Examples Of Loyalty In King Lear

Compared to today, there are some elements in “King Lear” that don’t seem that foreign to us. For example, betrayal and loyalty are two things that are shifted around today and where maybe even more present in the past, as a king had to be on his guard. This includes his family, as we can see from the story. The 1st act of “King Lear” starts the whole problem of the play, where Lear says (1.1.56-57) “which of you shall we say doth love us most, That we our largest bounty may extend.” Today, we don’t believe in 100% unconditional love to be expected from children. Under reasonable conditions, a child doesn’t have any reason to owe anything to the parent and they even have legal rights to protect them from abuse. In Lear’s time, a parent expected a child to be submissive, to know where there place was. Giving birth to them was enough to warrant love and loyalty.
Edmund describes how he feels (1.2.9-11) when he said,”Why brand they us with “base”, with “baseness”, “bastardy”, “base”, “base”...”. Back then, there was an emphasis on bloodlines and family status. To Gloucester, Edmund was a burden. Had we have lived in Lear’s time, we would have viewed Edmund the same way. Times have changed, and now bastard is used more like an insult and less to call someone an illegitimate child. While having a child from someone who is no longer with you may be a trace memory of unhappier times, the majority of parents will still love their