Professor David Peimer
King Lear: A Parable of Loss and Forgiveness
Professor David Peimer - King Lear: A Parable of Loss and Forgiveness
- So, hi everybody, and hope you’re well everywhere, and welcome. Right, in the spirit of still the High Holy Days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, we chose to look at “King Lear” in terms of reflection and some of the ideas which the High Holy Days are about. So the main question that I want to look at with “King Lear” is what exactly… what is this play really about, does it still have a resonance for us today, this unbelievable Mount Everest, extraordinary play, which is extraordinary but it is a Mount Everest and it is massive and huge. Almost biblical in proportion and impact when you read it and study it or think about it. And does it still resonate or does it belong to other eras? What can we glean from this remarkable play today? And I want to suggest, because there have been obviously many, many varied interpretations in terms of staging and scholarly insights as to what this play really can be about. Clearly it’s open to so many interpretations, so many possibilities. And all I can do is give my own and what strikes me today. Which is quite different to when I first read it as a university student all those years ago back in South Africa. I never forget reading it for the first time, I think I was in first-year if I remember. And I read it through the night and was stunned.
And it’s very seldom that a play affected me quite so much emotionally just on the reading. And intellectually and how much it sparked so many thoughts and feelings. And I’m sure many have this with a book or a novel or a play, obviously with music one does, where one attaches a moment of one’s own life, which in a way links to that piece of music, or play maybe, or a book. This one, this mammoth of “King Lear” certainly did for me in first-year. So coming back to it all these years later, it’s not an entirely different perception, but quite a lot of things look different. And the extraordinary cliche, but the truth of the incredible amount of richness in this guy’s writing obviously comes out. So is it a parable of loss and forgiveness? Is it more about loss, is it really actually about forgiveness? What is this actually about? As we try and dig into what’s it in essence, the core of this play. It’s been called a family drama, it’s been called a piece of existential brilliance and insights, philosophy of the human condition, of how far we can go and how deep we can go with how much we can endure of suffering in life. It’s been seen as a parable of civil war, of politics, power, ripping apart a family but also ripping apart a country. But from civil war, not from external military attack. And I want to suggest that… I’m going to look at a couple of productions today. The one with Anthony Hopkins, a very recent one, a fantastic one with Emma Thompson and others. Literally a couple years ago, directed by Richard Eyre.
And then I’m going to look at one of the great productions briefly, Trevor Nunn, fantastic director, directed Ian McKellen. And also, if you like, almost a classic of the post-war era, the Peter Brook production with Paul Scofield. Just a couple of little clips from these different ones. And then very briefly as well, Peter Brook in being invited to America, where he directed Orson Welles as Lear. Let’s just dive into this first of all. The story, as in most of Shakespeare and many of his contemporary writers, came from another story. In those days, of course, the aim was not to be original, like we have the pressure today of originality of story. But in those days, it was much more like the ancient Greek idea, how well you could tell a story, which perhaps quite a few people knew. This was taken from an old folk tale which Geoffrey of Monmouth wrote about centuries before Shakespeare. And basically it was about a king called Leir, spelt differently, and he had three daughters and they have to declare… You know, he’s going to give them a big present and a prize of castles and so on. In the fairytale, same thing, the love question, “How much do you love me?” To the eldest. “Oh, I love you more than all the world, Daddy.” “Oh, okay, I’ll give you a third of all my castles.”
Then the second one, “How much do you love me?” “Well, I love you more than all the stars in the skies.” Oh, love, love, love, “I’ll give you also a third of all my castles and possessions.” And then the third youngest daughter says, “I love you as much as salt loves meat.” And the lord of the castle, the king, the Lord Leir says, “What? Are you crazy? Salt and meat? That’s pathetic, that’s ridiculous. The others are offering me the world, everything, and the universe and the stars. Pathetic. I ban you.” So that’s the fairytale. And then of course what happens in the fairytale is the youngest daughter is banished and comes back in disguise, marries, et cetera, et cetera, cut a long story short. And at the wedding to which the lord is invited but he doesn’t know it’s the wedding of his banished youngest daughter, the youngest daughter has instructed all the chefs to make food of meat and anything else, but no salt. So nobody is allowed to eat salt. Because in those days of course, salt was crucial for keeping meat at least a little bit fresh, last a bit longer than a day or two. Anyway, so they all sit down, have the banquet, and the lord, “What? No, but we can’t bear the taste, this is terrible.” And they all get sick and spit it out, et cetera. And then she reveals the truth. And then the daddy, the lord understands, “Oh, we can’t live without salt, I get it.” And everything is restored, he loves the youngest one as much as ever, and all three daughters happy ever after, it’s a fairytale story.
Which was told in England and in Europe. So Shakespeare knew this. It’s evidence that’s been researched that he took, obviously the name is the same, King Lear, Lord Lear. So he took from that fairytale and does this. Now what’s extraordinary, is what does he do with this old little fairytale? He turns it into an incredible play, I think for his own time and for our time. And from salted meat and three daughters into a story about land. Yes, a family drama. Which I think gives us the most intense emotions possible, because the emotions that come from being a family, a son, a daughter, father, mother, et cetera, grandparent, child and so on, are so intensely felt. It’s about inheritance, it’s about, there’s a fool who turns out to be the wisest truth-teller in the play. What does he do with the character of a fool, the trickster if you like, in Jungian terms. The fool tells us about what folly is, and the main character has to fall from being a king to being a mad naked wretch in a storm on a heath in order to understand a little bit of what life is really, what human life can really be about. An arrogant, stubborn, difficult father, who’s a king. Obsessed with flattery and pride and given so much flattery and pride by Goneril and Regan. And, you know, full of it. Is he really serious? What on earth of a ridiculous beginning of a play. The opening scene, Goneril, Regan and Cordelia, the three daughters are sitting there with their partners, the men, Duke of Albany, Cornwall, et cetera.
