KING LEAR

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

(PAGINA 2)

KING LEAR



ACT I





SCENE II The Earl of Gloucester's castle.



[Enter EDMUND, with a letter]

EDMUND Thou, nature, art my goddess; to thy law

My services are bound. Wherefore should I

Stand in the plague of custom, and permit

The curiosity of nations to deprive me,

For that I am some twelve or fourteen moon-shines

Lag of a brother? Why bastard? wherefore base?

When my dimensions are as well compact,

My mind as generous, and my shape as true,

As honest madam's issue? Why brand they us

With base? with baseness? bastardy? base, base?

Who, in the lusty stealth of nature, take

More composition and fierce quality

Than doth, within a dull, stale, tired bed,

Go to the creating a whole tribe of fops,

Got 'tween asleep and wake? Well, then,

Legitimate Edgar, I must have your land:

Our father's love is to the bastard Edmund

As to the legitimate: fine word,--legitimate!

Well, my legitimate, if this letter speed,

And my invention thrive, Edmund the base

Shall top the legitimate. I grow; I prosper:

Now, gods, stand up for bastards!

[Enter GLOUCESTER]

GLOUCESTER Kent banish'd thus! and France in choler parted!

And the king gone to-night! subscribed his power!

Confined to exhibition! All this done

Upon the gad! Edmund, how now! what news?

EDMUND So please your lordship, none.

[Putting up the letter]

GLOUCESTER Why so earnestly seek you to put up that letter?

EDMUND I know no news, my lord.

GLOUCESTER What paper were you reading?

EDMUND Nothing, my lord.

GLOUCESTER No? What needed, then, that terrible dispatch of

it into your pocket? the quality of nothing hath

not such need to hide itself. Let's see: come,

if it be nothing, I shall not need spectacles.

EDMUND I beseech you, sir, pardon me: it is a letter

from my brother, that I have not all o'er-read;

and for so much as I have perused, I find it not

fit for your o'er-looking.

GLOUCESTER Give me the letter, sir.

EDMUND I shall offend, either to detain or give it. The

contents, as in part I understand them, are to blame.

GLOUCESTER Let's see, let's see.

EDMUND I hope, for my brother's justification, he wrote

this but as an essay or taste of my virtue.

GLOUCESTER [Reads] 'This policy and reverence of age makes

the world bitter to the best of our times; keeps

our fortunes from us till our oldness cannot relish

them. I begin to find an idle and fond bondage

in the oppression of aged tyranny; who sways, not

as it hath power, but as it is suffered. Come to

me, that of this I may speak more. If our father

would sleep till I waked him, you should half his

revenue for ever, and live the beloved of your

brother, EDGAR.'

Hum--conspiracy!--'Sleep till I waked him,--you

should enjoy half his revenue,'--My son Edgar!

Had he a hand to write this? a heart and brain

to breed it in?--When came this to you? who

brought it?

EDMUND It was not brought me, my lord; there's the

cunning of it; I found it thrown in at the

casement of my closet.

GLOUCESTER You know the character to be your brother's?

EDMUND If the matter were good, my lord, I durst swear

it were his; but, in respect of that, I would

fain think it were not.

GLOUCESTER It is his.

EDMUND It is his hand, my lord; but I hope his heart is

not in the contents.

GLOUCESTER Hath he never heretofore sounded you in this business?

EDMUND Never, my lord: but I have heard him oft

maintain it to be fit, that, sons at perfect age,

and fathers declining, the father should be as

ward to the son, and the son manage his revenue.

GLOUCESTER O villain, villain! His very opinion in the

letter! Abhorred villain! Unnatural, detested,

brutish villain! worse than brutish! Go, sirrah,

seek him; I'll apprehend him: abominable villain!

Where is he?

EDMUND I do not well know, my lord. If it shall please

you to suspend your indignation against my

brother till you can derive from him better

testimony of his intent, you shall run a certain

course; where, if you violently proceed against

him, mistaking his purpose, it would make a great

gap in your own honour, and shake in pieces the

heart of his obedience. I dare pawn down my life

for him, that he hath wrote this to feel my

affection to your honour, and to no further

pretence of danger.

