Literary Classics are indispensable masterpieces, which help us understand our world irrespective of changing times. Timelessness of such works make them even more relevant for younger minds that are in their formative years. But the children, when they are just brushing their linguistic teeth might find Elizabethan English a little harder to chew and might choose to stay away.
Wisemen Publication’s – Wisemen World Classics is an attempt to befriend your growing child with Great Masters of world literature, retelling their content in contemporary prose with vivid illustrations, while retaining the music of the original work.
About King Lear Story.
King Lear is a typical tragedy by Shakespeare. King Lear who suffers misfortune and meets a sad fate mainly on account of his own faults which is in this case are a hasty temper, an intolerant attitude towards everybody, an excessive egoism and an incapacity to judge the character of those around him. The play is also a study in evil. Lear meets tragic fate in the end not only because of the shortcomings of his own character but also because of the evil nature of his daughters.
The characters in the play are highly contrasted an can be easily categories as good and evil. Goneril, Regan, Cornwall and Edmund are the evil doers in the play, while Cordelia, Kent, Edgar and Albany represent royalty, a spirit of service, sense of justice and goodness of heart. The evil-minded son in law Cornwall has been contrasted with the good son in law Albany. The characters of the greedy and selfish suitor Burgundy and the unselfish and romantic lover, the King of France also present a fair contrast.
About William Shakespeare – William Shakespeare has ruled the English literature for 400 years. Born on 23 April in 1564 in the village of Stratford-on-Avon as the third child of John Shakespeare, he had to support his family as his father’s business fell apart. While 18, he married Anne Hathaway, a peasant girl, eight years older to him. About 1589, Shakespeare joined a theatre company in London as a general helper but soon started acting and writing plays.
Initially, he worked with other writers, before writing his own plays. Love’s labour lost, Comedy of Errors, Two gentleman of Verona, Romeo & Juliet and many other masterpieces were written during this period.
He got popular very soon. Within 10 years of coming to London, he had become the most famous actor and writer of plays in English. His monetary troubles were gone.
But some personal sorrow seems to have struck him around this time as now he started writing tragedies. He wrote his greatest plays during this time – The Merchant of Venice, as you like it, Twelfth Night, Julius Ceaser, Hamlet, Macbeth, Othello and King Lear.
He was at the prime of his literary carrier, but it seems that name, fame and money did not interest him any more. In 1597 he bought the finest house in Stratford and in 1611 he left London to settle there, permanently. He died on the anniversary of his birth 23 April 1616.
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