And the father, the king comes with a map maybe and says, “Right, I’m going to divide up my land, a third, a third, a third, if you tell me how much you love me.” I mean, it seems to me a completely ridiculous idea to start a play. If we pitch that as a movie in Hollywood, I don’t think many people would buy it, would take it as an idea. “That’s the premise of the whole thing? Are you mad?” And yet, Shakespeare does it. And he throws us straight into the play. He doesn’t care. Who’s the mother, who’s the queen, who’s the wife of Lear? She doesn’t exist. Uncles, aunts? No. The mother is hardly ever mentioned. The queen? Does it matter to Lear, matter to the three daughters? Shakespeare doesn’t care, we just dive straight into the action and let’s go for it. And I think he’s almost saying, “I’m going to take you on a rollercoaster ride beyond belief.” To a piece which is on the level of, later of course, perhaps Milton’s “Paradise Lost”, maybe “Hamlet”, Homer’s “Odyssey”, the “Iliad” and the “Odyssey”, “Dante”. A piece which stands at such a level of literature for me, of this extraordinary level, and yet begins in the most ridiculously absurd way. There’s nothing romantic in the play. When I look back on Shakespeare, I don’t see much romantic. Romeo and Juliet for me is not really romantic, it’s infatuation, yes. 15 year old teenagers and their mafia parents and families hate each other’s guts, can’t bear each other, and so ban the kids from seeing each other. Obviously contemporary story, “West Side Story”, et cetera.
But here… It’s such a strange way to begin what becomes a masterpiece or any kind of a play. It’s about war, chaos. It’s the breakdown and disintegration of the family and the society, triggered by such arrogance, pride, the ancient Greek theatrical idea, what’s the fatal flaw in the character? Too much pride, too much arrogance, okay. But that leads to the breakdown of the family, it leads to the breakdown of society, and civil war in England. This one ridiculous act, is it so far from the truth or not? What’s he really trying to tell us? He tells us that humans are more cruel than monsters of the deep. More cruel than animals. It’s a bit like T. S. Eliot’s “Waste Land” I guess is the closest from the 20th century. When humans are pushed so far, the centre cannot hold, to adapt W. B. Yeat’s great line. The centre cannot hold. Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world. The blood-dimmed tide and so on. It’s about human suffering. Suffering. What does it mean to suffer? Obviously there’s physical suffering, there’s mental suffering, there’s inner suffering and suffering that one causes others. Does human suffering ultimately lead to enlightenment, or is it just suffering, that is it, full-stop, part of the human condition? Does loss and this suffering and the pain of loss of a loved one, a parent, a child, a sibling, a partner, whoever. Does that really lead to self-knowledge? Does one need to go through a whole mad trip to discover self-knowledge and screaming and ranting in a storm-filled heath?
But I think in the darkening divisions of our times, the darkening divisions in societies in the west we live in, we’re not talking about civil discord. Maybe civil discord, not yet war. Are these the rumblings of the beginning of it in our own times or not? Is Shakespeare saying always be aware, not only about discord in a family and disintegration of a family, but it can be seen as a metaphor to spread literally. What does it mean when a society starts to divide amongst itself? And really divide. I don’t just mean petulant disagreements. So the civil discord and the war that it leads to and so on. So Shakespeare’s pulling all of these ideas together in one play. It would seem ridiculous for one writer to put so much in one. And maybe it is too much, maybe it is too long, maybe it needs editing, cutting. But at least the ambitious attempt to pull it all together is quite a remarkable attempt and, for me, achievement. Also, the good characters, they have to flee the society. They can only come back if they come back in disguise. Come back disguised as a beggar or different things. Was that a metaphor? We can only live in a society of such discord if we disguise our inner authentic feeling and pretend to be something we’re not. Do we learn anything from suffering or is just suffering, is it that, full-stop? We talk about learning but do we really? Sam Mendes did a production with Simon Russell Beale some years ago, I think about eight, nine years ago in England. And it’s a wonderful interview where he and the actor talk about, they chose to lessen the sense of family drama, the sense of the existential questions I’ve just alluded to, and focus more on the politics of civil war and civil discord, and the politics of their times.
And this was eight, nine years ago when they did it. Perhaps an intuitive sense by wonderful artists, pre-sensing what was to come in our times. And they speak about a gradual dripping away of power, not just the family but a dripping away, a stripping away of power and the forces it can unleash in a society. Peter Brook’s production was much more existential in the sense of suffering and the sense of loss. The philosophical questions that I’ve mentioned earlier, where you can see it’s much more about all of those things and much less about a specific moment in human history. Then the Trevor Nunn production with Ian McKellen, very interestingly starts out where the three daughters go up onto a lectern and they tell their father, Lear, the king, why they love him so much, why they should get a third of the property of England as an inheritance. Go up onto a lectern to tell your father how much you love him, so that of course you can get a third of property and be powerful and rich. What’s he saying with that, Trevor Nunn and that wonderful image in that production? It’s so detached from emotion, it’s so detached from anything authentic and real between father and daughter. Fantastic image to put on stage. It was first done in front of King James I. And it’s interesting that from the records that we can find, that was the first production.
And then of course elsewhere. So actually, Shakespeare would have had the king, who believed he was descended, he had divine right of kingship to actually perform. So he did it in front of the king. That’s quite a tricky trip to do, a guy who believes he’s there because of divine rights and divine rule, god-given, he could be king, et cetera, et cetera. And here he’s shown this crazy king who makes this crazy decision at the beginning, then goes mad and has to discover his love for his youngest daughter, et cetera. Could be risky. But Shakespeare does it. Shakespeare, to me, always just pushes the edge. He has a black general, Othello. Black general who marries his white Desdemona. You know, written 500 years ago. He has a Jewish character, you know, “The Merchant of Venice”. He’s not scared to take on characters in the margin of society and make them the central protagonist, not objects for ridicule, but to empathise with those characters. He can move into the margin and imagine himself Jewish or a black general, or here a king who’s full of arrogance and pride and stubbornness at the beginning and stupidity and has to learn a little bit of human love. Now, the question is, why do we feel for Lear? If Lear makes such a stupid mistake at the beginning, why don’t we just say, “Look, this is ridiculous, if you’re going to make your decision, you know, you’re the boss, you’re the head, you make your decision on how much they declare their love and their flattery for you?
Are you not a bit smart… I mean, why should we care about this guy? He’s nothing.” And I think what Shakespeare does brilliantly, he brings in what I’ve often spoken about, the technique of dramatic irony. Because he puts the fool with Shakespeare, the trickster. And the fool is the wise, intelligent guy. He doesn’t change, can’t dictate the dramatic action or make decisions, but he gives the audience insights to what’s going on in the society, the family, and most importantly what’s going on in King Lear’s mind. And through that, we come into the madness of the king and the descent into hell. The king goes through his own Dante-like inferno, to the bottom of hell where he realised he’s been such an idiot, such a fool, and it’s his fault, he was the one who was stupid. Is he really more sinned against than sinning himself, as he says? No. He sinned in the beginning. So idiotic. But he starts to realise, what is it to be a man? An unaccommodated fraught, poor, naked creature. You know, all these words which I’m going to come to in a moment. What is it? He has to be reduced to a naked human being on a naked man on a field with raging storm and mud and all the rest of it to begin to wake up a little bit. It’s not only that that gives us empathy for the character, it’s because of the fool and that ironic device. Because the fool is ironic, the fool is witty, but insightful and wise.
And enables us to feel softer and humanises Lear, and then we can feel much more. So when he comes at the end and walks on stage holding his dead daughter Cordelia, realising, “God, that’s the one that loved me,” we can feel for him. It’s such an intelligent, dramatic device used by Shakespeare, to use the fool to humanise Lear more and more, the madness and the irony of that descent. That we can feel empathy for him and we almost forget that he made such a ridiculous decision and stupid and stubborn and arrogant for a pride at the beginning. So it’s an incredible journey we go on, not just a fall from pride, but to an understanding and an insight what suffering and loss, what acceptance, what the value of love, what some sort of meaning of who you are as an individual. It’s not dependent on the word king, it’s not dependent even on the word father. It’s not dependent on any of those things. It’s the ability to just care a little bit for somebody else, perhaps. But it’s not done in a romantic way in the slightest, or idealistic way. And I don’t think there’s anything romantic in most of Shakespeare’s plays. The comedies play with it, but they’re comedy. It’s the same when I read Homer’s “Odysseus”. There’s nothing romantic. There’s nothing naive about human nature. Okay, so I’m giving you just a sense of something of my response to this play, and now I want to look at some specifics and some of the language and some of these clips from the productions. This is from Homer in the “Iliad”. There is nothing alive more agonised than man of all that breathe and crawl across the earth. Look how close it is to Shakespeare. There’s nothing more alive, there’s nothing alive more agonised than man of all that breathe and crawl across the earth.
The torments, the conflict, the inner torture, the suffering. Homer gets it. Humanity must perforce prey on itself like monsters of the deep. Humanity must prey on itself like monsters, like more grotesque and horrific than anything else. Unaccommodated man is no more than such a poor, bare, forked animal as thou art. Lear, when he comes to that moment of realisation, unaccommodated man doesn’t have titles, doesn’t have anything, doesn’t have clothes, doesn’t have anything in this raging storm on this field, going mad, nuts. But, ironically of course, again, double irony, in the moment of madness is his moment of greatest insight to himself. He’s no more than a poor, bare, forked animals are. One has to go, I think Shakespeare’s saying, to the bottom and say, “Right, I’m just a naked, forked, bare animal. That’s it. All the rest dressed in a little bit of authority is not me, or is external. I can wear it and play it but it’s not me, necessarily.” Okay, so I think that these are some of the main ideas I would pick out from “Lear”. T. S. Eliot uses this, monsters, in some of his poetry, and many others, of course, have taken so many lines from this and other plays. I want to mention something about the tragedy. This play was called a tragedy only after, much later after Shakespeare died.
This is the original title. “His True Chronicled History of the life and death of King Lear and his three daughters”. It’s called a chronicled history. Shakespeare doesn’t call it a tragedy, and he would have known Aristotle’s tragedy and comedy. And here’s all the rest of it, et cetera. This is a picture of Paul Scofield in the Peter Brook’s ‘70s production playing it. So it’s fascinating to me. And I think if we look with contemporary eyes at this play, there’s a brilliant polish critic called Jan Kott, who massively influenced Peter Brook and many, many others of ways of staging and understanding Shakespeare. The book is called “Shakespeare, Our Contemporary”, and for me it remains, I read it when I was a student, but it remains one of the most powerful and passionate and intelligent insights into Shakespeare that I’ve read of our times. And Jan Kott, of course, grew up, I mean he was very young during the war, but he observed what happened with the Holocaust and the war and the horror of that Second World War, and he writes as a polish academic, but he writes knowing what it’s like to expect a knock on the door at three in the morning to be arrested, taken off to prison, or killed, or family. And that’s very different if you’re a scholar, I think in those situations, to a different kind of scholar in a different society. And he talks about “Lear” in our times is not just a tragedy, but it shows the grotesqueness of human cruelty, the grotesqueness of the human animal and the levels that we can all reach. And the remarkable levels of forgiveness, love, understanding, intelligence, insight, knowledge, that we can all reach as well.
