plotlear Importance of the Subplot in Shakespeares King Lear :: King Lear essays

Importance of the subplot in King Lear     Why bastard wherefore base? asks Edmund. The bitter illegitimate word of honor resents his father and brother. He is determined to prosper and grow. Ruthlessly, he plays on old Gloucesters weakness and persuades him that Edgar seeks his death to obtain his inheritance. Edgar, being told that Gloucester seeks his life for some reason, flees. With Edgar thus removed, Edmund straightaway seeks to destroy his father and reports his alleged treason to Cornwall who removes the old mans eyes. The bastard has travelled far and is now Earl of Gloucester. Sought in love by both Goneril and Regan, exulting in battle over Cordelias forces, Edmunds future seems assured. Alas, the discovery of Gonerils letter urging Edmund to kill her husband Albany leads to his arrest. Edgar in disguise fights Edmund, who is defending his honour and is mortally wounded - the wheel has come full circle. Gloucester, realising the wrong he has done t o Edgar, yet joyful he is alive, dies. Edgar joins Albany in ruling the country.     So skillfully has Shakespeare intertwined the two plots, beginning in Act II at Gloucesters castle and ending in the alliance of Edgar and Albany, that is is difficult to separate them. Gloucester, like Lear, suffers from filial ingratitude. It is in his castle that Lear is humiliated by his daughters and flees into the storm. Gloucesters sympathy helps Lear to Dover to meet Cordelia, yet leads to his own blindness and his going to Dover for suicide.     Edgar becomes embroiled in the main(prenominal) plot when, disguised as a madman, he meets Lear on the heath. His destruction of Oswald, Gonerils steward and his defeat of Edmund in the duel leading to Edmund admitting he has given cryptic orders for the execution of Lear and Cordelia, together with his alliance with Albany, all relate him to the main plot.     However, it is - appropriately enough - the corrupt E dmund who becomes most entangled with the main plot. Ambition drives him into Cornwalls hands, and to his double interlocking with Goneril and Regan.