Act 5 KENT 158. Is this … end?: Is this the end of the world? EDGAR
159. Or … horror?: Or is it merely a representation of that horror?
160. Fall and cease!: Albany is so appalled by what he sees that he calls on the world to collapse and come to an end.
161. This feather stirs!: Holding a feather in front of a person’s nose or mouth was another way of testing for signs of life. If they breathed, the feather would move. One reading of these words is that Lear is so desperate to believe Cordelia is alive that he imagines he sees the feather moving. Another reading is that he means ‘if this feather stirs, she is alive’.
162. redeem all sorrows: compensate me for all suffering and sadness
Or image of that horror?159 ALBANY
Fall, and cease.160
LEAR This feather stirs!161 She lives! If it be so, It is a chance which does redeem all sorrows162 That ever I have felt.
KENT O my good master! 270
LEAR Prithee, away!
Howl, howl, howl! O you are men of stones! Had I your tongues and eyes I’d use them so Tat heaven’s vault should crack. She’s gone for ever. (King Lear, lines 259–261)
Is this the promised end?158
212
King Lear, directed by Trevor Nunn, Royal Shakespeare Company, 2007 King Lear
