Lear Blog 1

The unhappiness in Gloucester’s family lies in Edmund’s illegitimacy, while Lear’s family is torn apart by poor decisions and unfaithfulness. Edmund feels wronged by his father’s shame toward him, and so he finds a way to get back at Gloucester by turning Edgar against him, and he against Edgar. This is the beginning of the tearing apart of Gloucester’s family. The fault here lies within both Edmund and Gloucester. Gloucester is ashamed of Edmund’s illegitimacy, and this rightfully upsets Edmund. Edmund takes it to too much of an extreme when, in order to get “his share” of the inheritance, he pits his father and half-brother against one another. Here we begin to see that Edmund is not quite as innocent as he seems in the opening scene. It is a combination of Gloucester’s shame and Edmund’s vindictiveness that create the unhappiness in their family. While Edmund is somewhat justified in his unhappiness, he creates a larger problem by pursuing it beyond a feasible boundary.

Lear contributes greatly to his family’s unhappiness, primarily due to his mental instability. Even early on in the play, the reader is aware that Lear does not know his own mind. He makes a poor decision to disinherit Cordelia, his only truly faithful daughter, and resign his kingdom to the unfaithful Regan and Goneril. This soon comes back to haunt him, when Goneril turns against him and sets Regan on that same path. Lear realizes his mistake, but it is, of course, too late.

Some similarities lie between the two families in the fact that both are destroyed by fault of the fathers and the children. Regan, Goneril, and Edmund are similar characters in the fact that all three are after revenge. They have different motivations, but the result is the same; it tears their families apart.