The youngest daughter, Cordelia, whom Lear calls "our joy" (I.i.82), i.e. his favorite, says only, "Nothing, my lord" (I.i.87). She does not wish to play this game of flattery. The nihilists have made much of this nothing, which Lear amplifies by adding, "Nothing comes of nothing" (I.i.90), a quote from Deuteronomy. The nihilists see these nothings as a foretaste of the despair to come. But there is an ambiguity. In early 17th century England "nothing" was not just no-thing; it was the Nothing, that about which nothing could be said, as it was beyond human concepts, more, indeed, "than word can yield," in Goneril’s words. It was the God of the Via Negativa of the mystics, the En Sof of the newly popular Kabbalah--the negation of everything that the finite mind could comprehend, the hidden essence of God. Robert Fludd, English physician and alchemist, pictured this original Nothing as a totally black field in his Utriusque Cosmi, Vol. 1 of 1621 (Roob 2001, 104). It is also the prima materia of the alchemists, the original formlessness of matter, of which Thomas Vaughan wrote in 1650, "From this darkness all things have come as from its spring or womb" (1968, 175). One might liken this positive emptiness to the "beginner's mind" of Zen, the way of the simpleton—but one which takes much training to achieve. I will return to this Nothing more than once.
Pressed by her father, Cordelia explains that she loves him "according to my bond" (I.i.93), but half her love must go to her husband when she weds. "Why have my sisters husbands, if they say they love you all?" she challenges (I.i.99-100). Lear's grand retirement ceremony has been spoiled and his kingly authority affronted by Cordelia's apparently cold-hearted reply. He explodes, taking away all Cordelia's inheritance and sundering all ties to her.
Lear's friend and vassal, the Duke of Kent, takes Cordelia's side against Lear, even persisting when Lear tells him to be quiet. For Lear this is treasonous defiance, and Kent's life is forfeit if he persists. When Kent will not desist, Lear banishes him from the kingdom, on pain of death. Then he insinuates to Cordelia’s suitors, who have been waiting in the wings, that she is beneath consideration as a wife. Her dowry will be "nothing" (I.i.247). One might wonder whether this discrediting is not done for the precise reason of keeping her home with him. The Duke of Burgundy declines to woo her. But the young King of France is not deterred: "She is herself a dowry...that art most rich being poor" (I.i.243, 252), he says, turning Lear's evaluation into its opposite. She will be Queen of France.
Lear divides Cordelia's portion among the two older sisters. He also sneaks in a condition--that they support not only him, but also a retinue of a hundred knights--as befitting such devoted daughters, no doubt! The sisters, caught in the rhetoric of their declarations of devotion and the occasion's formality, cannot protest. Later, as the play unfolds, they will renege on their implicit agreement. Then when Lear refuses to accede to their wishes and goes out into a storm, they will lock the gates in case he changes his mind. When it appears that Cordelia is coming to Lear's aid with an army from France, they will respond with armies of their own. Love will turn to war.
In all of this there is an echo of the cult of courtly love, even though it is filial love and not romantic love that is being discussed. (That is part of the problem, in fact.) As the troubadours sang, a man could pledge "all" his love to his Lady, and the Lady could respond in kind. But then the Lady might meet someone else. The faithful one—the poet, of course--would lament his fate and the trust that had been misplaced. An example is this stanza from Cardenal:
Giving myself, at her mercy I put Donan me, mes en sa merceIn our play, Lear takes on this role of the betrayed. His elder daughters' words were just poems, expressions within the framework of the conventions of courtly love. But Lear has given more than sentiments to his daughters: he has given them his lands, the source of his worldly power. How could Lear have taken the pledges so seriously? Perhaps getting his daughters' love-pledges was a way to prevent them from arguing with his demand later for his knights. He sought to trap his daughters, failing to see that his daughters could also trap him. When that happens, Lear laments in fine troubadour style. It is a game of entrapment that Cordelia refuses to play.
Myself, my heart and my life-- Mi, mon cor, e ma via--
Hers, who casts me aside De leis, que.m vir’e.m desmante
And abandons and changes me for another! Per autrui, e.m cambia!