GLOUCESTER Think you so?

EDMUND If your honour judge it meet, I will place you

where you shall hear us confer of this, and by an

auricular assurance have your satisfaction; and

that without any further delay than this very evening.

GLOUCESTER He cannot be such a monster--

EDMUND Nor is not, sure.

GLOUCESTER To his father, that so tenderly and entirely

loves him. Heaven and earth! Edmund, seek him

out: wind me into him, I pray you: frame the

business after your own wisdom. I would unstate

myself, to be in a due resolution.

EDMUND I will seek him, sir, presently: convey the

business as I shall find means and acquaint you withal.

GLOUCESTER These late eclipses in the sun and moon portend

no good to us: though the wisdom of nature can

reason it thus and thus, yet nature finds itself

scourged by the sequent effects: love cools,

friendship falls off, brothers divide: in

cities, mutinies; in countries, discord; in

palaces, treason; and the bond cracked 'twixt son

and father. This villain of mine comes under the

prediction; there's son against father: the king

falls from bias of nature; there's father against

child. We have seen the best of our time:

machinations, hollowness, treachery, and all

ruinous disorders, follow us disquietly to our

graves. Find out this villain, Edmund; it shall

lose thee nothing; do it carefully. And the

noble and true-hearted Kent banished! his

offence, honesty! 'Tis strange.

[Exit]

EDMUND This is the excellent foppery of the world, that,

when we are sick in fortune,--often the surfeit

of our own behavior,--we make guilty of our

disasters the sun, the moon, and the stars: as

if we were villains by necessity; fools by

heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, and

treachers, by spherical predominance; drunkards,

liars, and adulterers, by an enforced obedience of

planetary influence; and all that we are evil in,

by a divine thrusting on: an admirable evasion

of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish

disposition to the charge of a star! My

father compounded with my mother under the

dragon's tail; and my nativity was under Ursa

major; so that it follows, I am rough and

lecherous. Tut, I should have been that I am,

had the maidenliest star in the firmament

twinkled on my bastardizing. Edgar--

[Enter EDGAR]

And pat he comes like the catastrophe of the old

comedy: my cue is villanous melancholy, with a

sigh like Tom o' Bedlam. O, these eclipses do

portend these divisions! fa, sol, la, mi.

EDGAR How now, brother Edmund! what serious

contemplation are you in?

EDMUND I am thinking, brother, of a prediction I read

this other day, what should follow these eclipses.

EDGAR Do you busy yourself about that?

EDMUND I promise you, the effects he writes of succeed

unhappily; as of unnaturalness between the child

and the parent; death, dearth, dissolutions of

ancient amities; divisions in state, menaces and

maledictions against king and nobles; needless

diffidences, banishment of friends, dissipation

of cohorts, nuptial breaches, and I know not what.

EDGAR How long have you been a sectary astronomical?

EDMUND Come, come; when saw you my father last?

EDGAR Why, the night gone by.

EDMUND Spake you with him?

EDGAR Ay, two hours together.

EDMUND Parted you in good terms? Found you no

displeasure in him by word or countenance?

EDGAR None at all.

EDMUND Bethink yourself wherein you may have offended

him: and at my entreaty forbear his presence

till some little time hath qualified the heat of

his displeasure; which at this instant so rageth

in him, that with the mischief of your person it

would scarcely allay.

EDGAR Some villain hath done me wrong.

EDMUND That's my fear. I pray you, have a continent

forbearance till the spied of his rage goes

slower; and, as I say, retire with me to my

lodging, from whence I will fitly bring you to

hear my lord speak: pray ye, go; there's my key:

if you do stir abroad, go armed.

EDGAR Armed, brother!

EDMUND Brother, I advise you to the best; go armed: I

am no honest man if there be any good meaning

towards you: I have told you what I have seen

and heard; but faintly, nothing like the image

and horror of it: pray you, away.

EDGAR Shall I hear from you anon?

EDMUND I do serve you in this business.

[Exit EDGAR]

A credulous father! and a brother noble,

Whose nature is so far from doing harms,

That he suspects none: on whose foolish honesty

My practises ride easy! I see the business.

