| I have no way, and therefore want no eyes:I stumbled when I saw. | Author: Shakespeare Work: King LearGloucester; 4.1.20-21-want = desire (double meaning) –> not want and don’t lack –> stumble when saw |
| O gods! Who is’t can say ‘I am at the worst’?I am worse than e’er I was.And worse I may be yet; the worst is notSo long as we can say ‘This is the worst.’ | Author: Shakespeare Work: King LearEdgar (as Poor Tom); -countrymen walking with father-able to say this is the worse –> we know things have to get better |
| As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods,They kill us for their sport. | Author: Shakespeare Work: King LearGloucester;4.1.39-40-terrifying claim of universe-monosyllable-gods torturing us <– how else to explain what happen, has to be |
| If that the heavens do not their visible spiritsSend quickly down to tame these vile offences,It will come:Humanity must perforce prey on itself,Like monsters of the deep. | Author: Shakespeare Work: King LearAlbany, on Goneril’s injustices; 4.2.47-51-horrified who married to (family)-if heavens don’t punish –> test case –> humanity is going to eat itself up-no natural principle or benign gods –> where at we –> humanity is going to eat itself up |
| There is a cliff whose high and bending headLooks fearfully in the confined deep:Bring me but to the very brim of it,And I’ll repair the misery thou dost bearWith something rich about me. From that placeI shall no leading need. | Author: Shakespeare Work: King LearGloucester;4.1.76-81- offer bribe companion to help him commit sucide and make sure worth your time. |
| Come on, sir, here’s the place. Stand still: how fearfulAnd dizzy ’tis to cast one’s eyes so low.The crows and choughs that wing the midway airShow scarce so gross as beetles. Half-way downHangs one that gathers samphire, dreadful trade;Methinks he seems no bigger than his head.The fisherman that walk upon the beachAppear like mice, and yon tall anchoring barqueDiminished to her cock, her cock a buoyAlmost too small for sight. The murmuring surgeThat on th’unnumbered idle pebble chafes,Cannot be heard so high. I’ll look no more,Lest my brain turn and the deficient sightTopple down headlong. | Author: Shakespeare Work: King LearEdgar’s deception; 4.6.11-24-Shake shows us how to create fiction and believe and on stage audience-we recog. we’re watching a play w/in a play w’in a play – about performance <– not really kill self, 1. role w/in in role w/in role |
| Why I do trifle with his despairIs done to cure it. 4.6.33-34 [Aside]Is done to cure it. O you mighty gods”shared line” | Author: Shakespeare Work: King LearEdgar, shared line with Glouc.-cure Glou. -irony: Glou. can’t hear Edgar say first 1/2 of line (aside), don’t know sharing line, iambic pentameter -violates realism, play w/ convention of theater inside |
| Ten masts at each make not the altitudeWhich thou hast perpendicularly fell.Thy life’s a miracle. | Author: Shakespeare Work: King LearEdgar; 4.6.53-55-saved Glouc. |
| As I stood here below methought his eyesWere two full moons. He had a thousand noses,Horns whelked and waved like the enraged sea.It was some fiend. Therefore, thou happy father,Think that the clearest gods, who make them honoursOf men’s impossibilities, have preserved thee. | Author: Shakespeare Work: King LearEdgar on the ‘fiend’; 4.6.69-74-detail -why ppl would buy for poetry, not plot -lear appear like man or nature, reunion w/ Glouc. |
| Your eyes are in a heavy case, your purse in a light, yet you see how this world goes. | Author: Shakespeare Work: King LearLear 4.6.142-45-how world goes –> King Lear about -feelingly –> see in painful and touching way |
| What, art mad? A man may see how this world goes with no eyes. Look with thine ears. See how yon justice rails upon yon simple thief. Hark in thine ear: change places and handy-dandy, which is the justice, which is the thief? Thou hast seen a farmer’s dog bark at a beggar? . . . And the creature run What, art mad? A man may see how this world goes with no eyes. Look with thine ears. See how yon justice rails upon yon simple thief. Hark in thine ear: change places and handy-dandy, which is the justice, which is the thief? Thou hast seen a farmer’s dog bark at a beggar? . . . And the creature runfrom the cur–there thou mightst behold the great image of authority: a dog’s obeyed in office. | Author: Shakespeare Work: King LearLear on ‘justice’ and ‘authority’; 4.6.146-155-which justice and which their authority -aut. –> dog w/ teeth chasing beggar, can bite, look out for it, haunting def. of power-see child die –> tough |
| Howl, howl, howl, howl! O, you are men of stones!Had I your tongues and eyes, I’d use them soThat heaven’s vault should crack: she’s gone for ever.I know when one is dead and when one lives;She’s dead as earth. Is this the promised end?Or image of that horror?Fall, and cease.And my poor fool is hanged. No, no, no life!Why should a dog, a horse, a rat have lifeAnd thou no breath at all? O thou’lt come no more,Never, never, never, never, never.Pray you undo this button. Thank you, sir.O, O, O, O.Do you see this? Look on her: look, her lips,Look there, look there!epilogueThe weight of this sad time we must obey,Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say.The oldest hath borne most; we that are youngShall never see so much, nor live so long. | Author: Shakespeare Work: King LearLear – maybe breath there, maybe still alive (convincing self, hope upon hope)-actors say pentameter -> watch end of world-Cordelia was foolish to think she was a good father-never = 5x –> never happened in other play “O” -> nothing, but means everything-dies of broken heart, daughter die and father dyring (emotional death) |
King Lear: Is This the Promised End
July 12, 2019