commentary on act 1 sc 1


enter..	As is frequently the case, we begin the play with characters talking about the main character. But we can say something more interesting than that dire phrase: they're setting the scene. Firstly - visually these are great courtiers - at least Gloucester and Kent are - by their costumes, tone and age. (The play will concern itself much with the relations between generations. Here we have two old men with one younger, no doubt set somewhat apart, and essentially somewhat passive in the conversation. The power relations which apply between the generations are established - visually, and through the tone of the conversation which follows. Important - since those relations - very rapidly - are going to change. Gloucester and Kent are exchanging gossip in the 'corridors of power' - that's what courtiers do. (Look ahead to Lear and Cordelia's last exchanges on stage :Act 5 sc 3 -......[we will] 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; / And take upon's the mystery of things. By this time Lear will think he has disengaged himself from this world, got some ironic distance from it. But in scene 1, it's this world we are immediately plunged into). Incidentally - how would you have them dressed? The play is set in a pagan Britain - but the tone and concerns of these courtiers are Elizabethan. Shakespeare owes some of his freedom and fluidity to the Elizabethan disregard for concern about anachronism - it allows him to flit between historical epochs we would regard as quite distinct.
I thought the king..	The content of this gossip is already about the division of the kingdom. It is speculating about who the king favours. A couple of points about this (i) the scene as it follows will be much concerned about love - the proof of it in a public declaration. Perhaps it is possible to see Lear's mistake as confusing favouritism - which is how Lear's court functions ( as indeed would any court of the time) - essentially a public way of proceeding, with love - quite private. Hence, Cordelia's difficulty: being asked to transform something private into something public. (ii) The two courtiers just don't know. Lear's actions - his darker purposes - are his alone, made without reference or advice. This underlines the absoluteness nature of his power, but also its personal nature - something which again will allow him to confuse the private with the public, his public role as king with his personal neediness.
Is not this your son..	The first topic of conversation runs out - they have nothing more to say on it, because they don't know. (It might seem odd that two such obviously great courtiers are left so in the dark by their king. This, in turn, underlines the theatricality of Lear's announcement of his abdication). They turn from a public topic to a more personal one - Gloucester's son (although the course of the play will make Edmund's role precisely of public importance). We become aware of Edmund's presence - but silent, marginalised. He will be silent for another page; that he is marginalised will form the complaint of his first soliloquy. Imagine Kent's tone as merely being polite - avoiding the silence which the first topic of their conversation has run into.
His breeding..	Gloucester's line has two meanings: (i) I have been accused of being his father, (ii) I have paid for his upbringing.(ii) follows, as it were, from (i)
so often blush'd	We still have the sense of being brazen - that is, not being embarrassed or shamed by something most people would expect us to be ashamed of. Gloucester will not be embarrassed by the fact he has an illegitimate son - in fact, he will go on to talk openly, almost braggingly about it.
conceive	Kent - in this conversation out of mere impersonal politeness - does not understand what Gloucester is saying; he's not quite expecting this tone of unembarrassed confession. But Gloucester plays upon Kent's word; not only will he be unembarrassed by it, but he will make it into a kind of joke.
do you smell a fault	Imagine Gloucester's tone to be something like a kind of laddish naughtiness - he's not expecting Kent to blame him; he's almost proud of his laddishness. He knows how the world goes; he's self-consciously a 'man of the world'. His sense of the world here is obviously quite different to his answer to Lear in Act 4 scene 6:...yet you see how this world goes. Glos.:I see it feelingly. There is no sense here of what the later word -feelingly -will suggest; here, Gloucester will strike us as morally complacent, comfortable in his world. It seems a deliberate irony that he uses the words smell a fault here so complacently as these words will echo through Act 4 sc 6 in quite a different key. Does Gloucester's moral complacency here justify his later fate? Edgar will later speak as if this is so. He says to the dying Edmund in Act 5 scene 3: The dark and vicious place where thee he got / Cost him his eyes. This asserted neatness of punishment certainly seems to me uncomfortable - it lacks proportionality as punishment, too 'moralistic', too easily discounting Gloucester's sufferings. I would put it down to the need most of the characters in Lear have to make 'sense of suffering', to give it a reason. They need - as we do - to have a sense of moral accounting in the world, whereas the play as a play denies this (what would 'justify' Cordelia's death?)
I cannot wish the fault..	I can't imagine Kent's response as anything more than merely polite - Gloucester seems to me one of those characters who believe that the whole world will appreciate their fast and loose ways. They are either amusing or embarrassing, or a combination of both. But they don't need much of a response - since they feel they are assured of it already.
