King Lear And Oedipus Rex Essay Research

King Lear And Oedipus Rex Essay, Research Paper

Term Essay: Final Draft ENG OA May 19, 2000

The suffering that occurs in both, King Lear and Oedipus Rex, is very similar. Suffering is the act of undergoing an event that is painful or unpleasant. The emotional and physical suffering that the characters in the plays go through are similar. In both plays, emotional suffering is caused by rejection from a family member and by growing madness, experienced by the protagonists, throughout the play. The physical suffering is similar because characters in each play are wounded physically as a form of punishment. Mental strength was built up in the protagonists as a result of the death of their loved ones. Both characters have excessive pride. Pride is an overhigh opinion of oneself. In these cases, the excessive pride causes the characters to suffer because of a drastic downfall.

In the plays, King Lear and Oedipus Rex , both protagonists suffer from rejection by their families. King Lear suffers by the lies that his daughters tell him. Lear wants to hear the words of love from his daughters. If they prove to love him enough, then they will be rewarded one-third of his land and a castle upon his retirement from the crown. His daughter, Goneril, speaks her words of love to him:

Sir, I love you more than words can wield the matter;

Dearer than eye-sight, space, and liberty;

Beyond what can be valu d, rich or rare;

No less than life, with grace, health, beauty, honour;

as much as child e er lov d, or father found;

A love that makes breath poor speech enable;

Beyond all manner of so much I love you.

Goneril s flattering speech is successful in regards to her father. She was rewarded one-third of his land and a castle. She causes emotional suffering to Lear because he believed that Goneril loved him so dearly when in actuality her love was all a hoax. Her speech was said to inherit his assets and then to destroy her father s authority. Goneril s speech has caused suffering to Lear because it was all a lie. Goneril was the first to hurt the feelings of her father by sending Lear s loyal servant, Kent, to the stocks to be punished for defending the King Lear. The sight of Kent in the stocks hurts Lear because his daughter is not showing her love towards him by punishing Kent. If Goneril s love for Lear were genuine, she would not have thrown Kent in the stocks. Goneril would have been happy that Kent stuck up for Lear as her feelings were truly heart-felt. Goneril caused Lear emotional suffering by making him feel rejected by throwing Kent in the stocks.

Regan also made a promising speech to her father.

I am made of that self metal as my sister,

And prize me at her worth. In my true heart

I find she names my very deed of love;

Only she comes too short: that 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

Regan also succeeds in persuading her father into giving her one-third of his land and a castle. Regan, like Goneril, wants her father to be stripped of his authority. Regan s acts of evil towards her father are shown throughout the play. Goneril and Regan both take away Lear s knights to make him old and useless. Regan contributes to the emotional suffering of Lear by locking him out of her castle. The fact that Regan and her husband Cornwall locked him out of her castle was bad enough. To add to their devilish plan they locked Lear out in the middle of a storm. Shut your doors, my lord; tis a wild night (Act II Scene IV ll. 308-309) Regan s rejection causes Lear to suffer emotionally and physically because of the lack of love he is receiving from his daughters.

Lear is not only the victim of suffering because he causes it as well. Cordelia suffers when her father disowns her. Cordelia speaks the truth of her love and receives nothing:

Good my lord,

You have begot me, bred me, lov d me: I

Return those duties back as are right fit,

Obey you, love you, and most honour you.

Why have my sisters husbands, if they say

They love you all. Haply, when I shall wed,

That lord whose hand must take my plight shall carry

Half my love with him, half my care and duty:

Sure I shall never marry like my sisters,

To love my father all.

She spoke of the less love between her sisters and herself, but she is the one who stays loyal to her father. Cordelia suffers from rejection because her father disowns her as an inheriting daughter. Lear left his honest daughter out which caused suffering to even himself by the end of the play. Lear suffered emotionally by the death of his most loved daughter, Cordelia. A plague upon you, murders, traitors all! (Act V Scene III ll. 269-274). Lear and Cordelia have both suffered emotionally.

In Oedipus Rex, Oedipus suffers rejection from his birth family when he I left to die upon a mountaintop with his feet shackled together. The fact that his parents left him to die is not the reason of suffering. The revelation of the truth about his parents is what caused him to suffer. An Oracle told Oedipus parents that their child would grow up to murder his father and ma

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