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No, no, no life!
Why should a dog, a horse, a rat, have life,
And thou no breath at all? Thou'lt come no more,
Never, never, never, never, never!
Pray you, undo this button: thank you sir.
Do you see this? Look on her, look, her lips,
Look there, look there!
King Lear, Act V
I’m about to leave for Stratford again and a two-week summer school looking at Shakespeare’s sources, that vast primordial soup of myth and culture he drew from to write his plays. The majority of stories he dipped in and caught up were refashioned almost beyond recognition. And at the height of his powers, with literary London and a mass audience in the palm of his hand, he wrote King Lear, the bleakest and most chaotic of all his tragedies.
He could have undone the button. Made it all come out all right. By the time the audience got to Act Five and the death of Cordelia, they’d had more than enough. Why ramp up the angst? What was going through his mind? What useful purpose did it serve?
( Read more... (SPOILERS UP TO DAY FIVE) )
Why should a dog, a horse, a rat, have life,
And thou no breath at all? Thou'lt come no more,
Never, never, never, never, never!
Pray you, undo this button: thank you sir.
Do you see this? Look on her, look, her lips,
Look there, look there!
King Lear, Act V
I’m about to leave for Stratford again and a two-week summer school looking at Shakespeare’s sources, that vast primordial soup of myth and culture he drew from to write his plays. The majority of stories he dipped in and caught up were refashioned almost beyond recognition. And at the height of his powers, with literary London and a mass audience in the palm of his hand, he wrote King Lear, the bleakest and most chaotic of all his tragedies.
He could have undone the button. Made it all come out all right. By the time the audience got to Act Five and the death of Cordelia, they’d had more than enough. Why ramp up the angst? What was going through his mind? What useful purpose did it serve?
( Read more... (SPOILERS UP TO DAY FIVE) )