So he talks about it as a theatre of the grotesque. It’s absurd, yes, as the beginning is, but a theatre more grotesque. And I think there’s something very powerful, and I’m going to show you a little bit of the Anthony Hopkins, where I think they capture it. The most recent production on film, fantastic film of the play. This is here a picture, obviously we all know this, the image of the Globe. I wanted this just to remind us, it’s done in this kind of theatre originally. You know, open air, maybe raining, night, muddy, people selling things all the time, standing, shouting, you know, if they manage to have a bath once a month it’s a lot. Just imagine the sweat and the smells and all of this energy and hustle and bustle in the theatre. And along comes this massive play and getting on with the action. This is the poster from the Richard Eyre production on film with Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson. And now I’m going to show some of that, the trailer.
CLIP BEGINS
Know that we have divided in three our kingdom. It is our fast intent to shake all cares and business from our age, conferring them on younger strengths. What can you say to draw a third more opulent than your sisters?
Nothing, my lord.
Well, nothing will come of nothing. Speak again. Where’s my daughter?
By day and night he wrongs me. Every hour he flashes into one gross crime or other that sets us all at odds. I’ll not endure it.
Who is it that can tell me who I am?
Why not by the hand, sir? How have I offended?
You are old. You should be ruled and led by some discretion that discerns your state.
Thou art my daughter, rather a disease that’s in my flesh.
Fly, brother! Fly!
Here I stand, your slave, a poor, infirm, weak and despised old man.
To whose hands you have sent the lunatic king?
I am a man more sinned against than sinning. Better thou hadst not been born… than not to have pleased me better.
CLIP ENDS
- All that matters is you please me, my daughter, and if not, better you were not born. I mean, the stunning lines. This, for me, is my favourite production in a very contemporary context, as you can see. This is way before the current Ukraine war and all that, that these guys are making it. I think it’s a fantastic production and so contemporary, not only the costumes, the clothing and the editing, but the interpretation of it. I’ve tried to show how I think Richard Eyre combines the civil war idea, the disintegration of society, the obvious breakdown of a family, the arrogance of the guy at the beginning, the empathy we feel in those mad scenes, in the storm, and existential questions of love and loss, and suffering and insight, madness. All of these huge things taken on in such a contemporary way. This is the opening scene from the Hopkins movie, which is the opening scene of the play, where he sets out to the three daughters, “Tell me, whoever’s going to love me the most, and… Whoever flatters my pride, basically, will inherit the most.”
CLIP BEGINS
Attend the lords of France and Burgundy, Gloucester.
Aye, my good lord.
Meantime we shall express our dark purpose. Give me the map there. Know that we have divided in three our kingdom. 'Tis our fast intent to shake all cares and business from our age, conferring them on younger strengths, while we, unburdened, crawl toward death. Our son of Cornwall, and you, our no less loving son of Albany, we have this hour a constant will to publish our daughters’ several dowers that future strife may be prevented now. The princes France and Burgundy were great rivals in our youngest daughter’s love. Long in our court have made their amorous sojourn, and here are to be answered. Tell me, my daughters, since now we will divest us both of rule, interest of territory, cares of state, which of you, shall we say, doth love us most, that we our largest bounty may extend where nature doth with merit challenge? Goneril, our eldest born, speak first. Sir, I love you more than word can wield the matter. Dearer than eyesight, space and liberty, beyond what can be valued, rich or rare. No less than life, with grace, health, beauty, honour, as much as child e'er loved or father found, a love that makes breath poor and speech unable. Beyond all manner of so much I love you.
Of all these bounds, even from this line to this, with shadowy forests, with champains rich’d, with plenteous rivers and wide-skirted meads, we make thee lady. To thine and Albany’s issue be this perpetual. Now, what says our second daughter, our dearest Regan, wife to Cornwall? Speak.
I am made of that self mettle as my sister and prize me at her worth. In my true heart, I find she names my very deed of love, only she comes too short. That I profess myself an enemy to all other joys, which the most precious square of sense possesses and find I am alone felicitate in your dear highness’ love.
And to thee and thine hereditary ever remain this ample third of our fair kingdom, no less in space, validity and pleasure, than that conferred on Goneril. Now our joy, although the last and least to whose young love the vines of France and milk of Burgundy strive to be interessed. What can you say to draw a third more opulent than your sisters? Speak.
Nothing, my lord.
Nothing?
Nothing.
Well, nothing will come of nothing. Speak again. Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave my heart into my mouth. I love your majesty according to my bond, no more nor less.
How now, Cordelia? Mend your speech a little, lest you may mar your fortunes.
Aye, my good lord. You have begot me, bred me, loved me. I return those duties back as are right fit: obey you, love you, and most honour you. Why have my sisters husbands if they say they love you all? Sure I shall never marry like my sisters to love my father all.
But goes thy heart with this?
Aye, my good lord.
So young and so untender.
So young, my lord, and true.
Let it be so, thy truth then be thy dower. Here I disclaim all my paternal care, and as a stranger to my heart and me hold thee from this forever.
Good, my liege-
Peace, Kent. Come not between the dragon and his wrath. I loved her most and thought to set my rest on her kind nursery. Hence and avoid my sight! Call France, who stirs? Call Burgundy! Ha, ha! Cornwall and Albany, with my two daughters’ dowers, digest the third. Let pride, which she calls plainness, marry her. I do invest you jointly with my power, preeminence, and all the large effects that troop with majesty. Ourself by monthly course with reservation of… An hundred knights by you to be sustained, shall our abode make with you by due turn. Only we still retain the name and all the addition to a king. The sway, revenue, execution of the rest, beloved sons, be yours.
Royal Lear, whom I have ever honoured as my king, as my great patron, thought on in my prayers.
The bow is bent and drawn, make from the shaft.
Let it fall rather, though the fork invade the region of my heart. Be Kent unmannerly when Lear is mad? What wouldst thou do, old man? Thinkest thou that duty shall have dread to speak when power to flattery bows?
Kent, on thy life, no more.
My life I never held but as a pawn to wage against thine enemies.
Out of my sight!
