King Lear Act 1: Too much today. I'm in love with this play.

Intro:
So... I have already slightly messed up my order by doing Comedy of Errors before King Lear. I read Lear in anticipation of seeing it over my spring break Junior year. I was touring colleges with my soul twin and my mother and one was Pepperdine, where my dear friend Zac was in his first year and playing, if I remember correctly... the King of France? I fell in love just reading the play, so maybe that's part of why I fell in love with Pepperdine when I saw it. I remember my mom wouldn't sit through 3 hours of Shakespeare so Zac's mom offered to drive me through the canyon to our hotel after the performance so I could stay and watch. I LOVED it. It's kept a very tight grasp on my heart ever since then and many days I will say it's my favorite Shakespeare, or at least my favorite tragedy. Then, I revisited it during REN 500 and one of my favorite grad school memories is doing a group reading of this play in Grafton Library. Asae "cast" the reading and asked me to read Lear and during the storm scene everyone made the sound effects and it was so wonderful and we got so into it that the librarian had to interrupt because our sound was carrying from the enclosed study room out to the whole library. As for the class on Lear... to be honest, Professor Cohen's lecture on this play was a total blur because all I can remember is over half the class crying and crying by the end. So hold onto your tissues, and if you're a Lannister lover get ready for some ladies who can give Cersei a run for her money in femme fetale style and daddy issues...

1.1
Going right along with my Game of Thrones reference (because honestly, who ISN'T referencing it right now...) we get to start the play talking about bastards. Within the first 20 seconds of the play we hear Gloucester and Kent discussing Gloucester's bastard son Edmond. Kent immediately seems uncomfortable with the subject and I believe he tries to relieve that by playing dumb and when Gloucester then makes himself painfully clear, Kent has to try a new tactic:

KENT

I cannot conceive you.

GLOUCESTER

Sir, this young fellow's mother could: whereupon she grew round-wombed, and had, indeed, sir, a son for her cradle ere she had a husband for her bed. Do you smell a fault?

KENT

I cannot wish the fault undone, the issue of it being so proper.

GLOUCESTER

But I have, sir, a son by order of law, some year elder than this, who yet is no dearer in my account: though this knave came something saucily into the world before he was sent for, yet was his mother fair; there was good sport at his making, and the whoreson must be acknowledged. Do you know this
noble gentleman, Edmund?

So not only does Gloucester go on and on about his bastard son and how he was conceived- but surprise- did I forget to mention that Edmund has been right there this whole time!This, again, is a gold mine for an actor. What is your face giving away or witholding? Where on stage is this bastard? and do we know how much he lives up to his name? All staging/acting choices but what we do know is that from the moment he speaks there is awesomeness:

KENT

I must love you, and sue to know you better.

EDMUND

Sir, I shall study deserving.

Add that to sayings for our etsy shop. "I shall study deserving" brilliance.

 Shortly thereafter, the King and the rest of the royal family enter and after sending Gloucester to grab Cordelia's potential husbands we get the gist of the set up for the rest of the play:

KING LEAR

Meantime we shall express our darker purpose.
Give me the map there. Know that we have divided
In three our kingdom: and 'tis our fast intent
To shake all cares and business from our age;
Conferring them on younger strengths, while we
Unburthen'd crawl toward death.

 OK, this makes sense to me... why you would rather not still be Kinging it up when you are really old. But I was also pro-Pope Benedict stepping down. Where the trouble seems to come is here:

Tell me, my daughters,--
Since now we will divest us both of rule,
Interest of territory, cares of state,--
Which of you shall we say doth love us most?
That we our largest bounty may extend
Where nature doth with merit challenge. Goneril,
Our eldest-born, speak first.

 Dude... YOU NEVER divide a kingdom between rulers. House divided not standing and whatnot. Never good for the people of the realm. Clash of Kings and all that (or QUEENS?!) I get that you didn't have a son and the patriarchal inheriting thing is proving tricky for you but still... and THEN you are going to base the dividing of your country on how well people can flatter you? Even if this was somehow an exercise in how much people legit love you instead of claiming they do this is still a TERRIBLE idea. But Lear doesn't see that. and at this point no one is speaking up about it so on we go.

GONERIL

Sir, I love you more than words can wield the matter;
Dearer than eye-sight, space, and liberty;
Beyond what can be valued, rich or rare;
No less than life, with grace, health, beauty, honour;
As much as child e'er loved, or father found;
A love that makes breath poor, and speech unable;
Beyond all manner of so much I love you.

