King LearRandom House Publishing Group, 2013 M06 12 - 352 pages A king foolishly divides his kingdom between his scheming two oldest daughters and estranges himself from the daughter who loves him. So begins this profoundly moving and disturbing tragedy that, perhaps more than any other work in literature, challenges the notion of a coherent and just universe. The king and others pay dearly for their shortcomings–as madness, murder, and the anguish of insight and forgiveness that arrive too late combine to make this an all-embracing tragedy of evil and suffering. Each Edition Includes: • Comprehensive explanatory notes • Vivid introductions and the most up-to-date scholarship • Clear, modernized spelling and punctuation, enabling contemporary readers to understand the Elizabethan English • Completely updated, detailed bibliographies and performance histories • An interpretive essay on film adaptations of the play, along with an extensive filmography |
From inside the book
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Page vii
... blind Gloucester “sees" at last the truth about Edgar; and both fathers are cared for by their loving children and are belatedly reconciled to them, but then die brokenhearted. As recent criticism has noted, these narrative parallels ...
... blind Gloucester “sees" at last the truth about Edgar; and both fathers are cared for by their loving children and are belatedly reconciled to them, but then die brokenhearted. As recent criticism has noted, these narrative parallels ...
Page xiv
... blind. “Full oft 'tis seen / Our means secure us, and our mere defects / Prove our commodities” (4. 1. 19-21 ). And this realization leads him, as it does Lear, to express a longing for utopian social justice in which arrogant men will ...
... blind. “Full oft 'tis seen / Our means secure us, and our mere defects / Prove our commodities” (4. 1. 19-21 ). And this realization leads him, as it does Lear, to express a longing for utopian social justice in which arrogant men will ...
Page xxvi
... blind and bleeding Gloucester stared sightlessly at an enormous moon, which cracked and spilled out sand as the house lights darkened. Late in the summer of 1997, Peter Hall's production of the play opened at London's Old Vic. Hall was ...
... blind and bleeding Gloucester stared sightlessly at an enormous moon, which cracked and spilled out sand as the house lights darkened. Late in the summer of 1997, Peter Hall's production of the play opened at London's Old Vic. Hall was ...
Page xxviii
... blind father a scene of cliffs, vast heights, and a ship far below bobbing on the waves like a toy boat. What is the audience to believe? This sort of verbal scenesetting is the way Elizabethan actors regularly established a sense of ...
... blind father a scene of cliffs, vast heights, and a ship far below bobbing on the waves like a toy boat. What is the audience to believe? This sort of verbal scenesetting is the way Elizabethan actors regularly established a sense of ...
Page xxxv
... blind Tsurumaru survives, but in an apocalyptic landscape that mutely symbolizes the ruined world suggested by the film's title: Ran, or “chaos.” ]ane Smiley won the Pulitzer prize in I991 for her novel A Thousand Acres, adapting the ...
... blind Tsurumaru survives, but in an apocalyptic landscape that mutely symbolizes the ruined world suggested by the film's title: Ran, or “chaos.” ]ane Smiley won the Pulitzer prize in I991 for her novel A Thousand Acres, adapting the ...
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Common terms and phrases
Alack ALBANY bastard blind brother Burgundy Charles Dickens Child Rowland Cordelia CORNWALL D. H. Lawrence daughters dear death disguised doth Dover Duke Duke of Cornwall Edith Wharton Edmund Enter Edgar Enter Lear Exeunt Exit eyes father fear film flatter folio follow FOOL fortune France Fyodor Dostoevsky GENTLEMAN give Gloucester's gods GONERIL Goneril and Regan grace hast hath hear heart heavens honor horse i'th Jane Austen justice KENT King Lear kingdom knave Lear's Leir Leonatus letter lord madam master means MESSENGER nature never night noble nuncle Perillus pity play play's Plexirtus poor pray princes quarto RAGAN REGAN royal scene servants Shakespeare sister Skalliger speak stage stand storm Stratford-upon-Avon suffering sword Telenor tell theater thee There's thine thou art traitor trumpet unto villain wicked sisters William Shakespeare wretched