Dear sir, forbear-
See better, Lear.
Now, by Apollo…
Oh, now by Apollo, king. Thou swear'st thy gods in vain. I’ll tell thee, thou dost evil.
Hear me, recreant. On thine allegiance, hear me! That thou hast sought to make us break our vows, which we durst never yet, our potency made good, take thy reward. Five days we do allot thee for provision to shield thee from diseases of the world, and on the sixth to turn thy hated back upon our kingdom. If on the tenth day following, thy banished tongue be found in our dominions, the moment is thy death. Away, by Jupiter. This shall not be revoked!
Here’s France and Burgundy, my noble lord. My noble lord.
My Lord of Burgundy, we first address towards you, who with this king hath rivalled for our daughter. What in the least will you require in present dower with her or cease your quest of love?
Most royal majesty, I crave no more than hath your highness offered, nor will you tender less.
Right noble Burgundy, when she was dear to us we did hold her so. But now her price is fallen.
CLIP ENDS
- Going to hold that there. Okay, sorry everyone. Just a glitch here. Okay, so what for me is being shown here is… I mean, I think this is an extraordinary production and I wanted to show that scene in that length. It does open the play, as I mentioned, and I think Anthony Hopkins gets it. That little laugh, the way he looks. He’s not obviously mad and he’s not obviously just seeking flattery, he’s not obviously playing slimy sleazeball, anything like that. He’s just playing an ordinary father who’s shocked, and he’s stunned. Why can’t you say how much you love me as much as the others do, Cordelia? You know, and so on. And even when Kent confronts him at the end, you know, what, power bows to flattery like this? He has no… It doesn’t even register. This is the opening of a play. As I said, the premise feels ridiculous. A king would make such huge decisions based on this, in a couple of minutes? Secondly… And yet, we get the glances from Emma Thompson, from the others, Goneril, Regan, the other characters. We get the meaning completely and we get what’s really going on. And obviously the feeling is moving, our empathy goes away from Lear towards the other, towards Cordelia. So to begin this and then achieve it by the end in the ways that I mentioned, of that ironic device.
What also comes across to me is Jan Kott’s idea that in our times, the most intelligent interpretation of tragedy is to see it as grotesque, almost comic and farcical. And those words are quite different from the classical understanding of the word tragedy of a play like this. Because if it is more the grotesque and on the borderline of mad, farcical, comic, it’s a whole different story. And I think this is something that strikes a chord for me of our age. That Richard Eyre is tapping into, that Shakespeare is tapping into, certainly Hopkins and the others are. There’s a certain grotesqueness in that little laugh. And I’m putting away “Hannibal Lecter” and “Silence of the Lambs” and so on. But he gets it. Huh, huh? Nothing will come of… I mean, don’t you get it, don’t you understand? In essence, what I’m saying is that he… He makes it sound so natural, as they all do. Just so natural the flattery, the two daughters. Just so natural the way Anthony Hopkins does the response to Cordelia refusing to flatter you. I love you as according to my bond. You’re my father so I love you as my father. Full-stop. You know? So he doesn’t make a whole thing out of demand, “gimme gimme.” There’s no desperate. And you think there’s something grotesque in the way it’s shown. Something horrific, terrifying. Because it is so normal and natural in appearance. Horror doesn’t necessarily only look like raging cannibals in ancient, old movies. Horror is something so close to home, horror is in decisions, it’s in the actions, it’s in the natural way of being. And that, to me, is what makes it so extremely grotesque. And I think, as I said, Jan Kott gets it.
And there’s a profound distinction post the Second World War, of this idea of the grotesque and horror and tragedy. Kott also links it a lot to Beckett and Beckett’s vision, because there’s nothing romantic there. And Beckett’s vision is yes, it’s comic, and it’s fast and it’s very funny, and Beckett uses those words to call his plays tragic comedy, tragic farce. I think Beckett intuitively or intellectually gets the connection in “Waiting for Godot” and others. This is something grotesque going on here. This is something so crazy, so absurd, and yet is given the appearance of such absolute normality, we all accept, no question. What do our leaders do? How do they perform? How do they behave? How do they show themselves as leaders? What do our parents, mothers, fathers, whoever, people we know, children, how do they respond? What are we teaching when flattery rules the day? What is it worth? There’s something very powerful with the naturalising of what I’m calling the grotesque where it’s not even seen as grotesque anymore. It’s just seen as ridiculous, absurd, funny or witty or whatever. But there’s something dangerously grotesque. And that, to me, is what he’s suggesting in the play and in this production, with Richard directing. Coming out of that Beckett world. Yes, the Beckett world is funny, the two tramps around a tree, et cetera, et cetera.
But as the play goes on, there’s something grotesque. This is an image of contemporary human life, this is an image of suffering, this is an image of what humans are capable of. Something quite extraordinary. What Shakespeare’s doing and what Beckett is doing, if we link the two as Jan Kott does. Lear is the decay, it’s the fall of the world, it’s a convulsive civilization. It’s convulsive in the family. It has been now taken over with something of the grotesque. In a way, this modern idea of looking at it, understanding civilization, and it is precisely grotesque because it appears so natural and normal. Why not? Why do we care? Should we care? And I think there is a Biblical parable going on here, because I think we can look with our contemporary eyes at some of the Biblical stories, which we can now see as grotesque. Not just tragic or sad or comic. You know, a person who becomes a beggar in order to understand how society really works. Someone who goes mad and loses everything in order to gain wisdom and insight. Someone who is blind, who, in order to gain inner insight to themselves, someone who has to not necessarily only act out, but understand the human potential for cruelty and suffering in order to see the opposite. Someone who knows that night comes before dawn.