CORDELIA

[Aside] What shall Cordelia do?
Love, and be silent.

OK, so Goneril's speech is really beautiful. Beautiful enough that its one of those speeches that out of context, if you don't know what's coming, she seems like this lovely daughter, or hell, you could steal that, cut the lines about children and fathers and use that on your significant other. it's great. But you know Cordelia is a winner straight off b/c she uses these simplistic lines that you almost miss if you aren't paying attention, and they hold these grains of incredible wisdom. Love, and be silent- it's very "preach the gospel at all times, when necessary use words" to me. (of course the when necessary part Cordelia never quite accomplishes)

Moving on to the last sister, Regan uses the opportunity to piggy back on Goneril's clear success:

REGAN

I find she names my very deed of love;
Only she comes too short: that I profess
Myself an enemy to all other joys,
Which the most precious square of sense possesses;
And find I am alone felicitate
In your dear highness' love.

CORDELIA

[Aside] Then poor Cordelia!
And yet not so; since, I am sure, my love's
More richer than my tongue.

I will say right now that it always astounds me that people confuse Goneril and Regan and I think they are very different in their manners and cruelty. but more on that as the play progresses.

Now HERE's a twist. going along with the theme of talking about things you maybe shouldn't in front of your children, Lear says IN FRONT OF EVERYONE including his two other daughters that Cordelia is his favorite. He calls her his joy. He says although she was born last she is not least, etc. then the trouble starts:

KING LEAR

what can you say to draw
A third more opulent than your sisters? Speak.

CORDELIA

Nothing, my lord.

KING LEAR

Nothing!

CORDELIA

Nothing.

KING LEAR

Nothing will come of nothing: speak again.

CORDELIA

Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave
My heart into my mouth

I hear the nothing will come of nothing line in casual speech all the time, some from people knowingly referencing this and some from people I'm pretty sure have no idea it's even Shakespeare. and every time I want to tell them "I cannot heave my heart into my mouth". I LOVE that. There's something so perfectly painful and beautiful about not being able to express just how important someone is to you. Cordelia goes on to talk about how not marrying and not having a husband shows that she loves her father more. Logic that I find troubling... and again all this in front of her sisters who are both married and who she calls out for being married. Not the nicest sisterly thing to do but who knows what the sisterly history is there...

Lear then freaks the flip out and disowns Cordelia, and Kent finally speaks up against the madness and what is Lear's response?:

KING LEAR

Peace, Kent!
Come not between the dragon and his wrath.
I loved her most, and thought to set my rest
On her kind nursery. Hence, and avoid my sight!

Again, not being subtle with the who the favorite child was here...

KENT

Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least;
Nor are those empty-hearted whose low sound
Reverbs no hollowness.

KING LEAR

Kent, on thy life, no more.

KENT

My life I never held but as a pawn
To wage against thy enemies; nor fear to lose it,
Thy safety being the motive.

  Kent is not killed but banished and then the marrying off of Cordelia commences. Burgundy goes first but for him it was all about the dowry apparently because now he's not thrilled with marrying cordelia. France, though, steps it up:

KING OF FRANCE

Fairest Cordelia, that art most rich, being poor;
Most choice, forsaken; and most loved, despised!
Thee and thy virtues here I seize upon:
Be it lawful I take up what's cast away.
Gods, gods! 'tis strange that from their cold'st neglect
My love should kindle to inflamed respect.
Thy dowerless daughter, king, thrown to my chance,
Is queen of us, of ours, and our fair France:

So Cordelia is about to leave for France and her goodbye with her sisters is less than tender:

GONERIL

You have obedience scanted,
And well are worth the want that you have wanted.

Once Cordelia leaves the true colors come through:

REGAN

'Tis the infirmity of his age: yet he hath ever but slenderly known himself.

GONERIL

The best and soundest of his time hath been but rash; then must we look to receive from his age, not alone the imperfections of long-engraffed condition, but therewithal the unruly waywardness that infirm and choleric years bring with them.

1.2

My current FAVORITE male monogue- Edmond's stand up for bastard's speech. If you have any love of Shakespeare You should go read/memorize it all. It's certainly on my list. Here's a higlight:

Why bastard? wherefore base?
When my dimensions are as well compact,
My mind as generous, and my shape as true,
As honest madam's issue? Why brand they us
With base? with baseness? bastardy? base, base?
Who, in the lusty stealth of nature, take
More composition and fierce quality
Than doth, within a dull, stale, tired bed,
Go to the creating a whole tribe of fops,
Got 'tween asleep and wake? Now, gods, stand up for bastards!