Let me, if not by birth, have lands by wit:

All with me's meet that I can fashion fit.

[Exit]







KING LEAR



ACT I





SCENE III The Duke of Albany's palace.



[Enter GONERIL, and OSWALD, her steward]

GONERIL Did my father strike my gentleman for chiding of his fool?

OSWALD Yes, madam.

GONERIL By day and night he wrongs me; every hour

He flashes into one gross crime or other,

That sets us all at odds: I'll not endure it:

His knights grow riotous, and himself upbraids us

On every trifle. When he returns from hunting,

I will not speak with him; say I am sick:

If you come slack of former services,

You shall do well; the fault of it I'll answer.

OSWALD He's coming, madam; I hear him.

[Horns within]

GONERIL Put on what weary negligence you please,

You and your fellows; I'll have it come to question:

If he dislike it, let him to our sister,

Whose mind and mine, I know, in that are one,

Not to be over-ruled. Idle old man,

That still would manage those authorities

That he hath given away! Now, by my life,

Old fools are babes again; and must be used

With cheques as flatteries,--when they are seen abused.

Remember what I tell you.

OSWALD Well, madam.

GONERIL And let his knights have colder looks among you;

What grows of it, no matter; advise your fellows so:

I would breed from hence occasions, and I shall,

That I may speak: I'll write straight to my sister,

To hold my very course. Prepare for dinner.

[Exeunt]







KING LEAR



ACT I





SCENE IV A hall in the same.



[Enter KENT, disguised]

KENT If but as well I other accents borrow,

That can my speech defuse, my good intent

May carry through itself to that full issue

For which I razed my likeness. Now, banish'd Kent,

If thou canst serve where thou dost stand condemn'd,

So may it come, thy master, whom thou lovest,

Shall find thee full of labours.

[Horns within. Enter KING LEAR, Knights, and

Attendants]

KING LEAR Let me not stay a jot for dinner; go get it ready.

[Exit an Attendant]

How now! what art thou?

KENT A man, sir.

KING LEAR What dost thou profess? what wouldst thou with us?

KENT I do profess to be no less than I seem; to serve

him truly that will put me in trust: to love him

that is honest; to converse with him that is wise,

and says little; to fear judgment; to fight when I

cannot choose; and to eat no fish.

KING LEAR What art thou?

KENT A very honest-hearted fellow, and as poor as the king.

KING LEAR If thou be as poor for a subject as he is for a

king, thou art poor enough. What wouldst thou?

KENT Service.

KING LEAR Who wouldst thou serve?

KENT You.

KING LEAR Dost thou know me, fellow?

KENT No, sir; but you have that in your countenance

which I would fain call master.

KING LEAR What's that?

KENT Authority.

KING LEAR What services canst thou do?

KENT I can keep honest counsel, ride, run, mar a curious

tale in telling it, and deliver a plain message

bluntly: that which ordinary men are fit for, I am

qualified in; and the best of me is diligence.

KING LEAR How old art thou?

KENT Not so young, sir, to love a woman for singing, nor

so old to dote on her for any thing: I have years

on my back forty eight.

KING LEAR Follow me; thou shalt serve me: if I like thee no

worse after dinner, I will not part from thee yet.

Dinner, ho, dinner! Where's my knave? my fool?

Go you, and call my fool hither.

[Exit an Attendant]

[Enter OSWALD]

You, you, sirrah, where's my daughter?

OSWALD So please you,--

[Exit]

KING LEAR What says the fellow there? Call the clotpoll back.

[Exit a Knight]

Where's my fool, ho? I think the world's asleep.

[Re-enter Knight]

How now! where's that mongrel?

Knight He says, my lord, your daughter is not well.

KING LEAR Why came not the slave back to me when I called him.

Knight Sir, he answered me in the roundest manner, he would

not.

KING LEAR He would not!

Knight My lord, I know not what the matter is; but, to my

judgment, your highness is not entertained with that

ceremonious affection as you were wont; there's a

great abatement of kindness appears as well in the

general dependants as in the duke himself also and

your daughter.

KING LEAR Ha! sayest thou so?

