"The Base Shall Top Th'Legitimate": The Bedlam Beggar and the Role of Edgar in "King Lear"

Carroll, William C.

doi:10.2307/2870423

Cited by 12 publications

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“…Concurrent with Edgar's more recent, elevated assessment of his moral significance, other contemporary critics 42 have emphasized the character's importance to the play through his inclusion in Q's title page 43 which provides, in William Carroll's words, an "equal billing" 44 for Edgar. It reads: M. William Shak-speare: His True Chronicle Historie of the life and death of King LEAR and his three Daughters.…”

Section: Revisiting the Title Of The Playmentioning

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‘I heard myself proclam’d:’ the transition in the critical and textual reception of Edgar in King Lear

Dale

2022

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The publication of Shakespeare's First Folio in 1623 marked the beginning of a period, lasting over three centuries, in which the critical reception of Edgar in King Lear was often unenthusiastic, judging by the opinions of subsequent theatre practitioners and literary critics. There were voices that questioned Edgar's relevance to the plot and considered him a superfluous character. Moreover, Edgar's heteroglossia was increasingly toned down in stage interpretations, removing the complex polyphony of Shakespeare's character by omitting lines given to the character in the Quarto version of the play. Since the mid-twentieth century, however, the critical (and textual) reception of Edgar has changed, as evidenced by the research of textual scholars who seek to preserve the ethical meaning of Edgar in the play. This has resulted in Edgar's text being revisited in stage performances. In addition, recent critics are paying more attention to Edgar's dexterity in the use of language and disguise, which they believe restores the character's role as crucial to the play's plot.

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Section: Revisiting the Title Of The Playmentioning

confidence: 99%

‘I heard myself proclam’d:’ the transition in the critical and textual reception of Edgar in King Lear

Dale

2022

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“…'Bedlam beggars' were notoriously counterfeits, and the Poor Tom persona in particular had a reputation for theatrical fraudulence. 24 And yet Edgar comes to 'feel what wretches feel' all the same, not because of the specific condition of his body, but because of his embodied knowledge. He knows the cramp of the cold, the pain of shredded, chapped skin, the ache of starvation, the frenzy of trying to manage new wounds, and the exhaustion of having to deal with old ones.…”

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'Known and Feeling Sorrows': Disabled Knowledge and King Lear

Row-Heyveld

2019

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This essay argues that King Lear presents a version of disability determined not by bodily authenticity but by bodily knowledge. By staging multiple forms and experiences of disability, the play defies the drive to authenticate and control non-standard bodies that flourished in early modern England. King Lear’s insistence on embodied knowledge both recognizes the unique perspective afforded to disability and resists disability exceptionalism through its attention to populations made vulnerable to impairment. King Lear specifically dramatizes the way disabled knowledge extended to precarious populations by granting Edgar disabled knowledge even though his disability is fraudulent.

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Introduction: Dissembling Disability in Early Modern English Drama

Row-Heyveld

2018

Dissembling Disability in Early Modern English Drama

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"The Base Shall Top Th'Legitimate": The Bedlam Beggar and the Role of Edgar in "King Lear"

Cited by 12 publications

References 0 publications

‘I heard myself proclam’d:’ the transition in the critical and textual reception of Edgar in King Lear

‘I heard myself proclam’d:’ the transition in the critical and textual reception of Edgar in King Lear

'Known and Feeling Sorrows': Disabled Knowledge and King Lear

Introduction: Dissembling Disability in Early Modern English Drama

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