Act I, Scene I
· An aged King Lear, who has no son to succeed him as king, has discussed with some of his lords his plans to divide his Kingdom between his three daughters, Goneril, Regan, and Cordelia. One young lord suggested that he divide the country between the sisters in portions equal to the amount they were prepared to profess that they loved him. The idea pleased the king and that lord ran to the two older sisters to inform them of their father's decision. The young lord moves from the service of Lear to that of Goneril. * (see note below)
· The play begins in Lear's Palace with the Earls of Kent and Gloucester discussing Lear's love for his two sons-in-law, the Dukes of Albany and Cornwall. They can't decide which one he loves the most since the shares of land Lear intends allotting their wives, Goneril and Regan, seem so equal.
· Gloucester introduces Edmund, his illegitimate son, to Kent stating that although he has been ashamed to own him in the past, yet he must acknowledge him. He explains that he also has a legitimate son whom he loves no more than he loves Edmund, and that just as Edmund has been abroad for the past years he will go away again.
· Lear enters with his train to announce the division of his land and the turning over of his power to Albany and Cornwall and either the King of France or the Duke of Burgundy, both of whom have come to gain the hand of Lear's youngest daughter Cordelia. He wants to do this in order to prevent strife between his children when he dies.
· Lear tells the gathering he has determined that he will divide his kingdom according to the amount of love each daughter will profess that they have for him, and invites Goneril then Regan to speak. Both girls flatter him with professions of love they cannot possibly fulfil.
· On hearing the flattery Cordelia is stunned and wonders how she is going to respond without flattering her father even more. She determines to herself that she will "love and be silent" even though she knows that her love for her father is much greater than she could speak.
· Delighted with Goneril's and Regan's speeches, Lear then turns to ask Cordelia, his favourite, what she can say to better her sisters' professions of love, to which Cordelia responds repeatedly "Nothing." Following his repeated requests, Cordelia explains that she loves him as the bond between father and daughter requires, no more and no less, and she points to the folly of his sisters' responses which indicated that they loved their father entirely. Cordelia would have to reserve half her love for the lord she would marry.
· Lear's anger rises at Cordelia's refusal to participate in the love contest, eventually causing him to disown her as his daughter, saying that from then onwards she would be a stranger to him.
· The Earl of Kent could see the emptiness of Goneril's and Regan's speeches and the obvious love Cordelia has for her father. He seeks to intervene on her behalf but Lear will not listen to him. Lear had hoped that Cordelia would nurse him in his old age. He told Cordelia to leave and avoid his sight, and declared that the territory that had been set aside for Cordelia was now to be divided between Albany and Cornwall. He then made the announcement that he and his one hundred knights would reside with each daughter month about at the expense of the daughters.
· Kent continues to seek to intervene to such an extent that Lear has to be restrained from executing him right there and then, choosing instead to banish him from his country. Kent leaves with the words
Freedom
lives hence, and banishment is here....
Thus Kent, O Princes! bids you all adieu;
He'll shape his old course in a country new.
· The King of France and the Duke of Burgundy enter and Lear offers Cordelia first to Burgundy explaining that she now has no dowry. Burgundy turns the offer down and Lear then turns to France suggesting that he did not want to match him with one "whom Nature is ashamed almost to acknowledge hers."
· France readily sees what Kent has seen. He hears Cordelia explain to her father that she wasn't the type to make promises she did not intend keeping, but that she would do what she intended doing before she spoke of it, that Lear himself would make known that her motives were not impure.
· France describes this as simply a natural reluctance to speak about what one intends to do for another, and seeing her real worth declares her to be his Queen and the Queen of France. He explains:
Not
all the dukes of wat'rish Burgundy
Can buy this unpriz'd maid of me.
He tells Cordelia to bid farewell to her unkind sisters, promising:
Thou losest here, a better where to find.
· With tears in her eyes at the thought of what her sisters might do to her father she commits him to their "professed bosoms", saying,
But
yet, alas! stood I within his grace,
I would prefer him to a better place.
· Regan and Goneril reject Cordelia's words, suggesting that she consider herself fortunate to have been chosen by France. Then Cordelia, who has not said anything of what she intends doing, leaves them saying:
Time shall unfold what plighted cunning hides;
and warning them:
Who covers faults, at last with shame derides.
· Alarmed at the behaviour of their father and the prospect of his living with them, immediately Goneril and Regan begin plotting to strip their father of everything.
* See the opening scene of The True Chronicle History of King Leir, and his three daughters, Gonorill, Ragan, and Cordella (1605) which Shakespeare's play counterpoints.
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