Importance Of Metaphors In King Lear

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In King Lear, there are many metaphorical comparisons which are used to highlight the central theme of the play- recognition. The presence of physically and mentally blind characters throughout the play is used as an ironic way to emphasize the importance of correctly recognizing a situation. Throughout this piece, the main characters used to portray the theme are King Lear and Gloucester. Both men are characterized as wealthy and powerful people who are seen to gradually become blinded by different things, like greed, to the point they cannot recognize circumstances for what they are. Shakespeare uses two scenes in this play to convey the theme through metaphors; when King Lear begins to go mentally insane once he does not recognize his two …show more content…
This ultimately led to his downfall and the physical loss of his sight. For being too blinded by lies to see the truth, he led to a downfall of everyone in the play. Cornwall, Lear’s son-in-law, even stated at one point, “…it was not altogether your brother’s evil disposition made him seek his death…set a-work by a reprovable badness in himself” (KL, 3.6. 4-7). Though readers are aware that Edgar is not the evil son, Cornwall is still using this example to illustrate how Gloucester led to the position both Edgar and Edmund are in. Therefore, Shakespeare implies that Gloucester led to his own demise as well, due to his inability to recognize truth and lies. Gloucester finally begun to “see” clearly when his son, Edmund, led to his capture and physical blindness. Then in the end, when he finally began to see the truth, Gloucester was unable to see anything. This metaphor is used to convey the play’s theme because his lack of recognition led to his downfall, much like Lear.
In conclusion, these two examples seen above are used to convey the theme of the play. King Lear’s ignorance from greed led to his inability to mentally recognize anything ever again because he went insane. Likewise, Gloucester’s gullibility led to his physical blindness along with the capability to finally recognize reality. These two
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