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The Tragedy of

King Lear

by

William

Shakespeare

An Electronic Classics Series Publication

The Tragedy of King Lear is a publication of The Elec- tronic Classics Series. This Portable Document file is furnished free and without any charge of any kind. Any person using this document file, for any pur- pose, and in any way does so at his or her own risk. Neither the Pennsylvania State University nor Jim Manis, Editor, nor anyone associated with the Pennsylvania State University assumes any respon- sibility for the material contained within the docu- ment or for the file as an electronic transmission, in any way.

The Tragedy of King Lear by William Shakespeare, The Electronic Classics Series, Jim Manis, Editor, PSU- Hazleton, Hazleton, PA 18202 is a Portable Docu- ment File produced as part of an ongoing publica- tion project to bring classical works of literature, in English, to free and easy access of those wishing to make use of them.

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DRAMATIS PERSONAE

LEAR, King of Britain KING OF FRANCE DUKE OF BURGUNDY DUKE OF CORNWALL DUKE OF ALBANY EARL OF KENT EARL OF GLOUCESTER EDGAR: Son to Gloucester. EDMUND: bastard son to Gloucester. CURAN: a courtier. Old Man: tenant to Gloucester. Doctor Fool OSWALD: Steward to Goneril. A Captain employed by Edmund Gentleman attendant on Cordelia A Herald Servants to Cornwall GONERIL: REGAN: daughters to Lear. CORDELIA: Knights of Lear’s train, Captains, Messengers, Sol- diers, and Attendants

SCENE: Prehistoric Britain.

KING LEAR

by William Shakespeare

ACT I

SCENE I: King Lear’s palace.

Enter KENT, GLOUCESTER, and EDMUND.

KENT: I thought the king had more affected the Duke of Albany than Cornwall.

GLOUCESTER: It did always seem so to us: but now, in the division of the kingdom, it appears not which of the dukes he values most; for equalities are so weighed, that curiosity in neither can make choice of either’s moiety.

KENT: Is not this your son, my lord?

GLOUCESTER: His breeding, sir, hath been at my charge: I have so often blushed to acknowledge him, that now I am brazed to it.

KENT: I cannot conceive you.

GLOUCESTER: Sir, this young fellow’s mother could: whereupon she grew round-wombed, and had, indeed, sir, a son for her cradle ere she had a hus- band for her bed. Do you smell a fault?

Exeunt GLOUCESTER and EDMUND.

KING LEAR: Meantime we shall express our darker purpose. Give me the map there. Know that we have divided In three our kingdom: and ’tis our fast intent To shake all cares and business from our age; Conferring them on younger strengths, while we Unburthen’d 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, Great rivals in our youngest daughter’s love, Long in our court have made their amorous sojourn, And here are to be answer’d. 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.

GONERIL: Sir, I love you more than words can wield the matter; Dearer than eye-sight, space, and liberty; Beyond what can be valued, rich or rare; No less than life, with grace, health, beauty, honor; 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.

CORDELIA: [Aside] What shall Cordelia do? Love, and be silent.

LEAR: Of all these bounds, even from this line to this, With shadowy forests and with champains rich’d, With plenteous rivers and wide-skirted meads, We make thee lady: to thine and Albany’s issue Be this perpetual. What says our second daughter, Our dearest Regan, wife to Cornwall? Speak.

REGAN: Sir, I am made of the self-same metal 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.

CORDELIA: [Aside] Then poor Cordelia! And yet not so; since, I am sure, my love’s More richer than my tongue.

KING LEAR: To thee and thine, hereditary ever Remain this ample third of our fair kingdom; No less in space, validity, and pleasure, Than that conferr’d on Goneril. Now, our joy, Although the last, not least; to whose young love The vines of France and milk of Burgundy Strive to be interess’d; what can you say to draw A third more opulent than your sisters? Speak.

CORDELIA: So young, my lord, and true.

KING LEAR: Let it be so; thy truth, then, be thy dower: For, by the sacred radiance of the sun, The mysteries of Hecate, and the night; By all the operation of the orbs From whom we do exist, and cease to be; 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. The barbarous Scythian, Or he that makes his generation messes To gorge his appetite, shall to my bosom Be as well neighbor’d, pitied, and relieved, As thou my sometime daughter.

KENT: Good my liege,—

KING LEAR: 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! So be my grave my peace, as here I give Her father’s heart from her! Call France; who stirs? Call Burgundy. Cornwall and Albany, With my two daughters’ dowers digest this third: Let pride, which she calls plainness, marry her. I do invest you jointly with my power, Pre-eminence, and all the large effects That troop with majesty. Ourself, by monthly course, With reservation of an hundred knights, By you to be sustain’d, shall our abode Make with you by due turns. Only we still retain

The name, and all the additions to a king; The sway, revenue, execution of the rest, Beloved sons, be yours: which to confirm, This coronet part betwixt you. [ Giving the crown. ]

KENT: Royal Lear, Whom I have ever honor’d as my king, Loved as my father, as my master follow’d, As my great patron thought on in my prayers,—

KING LEAR: The bow is bent and drawn, make from the shaft.

KENT: Let it fall rather, though the fork invade The region of my heart: be Kent unmannerly, When Lear is mad. What wilt thou do, old man? Think’st thou that duty shall have dread to speak, When power to flattery bows? To plainness honor’s bound, When majesty stoops to folly. Reverse thy doom; And, in thy best consideration, check This hideous rashness: answer my life my judg ment, Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least; Nor are those empty-hearted whose low sound Reverbs no hollowness.

