Lear: To thee and thine hereditary ever Remain this ample third of our fair kingdom, No less in space, validity, and pleasure Than that conferred on Goneril.-- Now, our joy, Although our last and least, to whose young love [The vines of France and milk of Burgundy Strive to be interessed,] what can you say to draw A third more opulent than your sisters? Speak.
Cordelia: Nothing, my lord.
[Lear: Nothing?
Cordelia: Nothing.]
Lear: Nothing will come of nothing. Speak again.
Cordelia: Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave My heart into my mouth. I love your Majesty According to my bond, no more nor less.
(Lear and Cordelia 1.1.88)
This quote, while establishing the significance of one of King Lear’s most essential motifs (nothingness), also illustrates Cordelia’s rebellion against lying and exaggerating the truth, as well as her resistance against the primogeniture going on in her family. However, it is also at this point where the central conflict begins. It is because Cordelia will not “heave her heart into her mouth” that she is exiled and abandoned, while her two evil sisters split the power and fortune equally. She later goes on to express the absurdity she feels Goneril and Regan are displaying as they swear their love for their father in taking the hand of another man in marriage. The irony in the matter is that, later in the play, the thing Cordelia is most criticized and hated for at the beginning of the novel, is what later exemplified her genuine personality. While the emotion that wins Goneril and Regan praise, is later unmasked as pure evil insincerity.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment