King Lear: Annotated version of King Lear with in-depth literary analysis

by William Shakespeare

I thought the king had more affected the Duke of Albany than Cornwall.

ACT I SCENE I. King Lear's palace. Enter KENT, GLOUCESTER, and EDMUND KENT I thought the king had more affected the Duke of Albany than Cornwall.

It did always seem so to us: but now, in the division of the kingdom, it appears not which of the dukes he values most; for equalities are so weighed, that curiosity in neither can make choice of either's moiety.

GLOUCESTER It did always seem so to us: but now, in the division of the kingdom, it appears not which of the dukes he values most; for equalities are so weighed, that curiosity in neither can make choice of either's moiety.

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?

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?

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.

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?

Love, and be silent.

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

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.

my love's More richer than my tongue.

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

Nothing will come of nothing: speak again.

I cannot heave My heart into my mouth: I love your majesty According to my bond; nor more nor less.

CORDELIA Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave My heart into my mouth: I love your majesty According to my bond; nor more nor less.

How, how, Cordelia! mend your speech a little, Lest it may mar your fortunes.

KING LEAR How, how, Cordelia! mend your speech a little, Lest it may mar your fortunes.

Let it be so; thy truth, then, be thy dower:

Think'st thou that duty shall have dread to speak, When power to flattery bows?

And, in thy best consideration, cheque This hideous rashness: answer my life my judgment, Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least; Nor are those empty-hearted whose low sound Reverbs no hollowness.

KENT Let it fall rather, though the fork invade The region of my heart: be Kent unmannerly, When Lear is mad. What wilt thou do, old man? Think'st thou that duty shall have dread to speak, When power to flattery bows? To plainness honour's bound, When majesty stoops to folly. Reverse thy doom; And, in thy best consideration, cheque This hideous rashness: answer my life my judgment, Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least; Nor are those empty-hearted whose low sound Reverbs no hollowness.

Fare thee well, king: sith thus thou wilt appear, Freedom lives hence, and banishment is here. To CORDELIA The gods to their dear shelter take thee, maid, That justly think'st, and hast most rightly said! To REGAN and GONERIL And your large speeches may your deeds approve, That good effects may spring from words of love. Thus Kent, O princes, bids you all adieu; He'll shape his old course in a country new.

KENT Fare thee well, king: sith thus thou wilt appear, Freedom lives hence, and banishment is here. To CORDELIA The gods to their dear shelter take thee, maid, That justly think'st, and hast most rightly said! To REGAN and GONERIL And your large speeches may your deeds approve, That good effects may spring from words of love. Thus Kent, O princes, bids you all adieu; He'll shape his old course in a country new.

I yet beseech your majesty,-- If for I want that glib and oily art, To speak and purpose not; since what I well intend, I'll do't before I speak,--that you make known It is no vicious blot, murder, or foulness, No unchaste action, or dishonour'd step, That hath deprived me of your grace and favour; But even for want of that for which I am richer, A still-soliciting eye, and such a tongue As I am glad I have not, though not to have it Hath lost me in your liking.

CORDELIA I yet beseech your majesty,-- If for I want that glib and oily art, To speak and purpose not; since what I well intend, I'll do't before I speak,--that you make known It is no vicious blot, murder, or foulness, No unchaste action, or dishonour'd step, That hath deprived me of your grace and favour; But even for want of that for which I am richer, A still-soliciting eye, and such a tongue As I am glad I have not, though not to have it Hath lost me in your liking.

Better thou Hadst not been born than not to have pleased me better.

Love's not love When it is mingled with regards that stand Aloof from the entire point.

She is herself a dowry.

KING OF FRANCE Is it but this,--a tardiness in nature Which often leaves the history unspoke That it intends to do? My lord of Burgundy, What say you to the lady? Love's not love When it is mingled with regards that stand Aloof from the entire point. Will you have her? She is herself a dowry.

Peace be with Burgundy! Since that respects of fortune are his love, I shall not be his wife.

CORDELIA Peace be with Burgundy! Since that respects of fortune are his love, I shall not be his wife.

Fairest Cordelia, that art most rich, being poor; Most choice, forsaken; and most loved, despised!

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: Not all the dukes of waterish Burgundy Can buy this unprized precious maid of me. Bid them farewell, Cordelia, though unkind: Thou losest here, a better where to find.

Gods, gods! 'tis strange that from their cold'st neglect My love should kindle to inflamed respect.

Thou losest here, a better where to find.

Time shall unfold what plaited cunning hides: Who cover faults, at last shame them derides.

CORDELIA Time shall unfold what plaited cunning hides: Who cover faults, at last shame them derides. Well may you prosper!

You see how full of changes his age is; the observation we have made of it hath not been little: he always loved our sister most; and with what poor judgment he hath now cast her off appears too grossly.

GONERIL Sister, it is not a little I have to say of what most nearly appertains to us both. I think our father will hence to-night. REGAN That's most certain, and with you; next month with us. GONERIL You see how full of changes his age is; the observation we have made of it hath not been little: he always loved our sister most; and with what poor judgment he hath now cast her off appears too grossly.

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

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.

Now, gods, stand up for bastards!