KING LEAR: Kent, on thy life, no more.

KENT: My life I never held but as a pawn To wage against thy enemies; nor fear to lose it, Thy safety being the motive.

Upon our kingdom: if, on the tenth day following, Thy banish’d trunk be found in our dominions, The moment is thy death. Away! by Jupiter, This shall not be revoked.

KENT: Fare thee well, king: sith thus thou wilt appear, Freedom lives hence, and banishment is here.

[ To CORDELIA. ]

The gods to their dear shelter take thee, maid, That justly think’st, and hast most rightly said!

[ To REGAN and GONERIL. ]

And your large speeches may your deeds approve, That good effects may spring from words of love. Thus Kent, O princes, bids you all adieu; He’ll shape his old course in a country new.

[Exit.]

[Flourish. Re-enter GLOUCESTER, with KING OF FRANCE, BURGUNDY, and Attendants.]

GLOUCESTER: Here’s France and Burgundy, my noble lord.

KING LEAR: My lord of Burgundy. We first address towards you, who with this king Hath rivall’d for our daughter: what, in the least, Will you require in present dower with her, Or cease your quest of love?

BURGUNDY: Most royal majesty, I crave no more than what your highness offer’d, Nor will you tender less.

KING LEAR: Right noble Burgundy, When she was dear to us, we did hold her so; But now her price is fall’n. Sir, there she stands: If aught within that little seeming substance, Or all of it, with our displeasure pieced, And nothing more, may fitly like your grace, She’s there, and she is yours.

BURGUNDY: I know no answer.

KING LEAR: Will you, with those infirmities she owes, Unfriended, new-adopted to our hate, Dower’d with our curse, and stranger’d with our oath, Take her, or leave her?

BURGUNDY: Pardon me, royal sir; Election makes not up on such conditions.

KING LEAR: Then leave her, sir; for, by the power that made me, I tell you all her wealth.

[ To KING OF FRANCE. ]

For you, great king, I would not from your love make such a stray, To match you where I hate; therefore beseech you To avert your liking a more worthier way Than on a wretch whom nature is ashamed

What say you to the lady? Love’s not love When it is mingled with regards that stand Aloof from the entire point. Will you have her? She is herself a dowry.

BURGUNDY: Royal Lear, Give but that portion which yourself proposed, And here I take Cordelia by the hand, Duchess of Burgundy.

KING LEAR: Nothing: I have sworn; I am firm.

BURGUNDY: I am sorry, then, you have so lost a father That you must lose a husband.

CORDELIA: Peace be with Burgundy! Since that respects of fortune are his love, I shall not be his wife.

KING OF FRANCE: Fairest Cordelia, that art most rich, being poor; Most choice, forsaken; and most loved, despised! Thee and thy virtues here I seize upon: Be it lawful I take up what’s cast away. Gods, gods! ’tis strange that from their cold’st neglect My love should kindle to inflamed respect. Thy dowerless daughter, king, thrown to my chance, Is queen of us, of ours, and our fair France: Not all the dukes of waterish Burgundy Can buy this unprized precious maid of me. Bid them farewell, Cordelia, though unkind: Thou losest here, a better where to find.

KING LEAR: Thou hast her, France: let her be thine; for we Have no such daughter, nor shall ever see That face of hers again. Therefore be gone Without our grace, our love, our benison. Come, noble Burgundy.

[ Flourish. Exeunt all but KING OF FRANCE, GONERIL, REGAN, and CORDELIA. ]

KING OF FRANCE: Bid farewell to your sisters. CORDELIA: The jewels of our father, with wash’d eyes Cordelia leaves you: I know you what you are; And like a sister am most loath to call Your faults as they are named. Use well our father: To your professed bosoms I commit him But yet, alas, stood I within his grace, I would prefer him to a better place. So, farewell to you both.

REGAN: Prescribe not us our duties.

GONERIL: Let your study Be to content your lord, who hath received you At fortune’s alms. You have obedience scanted, And well are worth the want that you have wanted.

CORDELIA: Time shall unfold what plaited cunning hides: Who cover faults, at last shame them derides. Well may you prosper!

KING OF FRANCE: Come, my fair Cordelia.

GONERIL: We must do something, and i’ the heat.

[ Exeunt. ]

SCENE II: The Earl of Gloucester’s castle.

[ Enter EDMUND, with a letter. ]

EDMUND: Thou, nature, art my goddess; to thy law My services are bound. Wherefore should I Stand in the plague of custom, and permit The curiosity of nations to deprive me, For that I am some twelve or fourteen moon-shines Lag of a brother? Why bastard? wherefore base? When my dimensions are as well compact, My mind as generous, and my shape as true, As honest madam’s issue? Why brand they us With base? with baseness? bastardy? base, base? Who, in the lusty stealth of nature, take More composition and fierce quality Than doth, within a dull, stale, tired bed, Go to the creating a whole tribe of fops, Got ‘tween asleep and wake? Well, then, Legitimate Edgar, I must have your land: Our father’s love is to the bastard Edmund As to the legitimate: fine word,—legitimate! Well, my legitimate, if this letter speed, And my invention thrive, Edmund the base Shall top the legitimate. I grow; I prosper: Now, gods, stand up for bastards!

[ Enter GLOUCESTER. ]

GLOUCESTER: Kent banish’d thus! and France in choler parted! And the king gone to-night! subscribed his power!