Each punishment afflicted upon a character is appropriate - Lear with his madness, Gloucester and his blindness, are just a few of such examples. No one character is clearly without fault, there exists an underlying web of transgression between characters. As seen within the dysfunctional families of Lear and Gloucester - Treachery abounds. But, as the old saying goes - "What goes around, comes around".

This play begins late into the lives of the characters. A mature Lear, about to "retire" is to relinquish his power and authority to his

In the final scene the tragedies of this play come full circle and closure is attempted: Edgar duels with and kills Edmund - for tricking Gloucester, causing adultery between Goneril and Regan, and framing him. Gloucester dies - for his earlier mistreating of his bastard-son; Goneril kills her sister Regan out of jealousy, and then commits suicide when she is revealed to Albany - for their mistreatment of Lear and their adultery with Edmund; Edmund's betrayal of Cordelia leads to her death; and Lear finally dies both insane and grieving over the death of "innocent" Cordelia. The only people left to rule Britain are Edgar, Albany and Lear's servant Kent.

Edgar, the legitimate, never felt the slights visited upon Edmund. He plays an unwitting pawn in Edmund's plan to gain power. Without questioning anything, he takes every word from his brother as the absolute truth, and as a fugitive from his father takes on the countenance and mannerisms of a Bedlam madman to avoid capture. As the Tom character, Edgar leads both Lear and his father Gloucester around the countryside. As a sane man masquerading as a lunatic, Edgar becomes the "Voice of Reason" for Lear, and foils Gloucester's suicide attempt. He is the only innocent of this play.

The two characters who suffer the most in the play are King Lear and Gloucester. Their stories are similar in many ways, however while Lear goes mad, Gloucester is blinded. Unlike Lear, Gloucester is able to retain his sanity. Shakespeare uses these two characters to parallel between the two conditions. Although the conditions are meant to cloud perceptions, both Lear and Gloucester recognize certain things more clearly after they lose their sight or sanity.

Although Lear loses everything, he regains his daughter Cordelia in the end. Her return, with her forces from France, brings everything to a close. She left as Lear's "dishonored" but returns as his savior. Though only for a short amount of time before she too dies, he realizes the magnitude of her love for him - it never changed, despite his earlier dishonorable actions.

Nearly every major character dies at the end of this tragedy. Did everyone deserve it? In a perfect world, Cordelia and Edgar would both be alive to bring closure to the tragedy. However, with Cordelia's death, there is a complete end to Lear's line. Since she too was too haughty to express her love for him, she too may have deserved to die. If she had only said som

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Approximate Word count = 1664
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)