Identity and Nature in King Lear

After finishing King Lear, I’m sort of sad that so many of the characters were killed. Not only were the “bad guys” killed off, but others like Gloucester, Cordelia, and Lear. Not only were they killed, but both Gloucester and Lear died in moments that could have potentially been a happy time for them. Gloucester dies when Edgar reveals himself, and Lear dies when he thinks Cordelia might be beginning to breathe again. Despite being depressing, I thought that these events added to our discussion on the play supporting nihilism. Perhaps as readers we are supposed to look at the deaths of these characters and use it to propel a questioning of our own lives, and observe them to see if there actually is any meaning to them.

Something else I still find to be interesting after finishing the play is Lear’s regression or descent from King to an almost non-human being. I liked that when Lear gave his daughters his kingdom to rule, that he was basically removing himself from the position of king, and thus, a position of authority. I think we talked in class about how Lear was able to regain power over himself/his life through this regression to a more animalistic way of living. He removes the clothes which helped create his identity of a king, and formulates his own natural identity based on his connection to nature. The idea of natural also relates to Edmund, who is “natural” born, or illegitimate. Because of this Edmund is unable to get the position of power that he longs for, and has to resort to other, more shady ways of getting it.

Albany, Tellin' It Like It Is

If you ask me, Regan is more horrific than her sister--just because she witnesses and endorses the eye-gouging in Act III and has the audacity to suggest Gloucester smell his way to Dover--but Goneril is pretty awful too. By virtue of being the eldest of Lear's daughters, it stands to reason that Regan takes cues from her. (We see in 2.4 how they collaborate to strip Lear of his train. It's as if they feed on each other's nastiness in snowballing the matter.) But I wanted to take a look at what Albany has to say about his beloved wife in 4.2, as the language is particularly graphic and condemning.

Allow me to preface this reading with two thumbs up for Albany, who defies his "monster" of a mistress though she bests him as a soldier (4.5.5). He is the only character who has changed allegiances thus far, the only one who as opted for action over passivity. If Goneril and Regan are "unnatural" for all but disowning their feminine sides--that is, their innate desire to nurture and keep the peace--then Albany is "natural" for performing the more masculine function of maintaining order by at least giving Goneril a piece of his mind and refusing to fight her battle against Lear and his French allies. I hope he doesn't die in Act V.

"O Goneril!...I fear your disposition," Albany cries upon accosting his wife (4.2.30-2). "Disposition" here is a particularly apt pun, denoting mood, physical condition, and displacement, according to the OED. This one statement, therefore, foreshadows Goneril's fall from power (which we sense is inevitable; she is a villain after all) and the deterioration of her physical self (her "body," or following of soldiers). A little close reading, and we know she's going to get creamed by the French.

That nature, which contemns it origin,
Cannot be bordered certain in itself.
She that herself will sliver and disbranch
From her material sap, perforce must wither
And come to deadly use. (4.2.33-7)

The imagery here speaks to Goneril's unnaturalness as a creature that bites the hand that feeds it. Sap here, to continue to the extended tree metaphor, symbolizes blood; and material sap may be considered flesh. Disbranching, then, is dismemberment. This alludes to the gouging of Gloucester's eyes (which Goneril, admittedly, has nothing to do with) and to the dismissal of King Lear from his status as king and father. He who bestowed upon Goneril her royal blood, her life, and her legacy is cast off, but not without repercussions.

Albany continues by calling Goneril and her sister "Tigers" (41)--predatory, carnivorous--then "barbarous," "degenerate," and "vile." Perhaps this is Shakespeare demonstrating through his word choice that self-predation, a tendency to attack oneself via one's kin, is what separates man from beast or at least that which is humane from that which is barbaric. To show his humanity, Albany resists the urge to dismember her ("dislocate and tear/ They flesh and bones" (66-7)) because she is a woman in form and must therefore harbor some of that womanly essence he has been taught to respect. I think Shakespeare realizes that his female villains are all the more provoking for being so far from what we expect a woman to be by her nature.