Stampfer and The Catharsis of King Lear Essay -- King Lear essays

Stampfer and The Catharsis of King Lear At the end of King Lear, when the only characters left standing are Albany, Edgar, and Kent, is the audition supposed to come out from the play with any feeling other than remorse? This search for emotional release by the audience is one which J. Stampfer believes is the most profound problem in King Lear. The overriding critical problem in King Lear is that of its ending. The deaths of Learand Cordelia confront us like a raw, fresh wound where our every instinct c completelys for meliorate and reconciliation. This problem, moreover, is as much one of philosophicorder as of dramatic effect. In what sort of universe, we ask ourselves, can wastefuldeath follow woe and torture? In his essay The Catharsis of King Lear, Stampfer discusses sevearal readings of Lears death, proves them faulty, and, through analyzation of this and other Shakespearian texts, arrives at his own conclusion concerning Lears denouement and the audiences reaction. The es say begins with Stampfer defining the relevance of Lears death to King Lear and the essay reader. Stampfer does not waste the time of the reader with an elaborate introduction. Instead, the first musical note defines the problem The overriding critical problem in King Lear is that of its ending (361). Still in the first paragraph, he quotes the line from Lear that causes the interpretation problems, referring to it as Lears desparing question (361) Why should a dog, a horse, a rat have life,And thou no breath at all? (v,iii, 306-7) The rest of the paragraph discusses problems which, in Stampfers opinion, cannot be pushed aside, such as the source Shakespeare used to write King Lear, and the Christian referenc... ...ld, and abandons athiesm and attempts to save Lear and Cordelia. This creates a paradox for Stampfer if characters such as Lear, Gloucester, and Edmund all go through some sort of awakening, why do they all die? Is there any justice in the universe? Stampfer examines O thello, Hamlet, and Romeo & Juliet, and concludes that in several(prenominal)ly of those tragedies, the play ends with the reconciliation of the tragic hero and fraternity (371). Lear, in Stampfers opinion, is the first tragedy in which the tragic hero dies unreconciled and indifferent to society (371). So Stampfer finds it necessary to go over the plot of Lear again, and dervie what within the structure makes Lear different from the before mentioned plays, and attempt to find some sort of catharsis. Stampfer comes up with several key points. The first is Lears abandonment of everything he once knew.