Knight I beseech you, pardon me, my lord, if I be mistaken;

for my duty cannot be silent when I think your

highness wronged.

KING LEAR Thou but rememberest me of mine own conception: I

have perceived a most faint neglect of late; which I

have rather blamed as mine own jealous curiosity

than as a very pretence and purpose of unkindness:

I will look further into't. But where's my fool? I

have not seen him this two days.

Knight Since my young lady's going into France, sir, the

fool hath much pined away.

KING LEAR No more of that; I have noted it well. Go you, and

tell my daughter I would speak with her.

[Exit an Attendant]

Go you, call hither my fool.

[Exit an Attendant]

[Re-enter OSWALD]

O, you sir, you, come you hither, sir: who am I,

sir?

OSWALD My lady's father.

KING LEAR 'My lady's father'! my lord's knave: your

whoreson dog! you slave! you cur!

OSWALD I am none of these, my lord; I beseech your pardon.

KING LEAR Do you bandy looks with me, you rascal?

[Striking him]

OSWALD I'll not be struck, my lord.

KENT Nor tripped neither, you base football player.

[Tripping up his heels]

KING LEAR I thank thee, fellow; thou servest me, and I'll

love thee.

KENT Come, sir, arise, away! I'll teach you differences:

away, away! if you will measure your lubber's

length again, tarry: but away! go to; have you

wisdom? so.

[Pushes OSWALD out]

KING LEAR Now, my friendly knave, I thank thee: there's

earnest of thy service.

[Giving KENT money]

[Enter Fool]

Fool Let me hire him too: here's my coxcomb.

[Offering KENT his cap]

KING LEAR How now, my pretty knave! how dost thou?

Fool Sirrah, you were best take my coxcomb.

KENT Why, fool?

Fool Why, for taking one's part that's out of favour:

nay, an thou canst not smile as the wind sits,

thou'lt catch cold shortly: there, take my coxcomb:

why, this fellow has banished two on's daughters,

and did the third a blessing against his will; if

thou follow him, thou must needs wear my coxcomb.

How now, nuncle! Would I had two coxcombs and two daughters!

KING LEAR Why, my boy?

Fool If I gave them all my living, I'ld keep my coxcombs

myself. There's mine; beg another of thy daughters.

KING LEAR Take heed, sirrah; the whip.

Fool Truth's a dog must to kennel; he must be whipped

out, when Lady the brach may stand by the fire and stink.

KING LEAR A pestilent gall to me!

Fool Sirrah, I'll teach thee a speech.

KING LEAR Do.

Fool Mark it, nuncle:

Have more than thou showest,

Speak less than thou knowest,

Lend less than thou owest,

Ride more than thou goest,

Learn more than thou trowest,

Set less than thou throwest;

Leave thy drink and thy whore,

And keep in-a-door,

And thou shalt have more

Than two tens to a score.

KENT This is nothing, fool.

Fool Then 'tis like the breath of an unfee'd lawyer; you

gave me nothing for't. Can you make no use of

nothing, nuncle?

KING LEAR Why, no, boy; nothing can be made out of nothing.

Fool [To KENT] Prithee, tell him, so much the rent of

his land comes to: he will not believe a fool.

KING LEAR A bitter fool!

Fool Dost thou know the difference, my boy, between a

bitter fool and a sweet fool?

KING LEAR No, lad; teach me.

Fool That lord that counsell'd thee

To give away thy land,

Come place him here by me,

Do thou for him stand:

The sweet and bitter fool

Will presently appear;

The one in motley here,

The other found out there.

KING LEAR Dost thou call me fool, boy?

Fool All thy other titles thou hast given away; that

thou wast born with.

KENT This is not altogether fool, my lord.

Fool No, faith, lords and great men will not let me; if

I had a monopoly out, they would have part on't:

and ladies too, they will not let me have all fool

to myself; they'll be snatching. Give me an egg,

nuncle, and I'll give thee two crowns.

KING LEAR What two crowns shall they be?

