The study or Shakespear's Lear and Kurosawa's Ran

“As flies to wanton boys, are we to th’ gods, They kill us for their sport.” ( ACT IV, scene
I, l.36). By analysing Shakespear’s King Lear and Kurusawa’s Ran, we analyse the common idea
that the universe is indifferent to the human life which is meaningless and brutal. By dividing the
idea in three parts we can easily examine the brutality of humans, their destiny and meaningless
as well as the universe’s indifference to humans through the character in Lear and in Ran.

The characters of King Lear and of Ran are easily identified between the good and the
bad, like pieces of a chess board as Northrop Frye would say. The good characters being
Cordelia, the Fool, Kent and Albany in Lear and Sué, the Fool and Saburo in Ran. The bad
characters being everyone else basicaly. The level at which the characters stand in the natural
order is important. To understand this concept more, according to the Elizabethans, humans have
fallen from grace or from the Gardens of ...