I have a son..	Edgar is older than Edmund and also legitimate: he is doubly advantaged over Edmund. We must remember Gloucester's statement here that he doesn't favour Edgar over Edmund - Edgar is no dearer in my account. There's no reason to disbelieve this; if there is difference in their treatment, it is because of social custom, not of love.
there was good sport	Does Kent wish to know this? What's more does Edmund? We have to remember that Edmund is stood there - silent, being spoken about as an object. And wouldn't the topic be deeply embarrassing to any child? Further, we shall see how Edmund suffers under and resents the fact of his illegitimacy (Act 1 scene 2). How must his father's exceptional brazenness affect him?
do you know this noble gentleman	Gloucester formally introduces Edmund to Kent. An illegitimate son's future might well depend upon such introductions; such great lords might be able to offer him a position in their households or do them the favour of recommending them to other positions. The alternative is for them to go to Europe and seek their fortune there - as is likely to be Edmund's fate at this point: He hath been out [of the country] nine years, and away he shall again. (There was a genuine problem in Elizabethan times: what are the younger sons of the aristocracy to do? The eldest son would inherit the estates - by primogeniture - and there were few occupations which it would be permissible for a member of the nobility to pursue (some positions in the Church, some at Court, some military posts - and all these would be by gift, not application) . Edmund has no 'natural' place in the existing social structure.
Enter King Lear	It's important that this entrance be imposing - as this is the last and only opportunity we have of seeing Lear as simply King. More or less as soon as he speaks he is giving his position away. The entrance in its staging is also important as marking the occasion and speeches which follow as public. It underlines therefore the oddity of Lear's actions and motives, and the competition to which they give rise.
our darker purpose	This is a stage-managed event - but by Lear alone. He has no need to consult anyone, and he has every confidence about what will happen. (The love-competition is no real competition - Lear will hand out the prizes without comparing one entry to another).
.shake all cares and business.... Unburthen'd crawl toward death.	Can a king abdicate in this way - can a king retire from the job, when the 'job' is his by birth, by virtue of who he is, not by virtue of what he does. Is there a note of self-pity, of asking for pity, in his phrases and emphases: all cares and business.......Unburthen'd crawl toward death...? If so, he is asking pity for the person but by using the figure of the king. Whether this is so or not, an unburdened crawl towards death is precisely what the story will not give him.
that future strife..	Lear has some apparent sense of his responsibilities - but the mention of this aim only underlines what must be obvious to anyone: that dividing the kingdom in this way is likely to lead to civil war in the future. A kingdom is not a family estate - and family estates were not divided between children either.
Tell me, my daughters... doth love us most	Lear has set up an answer to a string of questions which might be puzzling his court: what is he about to do with the kingdom, which of his family he favours the most, who will Cordelia marry? All here are to be answer'd. Hence the feeling that he is stage-managing this, looking for the maximum effect. He turns then to his daughters - as if now to speak personally, since now we will divest us both of rule, interest of territory, cares of state... But: does he really think this? (i) his daughters and the story will show him what divestment really means - literally, since at one point he will, by now carrying through the logic of divesting, strip himself of clothes. Divesting - once begun - will not stop. (ii) although he turns to his daughters, he is still addressing the court, it is still part of a public performance. He still uses the royal plural :...we say.. doth love us.. This aspect of performance is surely what is most shocking about his question, that, and related to it, its peculiar personal neediness. What does he want? Reassurance? A jumping through hoops of his well-trained daughters? Goneril and Regan will provide him with both (although the one undermines the other - a performing dog trained to spell out 'I love you' with lettered bricks would not be making a declaration of love).
our largest bounty	As said above, Lear can't really mean this - as he hands out the prizes after each speech without comparing them one to the other.
Sir, I love you	Goneril provides what such an impossible question demands: a performance. The point is not the words sincerity but their polish. There's even a nice underlining irony: she starts by saying that words cannot express the quantity of her love, but her speech goes on to say it anyway. Only Cordelia will follow the true logic of this. Is there something deliberately prefiguring in dearer than eye-sight, space and liberty ? The story will show the literal meaning of these terms.
Love, and be silent	Some have found Cordelia's eventual answer Nothing to be too abrupt, too coldly 'honest'. Maybe - but there are some considerations which might lessen that impression. Firstly, Cordelia's first aside shows a genuine concern: What shall Cordelia speak? Cordelia is looking for something she might be able to say. (Like somebody in a competition telling jokes desperately casting about in their own minds for a tellable joke - except none will come up.) Cordelia decides that actions, the substance of Love, is surely the most important thing, so that she can Love, and be silent. Trouble is we might already be aware that Lear is one who likes the performance aspect of words: his first speech has been full of self-conscious searching for effect, and indeed do his following words to Goneril: Of all these bounds...with shadowy forests and with champains rich'd, with plenteous rivers and wide-skirted meads... The piling of description and choice of adjectives are there to praise his own gift, to show his own generosity. Cordelia is caught between those who know how to play games with words.
I am made of that self mettle ..Only she comes too short	Regan just as much as Goneril knows the game being played. She is of the same type as her sister. They will both be the same throughout the play - and therefore competitive (to their eventual mutual destruction). Here, Regan finds an easy way to go beyond her sister - merely by saying: 'Me too, but more.' This (ridiculous) aspect of competition underlines the ridiculous nature of Lear's question - again raising the question 'what does he really want; he can't really want these glib words? But he does.
what can you say..	When Lear turns to Cordelia Now, our joy.. he really is anticipating something special in her words since (our joy) he has a special regard for her. The world must conform to his expectations - or rather that 'must' is too wishful - there is no question that the world will confirm his expectations. What he is expecting is something rich (opulent) in words to match the richness of his gift.
Nothing	So Cordelia's bare response is a complete shock to him. He repeats the word Nothing? as though stunned; he can't have heard straight.

	Commentary on Act 1 sc 1
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