“Can You Make no Use of Nothing?” Madness, Heroism, Power in William Shakespeare’s King Lear
Fatin Awad Abuhilal,Department of English Language and Literature, Yarmouk University, Irbid, Jordan.
Abstract
The originality of Shakespeare's King Lear lies in the formulation of a mad personality that goes beyond its stock and stereotypical role. Shakespeare seems intent on a portrayal of madness that conveys the complication of the individuality of the hero. In an ambivalent way, madness is implemented as the driving force of conflict and its ultimate outcome or end. In its subversion of the accepted and standard roles of characterization and heroism, Lear's madness becomes the central totalizing theme in the play that overthrows the very hierarchies of power in the English Renaissance drama. The personality of Lear is imbued with power, insight, growth and distinctiveness only when he gets mad. The necessary abstraction needed in heroes, and their removal and estrangement from reality, and the existence apart from their institutionally defined roles are, also, essential characteristics of heroism and located only in King Lear's madness. In this paper madness is treated as a powerful force for it is conscious, self -determined and heroic.