Lears Relinquishment of Power in Shakespeares King Lear Essay

Lears Relinquishment of Power in Shakespeares King Lear King Lear is an participant who can only play the top executive. Thus, after he has abdicated his throne, passing the assurance to his posterity, he still demands respect and power, which he is unable to claim from any of his former subjects, even his daughters. And as a king with no kingdom, he is an actor with no role to play, the most loathsome of entirely conditions. Lear himself realizes this, and in scene 4, he cries Why, this is not Lear (4.204). And later in the same speech, he says Who is it that can promise me who I am? (4.209). Lear is stuck in his role as king, unable to act in any other manner and powerless to provide for himself, causing the last-ditch downfall of he and his family from their status of authority.As the play opens in the first scene, King Lear uses his authority to divide the kingdom. However, this is a power that not even the king possesses no one may divide the kingdom. Per the divin e right of the king, Lear is in control and must remain so he cannot pass the powers of the throne to anyone, sustain his heir, and then only following his death. Yet, Lear contradicts his divine right and divides the kingdom. In this action, authority is not destroyed but split between those with the greatest claims to land and riches (Spotswood 280). The authority transfers to Goneril and Regan, as Lear no longer has a claim having resigned his reign. But even though he has no claim, Lear still wants to play his kingly role. So then, the major problem of King Lear is that after he has relinquished control of the kingdom, he still desires to rule in principle, though not in feat Only we still retain The name and all th... ...rature 40 (2000) 241-60. Righter, Anne. Shakespeare and the Idea of the Play. Westport, CT Greenwood Press, 1962. Spotswood, Jerald W. Maintaining Hierarchy in The Tragedie of King Lear. Studies in English Literature 38 (1998) 265-80. Squire, Sir John. Shakespeare as a Dramatist. London Cassell and Company, 1935. Stevenson, William B. A Muse of Fire of a Winter of Discontent? Journal of Management Education 20 (1996) 39-48. Weimann, Robert. Mingling viciousness and Worthiness in King John. Shakespeare Studies 27 (1999) 109-33. Zamir, Tzachi. A Case of Unfair Proportions Philosophy in Literature. New Literary History 29 (1998) 501-20. Noteall Shakespeare text is quoted from The Norton Shakespeare. In the case of Lear, all quotations are from The History of King Lear which contains scene numbers, but no act numbers.