King Lear Quotes

Front 1

A1 - Lear is an autocratic ruler

Back 1

"Give me the nap there. Know that we have divided / In three our Kingdom."

Front 2

A1 - Conducts love test - egotistical, vain, arrogant.

Back 2

"Tell me, my daughters ...

Which of you shall we say doth love us most?

That we our largest bounty may extend

Where nature doth with merit challenge."

Front 3

A1 - Goneril shamelessly feeds her fathers ego - sycophantic, astute, cunning.

Back 3

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

Front 4

A1 - Regan is egually as deceptive as her sister.

Back 4

"I am of the self-same mettle that my sister is."

Front 5

A1 - Cordelia is incapable of flattery, stark contrast to her sisters - genuine, honest.

Back 5

"Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave

My heart into my mouth. I love your Majesty

According to my bond, no more nor less."

Front 6

A1 - Cordelia is stubborn to her fathers wishes.

Back 6

"So young, my Lord and true."

Front 7

A1 - Lear banishes Cordelia - harsh, cruel, bullish, impetuous, rash.

Back 7

"Here I disclaim all my paternal care,

Propinquity and property of blood,

And as a stranger to my heart and me

Hold thee, from this, for ever."

Front 8

A1 - Lear's feelings of self importance are reflected in his use of language.

Back 8

"Come not between the dragon and his wrath!"

Front 9

A1 - Kent urges Lear to see the truth and not to be blinded by his ego - frank, genuine, honest.

Back 9

"See better Lear, and let me still remain

The true blank of thine eye."

Front 10

A1 - Cordelia is publicly rejected by Burgandy, he refuses to take her as his wife now that she is without dowry.

Back 10

"Will you... take her, or leave her?"

Front 11

A1 - Cordelia knows her sisters and knows that eventually the truth shall emerge.

Back 11

"Time shall unfold what plight wd cunning hides;

Who covers faults, at last with shame derides."

Front 12

A1 - Goneril and Regan form an alliance against Lear.

Back 12

" Pray you, let us hit together."

Front 13

A1 - Edmund delivers a soliloquy before he tricks his father, Gloucester, into believing that Gloucester's legitimate son, Edgar is plotting against him.

Back 13

"Why bastardd? Wherefore base?

When my dimensions are as well compact,

My mind as generous and my shape as true,

As honest madam's issue?"

Front 14

A1 - Gloucester's angry tirade of hatred against Edgar. His fury reminds us of Lear's anger towards Cordelia.

Back 14

"Abhorred / villain! Unnatural, detested, brutish villain! Worse that brutish!"

Front 15

A1 - Gloucester blames astrological phenomena for these unusual events - gullible, easily duped.

Back 15

"These late eclipses in the sun and moon portend no good to / us;"

Front 16

A1 - Goneril begins her machinations against Lear by adopting a policy of rudeness against him.

Back 16

"And let his knights have colder looks among you."

Front 17

A1 - Lear only vaguely sees that things have changed.

Back 17

" I have / perceived a most faint neglect of late ... I will look further into't."

Front 18

A1 - Lear, in sharing out his Kingdom, has parted with any intelligence he might have had left.

Back 18

"Though hast pared thy wit o'both sides./ and left nothing i'the middle."

Front 19

A1 - Lear's self identity has been shattered. He is baffled and confused by the new order. This confusion is both touching and pathetic.

Back 19

"Who is it that can tell me who I am?"

Front 20

A1 - Goneril tries to reduce Lear's retinue

Back 20

"Disquantity your train"

Front 21

A1 - Lear finally begins to realise his enormous foolishness

Back 21

"O Lear, Lear, Lear!

Beat at this gate, that let thy folly in,

And thy dear judgement out!"

Front 22

A1 - Lear vents his anger in a ferocious tirade of hatred.

Back 22

"Into her womb convey sterility!"

"How shaper than a serpent's tooth it is/ To have a thankless child!"

Front 23

A1 - Lear still hasn't fully comprehended his situation. Still deluded.

Back 23

"Ha! Let it be so. I have another daughter

Who, is kind and comfortable.

... she'll flay thy wolfing visage."

Front 24

A1 - Lear finally realises that he treated Cordelia in a monstrously unjust manner.

Back 24

"I did her wrong."

Front 25

A1 - After Goneril betrays Lear, he teeters on the brink of maddness.

Back 25

"O, let me not be mad, not mad, sweet heaven!

Keep me in temper; I would not be mad!"

