King Lear and 1984

Power
King Lear offers a reflection on power or, more accurately, the loss of power. After retiring and divvying up his kingdom among his ungrateful daughters, Lear discovers what it's like to lose the power and authority that come with the responsibilities of active rule. In addition to being a monarch, King Lear is also a family patriarch and Shakespeare asks us to consider the similarities between a father's relationship with his children and a king's relationship with his subjects.
Sir, I love you more than words can wield the matter; 
Dearer than eyesight, space, and liberty;...
1984 is not just about totalitarianism; it makes us live through totalitarianism. The Party wants power for its own sake. The Party carefully monitors the behavior of all of its constituents. Morning group exercises are mandatory. The Party demands that all loyalty created in private be severed, and that the only acceptable loyalty is loyalty to the Party. The Party condemns sex, and brainwashes its constituents. The Party recognizes no concept of a "family" other than the collective family under rule by the Party. The Party controls everything – the past, the present, and the future – by controlling historical records, language, and even thought. The Party tortures and "vaporizes" those who harbor rebellious thoughts. The state suffers through constant warfare. The conditions are dilapidated, but the citizens do not know better. Classism exists everywhere, and different classes generally do not socialize with each other.

Loyalty

V tests Evey’s loyalty by imprisoning her. She displays loyalty to V even after his death. She finds a new protégée and will remain loyal to V by not letting his idea of anarchy die.

In the harsh world of King Lear, loyalty is rare. Surviving in an unstable political situation means that many people focus on the bottom line: saving their own skins. But there are some characters in the play who demonstrate astonishing loyalty, such as Kent and Cordelia. The play celebrates this virtue, but it also shows that it can be dangerous. Loyalty is not appreciated, but rather ignored. In some cases, loyalty means death, and in all cases, it means suffering.

Reverse thy doom;
And, in thy best consideration, cheque
This hideous rashness: answer my life my judgment,
Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least;
Nor are those empty-hearted whose low sound
Reverbs no hollowness.

A successful totalitarian state cannot accommodate private loyalties, since private loyalties will often trump loyalty to the Party. Therefore, the Party in 1984 seeks to ensure that the only and ultimate loyalty its members have will be loyalty for the Party. They eliminate all potential private loyalties, such as the familial or the sexual. In order to remain all-powerful, the Party destroys loyalty between people: co-workers, friends, even family members. Children are encouraged to betray their parents to the state if they suspect them of Thoughtcrimes (thinking something that goes against the Party line).
The Party has outlawed sex for pleasure and reduced marriage to an arrangement between a man and woman that exists only for procreation. Sexual urges must be repressed for fear they will lead to love, human connection, and personal loyalty, all of which threaten the Party. Winston believes that love like the love he and Julia share will eventually destroy the Party, but he underestimates the Party’s ability to destroy that love and loyalty. Winston and Julia both give in to torture and betray each other. When they are released, their love and loyalty to each other have been destroyed. Because the Party can easily detect Thoughtcrimes, people always act as if they are completely loyal to the Party. No one trusts anyone else completely. Winston makes fatal mistakes when he trusts O’Brien and Charrington, both of whom betray him. His misjudgment is almost understandable; given the subtle cues both give him to indicate that they are fellow subversives. But as it turns out they are deliberately setting a trap for him and Julia. In the end, no one can be trusted.

Thoughtcrime does not entail death: thoughtcrime IS death.

The Party takes loyalty seriously, and does not tolerate any acts of subversion – even if they are mere thoughts.

