King Lear, a legendary play by Shakespeare, tells a tragic story about the relationship between fathers and children. The protagonist Lear is not an ordinary father, he is a king, with three beautiful daughters. However, Lear eventually cried out in pain in the storm.
He fell from the pinnacle of power to the most specious part of the dust, entirely because of her daughter. Here, the fall of the royal power and the collapse of family etiquette are concentrated on Lear alone, who suffers greatly as a result. The root cause of King Lear's fate is seen to be an imbalance in kingship and family etiquette, and this article will discuss the balance between family etiquette and city-state politics in King Lear.
<h1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" > King and Father – A Brief Analysis of the Particularity of Lear's Identity</h1>
Filial piety was King Lear's most important quality, and he was eager to know how much his daughter loved him. As fathers, we all hope that our children will respect themselves and be able to take care of them to a certain extent in their old age, and the same is true of Lear, who is a king.
As far as traditional Chinese society is concerned, the intrinsic character of Chinese is mainly introverted and deep, and it is unimaginable that parents ask their children to state in person how much they love themselves. In Shakespeare's play, the elderly King Lear asks his three daughters to state to their faces how deeply they love them.
Objectively speaking, this requirement actually has a strong vanity. As a generation of monarchs, King Lear had supreme power, but after all, he was old and sick, and what he wanted most at this time was to enjoy the joy of heaven, to be able to distribute his power to his daughter, and then to live in peace and quiet.
However, these ideals are in direct conflict with reality. Lear cultivated his daughters, but not all of them developed the character of filial piety.
The eldest daughter and the second daughter are completely mercenary, they have no respect for the so-called filial piety, they do not care about family etiquette, this kind of ideological neglect has led to their disrespect for Lear. But as far as the successors of politics are concerned, they know how to judge the situation and know how to be smooth.
In the event of dividing the land, the eldest daughter and the second daughter successively expressed their incomparable love for their father, using many gorgeous words to describe the praise for their father.
Lear was touched by the words of the eldest daughter and the second daughter, believing that they really loved him, so he did not hesitate to divide the power between the eldest daughter and the second daughter, and when it was the turn of the younger daughter, Lear found that Cordelia could not describe herself with lofty words of praise, which greatly damaged the king's self-esteem.
Although Lear was a father, his more important identity was that of a king. Especially in this important moment of political power division, Cordelia does not reflect the ambition for political power, but is indisputable from the world, and directly and clearly expresses her point of view: she will be filial to her father in his old age, but this is only the obligation of the children to the father, not the incomparable love for the father in her heart.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" >2 The total collapse of family etiquette</h1>
In terms of the beauty of the language, the younger daughter Cordelia is completely inferior to the eldest daughter and the second daughter.
Although Cordelia was sincere, the king was so enraged by these emotionless words that he was even prepared to sever his relationship with his young daughter, not to give her a dowry, and to marry her abroad, all of which showed Lear's old age.
The collapse of family etiquette has also allowed people to get a glimpse from here.
As far as the eldest daughter and the second daughter were concerned, they had no concept of filial piety at all, and although they uttered many flowery words to their fathers, they were all cunning to hide their sins. You must know that after gaining the territory of their fathers with these sweet words, they began to abandon their fathers completely, and they did not fulfill their obligations as children at all.
On the contrary, after the younger daughter was expelled from the house, she still paid attention to her father's every move, and when the father encountered danger, the younger daughter was always able to find a way to save the situation in time, and her various actions reflected the filial piety from the bottom of her heart to her father.
Although the younger daughter did not violate the norms of family etiquette, she did not live up to the behavior and qualities expected of a political successor.
<h1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" > the difficulty of maintaining the politics of the three city-states</h1>
Despite her pure character, Cordelia did not know how to behave in a political decentralization as a successor.
Cordelia, a princess, had no desire for power, so she did not possess the qualities of a royal heir, and although the eldest daughter and the second daughter had a vicious heart, they had a desire for power, so in the end they acquired a part of the territory.
At the moment of dividing the land, Cordelia did not express her love for her father in completely appropriate language, although her heart was simple and unpretentious, but she did not know how to match words and deeds, and the perfection of language did not match her filial piety.
Although the noble character of obscurity is to be praised, it is definitely not the behavior of a political successor. What's more, as a princess, she should understand the character characteristics of her father, Lear is a generation of monarchs, he is supreme in power, and at the same time he loves the respect of others, especially in his old age.
Cordelia should give her father appropriate praise in public, taking into account her father's face and self-esteem. However, Cordelia's words deeply hurt Lear's self-esteem, thus making the otherwise beautiful situation a mess.
All this was largely due to Cordelia's words making Li Wang sad. In Cordelia's case, the maintainer of family etiquette is highlighted but does not understand politics and power, and the two cannot be perfectly combined in Cordia, which ultimately causes a tragedy.
Lear was another victim of the loss of royal power. Due to his old age and illness, he intended to divide his power among his children, and Lear, who did not have any sons, intended to divide all his power among his three beloved daughters.
However, after this division of power, he did not get the desired old age, followed by abandonment and forgetting, the eldest daughter and the second daughter, after gaining power and national territory, completely treated their father as a stranger, and even added up to him, without the slightest kind attitude that one daughter should have, which showed the snobbery and indifference of the two daughters.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" >4 summary</h1>
On the night of the storm, the abandoned Lear roared in the wind and rain, and as an old king, he was no longer able to rule the country, and even lost a place in the family, and finally became a complete tramp.
Lear's body typically reflects the difficulty of city-state politics, he can not find a reasonable successor to inherit his throne, and the two daughters he chooses turn out to be selfish, even treating his father as an outsider.
The ruler of the city-state should possess noble qualities, but unfortunately none of the heirs he chooses have such talents. The total collapse of family etiquette caused Lear, who was the king, to end up with nothing.