The Madness of King LearIn Shakespeare's King Lear, the actions of King Lear and his daughters bring ruin and chaos to England. Social structures collapse, foreign invaders threaten the country, and, in a distinctly un-Hollywood ending, almost everyone dies tragically. The outlook is very bleak, as many issues remain unresolved at the end of the play: no one is able to assume sovereignty, and justice and virtue have not been restored to their rightful place in the structure of the country. All of these problems are listed by Edmund at the beginning of the play: lack of naturalness between child and parent; death, famine, the dissolution of old friendships; state divisions, threats and curses against the king and nobles; unnecessary distrust, banishment of friends, dissipation of cohorts, marital breakups, and I don't know what. (King Lear, I.ii.120-123) Each of these events occurs, in one way or another, during the course of the play. Later, Lear's fool adds to the list of misfortunes: priests who don't practice what they preach, brewers who water down their beer, nobles practicing common trades, people burned for expressing their sexuality, and many more. (King Lear, III.ii.76-89) Unlike Edmund's list of problems, the realization of these is not specifically detailed in the text of the play, but this second catalog adds to the general feeling of dissolution of society which runs through the entire play. the drama. All of these problems can be attributed (directly or indirectly) to Lear's abdication of the throne. Although Lear had not thought of the problems this might cause, the king's abandonment of the royal throne had struck at the very heart of the social order that the English...... middle of paper .... .. and made compelling by the larger-than-life drama that operates beyond any particular political situation in Shakespeare's contemporary world. The dramatic interaction of characters whose motivations are obscured adds a mythic quality to the actions of the play that only accentuates the harm Lear does to his society. In this context, the expulsion of good Kent from England seems almost a reversal of the expulsion of Adam and Eve from Paradise, for example. The veiled characters make the play understandable and captivating for audiences of all eras. Works Cited: Introduction to Shakespeare's King Lear in The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Ed. Mr. H. Abrams. New York: WW Norton & Company, 1993. Shakespeare, William. King Lear in The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Ed. Mr. H. Abrams. New York: WW Norton & Company, 1993.