The fool disappears through the play and towards the end a clown is not needed anymore. Lear has become the fool, Lear has become the clown himself. But not cracking jokes. He’s become the agent, if you like, of insight and some wisdom attained. And of course there’s the hint of the ancient idea of the regeneration, the rebirth. The possibility for something to come after, this discord, civil discord, family discord towards the end as he comes out with the body of his dead Cordelia. There’s a hint of something. You know, maybe something can come out better from it. Which goes way back to the regeneration, you know after Noah’s flood comes the regeneration, the rebirth. After the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. All of the these things comes… It’s the rebirth archetype in society. I think perhaps there’s a link between Lear and King Solomon. More than Job, you know the doubter in the Bible. If we think about it, Solomon is an aged monarch at the end of his reign. If we try to imagine him, the wisest of all kings and yet what happens and what decisions are made? What realisation does Solomon come to? I myself am also mortal and a man like all other, and come of him that was first made of the earth. Solomon realises, it’s not just about a king or a crown on the head. It’s not just about properties and possessions and all that. It’s about who am I, what am I as a man on this earth?
And in my mother’s womb was I fashioned to be flesh. I was brought together into blood of the seed of man. I came from a woman, I’m born flesh. It’s not sort of going on and on about being a king and divine rule and power and what I can do with all the power, yes, and pride and flattery. And when I was born I received the air and fell upon the earth crying and weeping at the first, as all others do. It’s so human, it’s so ordinary, and yet visceral and alive. “When we are born, we cry that we are come to this great stage of fools,” says Shakespeare. Maybe I’m pushing it too far, probably am, but I think there can be a link between Solomon and Lear, not completely, but yeah. Kingdom is divided and what happens? Father, king, he has to first just see what he is as a man. As he says in that very first scene, what am I? What man am I? So I think “Lear” is about suffering, yes, condition in the world. Beckett turns this, and this is what I mean by the grotesque, not just the tragic. You’re on earth, there’s no cure for that. It’s comic, it’s witty, but it’s also quite grotesque. It’s when the tragedy and the absurd go together. We give birth astride the grave, the light gleams an instant, then is no more. It’s a grotesque and yet alive image. Samuel Johnson, as we all know, he wrote, “I was so shocked when I saw the production, I was so shocked by Cordelia’s death that I know not whether I can ever endure to read the last scenes of the play again.” So this is going through centuries of that ending, that shock of coming on with the dead body. Again, there’s no queen, there’s no mother.
The female figures aren’t, it’s just there’s the daughters. He’s the head of the household, he’s the father, he’s the king. All of these things he assumes from an external point of view and what he has to learn. He says, “Oh, Fool, I shall go mad.” You know, I’m scared of it. And later he says, “Who is it that can tell me who I am?” In that little clip I showed. Who is it that can tell me who I am? Who am I? Am I a king? Am I a man, a father, what? I’ve got to get to it. And the fool says, “Lear’s shadow.” And in those two words we get all of Jung and the archetype and the shadow. Like, he is shadow and he is who he is. And the way that Anthony Hopkins does it with that laugh and that giggle and that marching and “ha ha” and laughing. There’s a hint of madness, but the fun mischief of the trickster, and we can feel for that character more as well. He prefigures the madness to come, but not in a cliched performance of madness. So of course he’s ripped apart, the society is ripped apart. It becomes a house divided against itself from within. And I think if there was ever a phrase that captured so much of what’s going on in the west in our times, perhaps. A house divided amongst itself, against itself, but from within. And there’s a suffering. What does one do? Does one take a fist and punch at it, rebel against it? Stoically accept it? Be indifferent like nature?
As he says nature in the play is Shakespeare’s metaphor. Because the indifferent doesn’t care. What do we as humans do in the face of it? Lear: Dost thou call me fool, boy? And the fool replies, “All thy other titles thou hast given away. That thou wast born with, thou art a fool.” We are all born mad. And Beckett picks it up in “Waiting for Godot”. We are all born mad, some remain so. He twists it with grotesque comedy. We laugh, but we’re aware. We think of the fools, of the gravediggers in “Hamlet”, you know, the comic characters. The porter in “Macbeth”. The other fool or trickster or light comic relief characters. Here the fool is not so detached from the main action. He is crucial, as I mentioned earlier, to that ironic device of guiding Lear to understand what on earth he’s done and how he can get out of this madness. He has to strip the other roles of being king and the pride, all of these things have to go, in order to just see himself as the man. Some people have linked the story of Ahab in “Moby-Dick” to this. And there have been a lot of others that could be discussed endlessly. A couple of other quick phrases that I want to mention. As flies are to wanton boys, are we to the gods. These phrases, which have become so, maybe cliched, but so handed down through the generations, I think show that Shakespeare, he was so philosophical but almost had to find a way to put that into a play so it wasn’t just a philosophical lecture.
But he had to make it as if coming out of these characters for real. The prince of darkness is a gentleman, another phrase from the play. Look at those images of Emma Thompson, Goneril and Regan in the beginning. The prince of darkness is a gentleman. That’s so polite, it’s so smiling, it’s so warm, apparently, but it’s absolute the prince or princess of darkness speaking through them, how much you can achieve with flattery. Many a true word have been spoken in jest. That comes from this play. I mean, that phrase, as with many others from Shakespeare, just in our daily life. Who is it that can tell me who I am? Anybody? I think most importantly for Lear, can I tell myself who I am? And so the play goes on. Nothing is permanent, nothing is fixed. This is almost set up when civil strife and civil discord begins, family, society, et cetera, existential questions come out. When we are aware of the fault lines in a family, when we are aware of the fault lines in our society, we start to see this kind of disintegration, this breakdown, that I think Lear is alluding towards. You know, King James has come onto the throne, what’s going to happen with other countries, England, Scotland, other parts of the empire, you know EU, Brexit, I’m not even going to mention, go there.