He who gives more than he keeps Qui dona mais que non rete
And loves another more than himself Et ama mais autrui que se,
Chooses a bad deal, Chauzis avol partia,
Since he has no care or thought for himself, Quan de se no.ilh cal ni.l sove,
But forgets himself E per aco s’oblia For that which profits him not. Que pro no.ilh te. (Press 1971, 283)
Moreover, for Lear to expect a troubadour-like love of a daughter, even ritually, gives it an incestuous quality, for it supposes that father and daughter love each other in the way lovers do. Indeed, what follows, in the intensity of negative feelings, does suggest such a quality in Lear's past treatment of the older daughters; having been taken captive by it, they resent it all the more when they break the illusion. They are all three fostering an emotionally incestuous relationship, one taking advantage of a parent's power and a child's natural love and desire to please. To the extent that the sisters have been victimized by Lear's shadow, as Jung called the part of the personality which a person hides from consciousness, they enact that shadow in relation to him.
It is not inappropriate to see Lear here as symbolizing the power of the patriarchy in Western society, into which women are conditioned from the time they are babies. (By patriarchy I mean systems of domination which hold to the doctrine of the natural superiority of males to rule.) To survive, women must serve this patriarchy, even praise it. Western culture has a repressed anger that erupts when women find themselves with a little power, as women began to have in the 20th century, at a time when brute strength counted for less in the workplace. In Shakespeare's time some women became bloody tyrants when they came to power, as for example Elizabeth's sister, nicknamed "Bloody Mary" for her mass burnings of Protestants. Others, such as her younger half-sister Elizabeth, tried to be different (although Elizabeth in turn killed many Catholics, for conspiring to overthrow the Throne, who were likely guilty only of practicing their faith).
These different images of powerful women influence us as well, at the beginning of the 21st century. Periodically during the 20th century, feminists declared their anger and bitterness at men and wished to take back their power; this anger and its power has led to greater awareness of women's oppression and a few steps forward. It also has led to a stereotype of the angry feminist. At the same time some observers have sensed a change in the new generation of women, who seem embarrassed by their mothers' or older sisters' anger. They seem more at ease, having been born into a culture that has been more affirming of them, even if many inequities remain. The younger generation unconsciously assimilated much less of patriarchy in the first place, so they are not so angry. Similarly, Cordelia as the doted-upon child of Lear's old age neither gives lip-service to Lear nor has repressed anger toward him. She can be straightforward: when she marries she will owe her husband half her love, as is customary. She can also be more forgiving, and even, in filial love, lend him aid when he himself is persecuted.
Lear’s success in turning over management of the kingdom to his daughters and sons-in-law has left him with a new problem: he is without a secure identity. "Who am I, sir?" (I.iv.77) he asks Goneril's steward, for reassurance that he is still the mighty king. The answer, "My Lady's father" (I.iv.78), was not the one Lear wanted. How different Lear's situation is now will be revealed by events, foretold by the gentle warnings of his Fool.
From the 15th through 17th centuries, the Fool, as the jester to a king or other important person, was a common figure in art and literature. A 1596 Viennese drawing (Fig. 1, above) shows a Fool between two posturing "wise men." "I cannot compete with fools who are eaten up with wisdom," he comments (Tietze-Conrat 1957, 56). Another example (57) is from Hans Holbein's illustrations to the 1515 edition of Erasmus's Praise of Folly. A man looks into a mirror, and the reflection sticks out its tongue (Fig. 2, below). The accompanying text says “Was ever greater folly than self-conceit” (106). In such fashion the fool mirrors his master—or an actor mirrors his audience: Hamlet, after all, counseled the actors to “hold as ‘twere the mirror up to nature” (Ham.III.2.20), meaning human nature.
Figure 2. Fool looking in a mirror. Drawing by Hans Holbein the Younger, illustration in Erasmus, Praise of Folly, 1515 edition, Offentliche Kuntsummlung, Basel.
