Quotation Analysis: Lear I.IV.275-289

Quotation Analysis: Lear I.IV.275-289

In the very first scene of act 1, Lear is devastated and enraged at the idea that his daughter, Cordelia, does not love him. Once there he comes to the conclusion that Cordelia does not love him as much as his other daughters he is quick to cut her from his life, basically he disclaims her: "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 forever" (I.I.115-118). Right from the beginning it is clear that the parent/child relationship is a large aspect of the play.

In scene 4, Lear is beginning to realize that he had cast away the wrong daughter. If his disownment of Cordelia was due to her lack of love, then Goneril and Regan ought to have been renounced a hundred times over. To Lear, who until this moment, lived in naivety; the lack of devotion of his daughters is a harsh slap in the face from reality. This unreciprocated love is the greatest pain that Lear has ever endured and therefore he sees it as the greatest possible pain out there.

This particular passage is a rant against Goneril. Lear has finally realized that the love that Goneril and Regan spoke prettily of in act 1, scene 1 was just a farce, merely pretty flattery. Since Lear values the love of his children so highly, as seen by how badly he takes Cordelia's "lack" of love and how harshly he reacts when he determines Goneril and Regan's lies, it is obvious that to Lear, not receiving the love of a child is the greatest pain of all. Conversely, it is also obvious how much emphasis Lear places on the wonders and amazements of having a child who does love you and, if there is love, the wonders of parenthood.

He wants her to either suffer the pain he has suffered or never enjoy the love of a child. Lear calls upon nature in the beginning of the passage to "suspend thy purpose