Front 26

A2 - Edmund wounds himself, telling Gloucester that Edgar did it - conniving, scheming, quick thinking.

Back 26

"Some blood drawn in me would beget opinion

Of my more fierce endeavour."

Front 27

A2 - Nobody respects Lear anymore. Regan puts his knave in the stocks - vindictive, callous

Back 27

"Till noon! Till night, my Lord, and all night too."

Front 28

A2 - There are redeeming features to Gloucester's personality as he pleads for leniency for Lear's knave.

Back 28

"Let me beseech your Grace not to do so."

Front 29

A2 - Cordelia and Kent are on the same side. There is a clear divide now between good and evil.

Back 29

"I know 'tis from Cordelia... seeking to give / Losses their remedies."

Front 30

A2 - Edgar disguises himself. This foreshadows Lear's maddness, shifting balance of power within the kingdom. - brave, clever, creative, resourceful, courageous.

Back 30

"Poor Turlygod! Poor Tom! / that's something yet. Edgar I nothing am. "

Front 31

A2 - Lear cannot fathom that his daughters could be so disrespectful.

Back 31

"They durst not do't;

They could not, would not do't.

.. such violent outrage."

Front 32

A2 - the fool is unquestionably loyal to Lear.

Back 32

"But I will tarry, the Fool will stay."

Front 33

A2 - Lear tries to repress emotions. Trys to regain self control.

Back 33

"O me, my riding heart! But down!"

Front 34

A2 - the sisters have treated Lear abominabally

Back 34

"Sharp - toothed unkindness, like a vulture."

Front 35

A2 - We can see that Regan is cold, clinical, callous, calculating by the bluntness of the language she uses.

Back 35

"O, sir, you are old."

Front 36

A2 - Lear evokes sympathy and compassion from the audience.

Back 36

"On my knees I beg."

Front 37

A2 - Lear again evokes sympathy.

Back 37

"I gave you all."

Front 38

A2 - Emotionally tpurchered and humiliated. The once all powerful king has been reduced to a wretch. He is at the bottom of the new order. His tone of voice tries to evoke sympathy.

Back 38

"You see my here, you gods, a poor old man,

As full of grief as age; wretched in both!"

Front 39

A3 - The kingdom has been totally fragmented but the forces of good have arrived.

Back 39

"From France there comes a power / Into this scattered Kingdom."

Front 40

A3 - Lear is in a frenzied rage. He roars at the raging storm, calling on it to bring destruction to the earth and to himself.

Back 40

"Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! Rage! Blow!.... singe my white head!"

Front 41

A3 - Lear's self awareness is seeping in. Once exposed to nature he realises the truth about himself.

Back 41

"A poor, infirm, weak and despised old man."

Front 42

A3 - Lear still believes that he has been wronged by others more than he has committed wrong himself. He is still on the journey of self awareness.

Back 42

"I am a man / more sinned against than sinning."

Front 43

A3 - for the first time we see Lear showing concern for others. Lear is developing a social conscience.

Back 43

"Come on, my boy. How dost, my boy? Art cold?"

Front 44

A3 - The Fool is aware of life's realities. He explores the falseness and hypocrisy that exists in our society.

Back 44

"When priests are more in word than matter."

Front 45

A3 - Gloucester tells Edmund that he intends to aid Lear even though he may be killed for doing so. Gloucester is loyal and earns our forgiveness.

Back 45

"If I die for it.. the king my / old master must be relieved."

Front 46

A3 - Lear's social conscience continues to grow. He realises that he never showed enough concern for the homeless within his Kingdom. He seems to regret this.

Back 46

"Poor naked wretches... O, I have ta'en / too little care of this!"

Front 47

A3 - without the trappings of his crown and robe Lear exposes his weakness and vulnerability.

Back 47

"Unaccommodated man is no more but such a poor / bare, forked animal as thou art."

Front 48

A3 - Edgar is deeply moved by Lear's display of insanity.

Back 48

"My tears begin to take his part so much

They mar my counterfeiting."

Front 49

A3 - Edgar says his pain is nothing to Lear's. He is compassionate and selfless like Cordelia.

Back 49

"How light and portable my pain seems now"

Front 50

A3 - Goneril is vicious, venomous and sadistic

Back 50

"Pluck out his eyes!"

Front 51

A3 - his initial reaction, unlike Lear, is one of regret for the wrong he has done. There is no evidence of self pity.

Back 51

"O my follies! Then Edgar was abused.

Kind gods, forgive me that, and prosper him!"