OK, so that was more than just a higlight, that was at least half the speech, but COME ON it is SOOOO GOOD!!!! and you really can't beat this speech for teaching alliteration and the beauty of plosive consonants  

So, much like Richard III, Edmond has this kind of sex appeal based out of his utter honesty with being a villain. Unlike Richard III he shares his reasons and they are pretty interesting/ good discussion points. Succession passing only through married issue, being born strong and feisty, etc.

So then Gloucester comes in and Edmond begins his work screwing over his brother using a fake letter and reverse psychology.

Gloucester seems to blame the universe/the weather for all this hubbub:

These late eclipses in the sun and moon portend no good to us: though the wisdom of nature can reason it thus and thus, yet nature finds itself scourged by the sequent effects: love cools, friendship falls off, brothers divide: in cities, mutinies; in countries, discord; in palaces, treason; and the bond cracked 'twixt son and father. 

Edmond immediately makes fun of this:

This is the excellent foppery of the world, that, when we are sick in fortune,--often the surfeit of our own behavior,--we make guilty of our disasters the sun, the moon, and the stars: as if we were villains by necessity; fools by heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, and treachers, by spherical predominance; drunkards, liars, and adulterers, by an enforced obedience of planetary influence; and all that we are evil in, by a divine thrusting on: an admirable evasion of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish disposition to the charge of a star!

  Did you notice that was all one sentence? (according to the punctuation of this edition at least) Edmond has an incredible way of words and using complex structure to make his point. Probably something else that I think makes him sexy.

Edmond's brother Edgar (yeah, that's not confusing for new people. Shakespeare loves his super similar names doesn't he?) enters and there's an incredible bit of dramatic irony as edgar tries to figure out what's wrong and confides in his scheming brother:

EDGAR

Some villain hath done me wrong.

EDMUND

That's my fear.

  After toying with Edgar a bit more, Edmund has another badass soliloquy:

A credulous father! and a brother noble,
Whose nature is so far from doing harms,
That he suspects none: on whose foolish honesty
My practises ride easy! I see the business.
Let me, if not by birth, have lands by wit:
All with me's meet that I can fashion fit.

Add that to the etsy list: all with me's meet that I can fashion fit. Perfect.

1.3

a short scene where Goneril meets with Oswald (I knew there was a reason I took so much time to trust the original disney rabbit) and basically plans to intentionally piss her dad off enough that he will leave her place early and go to her sister's.

1.4

The execution of Goneril's plan. Kent comes back disguised to keep serving the king even though he's banished. I love love love Kent's lines. When Lear asks what he wants with him the answer is:

to serve him truly that will put me in trust: to love him that is honest; to converse with him that is wise, and says little; to fear judgment; to fight when I cannot choose; and to eat no fish.

the comedic "and to eat no fish" is actor gold.

maybe I just love Kent because I've been meditating on service quite a bit recently. There's a lot of discipleship language in this play and beautiful moments of agape so that's on my mind and heart a lot as I read through these scenes.

There's also some heartbreaking moments and quick turns from Lear throughout this scene:

KING LEAR
 But where's my fool? I have not seen him this two days.

Knight

Since my young lady's going into France, sir, the fool hath much pined away.

KING LEAR

No more of that; I have noted it well.

The switch between no more of that -the not wanting to think of Cordelia to the I have noted it well, it cannot be ignored is incredible. Cordelia's absence permeates this play.

Of course, this play also shows some horrific and cruel sides of humanity, and along with that there are some FANTASTIC curses. Let's start with Lear's:

'My lady's father'! my lord's knave: your whoreson dog! you slave! you cur! …

  and then Kent's very odd but delightful one:

… you base football player.

When Lear's fool does come onto the scene he is very pointed and beautiful and odd. He is constantly shaming the choice to divide his kingdom and give his crown away. there are also echoes of cordelia throughout:

KENT

This is nothing, fool.

Fool

Then 'tis like the breath of an unfee'd lawyer; you gave me nothing for't. Can you make no use of nothing, nuncle?

KING LEAR

Why, no, boy; nothing can be made out of nothing.

(Something to consider: a common doubling in this play is Cordelia with the Fool. So that makes this exchange even better...)
and there's this:

KING LEAR

Dost thou call me fool, boy?

