“King Lear, as I see it, confronts the perplexity and mystery of human action. ” (Shakespeare’s Middle Tragedies, 169) As the previous quotation from the scriptures of Maynard Mack implies, King Lear is a very complex and intricate play which happens to be surrounded by a lot of debate. “The folio of 1623, which was, as is well known, edited by two of Shakespeare’s fellow actors” (Notes and Essays on Shakespeare, 242), contains not only historical errors, but errors which pertain to certain characters speaking other characters lines.
Amidst all the controversy one fact can be settled upon by ll; King Lear is one of Shakespeare’s best tragedies. While being a great play, the bulk of the plot in King Lear comes mainly from the first two scenes where most of the key events happen. Along with the plot there is also extensive amounts of setup that occur within the dialogue which key the audience in on the morals and values of the characters. Marilyn French is completely accurate when she states that “Everything about the play hangs on the first two scenes not just the plot but the values as well” (Shakespeare’s Division of Experience, 226).
The opening scenes of King Lear do an immaculate job of setting up the plot and forming the basis for all the events which occur in the later scenes of the play. “The elements of that opening scene are worth pausing over, because they seem to have been selected to bring before us precisely such an impression of unpredictable effects lying coiled and waiting in an apparently innocuous posture of affairs. ” (Shakespeare’s Middle Tragedies, 170) Not only do the opening scenes impress upon us what events could happen in the future, they seem to give us the whole plot in a neatly wrapped package.
After the first two scenes are over the audience is basically just along for the ride, waiting to see how the events given to us in the opening scenes unfold. “As we look back over the first scene, we may wonder whether the gist of the whole matter has not been placed before us, in the play’s own emblematic terms, by Gloucester, Kent, and Edmund in that brief conversation with which the tragedy begins. ” (Shakespeare’s Middle Tragedies, 171) In the first scene Lear, having realized that death is closing in on him, decides to divide his land between his daughters.
This is one of the most pivotal points in the play as the effects of this action are enormous. Lear ends up casting aside Cordelia, who is the only daughter he has who truly loves him, and gives all his land to his other two, power hungry, daughters. The other pivotal point in the first scene which has a huge affect on the rest of the play is the inclusion of the talk about Edmund. Edmund realizes that, due to his illegitimacy, he can never amount to anything. “The first action alluded to is the old king’s action in dividing his kingdom, the dire effects of which we are almost instantly to see.
The other action is Gloucester’s action in begetting a bastard son, and the dire effects of this will also speedily be known. ” (Shakespeare’s Middle Tragedies, 171) The consequences of these two actions are what the whole play revolves around. The division of Lear’s kingdom causes Reagan and Goneril to realize that “Lear had lived long, but he had not learned wisdom. ” (Notes and Essays on Shakespeare, 262) As they begin to realize just how easy they can take advantage of him, Lear begins to see this as well and is furious, at first, then his madness starts to set in.
Gloucester’s bastard son, Edmund, plays a very important role in the plot of the play as well. His struggle for power and notoriety causes much havoc throughout the play. He deceives both his brother and his father just so that he can advance his title. While the extreme outcomes of the two actions noted are not known until after the first two scenes of the play, they are the two most important pieces of plot information that are given throughout the length of the play.
The fact that the two most important pieces of plot information are structuralized in the two opening cenes of the play add a profound amount of credit towards Marilyn French’s opinion that everything about the play hangs on the first two scenes. The plot of King Lear is not the only part of the play that rests on the first two scenes. An enormous amount of the dialogue is specifically used to reveal the values and morals of each character. It is very important to know the values that each character has in order to have a greater understanding of why the play unfolds the way it does.
For example, it would be hard to believe that Goneril and Reagan could be so contemptible to their own father, without he incident in the first scene where both Goneril and Reagan show that they are morally corrupt, by making exaggerated claims of love and devotion to their father. The first scene plays a huge role in disclosing the views of Lear, Goneril, Reagan, and Cordelia while the second scene exposes Edmund for what he really is. The views of King Lear himself are more apparent in the first scene than the views of any other character.
When the play starts out, Lear is very much in control of his kingdom “but the very first scene gives us a hint of how Lear is going to lose contact with his natural relation to his environment. ” The Development of Shakespeare’s Imagery, 134) Armed with the foreknowledge that Lear is self-destructing it becomes easier to understand why he would make such obviously rash decisions. Along with his rashness, it is shown that Lear asks questions, only willing to receive the response he wants.
When Lear asks Cordelia “what can you say to draw / A third more opulent than your sisters? and she replies “Nothing, my lord. ” He inevitably becomes enraged and disowns her simply because her answer to his question was far from what he had expected to hear. “Lear determines in advance the answers he will receive; he fails to dapt himself to the person with whom he is speaking. Hence his complete and almost incomprehensible misunderstanding of Cordelia. ” (The Development of Shakespeare’s Imagery, 134) Lear’s values permit him only to see one side of every situation, which is his side.
This trait of Lear’s is what causes the onset of his madness and is thus a very important part of his psyche to consider. Since Lear feels that he has to be in control of every situation, when the time finally comes that he realizes he no longer has control of anything, he snaps. “More and more Lear loses contact with the outside world; ords become for him less a means of communication with others than a means of expression of what goes on within himself. (The development of Shakespeare’s Imagery, 134)
While it can be shown that Lear’s values are what eventually drive him to the verge insanity and beyond, the first scene does more than outline Lear’s values. As discussed earlier, the first scene also brings to light the underlying values and immorality in both Reagan’s and Goneril’s personality. Another important set of values that is expressed in the first scene is that of Cordelia’s. By not trying to outdo her sisters outlandish roclamations of love she shows that she truly loves her father and that she values her love for her father more than anything.
This value that is expressed in the first scene of play becomes very important when she accepts her father without condition at the end of the play regardless of the fact that he was so uncaring towards her. Shakespeare has, without a doubt, written some of the most powerful plays ever to grace the stage of a theatre. King Lear is no exception. At first glance, the play seems to be completely ridiculous, in that no human beings would possibly act the way the characters in King Lear act but there is ore to be offered by the collection of eclectic characters than can be seen at first glance.
The first two scenes offer a great insight into the characters behaviour by revealing their values through carefully crafted dialogue. Aside from showing the true colors of the characters, the opening scenes serve to create an atmosphere for the plot to be outlined in great detail without giving away how it will unfold. The first two scenes of King Lear are pivotal in influencing every aspect of the play including the plot, and the values of the characters contained within the plot.