English 433/633
Dr. Desmet
Summer 1996
Let's start with some of the words that have proved important in the first two plays that we read this quarter, and some that are particularly important to King Lear. I don't particularly instruct you here to look at frequency counts, but look to see where they are interesting.
Look for references to natur*. Nature, in the Renaissance, can be opposed to culture, as it is in The Winter's Tale, at least according to Perdita. Nature can be a goddess who helps maintain divine order in the universe, or nature can be a mechanistic force that is either neutral or cruel. Nature can also refer to "human nature," in terms of the body, mind, or emotions.
How do different characters perceive nature in this play? Who talks about nature the most and why? You might also check frequency distribution to see where references to nature are most prominent. When looking at the screen that tells you how many references appear in any given scene, your screen only goes down to 3.7. To see the rest, hit [shift] [down].
Fortune in the Renaissance is a goddess whose attitude toward human endeavor is symbolized by her wheel. In an inevitable and almost mechanistic way, people rise up Fortune's wheel and then fall off. Fortune can be characterized as cruel or two-faced. The term "fortune" can also refer loosely to luck. Look up references to fortun*. Who talks about fortune most often and with what attitude? Do the references come in a particular place or are they evenly distributed throughout the plays.
A very important word for this play is nothing. To my mind, this is a difficult word to pin down. What is the quality of nothingness in this play?
We have been talking some about the role of eyes (sight), hearing, and hands (touch) in King Lear.
1. Look up references to eye*. See whether eyes are passive or active, how they behave, and how effective they are. If you want to, look up references to see* and look*, but don't print out all the lines, just the references. It might be interesting to look specifically at places where one character commands another to look or see.
2. In a famous essay, Stanley Cavell argues that eyes in King Lear are associated with blindness until they become associated with the healing emotional power of tears. Eyes that cannot cry are destructive, eyes that cry are healing. Look up references to tear*. You will get some interference from "tear" as a verb, but since these words sound so much alike, it might be interesting to see if there is any symbolic relation between "tears" and the act of "tearing." Just a thought.
3. We've noticed some how important hands are, in terms of the hand-fast marriage and the parental blessing, but even in more general terms. Look up references to hand* and touch*. Using the frequency count, see if there are more references to hands and touching at particular places in the play. Who takes whom by the hand in King Lear?
One of Lear's preoccupations on the heath is the nature of justice. Try looking up references to justic* and perhaps to sin*. Can you find any evolution in Lear's ideas about justice? Why do you think that there are an unusually large number of references to justice at the end of the play?
I just noticed this today, but almost all references to woman* in this play are negative. Look up woman* and see if there are any positive references and where they occur in the play.
In this class, we have a particular fondness for symbolic animals. Since you are familiar with the use of animal imagery in Othello, see how animals are characterized and how they help to characterize people in King Lear. Try looking up the following words; you may think of others that I have overlooked!
Just as an experiment, look up Cor (which is Cordelia's speech prefix) and hit [insert]. Then hit F2 [combine lists] and add fool [insert]. In what scenes do these two characters appear together? What is the significance of this fact?