Fool

All thy other titles thou hast given away; that
thou wast born with.

KENT

This is not altogether fool, my lord.

Going back to the Nothing theme, the fool has this speech:

I marvel what kin thou and thy daughters are:
they'll have me whipped for speaking true, thou'lt
have me whipped for lying; and sometimes I am
whipped for holding my peace. I had rather be any
kind o' thing than a fool: and yet I would not be
thee, nuncle; thou hast pared thy wit o' both sides,
and left nothing i' the middle: 

Goneril enters and in a very wordy, roundabout way tells her father to go away and that she wont put up with his knights anymore Lear's response is killer:

Are you our daughter?

 followed by:

KING LEAR

Doth any here know me? This is not Lear:
Doth Lear walk thus? speak thus? Where are his eyes?
Either his notion weakens, his discernings
Are lethargied--Ha! waking? 'tis not so.
Who is it that can tell me who I am?

Fool

Lear's shadow.

That exchange gives me chills. And what a pertinent question. Who is it that can tell me who I am? 

So Lear decides to leave:

Darkness and devils!
Saddle my horses; call my train together:
Degenerate bastard! I'll not trouble thee.
Yet have I left a daughter.

…

 O most small fault,
How ugly didst thou in Cordelia show!
That, like an engine, wrench'd my frame of nature
From the fix'd place; drew from heart all love,
And added to the gall. O Lear, Lear, Lear!
Beat at this gate, that let thy folly in,

And thy dear judgment out! 

  Firstly, Darkness and devils is SUCH a good swear! Secondly, I always wonder if the yet have I left a daughter is about Cordelia not Reagan. Finally, watching an actor beat at his head (especially in a play written after the onstage insanity in Tamburlaine...) is always a tense and heightened experience for an audience member. and a challenge for an actor. 

 Of course, Lear won't go before he places this horrifying curse on Goneril:

Hear, nature, hear; dear goddess, hear!
Suspend thy purpose, if thou didst intend
To make this creature fruitful!
Into her womb convey sterility!
Dry up in her the organs of increase;
And from her derogate body never spring
A babe to honour her

and then one of the most famous lines of the play:

How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is
To have a thankless child!

But amid all the horrible, angry things, the lines that break my heart in this scene (aside from the ones I addressed above about Lear's shadow):

Life and death! I am ashamed
That thou hast power to shake my manhood thus;
That these hot tears, which break from me perforce,
Should make thee worth them. 

Life and death is another awesome swear. and the sentiment that I wish i wouldn't cry because you are not worth my tears is so painful on both sides. Meanwhile, poor Albany seems totally clueless about all that has just happened and ends the scene with trying to keep his wife in check:

How far your eyes may pierce I can not tell:
Striving to better, oft we mar what's well.

1.5

The journey to Reagan's is about to commence and there's more heartbreaking interchange between Lear and his fool:

KING LEAR

I did her wrong--

Fool

Canst tell how an oyster makes his shell?

KING LEAR

No.

Fool

Nor I neither; but I can tell why a snail has a house.

KING LEAR

Why?

Fool

Why, to put his head in; not to give it away to his
daughters, and leave his horns without a case.

 It kills me that Lear recognizes his mistake so early in the play but does nothing to remedy the situation. Whether it is pride that keeps him from reaching out to Cordelia or that he's convinced that she would reject his apology or what.

Fool

If thou wert my fool, nuncle, I'ld have thee beaten for being old before thy time.

KING LEAR

How's that?

Fool

Thou shouldst not have been old till thou hadst been wise. 

And then an incredible performance line for an actor to walk:

KING LEAR

O, let me not be mad, not mad, sweet heaven
Keep me in temper: I would not be mad!

How wonderful that instead of trying to play mad you get to play fighting for your sanity. SO. BEAUTIFUL. and so strong to actively choose to fight the madness which would probably be a lot of emotional comfort given the situation. 

And that's Act I. Buckle up because all the acts are at least this long and I'm in love with ALL OF IT so there are a lot of lines I want to include. And here's a picture of the Pepperdine production of Lear that I saw a decade ago (and somehow i've never seen a production of lear since... must remedy that):

Additionally... I have been delayed in posting as I have been lesson planning fairly constantly for the four classes I am teaching at Brophy this summer. I am so excited to share my love of theatre with these wonderful young people in a community of faith!!