Fool Why, after I have cut the egg i' the middle, and eat

up the meat, the two crowns of the egg. When thou

clovest thy crown i' the middle, and gavest away

both parts, thou borest thy ass on thy back o'er

the dirt: thou hadst little wit in thy bald crown,

when thou gavest thy golden one away. If I speak

like myself in this, let him be whipped that first

finds it so.

[Singing]

Fools had ne'er less wit in a year;

For wise men are grown foppish,

They know not how their wits to wear,

Their manners are so apish.

KING LEAR When were you wont to be so full of songs, sirrah?

Fool I have used it, nuncle, ever since thou madest thy

daughters thy mothers: for when thou gavest them

the rod, and put'st down thine own breeches,

[Singing]

Then they for sudden joy did weep,

And I for sorrow sung,

That such a king should play bo-peep,

And go the fools among.

Prithee, nuncle, keep a schoolmaster that can teach

thy fool to lie: I would fain learn to lie.

KING LEAR An you lie, sirrah, we'll have you whipped.

Fool 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 than a fool: and yet I would not be

thee, nuncle; thou hast pared thy wit o' both sides,

and left nothing i' the middle: here comes one o'

the parings.

[Enter GONERIL]

KING LEAR How now, daughter! what makes that frontlet on?

Methinks you are too much of late i' the frown.

Fool Thou wast a pretty fellow when thou hadst no need to

care for her frowning; now thou art an O without a

figure: I am better than thou art now; I am a fool,

thou art nothing.

[To GONERIL]

Yes, forsooth, I will hold my tongue; so your face

bids me, though you say nothing. Mum, mum,

He that keeps nor crust nor crum,

Weary of all, shall want some.

[Pointing to KING LEAR]

That's a shealed peascod.

GONERIL Not only, sir, this your all-licensed fool,

But other of your insolent retinue

Do hourly carp and quarrel; breaking forth

In rank and not-to-be endured riots. Sir,

I had thought, by making this well known unto you,

To have found a safe redress; but now grow fearful,

By what yourself too late have spoke and done.

That you protect this course, and put it on

By your allowance; which if you should, the fault

Would not 'scape censure, nor the redresses sleep,

Which, in the tender of a wholesome weal,

Might in their working do you that offence,

Which else were shame, that then necessity

Will call discreet proceeding.

Fool For, you trow, nuncle,

The hedge-sparrow fed the cuckoo so long,

That it's had it head bit off by it young.

So, out went the candle, and we were left darkling.

KING LEAR Are you our daughter?

GONERIL Come, sir,

I would you would make use of that good wisdom,

Whereof I know you are fraught; and put away

These dispositions, that of late transform you

From what you rightly are.

Fool May not an ass know when the cart

draws the horse? Whoop, Jug! I love thee.

KING LEAR Doth any here know me? This is not Lear:

Doth Lear walk thus? speak thus? Where are his eyes?

Either his notion weakens, his discernings

Are lethargied--Ha! waking? 'tis not so.

Who is it that can tell me who I am?

Fool Lear's shadow.

KING LEAR I would learn that; for, by the

marks of sovereignty, knowledge, and reason,

I should be false persuaded I had daughters.

Fool Which they will make an obedient father.

KING LEAR Your name, fair gentlewoman?

GONERIL This admiration, sir, is much o' the savour

Of other your new pranks. I do beseech you

To understand my purposes aright:

As you are old and reverend, you should be wise.

Here do you keep a hundred knights and squires;

Men so disorder'd, so debosh'd and bold,

That this our court, infected with their manners,

Shows like a riotous inn: epicurism and lust

Make it more like a tavern or a brothel

Than a graced palace. The shame itself doth speak

For instant remedy: be then desired

By her, that else will take the thing she begs,

A little to disquantity your train;

And the remainder, that shall still depend,

To be such men as may besort your age,

And know themselves and you.

KING LEAR Darkness and devils!

Saddle my horses; call my train together:

Degenerate bastard! I'll not trouble thee.

Yet have I left a daughter.

GONERIL You strike my people; and your disorder'd rabble

Make servants of their betters.

[Enter ALBANY]

KING LEAR Woe, that too late repents,--

[To ALBANY]

O, sir, are you come?

Is it your will? Speak, sir. Prepare my horses.

