King Lear
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First performed around 1605–1606, William Shakespeare’s King Lear is one of the great tragedies of the English stage, a searching exploration of power, family, madness and the terrible cost of self-deception. When the ageing King Lear decides to divide his kingdom among his three daughters according to the eloquence of their declarations of love, his youngest, Cordelia, refuses to flatter him, while her sisters Goneril and Regan offer words that conceal their ambitions. Lear’s attempt to secure affection through authority instead sets in motion a devastating unravelling, as political disorder and domestic betrayal strip away the certainties of rank, wealth and paternal command.
Moving between the royal household and a landscape exposed to the elements, Shakespeare examines the fragility of human judgement and the suffering that can follow when pride is mistaken for wisdom. The parallel story of the Earl of Gloucester and his sons deepens the play’s meditation on loyalty, blindness and the often brutal distance between appearance and truth. Among Shakespeare’s most uncompromising works, King Lear offers little comfort in the face of injustice, yet finds profound humanity in vulnerability and compassion. Its influence extends across centuries of theatre, literature and philosophy, while its questions about ageing, authority and our obligations to one another remain unsettlingly alive.
From the book
“I am a man more sinned against than sinning.”
— William Shakespeare, King Lear
On King Lear
“The play is about the nature of suffering, and about the possibility of redemption through suffering.”
— Harold Bloom, literary critic and Shakespeare scholar