Gloucester

is not just defined as not seeing with one’s eyes, but also the inability to see the truth and what is really happening around one’s self. In Homer’s epic, The Odyssey, Odysseus encounters a blind prophet and also blinds a Cyclops. King Lear and Gloucester are very similar in the fact that they are blind to actions happening around them, while Odysseus is encountering blindness around him at key moments in his journey back home. From the very beginning, King Lear is “blind” to how his…

reputation for the family members. Thus, Gloucester does not accept his bastard son for the majority of Edmund’s life. “My services are bound. Wherefore should I / stand in the plague of custom and permit / The curiosity of nations to deprive me,” (1.2.2-4). Edmund expresses that he should not be inferior to Edgar because of hateful…

Lear, Shakespeare addresses the idea of broken bonds. The play begins with King Lear dividing his kingdom amongst his daughters, in which the flattery of two of his daughters leads Lear to blindness. The play continues with the parallel story of Gloucester and his two sons. These two parallel stories converge at the end of the play with the realization of the truth. Using the theme of broken bonds as a focal point in the play, Shakespeare is able to create a most troubling tragedy. Using irony…

emotionally and physically due to their power. However Gloucesters downfall just like Lear could had been saved, however it was too late. Gloucester by the beginning of the play was sought to be a noble person ,which was a bit hypocritical. His blinding was seen as being a physical and emotional blinding of the world around him. It may also reflect his past affair with women which is also seemed upon as being a sin. Its is only when Gloucester became blind did he realize the reality of the world…

Gloucester’s loyal act was not only based off sympathy, but also out of respect for Lear’s rightful kingship. Gloucester acknowledged that Lear still was the rightful King and that he could not be abandoned to a fitful storm simply because of a debate about an amount of unreliable knights. Gloucester’s risk was never acknowledged by Lear more likely because Lear’s sanity had overtaken him, but Gloucester was still not one of the people he regretted having done wrong due to his…

the tools to destroy us. In William Shakespeare’s King Lear, we see many examples of this same theme. Lear dividing his kingly powers between his two selfish daughters, Goneril writing about her love for Edmund in a letter anyone could read, and Gloucester telling Edmund where he has stashed a letter containing news of the French army all show characters giving their enemies the means to their own destruction. When King Lear is first introduced at the beginning of the play, he is in the process…

After being blinded Gloucester states, “I have no way and therefore want no eyes. I stumbled when I saw. Full oft ’tis seen Our means secure us, and our mere defects Prove our commodities. O dear son Edgar, The food of thy abusèd father’s wrath, Might I but live to see thee in my touch, I’d say I had eyes again.”(Act 4, Line 207) Through this Shakespeare is creating a contrast between Gloucester and King Lear. Though Gloucester is physically blind, he is able to see the truth…

the theme of foolishness is very common, familiar and frequent. Shakespeare makes certain characters look foolish, completly idiotic, thoughtless, and unitelligent. Some of those fools are King Lear/ Earl of Gloucester, the Fool, Goneril/Regan, Kent/Codelia. King Lear and the Earl of Gloucester are alike, foolishness wise. They are both unable to see the truth and believe the wrong people. The Fool is a litteral fool but certainly does not act like one. Goneril and Regan are ignorant fools.…

their father? Why do the gods punish him in such a way? He hasn’t come to the same realization that Gloucester has at this point in the play.…

Had Gloucester not been blind towards the truth concerning his sons, and had he not “stumbled when I saw,” then perhaps Edmund never would have been able to set his plan in motion. However, here Gloucester’s hamartia comes into play, namely that even when he could see, he was blind. As with Lear, it is not until he loses his sight that he truly sees, which can be noticed in Act 4, scene 5 when Gloucester says: “Methinks y’are better spoken” to Edgar disguised…