King Lear-Psychoanalytical View

King Lear Essay 2026 words.

Viewed from a psychoanalytical perspective, King Lear is a Shakespearian tragedy involving madness, in more than one sense, and the causes and effects of this. There are many individual concepts to explore, and this exposition will investigate the following: the madness in Lear and how it progresses, absence of the mother, and the sexual relationship between Lear and his daughters. Lear lacks responsibility in terms of actively and willingly approaching his situations and confrontations blindly. This and his lack of self awareness and lack of awareness toward others, prove that the king is not a man “more sinned against than sinning”.

It seems quite clear that Shakespeare uses the word ‘mad’ for at least the first part of the play in the sense of ‘extremely angry’, and only later, when Lear does lose touch with reality, does it then mean ‘not in his right mind’ (insane). Lear is moving on a continuum that begins with extreme ...