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Hypocrisy In Much Ado About Nothing, And The Merchant Of Venice

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While Shakespeare’s plays are not “Christian plays,” many of his works present several moral themes and questions about life, death, and God. Christians can learn invaluable lessons from Shakespeare about Christian hypocrisy, the futileness of deception, and the devastating consequences of corrupt love; The Merchant of Venice, Much Ado About Nothing, and King Lear each show the fallen nature of humans and how the world desperately needs a Savior. The Merchant of Venice showcases Christian hypocrisy. In Act 4, Scene 1, Portia talks about the quality of mercy, “The quality of mercy is not strain'd. It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven upon the place beneath. It is twice blest: it blesseth him that gives and him that takes” (Open Source …show more content…

King Lear is a very selfish man who lacks a sense of duty. He wants to retire and has divided his kingdom among his three daughters; however, he wants his daughters to compete for who loves their father the most. Goneril and Regan both give melodramatic speeches about how words cannot begin to father their love for their father. When it is Cordelia’s turn, she simply states the truth; she loves her father as much as a daughter ought to. Because of Lear’s selfishness, he becomes enraged and disinherits his innocent daughter. Lear’s blindness soon catches up with him as Goneril and Regan begin to mistreat their father. All of Lear’s calamities could have been avoided if he had removed himself from his selfishness and realized which daughter truly loved him the “most.” Christian readers will recognize that King Lear presents a corrupt view of love. Real love, like God’s love, is honest and does not pretend to be more than it should be. Twisted love is flamboyant and often possesses hidden motives. Christians should admire Cordelia’s love for her father because that is the only realistic and genuine love that one can

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Similar to that of King Lear, the power roles are constantly being switched between members of the family, thus struggling for idealisms to meet. This is first seen when Lear divides his kingdom up between his three daughters, essentially passing on his position of power to Regan and Goneril. To his surprise, his daughters plans were different to those of Lear causing madness throughout the Kingdom and their overall bond. In mentioning their diverging views, Goneril has an outburst to her father, he quotes: My train are men of choice and rarest parts That all particulars of duty know

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Between King Lear and Cordelia is the embodiment of authentic self-sacrificing love. Near the end of the tragedy, Lear learns a cruel lesson in humanity, and recognizes his error which is vital to his reconciliation with Cordelia. He finally realized Cordelia’s sincerity, and the depth of her love that was far more authentic compared to her sisters. Likewise, on the last episode, Fiona is seen bald and weary from cancer. Fiona admitted to her daughter when a woman becomes a mother, she cannot help, but see life in the little baby’s face.

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In act four, Lear is finally able to reunite with Cordelia and expresses his new self in humbleness symbolizing repentance. When Cordelia addresses Lear as “royal lord" since the last time she has came in front of him, it is clear that she refers to Lear with the respect that he deserves as a king, as well with the admiration she still holds for her father. In comparison to Goneril’s and Regan’s formal “my lord”, it is evident that they do not display the same love and respect that Cordelia has for Lear. Lear’s response to her shows an urge to seek death, just as Gloucester did at the cliffs of Dover, when he states being taken “out o’the grave."

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Cordelia also says that if Regan and Goneril were as loyal as they say to their father, they wouldn’t just only have affection for Lear but also to their husbands. Another quote from Shakespeare’s King Lear is when Cordelia gets captured by Edmund. “For thee, oppressed King, I am cast down, Myself could else outgrown false fortune’s frown. Shall we not see these daughters and these sisters?”

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Lear’s disillusionment over the fake expression of love that his daughters portrayed drove him to madness and, ultimately, his demise. Throughout Regan and Goneril’s false facade toward their father, lies grew deeper throughout the kingdom, resulting in hateful crimes of murder against loved ones. In the end, Edgar clearly sees that deception grew too powerful, and to prevent any further damage, he teaches that honesty is the virtue that should drive one’s

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Throughout William Shakespeare’s tragic play, King Lear, the goal of gaining control over the kingdom and boasting about one’s status drove the characters to deceive each other through the use of lies and manipulation. Right from the start, King Lear demanded that his daughter profess their love for him, causing Regan and Goneril to exaggerate their love all to flatter their father and gain the most of his land. When it was Cordelia’s turn, even though she spoke from her heart about how much her father means to her, her words did not praise her father enough as he insisted she revise her confession. Act 1 Scene 1 started the destruction of the Lear family as Regan and Goneril proved successful in gaining their father’s land by spreading lies

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The first of the play scene begins with the injustice of his daughter Cordelia by depriving her of everything, even of her dowry and her relations with family, indeed, he has saved the biggest part of the kingdom for her but she is a failure to express her love for her father, this good clue indicates injustice at the beginning of the division of two instead of the three, hence the division according to his mood. that Lear is very emotional; he is irritation, hasty, and impatient and he is unable to recognize the hypocrisy behind the extravagant speeches of Goneril and Regan. Although, Cordelia says: Good my Lord,

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In addition, Lear not only loses his power, but also lose a daughter who is loyal to him. The decision that he made to banish his youngest daughter, Cordelia, is the most fatuous one. For the answer of the loving-test, Cordelia is honest to express her true love to her father, which does not sound as sweet as Goneril and Regan do. Lear becomes heartless to drives out Cordelia, “Shakespeare portrays a play-world in which gratuitous violence seems to be a norm. It begins with Lear's outbursts against Cordelia and Kent in the opening scene, in which he invokes the idea of barbarity and cannibalism

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In this scene, King Lear asks his daughters to speak of their love of their father, and he divides up his kingdom among them according to how greatly they shower him with their love for him. The beginning act of the play starts with King Lear asking his daughters to tell them how much they love him. His two older daughters, Regan and Goneril, create over exaggerated speeches filled

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In Shakespeare's King Lear, characters are categorized into three distinct groups of malevolence, ignorance, and benevolence. Cordelia and Kent are the characters most prominently defined by their inherent goodness. This goodness is primarily exemplified in their unwavering desire to help King Lear. In contrast to the kindness of these characters is a kingdom plagued by blindness, viciousness, and mal intent. In this environment, one’s ability to disguise one’s own true goodness directly relates to their ability to survive the evils that perpetually surround them.

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Witnessing the powerful forces of the natural world, Lear comes to understand that he, like the rest of humanity, is irrelevant in the world. This realization proves much more important than the realization of his loss of political control, as it enforces him to set up his values and become gentle and caring. With this newfound understanding of himself, Lear hopes to be able to accost the chaos in the political realm as well. King Lear is a symbol of a strong man, who has a Reason that counts, a powerful King who gives everything and gets nothing. King Lear, we may say that he lost his authority to his daughters, as a father, once he gave them

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In this paper, I will discuss how the following events in this tragic play can help us to analyze the character growth of King Lear. It is important for us to recognize the flaws and weaknesses of Lear’s personality to see how his actions and decisions led to his ruin. However, although he faces the misfortune of losing the things that he cherished the most, he also has the opportunity of transitioning into his being and experiencing the new-found attentiveness of love and morality. Whilst analyzing the progression of Lear’s complex character development, we must start from the beginning.

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Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest: It blesseth him that gives and him that takes. [...]

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It is a striking event how he treats his alleged favourite daughter and how easily he believes the lies he is being fed. Despite this, his quote holds a certain truth to it. As Lear has sinned against Cordelia, his other two daughters have sinned against him. He is right in his words for the reason that, although he was unjust and treated Cordelia disrespectfully, he did it because he felt betrayed.

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