Critique of Sparknotes' Information of King Lear

Sparknotes has a fairly organized an incredibly detailed description and analysis on various elements of the play King Lear. The key facts alone state motifs, themes, genre, publication date, and tone amongst several other important facts and observations. It is very factual, informative, and made up of a series of need-to-know pieces of information about the book’s contents as well as how it came about. However, it is noticeable that, besides the depth of character analysis, as well as plot analysis, the website does very little to connect King Lear to underlying messages and statements.
An article, written by Ronald Cooley on King Lear, focused mainly on the matter of primogeniture. I found this interesting because Cooley dug deep and made a series of valid statements and identified several moments in the play that, when tied together, suggested that Shakespeare was hinting to several flaws in the idea of primogeniture, a tradition that was highly regarded and practiced at the time in which King Lear was written. Sparknotes tends to focus on more superficial purposes of the placement of motifs or the significance of symbols; and therefore gives off the impression that everything that needs to be knows can be explained in a few paragraphs. However, articles such as the one written by Ronald Cooley suggest otherwise: that if one reads King Lear and focuses on elements that relate to primogeniture (negligence of it, acceptance of it, obsession with it), they will understand both it and King Lear to a much higher degree. This knowledge assists readers in understanding the way certain characters are written, such as Cordelia and Kent in this case. If one were to simply read Sparknotes analysis, they would never know what they were missing.
Another aspect of King Lear that was noticeably neglected was the mention of nothingness. Nothing was everything in King Lear; it pertained to nearly every character and situation. However, Sparknotes does not mention it as a motif, a theme, or a symbol of the play. There was the stripping of power, leaving King Lear with nothing. There was the lack of eyesight and subsequent inability to see. Cordelia was exiled from the family and left with nothing of her father’s fortune or love. Nothingness is associated mainly with the root of the issue in King Lear, and it is nothingness that leads to betrayal and reunion. Nothingness has more depth than the more obvious issues. Yet again, Sparknotes ignored something of significance and stated several surface clarities in its place.
Sparknotes, although a phenomenal resource for shallow but accurate and informative facts, does not dig deep into the purpose or meaning of King Lear. It bases all of its assumptions on surface ideas, and obvious statements made by Shakespeare through the play itself. It lacks the ability to explore elements of the play based on things that are not stated in the book, and its ability to understand King Lear’s purpose is therefore at a disadvantage.