The scene starts with Edmond receiving word that the Duke of Cornwall and Regan are coming with Gloucester, so Edmond sends Edgar away as seeming to help him, then:
Some blood drawn on me would beget opinion.
[ Wounds his arm]
Of my more fierce endeavour: I have seen drunkards
Do more than this in sport.
(in this way he kind of reminds me of the anti-Parolles...)
Edmond then tells Gloucester how he got this wound arguing with Edgar, and how he told his brother:
Spoke, with how manifold and strong a bond
The child was bound to the father;
On the note of parents and children, can I just say that I'm interested in the nature/nurture arguments to be had about both edmond and his brother as well as cordelia and her sisters... that could be a fun classroom discussion.
Regan and her husband then join the scene and hope to turn Edgar's accusation to their own good:
REGAN
What, did my father's godson seek your life?
He whom my father named? your Edgar?
GLOUCESTER
O, lady, lady, shame would have it hid!
REGAN
Was he not companion with the riotous knights
That tend upon my father?
Then Cornwall offers commendations to Edmund he will probably come to regret:
For you, Edmund,
Whose virtue and obedience doth this instant
So much commend itself, you shall be ours:
Natures of such deep trust we shall much need;
You we first seize on.
2.2
Before Gloucester's gates Kent meets Osmund and gives Osmund some more fabulous insults:
OSWALD
What dost thou know me for?
KENT
A knave; a rascal; an eater of broken meats; a base, proud, shallow, beggarly, three-suited, hundred-pound, filthy, worsted-stocking knave; a lily-livered, action-taking knave, a whoreson, glass-gazing, super-serviceable finical rogue; one-trunk-inheriting slave; one that wouldst be a bawd, in way of good service, and art nothing but the composition of a knave, beggar, coward, pandar, and the son and heir of a mongrel bitch: one whom I will beat into clamorous whining, if thou deniest the least syllable of thy addition. and then later on: Thou whoreson zed! thou unnecessary letter! My lord, if you will give me leave, I will tread this unbolted villain into mortar, and daub the wall of a jakes with him
Oswald is upset by this until Kent draws his sword and Oswald runs away like the fops Edmund hates.
their arguing draws a crowd and out come Regan, Cornwall, Edmund, and Gloucester.
Kent is put in the stocks and tells Gloucester not to bother pleading for him. and then, left alone on stage, Kent continues to be amazing:
To the warm sun!
Approach, thou beacon to this under globe,
That by thy comfortable beams I may
Peruse this letter! Nothing almost sees miracles
But misery: I know 'tis from Cordelia,
Who hath most fortunately been inform'd
Of my obscured course; and shall find time
From this enormous state, seeking to give
Losses their remedies.
2.3
OK, maybe act II is slightly shorter than act I, or else I reigned myself in a little after yesterday (doubtful though, my favorite parts are still to come...)
This whole scene is Edgar's chance to soliloquize and a lovely one it is, he gives us his general plan of how he's going to survive while everyone thinks him guilty of trying to kill his father:
my face I'll grime with filth;
Blanket my loins: elf all my hair in knots;
And with presented nakedness out-face
The winds and persecutions of the sky.
The country gives me proof and precedent
Of Bedlam beggars, who, with roaring voices,
Strike in their numb'd and mortified bare arms
...
Sometime with lunatic bans, sometime with prayers,
Enforce their charity. Poor Turlygod! poor Tom!
That's something yet: Edgar I nothing am.
And we're back to the theme of nothing and nothingness. The greatest acts in the play get to come from those who experience this "nothing" paradox. I'm beginning to wonder if this is part of why I immediately loved playing Anne Dexter in The Queens... she is called nothing right and left...
2.4
Kent returns to Lear in the stocks and they have a dialogue that I'm fairly sure inspired dr. seuss, including:
KING LEAR
By Jupiter, I swear, no.
KENT
By Juno, I swear, ay.
KING LEAR
They durst not do 't;
They could not, would not do 't
The Fool then has this little insight:
Fortune, that arrant whore,
Ne'er turns the key to the poor. (does this remind anyone else of Ben from Lost and his commentary on Fortune's good friend Destiny???)
When Kent asks the fool where Lear's train went, he get's this little ditty as part of his answer:
That sir which serves and seeks for gain,
And follows but for form,
Will pack when it begins to rain,
And leave thee in the storm,
But I will tarry; the fool will stay,
And let the wise man fly:
The knave turns fool that runs away;
The fool no knave, perdy.
Eventually Lear gets to see Regan and Cornwall and remember when I said I think Regan and Goneril are quite different? Goneril had long roundabout coils of sentences blaming mostly her father's knights and was begins quite passive aggressive towards Lear, Regan on the other hand, almost immediately starts in with this:
O, sir, you are old.
Nature in you stands on the very verge
Of her confine: you should be ruled and led
By some discretion, that discerns your state
Better than you yourself. Therefore, I pray you,
That to our sister you do make return;
Say you have wrong'd her, sir.
Yikes. I like to think of Regan as a vicious Lion (mostly because a Tiger will always be Evadne or Margaret for me...) and Goneril as a snake... and shortly after this exchange we get to see the two sisters in action together:
REGAN
I dare avouch it, sir: what, fifty followers?
Is it not well? What should you need of more?
GONERIL
Why might not you, my lord, receive attendance
From those that she calls servants or from mine?
REGAN
Why not, my lord? If then they chanced to slack you,
We could control them. If you will come to me,--
For now I spy a danger,--I entreat you
To bring but five and twenty: to no more
Will I give place or notice.
KING LEAR
I gave you all--
(CUE MUMFORD AND SONS REFERENCE I really don't know how you can hear that song and not think of Lear...)
REGAN
And in good time you gave it.
KING LEAR
Made you my guardians, my depositaries;
But kept a reservation to be follow'd
With such a number. What, must I come to you
With five and twenty, Regan? said you so?
REGAN
And speak't again, my lord; no more with me.
The sisters continue to outbid each other on lowering the number of Knights Lear should have with him until Regan forbids him even one.
After that Lear really starts to spiral into dark places:
You see me here, you gods, a poor old man,
As full of grief as age; wretched in both!
If it be you that stir these daughters' hearts
Against their father, fool me not so much
To bear it tamely; touch me with noble anger,
And let not women's weapons, water-drops,
Stain my man's cheeks! ...
No, I'll not weep:
I have full cause of weeping; but this heart
Shall break into a hundred thousand flaws,
Or ere I'll weep. O fool, I shall go mad!
The fool has no lines during the horrible exchange Lear has with his daughters but I think whatever the fool is left to do/how the reactions happen while the fool listens will speak volumes to any audience. The desperation and profound disillusionment and confusion and just... ALL THE FEELINGS.
And then THE STORM begins. but we'll really get into all that next time...
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