Lear’s Fool dresses in “motley,” meaning a variety of colors. Costumes with opposing light and dark colors were most typical, a juxtaposition of opposites. Tarot decks offer a suitable illustration with their Fool card (Fig. 3, from the so-called “Swiss” tarot deck; Innes 1978, 63). Lear’s Fool correspondingly plays with a multiplicity of perspectives and the unity of opposites in his very appearance. One such combination is his wisdom, as a wise fool, knowing at least that he is a fool and suggesting that his audience may be fools without such awareness: thus the tarot Fool makes a pair of horns with his left hand, the sign of the cuckold. The Fool contains other opposites as well: He is of lowly stock, yet highly prized by royalty, he is despised by some, yet deeply loved as well. Hamlet, for example, remembers Yorick, his father's fool, with a fondness he gives no other of that generation.
Figure 3. Fool card, "Swiss" tarot deck, late nineteenth century, dressed in motley and giving the sign of the horns with his left hand, signifying the cuckold. Hence the audience is the fool.
The Fool, by occupational definition, is in a position to tell a king things about himself which would, if they were not so cleverly put, be considered insubordination. As Erasmus observes of the fools kept by kings:
They can speak truth and even open insults and be heard with positive pleasure; indeed, the words which would cost a wise man his life are surprisingly enjoyable when uttered by a clown. For truth has a genuine power to please if it manages not to give offence, but this is something the gods have granted only to fools.(1971, 119)Holbein has an illustration for this passage, a fool standing in front of a king, smiling yet facing him down with his tongue out (Fig. 4; Erasmus 1877, 108). Lear's Fool, in conformity with this characterization, tells Lear things that he does not want to believe about himself, but does so in such amusing terms that Lear cannot think to punish him.
In Jungian terms, the Fool is the one to tell Lear of his shadow. "Who is it that can tell me who I am?" asks Lear (I.iv.221). The Fool replies bravely, "Lear's shadow" (I.iv.222). The surface meaning is that Lear is the shadow of his former self, meaning without the substance he possessed in his property. But shadow also implies what the light does not hit, due to blockages from the persona, or conscious image of oneself; Lear is revealing the side of himself he does not normally expose to others or even admit to himself.
The Fool has available an abundant supply of images to prod Lear into thinking about his actions, which made him the "shadow" of himself. Those who follow Lear, the Fool says, deserve the cockscomb, or fool's cap. When Lear objects, the Fool acts hurt: "Truth," which is what Cordelia and Kent represent, "must to kennel," i.e. be sent away like an ill-favored dog. Yet "Lady Brach"--Lady Bitch, the elder daughters--"may stand by the fire and stink," i.e. be given what they want despite their disgusting ways (I.iv.109-111). Similarly, the Fool riddles that "thou mad'st thy daughters thy mothers." The reason: "Thou gav'st them the rod and putt'st down thine own breeches" (I.iv.163-165). Giving up his power, he has made himself the child, reversing the natural relation. Therefore the Fool sings for sorrow, "That such a king should...go the fools among" (I.iv.169). Lear, and not the Fool, is the fool. The Fool wishes he knew how to lie, but he does not. But Lear values his Fool: "An you liest, sirrah, we'll have you whipped" (I.iv.172).
Soon enough, both Goneril and Regan renege on their agreements. Some of Lear's knights, they say, are disruptive and disrespectful to their hosts' staff. One can imagine that a hundred knights together would be rather rough, and incidents would occur: molesting serving women, cursing, etc. Quite explicitly, when Lear asks his anxious "Who am I?" we see the disguised Kent tripping Goneril's steward, and Lear roaring his approval. (At the same time, Goneril's steward does offend in not addressing Lear as "King" and continuing with mocking facial expressions.)
Just as strong-willed and touchy as their father, the sisters lay down their law to him, in the end saying that not even one of his knights is welcome. When he storms out, they lock the door in case he has second thoughts. The outcome is precisely what the Fool has warned about
Fool. [to Lear] I marvel what kin thou and thy daughters are. They’ll have me whipped for speaking true, thou’lt have me whipped for lying, and sometimes I am whipped for holding my peace. I had rather be any kind o’thing but a fool, and yet I would not be thee, nuncle. Thou hast pared thy wit o’both sides and left nothing i’the middle. (I.iv.173-179) [Note: comments in italics at the start of a speech are mine to clarify the context]Again the "nothing." The Fool had alluded to it once before, when Lear had dismissed the Fool's words as "nothing." "Can you make no use of nothing?" the Fool replied (I.iv.128-129). Lear thought not, repeating his "Nothing comes of nothing" proverb that he had used with Cordelia. The Fool then had a witty rejoinder, to Kent: "So much will the rent from his land come to" (I.iv.132-133). But it is a good question: What creative use derives from nothing?--meaning both what another says that one dismisses as nonsense, and one's lack of power. The tarot Fool, along these lines, is unnumbered and often by default is given the number zero.
