is the very mystery of pain that love becomes unconscious of suffering. So Shakespeare saw two plots: In that of Lear a father has two daughters, sinister but approved, and one faithful but repudiated, while in that of Gloucester a father has one son foul and acceptable, and another son honourable but disinherited. The parallel is very close, and of the two stories welded together he builded his stupendous tragedy.