Not only in Europe but other parts of the world. So I guess what I wanted to say at the end, is there’s the extraordinary language, there’s the extraordinary story, and it comes down to what is mortality, what is to be human, ultimately. Which is such a massive question, but I think Shakespeare tries to take it on. Maybe it’s over-ambitious in one play, but what he achieves, I think is pretty close. Lear says, “Oh, let me kiss that hand. Let me wipe it first, it smells of mortality.” These little phrases hints all the time, what is it to be mortal? What is it to be not part of the gods, mortal human? What is our potential for suffering, cruelty, magnificence, love, forgiveness, loss, all those things? And then right towards the end of the play, men must endure, they’re going hence even as they’re coming hither, ripeness is all. And I love that phrase, ripeness is all. Once one reaches a certain understanding and awareness of human nature and society, one can maybe contribute a bit more positively to a society. Hamlet, at the end of the play, when he finally kills Claudius, he says, “Readiness is all.” Well, it’s a coming of age play, “Hamlet”. He had to come of age, from boy to a man, to take responsibility, action, to kill the bad uncle Claudius. Here it’s ripeness is all. And about understanding a certain wisdom and insight into human nature. So I think the… And then there’s one last bit of speech that I want to mention here. He is mad… What is madness?
He is mad that trusts in the tameness of a wolf, a horse’s health, a boy’s love, or a whore’s oath. So the idea of trusting naively, naivety is seen as mad. Note the cliched, conventional ideas, but naivety is a certain kind of madness. The fool, in scene six, he’s mad that trusts in the tameness of a wolf, a horse’s health, a boy’s love, a whore’s oath. Okay, trusting naivety, ultimately we see here is mad. The naivety of Lear himself to trust what we saw in that opening scene with the daughters and their flattery. Okay. And then right towards the end, after Cordelia has died, and he’s there with her, “I’ll kneel down and ask of thee forgiveness.”
He’s talking to the dead Cordelia at the end, “I’ll knee down and ask of thee forgiveness, so will live and pray and sing and tell all tales, and laugh as gilded butterflies, and hear poor rogues talk of court news, and we’ll talk with them too. Who loses and who wins, who’s in, who’s out? Howl, howl, howl, howl. O, you are men of stones. Had I your tongue and eyes, I’d use them so that heaven’s vault should crack. She’s gone forever. I know when one is dead and when one lives. She’s dead as earth.” So he ends it with who wins, who loses, who’s up, who’s down, snakes and ladders of the court, the Medici, of Lear’s court. You know, who’s in power, who’s the boss, who isn’t, who’s in, who’s out, where are all the… in our jargon of today, all the dead bodies and so on? Well, what’s all this compared to the dead body of Cordelia in front of him? So this massive change from the beginning to the end, and what we’ve tried to do is tease out a couple of some of these main ideas in the play and to try and take it, crystallise it from these massive philosophical thoughts to something quite a bit more specific, perhaps, for our times.
Okay, thanks very much, everybody, and let’s hold it there. Emily, I can’t get the questions. Perhaps if you could read out to me some of the main questions, please.
Yeah, absolutely. Can you hear me?
Thank you. Yeah.
Q&A and Comments:
Sure. Okay, let’s see. There are a few comments to get started. Everyone’s enjoying your examination of “Lear”. Romaine says, “I agree, David, Shakespeare seems very cynical about love, from comedy to tragedy, he seems to think the fool really gets it.” A few people are asking for you to bring some insights on Greek tragedies in the future. Let’s see, some questions…
Okay, yeah.
Q - Apologies, there are a lot of comments, everyone’s loving this. Many actors have played King Lear, who is your favourite?
A - Well, that’s a great question. I mean, I loved the Paul Scofield in the Peter Brook production of the ‘70s many years ago. Then I was going to show a clip here but I can’t now, with the Orson Welles, but I don’t think he’s nearly as good. I think the Paul Scofield, everyone wants that kind of existential understanding of King Lear, and these themes and ideas that I mentioned. I think Anthony Hopkins in this contemporary version does a brilliant job. And I think that’s maybe the most… Not just because it’s the most recent, but I think it’s the most powerful of our times of the last five, seven, eight years, for me.
Q - Great. Things is from Richard, “Does the lack of a son to follow as king make a problem for Lear? Why divide the kingdom between three females when one, the eldest, would naturally take the crown as queen? Was it male narcissism that made Lear not even consider this? Would Elizabeth I… What would Elizabeth think of this?
A - Yes. It’s an interesting question. I don’t think, remember when Shakespeare’s writing and putting this on, is after Elizabeth I has died. And she’s already been a very powerful and remarkable queen. Enormous things were happening, England is discovering the world, colonising, going out, conquering, winning massive battles, et cetera. Surviving as an island nation. So I think he would never go against the idea of a woman being the queen, because this is James I who takes over just after Elizabeth I. So I don’t think he could ever risk that there can’t be a queen. So one of his daughters could absolutely be. But I think what’s important is that he is not abdicating, he is going into retirement. This is his retirement policy. He’s saying, "Right, the three of you will rule these three areas of England. You’ll rule Cornwall, Wales,” et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. “… but I’m still going to be king, I’ll still have the power.” He’s not abdicating, it’s his retirement and he thinks it’s insurance that he gives it to his daughters. So I know I’m giving it a very contemporary interpretation here, but I think it’s true. He never talks about abdicating, he never talks about, “Well, I’m going to go and sit under the trees and look at the seagulls.” None of that. He’s going to walk around with 100 horsemen and cavalry and march around and still have power. So that’s going on a bit there about the idea of queen and king.
Q - So, related, Bobby asks, “Is there any evidence that Shakespeare’s themes and insights ever impacted the king or the politics of the time?”
Sorry, could you say that again, Emily?
Is there any evidence that Shakespeare’s themes and insights ever impacted the king or the politics of the time?