When Lear finally storms out, saying he would prefer the cold night air to his daughters' conditions, his inner storm is matched only by the outer one raging around him:
Lear. ...In such a nightWe cringe here at Lear's calling himself "kind," remembering how he treated Cordelia. But he did give Goneril and Regan all, and his trust has indeed been misplaced, just as the Fool foretold.
To shut me out! Pour on! I will endure
In such a night as this! O Regan, Goneril,
Your old kind father, whose heart gave you all--
O, that way madness lies, let me shun that;
No more of that. (III.iv.17-22)
Lear and the Fool wander into the night, soon joined by Lear's two loyal vassals, the Dukes of Kent and Gloucester, and a mad beggar named Tom. The next morning Gloucester, blinded for sympathy with Lear, and the madman (really Gloucester's son fugitive son Edgar, unknown to the father) encounter Lear on the heath, "crowned" with various wildflowers, as Cordelia describes him (IV.iv.iii). He engages in a series of loose associations that would lead any audience to diagnose him mad. Then he turns to the white-bearded Gloucester:
Lear. Ha! Goneril with a white beard? They flattered me like a dog, and told me I had the white hairs in my beard ere the black ones were there [when I was a child]. To say "ay" and "nay" to everything that I said "ay" and "nay" to was no good divinity [theology]. When the rain came to wet me once, and the wind to make me chatter; when the thunder would not peace at my bidding; there I found 'em, there I smelt 'em out. Go to! They are not men o'their words; they told me I was everything; 'tis a lie, I am not ague-proof [immune to shivering, or fever]. (IV.vi.96-104) [Note: comments within a speech are from editors' notes to the play, from either the Riverside edition or one or the other of the Arden editions]Erasmus, in Praise of Folly, had said the same: “And for all their good fortune princes seem to me to be particularly unfortunate in having no one to tell them the truth and being obliged to have flatterers for friends” (1971, 118).
Later in the same interchange, Lear tells the blind Gloucester: “No, do thy worst, blind Cupid, I shall not love” (IV.vi.134). Lear will not love, knowing his love is so blind as to lead to his ruin. But he is now not so blind to himself: he has attained a certain amount of self-knowledge. He has learned that his need for flattery is what did him in, a need that apparently has been satisfied all his life; now, at the end, it makes him a dupe. Formerly blind to the fact that he is not all-powerful, he now has a humbling self-recovery through self-knowledge. Shakespeare even tells us in advance that the issue is self-knowledge, when he has Regan remark to Goneril that Lear "hath ever but slenderly known himself" (I.i.294-295). To be sure, even now he does not acknowledge his part in the affair, namely his throwing in the condition of the hundred knights, taking all objections to them as a personal affront, and insisting that they are all well-behaved. But he has indeed gained something precious from his "nothing," from his ignorance and powerlessness: self-knowledge. In that sense he could take consolation from another stanza of Cardenal's song on betrayed love:
I never won anything so great Anc non gazamhei tan gran re
As when I lost my mistress; Con quam perdei ma mia;
In losing her, I won back myself, Quar, perden leis, gazanhei me,
When she had won me over. Qu’il gazainhat m’avia.
He wins little who loses himself, Petit gazainha qui pert se,
But if one loses that which does one harm, Mas qui pert so que dan li te,
I think that it’s a gain. Ieu cre que gazainhs sia.
(Press 1971, 283-285)
This "myself" which Lear has won thus far is knowledge of the Jungian shadow, the part of oneself hidden from the conscious ego. But knowledge of that part leads one to more, toward what Jung, following ancient Hindu teachings, calls the Self. Lear is on his way.
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