Ingratitude, thou marble-hearted fiend,

More hideous when thou show'st thee in a child

Than the sea-monster!

ALBANY Pray, sir, be patient.

KING LEAR [To GONERIL] Detested kite! thou liest.

My train are men of choice and rarest parts,

That all particulars of duty know,

And in the most exact regard support

The worships of their name. O most small fault,

How ugly didst thou in Cordelia show!

That, like an engine, wrench'd my frame of nature

From the fix'd place; drew from heart all love,

And added to the gall. O Lear, Lear, Lear!

Beat at this gate, that let thy folly in,

[Striking his head]

And thy dear judgment out! Go, go, my people.

ALBANY My lord, I am guiltless, as I am ignorant

Of what hath moved you.

KING LEAR It may be so, my lord.

Hear, nature, hear; dear goddess, hear!

Suspend thy purpose, if thou didst intend

To make this creature fruitful!

Into her womb convey sterility!

Dry up in her the organs of increase;

And from her derogate body never spring

A babe to honour her! If she must teem,

Create her child of spleen; that it may live,

And be a thwart disnatured torment to her!

Let it stamp wrinkles in her brow of youth;

With cadent tears fret channels in her cheeks;

Turn all her mother's pains and benefits

To laughter and contempt; that she may feel

How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is

To have a thankless child! Away, away!

[Exit]

ALBANY Now, gods that we adore, whereof comes this?

GONERIL Never afflict yourself to know the cause;

But let his disposition have that scope

That dotage gives it.

[Re-enter KING LEAR]

KING LEAR What, fifty of my followers at a clap!

Within a fortnight!

ALBANY What's the matter, sir?



KING LEAR I'll tell thee:

[To GONERIL]

Life and death! I am ashamed

That thou hast power to shake my manhood thus;

That these hot tears, which break from me perforce,

Should make thee worth them. Blasts and fogs upon thee!

The untented woundings of a father's curse

Pierce every sense about thee! Old fond eyes,

Beweep this cause again, I'll pluck ye out,

And cast you, with the waters that you lose,

To temper clay. Yea, it is come to this?

Let is be so: yet have I left a daughter,

Who, I am sure, is kind and comfortable:

When she shall hear this of thee, with her nails

She'll flay thy wolvish visage. Thou shalt find

That I'll resume the shape which thou dost think

I have cast off for ever: thou shalt,

I warrant thee.

[Exeunt KING LEAR, KENT, and Attendants]

GONERIL Do you mark that, my lord?

ALBANY I cannot be so partial, Goneril,

To the great love I bear you,--

GONERIL Pray you, content. What, Oswald, ho!

[To the Fool]

You, sir, more knave than fool, after your master.

Fool Nuncle Lear, nuncle Lear, tarry and take the fool

with thee.

A fox, when one has caught her,

And such a daughter,

Should sure to the slaughter,

If my cap would buy a halter:

So the fool follows after.

[Exit]

GONERIL This man hath had good counsel:--a hundred knights!

'Tis politic and safe to let him keep

At point a hundred knights: yes, that, on every dream,

Each buzz, each fancy, each complaint, dislike,

He may enguard his dotage with their powers,

And hold our lives in mercy. Oswald, I say!

ALBANY Well, you may fear too far.

GONERIL Safer than trust too far:

Let me still take away the harms I fear,

Not fear still to be taken: I know his heart.

What he hath utter'd I have writ my sister

If she sustain him and his hundred knights

When I have show'd the unfitness,--

[Re-enter OSWALD]

How now, Oswald!

What, have you writ that letter to my sister?

OSWALD Yes, madam.

GONERIL Take you some company, and away to horse:

Inform her full of my particular fear;

And thereto add such reasons of your own

As may compact it more. Get you gone;

And hasten your return.

[Exit OSWALD]

No, no, my lord,

This milky gentleness and course of yours

Though I condemn not, yet, under pardon,

You are much more attask'd for want of wisdom

Than praised for harmful mildness.

ALBANY How far your eyes may pierce I can not tell:

Striving to better, oft we mar what's well.

GONERIL Nay, then--

ALBANY Well, well; the event.

[Exeunt]



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