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. This villain of mine comes under the prediction; there's son against father: the king falls from bias of nature; there's father against child. We have seen the best of our time: machinations, hollowness, treachery, and all ruinous disorders, follow us disquietly to our graves. Find out this villain, Edmund; it shall lose thee nothing; do it carefully. And the noble and true-hearted Kent banished! his offence, honesty! 'Tis strange.

GLOUCESTER 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. This villain of mine comes under the prediction; there's son against father: the king falls from bias of nature; there's father against child. We have seen the best of our time: machinations, hollowness, treachery, and all ruinous disorders, follow us disquietly to our graves. Find out this villain, Edmund; it shall lose thee nothing; do it carefully. And the noble and true-hearted Kent banished! his offence, honesty! 'Tis strange. Exit

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!

EDMUND 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! My father compounded with my mother under the dragon's tail; and my nativity was under Ursa major; so that it follows, I am rough and lecherous. Tut, I should have been that I am, had the maidenliest star in the firmament twinkled on my bastardizing. Edgar-- Enter EDGAR And pat he comes like the catastrophe of the old comedy: my cue is villanous melancholy, with a sigh like Tom o' Bedlam. O, these eclipses do portend these divisions! fa, sol, la, mi.

I have told you what I have seen and heard; but faintly, nothing like the image and horror of it:

I do profess to be no less than I seem; 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.

KENT I do profess to be no less than I seem; 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.

Not so young, sir, to love a woman for singing, nor so old to dote on her for any thing: I have years on my back forty eight.

KENT Not so young, sir, to love a woman for singing, nor so old to dote on her for any thing: I have years on my back forty eight.

I'll teach you differences:

Truth's a dog must to kennel; he must be whipped out, when Lady the brach may stand by the fire and stink.

Fool Truth's a dog must to kennel; he must be whipped out, when Lady the brach may stand by the fire and stink.

Have more than thou showest, Speak less than thou knowest, Lend less than thou owest,

Fool Mark it, nuncle: Have more than thou showest, Speak less than thou knowest, Lend less than thou owest, Ride more than thou goest, Learn more than thou trowest, Set less than thou throwest; Leave thy drink and thy whore, And keep in-a-door, And thou shalt have more Than two tens to a score.

nothing can be made out of nothing.

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

Mum, mum, He that keeps nor crust nor crum, Weary of all, shall want some.

Who is it that can tell me who I am?

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

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

Fool If thou wert my fool, nuncle, I'ld have thee beaten for being old before thy time. KING LEAR How's that?

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.

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

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

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

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

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.

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.

That such a slave as this should wear a sword, Who wears no honesty. Such smiling rogues as these, Like rats, oft bite the holy cords a-twain Which are too intrinse t' unloose; smooth every passion That in the natures of their lords rebel; Bring oil to fire, snow to their colder moods; Renege, affirm, and turn their halcyon beaks With every gale and vary of their masters, Knowing nought, like dogs, but following.

KENT That such a slave as this should wear a sword, Who wears no honesty. Such smiling rogues as these, Like rats, oft bite the holy cords a-twain Which are too intrinse t' unloose; smooth every passion That in the natures of their lords rebel; Bring oil to fire, snow to their colder moods; Renege, affirm, and turn their halcyon beaks With every gale and vary of their masters, Knowing nought, like dogs, but following. A plague upon your epileptic visage! Smile you my speeches, as I were a fool? Goose, if I had you upon Sarum plain, I'ld drive ye cackling home to Camelot.

This is some fellow, Who, having been praised for bluntness, doth affect A saucy roughness, and constrains the garb Quite from his nature: he cannot flatter, he, An honest mind and plain, he must speak truth!

CORNWALL This is some fellow, Who, having been praised for bluntness, doth affect A saucy roughness, and constrains the garb Quite from his nature: he cannot flatter, he, An honest mind and plain, he must speak truth! An they will take it, so; if not, he's plain. These kind of knaves I know, which in this plainness Harbour more craft and more corrupter ends Than twenty silly ducking observants That stretch their duties nicely.

They durst not do 't; They could not, would not do 't; 'tis worse than murder, To do upon respect such violent outrage: Resolve me, with all modest haste, which way Thou mightst deserve, or they impose, this usage, Coming from us.

KING LEAR They durst not do 't; They could not, would not do 't; 'tis worse than murder, To do upon respect such violent outrage: Resolve me, with all modest haste, which way Thou mightst deserve, or they impose, this usage, Coming from us.

Fortune, that arrant whore, Ne'er turns the key to the poor.

All that follow their noses are led by their eyes but blind men; and there's not a nose among twenty but can smell him that's stinking.

Cry to it, nuncle, as the cockney did to the eels when she put 'em i' the paste alive; she knapped 'em o' the coxcombs with a stick, and cried 'Down, wantons, down!' 'Twas her brother that, in pure kindness to his horse, buttered his hay.

Fool Cry to it, nuncle, as the cockney did to the eels when she put 'em i' the paste alive; she knapped 'em o' the coxcombs with a stick, and cried 'Down, wantons, down!' 'Twas her brother that, in pure kindness to his horse, buttered his hay.

thou art a boil, A plague-sore, an embossed carbuncle, In my corrupted blood.