King Lear is a brutual play witch his filled with cruelty and awful, seeminly meaningless disasters. The play's succession of terrible events raises an obvious qustion for the chracters, whether there is any possibility of justice in the world, or whether the world is fundamentally indifferent or even hostile to humankind. Various characters offer their opinions. "As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods;/ They kill us for their sport." Gloucester muses, realizes it foolish for humankind to assume that the natural world works in parallel with socially or morally convenient notions of justice (4.1.37-38). Edgar, on the other hand, insists that "the gods are just," believing that individuals get what they deserve (5.3169). But, in the end, we are left with only a terrifying uncertainty, although the wicked die, the good die along with them, culminating in the awful image of Lear cradling Cordelia's body in his arms. There is goodness in the world of the play, but there is also madness and death, and it is difficult to tell which triumphs in the end. King Lear has strengths and weaknesses. Some of his strengths are powerful, responsible, positive transformation. Some of his weaknesses are showing how he separates his power and responsibility and is betrayed. He is a powerful and important man, he is the king. He is getting …show more content…
First he puts his daughters through a test, asking each to tell him how much she loves him. Goneril and Regan, Lear's older daughtes, give their father flattering answers. But Cordelia, Lear's youngest and favorite daughter, remains silent, saying that she has no words to describe how much she loves her father. Lear flies into a rage and disowns Cordelia. The king of France, who has courted Cordelia, says that he still wants to marry her even without her land, and she accompanies him to France without her father's blessing. At this point Lear learns that he made a bad decision. His daughters are betraying him and Lear goes insane. He flees his daughters houses to wander on a heath during a great thunderstorm, accompanied by his Fool and by Kent, a loyal nobleman in disguise. Then an elderly nobleman named Gloucester realizes that Lear's daughters have turned against their father, he decides to help Lear in spite of the danger. Regan and her husband, Cornwall, discover him helping Lear, accuse him of treason, blind him, and turn him out to wander the countryside. He ends up being led by his diguised son, Edgar, toward the city of Dover, where Lear has also been brought. Then Gloucester tries to commit suicide, but Edgar saves him by pulling the strange trick of leading him off an imaginary cliff. Meanwhile,