A - No, but what is interesting is that I think he took a huge risk in doing this, because he, as I said, first showed it in front of King James I. Remember, this is divine right of kings, absolute rulers, monarch, et cetera. And the first production we know of was done in the palace in front of the king. The king would have been in front row centre. After this, he wrote two comedies and didn’t come back to this. So he might have pushed the edge a bit too far, but he wasn’t put into the Tower of London, he wasn’t banned, no, nothing happened, it was all fine. And I think because he would have said, “Okay, look, I’m showing a king in this light, et cetera, but it’s what happens when a king goes mad.” King went mad. That’s why he also made these decisions ridiculously at the beginning with the daughters. So I think he builds in a way out as a writer to justify it if King James was a bit irritated. This is all pure speculation on my behalf. Sorry. Go on, Emily.
Q - David, do you agree because of the richness of the text and the range of characters in “King Lear”, it’s almost impossible for any actor to give a bad performance in this role?
A - No, I think the opposite. It’s a great question, though, it’s a fantastic question. I think the way Shakespeare writes, not only in this play but so many of his other plays, I think he creates an incredible rhythm of speech and language, thought and emotion, that I think you just have to tap into the language, not be scared of it, and learn ways of how to, what we, in contemporary jargon call, naturalise the language, like we see Anthony Hopkins do it. Where it’s spoken as naturally as possible. And we don’t stress every second or third syllable. To be or not to be, that is the question. All I have to find is to stress two or three words and I can get a meaning. But if I stress every syllable or too many, it becomes like a machine gun, da-da-da-da-da-da on the iambic. But if I just stress two or three words or a couple of syllables in a line, I can get a meaning. It sounds very technical, but it’s a way to help act it. And I think it’s a fun technique to play with, and I think that it’s an actor’s dream. Because once you get into this, it just burns into the imagination of any human being and actors. And I think anyone who’s scared as an actor, just dive in, you know, deep end stuff.
Q - Would you use the term narcissist at all to describe Lear?
A - I mean, in the production I mentioned with Simon Russell Beale and Sam Mendes’ directing, they introduced a little element of dementia or hints of physical and mental dementia. And I’m ambivalent, I’m not sure about that, because I think that can distract from all these other themes that we’re talking about today. I think yes, he is old and he knows it. He says, “I’m just old despite…” But he’s so articulate about himself and about others. Yes, and is aware of age. I think Shakespeare is more interested in what age does to the human soul, the human nature, the human person, not just the physical ailment side of it, in a way. So I think… Yeah, you know, I think that this can be taken and it can be interpreted in so many ways. That’s one example. It can be more existential, like Scofield with Peter Brook. It can be more… sort of civil war, family, political, and philosophical like the Hopkins production tries to do. Or more political like the Sam Mendes one tried.
Q - Linda says, “The ancient spelling was L-E-I-R. Is there any underlying meaning to Shakespeare spelling it L-E-A-R?”
A - No. I mean, all I’ve found is that that’s from the fairytale I mentioned right at the beginning about the salt and the meat. That Jeffrey of Monmouth wrote the story, the fairytale, and spelt it L-E-I-R in most of the versions of that that I’ve found. But I don’t know any other meaning. There might be, I don’t know.
Q - Curious about your thoughts on Olivier’s versions?
A - That’s another whole talk. I think it’s brilliant for its times, but I think the Anthony Hopkins gets the closest to our times now, you know, in the last 8, 10 years of this century. When I was a student I loved the Peter Brook, the Scofield production. When you’re a student and thinking all these philosophical existential questions and everything. And yeah, the Olivier is more for his generation after the war. And that physicality and I think it’s a bit, for us today, maybe a little bit melodramatic. But that’s today, not in his times. So for me, the Anthony Hopkins, because the hint of madness is there to begin with, but it’s done in what I’m talking about, the grotesque way. And I love the idea of the grotesque as a way of showing contemporary tragedy.
Q - What about Jonathan Pryce as King Lear?
Jonathan who?
Pryce.
How do you spell that?
P-R-Y-C-E.
A - There’s R-H-Y-S, I don’t know. I’m not sure who that is, sorry. I’ll have to pass.
Q - In naturalising the text, should you extend that to use you instead of thou throughout?
A - No. No, great question. I don’t think so, because… Well, just to give an example, to be or not to be, that is the question. If we read it like a neutral newsreader and then we just take two or three words, to be or not to be, that’s the question. To be or not to be, that is the question. To be, or not to be? That’s the question. You know, all one stresses is a couple of words or syllables and you can immediately create different meanings without thought, in a way. And then of course you’ve got to combine it with thought in the character. So that’s to help an actor naturalise. And I don’t think… And then I think it becomes, you can play with it and have fun, and find the meaning ultimately that is authentic to the actor and the production.
Q - The last question, was there a book that you mentioned?
A - There is a fantastic book by John Barton. It was a series that he did with the Royal Shakespeare Company, and it’s on film as well, and one can find it on the internet, called “Playing Shakespeare”. Where, I forget, it was 9 or 10 episodes, and in the book. And it’s all about what we’re talking about, naturalising the language, how to find character. It’s all the… Everything is the language with Shakespeare. But how to access it, make it accessible for the actor, and then for the audience. So to naturalise it in this way. Not naturalistic, but naturalise so it feels like almost ordinary people talking. Because I’m sure many people know, in Shakespeare’s time the accent was closest to some of contemporary Irish accent. So you can start to feel the rhythm of the iambic in those lines, and I think that can help. The only book I think I mentioned was maybe the John Barton, “Playing Shakespeare”, where all of this is spoken about, these techniques, if you like, of acting and actors rehearsing and working with the language and creating character. That was the one, I don’t know if I mentioned any other. Okay.
Great, those are all the questions, David. Thank you.
Okay, great. Thank you so much everybody, hope you have a great evening and Sunday everywhere, and sorry about that little glitch that happened, will be fixed by next week, and thank you, Emily, and take care everyone, stay safe, stay strong.