King Lear, Act I

1. Sectary: a member of a sect. -Merriam-Webster Online

Act I, Scene II, Page 25: "EDGAR: How long have you been a sectary astronomical?"


2. The play begins with Gloucester telling Kent about his sons, Edgar and Edmund. Edmund is a bastard, but Gloucester claims to love them both. The attention then turns to King Lear, who is planning to divide his kingdom between his three daughters. He asks them to prove how much they love him, and his eldest two daughters, Goneril and Regan, who both eloquently flatter their father into appeasement. Cordelia, however, refuses to answer a question that she sees as so foolish, infuriating Lear. He disowns Cordelia and she leaves to marry the king of France without a dowry. Lear's loyal follower, Kent, stands up for Cordelia, causing Lear to banish him as well. Edmund then talks about how his brother, being a legitimate child, will inherit all of their father's wealth. Edmund schemes to plant a false letter hinting of a murder plot "written" by his brother, trying to pit his father and brother against each other. The scene then switches to Lear staying with Goneril along with the terms of his abdication. Goneril complains that her father's knights are rambunctious. Kent shows up in disguise to serve Lear, proving his faithfulness. Goneril finally snaps and tells Lear that his knights must leave the castle, and Lear is livid. Both Lear and Goneril write letters to Regan, the former asking for pity, the latter warning of trouble coming her way in the form of Lear's caravan.


3. At this point in the play, I was still very unsure of whether to side with Lear or his eldest daughters. Many of the situations in the play could be interpreted multiple ways, leading to different sympathy points. Lear appeared to be very childish and selfish. He wanted to give up the difficult parts of his job but retain the power, which is clearly very unfair. When his daughter, Cordelia, was honest and said that she loved him "according to my bond; nor more nor less," (Act I, Scene I, Page 15) Lear responded in an incredibly immature way by essentially disowning her. Ironically, Cordelia is probably the only daughter who actually loves her father. Lear, however, blinded by his foolish pride, threw a temper tantrum. On the other side of the issue, however, are the greedy daughters, Goneril and Regan. Their father gave them each half of his kingdom, and in return they plotted ways to control him completely. They refused to allow his knights to stay in their homes and in doing so demonstrated their lack of respect and his loss of power. It was especially difficult to determine which party was in the right because of Shakespeare's vagueness. One cannot be certain whether the knights are in fact rowdy and inappropriate, or whether the knights are well-behaved and the sisters simply looking for excuses.
I also thought the parallel between Gloucester and Lear was very cool. Both have multiple children, one of whom is loyal, one (or two) who is certainly not. Edgar and Cordelia both love their fathers very much, but do not show it as extravagantly as their fathers would like. Because of this, the other siblings are able to inspire doubt in the fathers, ultimately leading to the complete disownment of the honest siblings. As of this Act it was too soon to see whether Gloucester and Lear were meant to be completely parallel or if one was supposed to contrast the other.


4. My first question from this Act was whether Edmund would actually murder Gloucester, framing Edgar, or whether he was just planning to threaten Gloucester away from favoring Edgar. He is obviously very manipulative, but it was too soon to see how far he would go for the wealth that he views as rightfully his.

My second question was whether Lear or Goneril and Regan would be shown to be deserving of pity, or whether it would be up to interpretation throughout the entire play. As I mentioned in my analysis, many of the situations could be taken multiple ways, leading either to sympathy toward King Lear or toward his oldest daughters.

My third and final question from Act I was whether Cordelia would ever reunite with Lear, and if so, whether he would apologize or maintain his belief that she had mistreated him. I had heard that Lear lost his mind by the end of the play, but I was really curious as to whether he lost it believing that Cordelia wronged him or whether he came to terms with the truth.