King Lear Research Paper Shakespeare’s play, King Lear, characterizes the archetypes ‘good’ and ‘evil’ as good being loyal and bad being disloyal. In all Shakespearean tragedies, there is a series of events with a common theme that lead to the chaos of the plot: here, the theme is fidelity versus infidelity (Bonheim 39). King Lear highlights this theme mainly through familial and hierarchical relationships. The tragedy’s large cast of characters is divided into the archetypal categories of ‘good’ and ‘bad’, which are essentially determined by their faithful or unfaithful actions towards their family and kingdom. In their somewhat parallel lives, King Lear and Gloucester are driven to despair and madness by their familial relationships. Sibling rivalry, betrayal of fathers by daughters and by son and rash misunderstandings of a loyal son and a dutiful daughter, are the roots of chaos in the play (Bloom 15). King Lear and Gloucester’s downfalls are essentially caused by the ‘bad’ child’s betrayal and later resolved by the ‘good’ child’s help and support. Shakespeare introduced Cordelia as caring and loyal daughter, who is profoundly devoted to family (Bonheim 41). When it is her turn to publically confess her love for Lear, she explains in her own defense:
“Why have my sisters husbands, if they say
They love you all? Haply when I shall wed,
That lord whose had must take my plight shall carry
Half my love with him, half my care and duty.
Sure I shall never marry like my sisters
To love my father all.” (I.i 95-104).
Cordelia’s speech makes it clear that her two sisters are evil and unfaithful by questioning their exaggerated love confession to Lear. In doing so, Cordelia reveals that Goneril and Regan’s hypocritical love for Lear is nothing more than flattery and that she is the only one who truly loves him, thus expressing her loyalty to her family.