Appearance vs. Reality

Goneril and Regan first appear to Lear as loving daughters. In reality, they are selfish daughters who deceive their father for their own personal gain. They both trick Lear into believing they love him the most, when in reality it is Cordelia who loves Lear, virtuously, the most. It does not occur to Lear that Goneril and Regan may be exaggerating. Lastly, we have the Fool who appears to be a dumb, foolish, jester. In reality, the Fool is very wise. He serves as Lear's inner conscience throughout the play. His role is as a tutor to Lear. The Fool knows all of Lear's faults and he tries to offer Lear insight and reveal truth. Throughout the play, the Fool observes the disorder that Lear has not only caused to himself but also to his entire kingdom, while constant references made by him sarcastically indicate Lear's foolishness. The Fool tries to help Lear feel better about what is going on by putting a humorous spin on the words he is saying. The Fool uses poetry and song to get his point across to Lear. He helps Lear realize where he went wrong, he reveals truth to Lear.
"She will taste as like this as a crab does to a crab."

This little verse reveals truth to Lear, telling him that if he thinks that Regan is unlike Goneril, he is wrong. The Fool indicates that Regan's nature will be no different from Goneril's. The Fool is partially comparable to Cordelia, in that he is a truth-teller like her and is firmly obedient to Lear. The Fool is not just a servant to Lear but he is also a friend and the son Lear never had. The name "Fool" means nothing. The Fool is the most intelligent friend Lear has. Edmund appears to all as a fine young gentleman who is loyal and brave. In reality, Edmund is a cunning, devious, opportunist who will stop at nothing to please himself.
Gloucester and many others are tricked by Edmund's appearance. What Gloucester does not see or refuse to see, is the hatred Edmund has for him because of his cavalier treatment of him. Edmund wants all control of Gloucester's money and power.
Edmund fools both Edgar and Gloucester, destroying both their characters. Edmund turns them against each other, causing chaos and destruction in the natural universe

In totalitarian Oceania, it seems as if everyone is slavishly devoted to Big Brother and believes everything the government tells them. However, as we can understand from Winston’s thoughts, all is not as it seems. Some people secretly feel and believe differently from how they behave; of course, they are extremely careful not to betray themselves. Moreover, the Party is in control of all information and revises history, even yesterday’s history, to reflect their current version of events. Winston is very much aware of this, because it is his job in the inaccurately named Ministry of Truth to change the records of history. He cannot ignore what he remembers: Oceania was at war with Eurasia and allied with Eastasia yesterday, and not vice versa. If anyone else remembers differently, they certainly won’t say so.
Only the old man, a powerless prole who lives on the street, speaks about what really happened in the past, but in short and irrelevant snippets about his personal experiences. It is Winston’s need to reconcile what he knows with the Party’s version of reality that leads to his downfall. The Party cannot allow people to have an opinion of reality that is different from theirs. As Winston writes in his diary, “Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.”

Oceania is basically a state of lies. The line between truth and lies are blurred in the book. The state controls what truths are, so lies can become truths. It's a world of appearances that is passed off as reality. Reality, the way we understand it, is nonexistence according to the state. But Winston begs to differ; he believes that there is an objective reality despite what the party says. Examples in the book of this theme: when Winston and Julia stay in the room and think that they are safe, when the owner, I forget his name, is actually a member of the thought police. When Winston and Julia believe that O'Brien is on their side, or so it appears to be, but is actually a lie.

Edgar, on the other hand, insists that “the gods are just,” believing that individuals get what they deserve (5.3.169). But, in the end, we are left with only a terrifying uncertainty—although the wicked die, the good die along with them, culminating in the awful image of Lear cradling Cordelia’s body in his arms. There is goodness in the world of the play, but there is also madness and death, and it is difficult to tell which triumphs in the end.
Betrayal
Betrayals play a critical role in the play and show the workings of wickedness in both the familial and political realms—here, brothers betray brothers and children betray fathers. Goneril and Regan’s betrayal of Lear raises them to power in Britain, where Edmund, who has betrayed both Edgar and Gloucester, joins them. However, the play suggests that betrayers inevitably turn on one another, showing how Goneril and Regan fall out when they both become attracted to Edmund, and how their jealousies of one another ultimately lead to mutual destruction. Additionally, it is important to remember that the entire play is set in motion by Lear’s blind, foolish betrayal of Cordelia’s love for him, which reinforces that at the heart of every betrayal lies a skewed set of values.