Point of View

King Lear was written in 1605 and is one of Shakespeare’s most popular and well known tragedies. It is also one of his most bleak. The play was written in Elizabethan England, an era that held strictly to a hierarchical power structure. At the time, all of society, from the wealthy to the poor, would have adhered to social rules and constraints based on power, meaning that there were certain codes of conduct to show respect to those who were wealthier or more powerful than you. This system not only maintained social order, it also kept people “in their place.” Great respect would have been paid to elderly, particularly one’s parents, which is one of the many reasons why Lear was so shocking to audiences at the time. The daughters’ treatment of Lear – as their father and as the King of England – was considered...