The History of King Lear the complete Shakespeare text in 1845. In Shakespeare's version, Lear, King of Britain, is growing old, and decides to divide his kingdom among his three daughters – Goneril, wife of the Duke of Albany, Regan, wife of the Duke of Cornwall, and the youngest daughter, Cordelia, sought in marriage by the Duke of Burgundy and the King of France. The King decides that he will give the best part of the kingdom to the daughter who loves him most, and asks his three daughters to state how much they love him. Goneril and Regan make hypocritical, flattering speeches, and are
The History of King Lear Reader and Audience to have Vertue and Piety meet so unjust a Reward. . . . We rejoice at the deaths of the "Bastard" and the two Sisters, as of Monsters in Nature under whom the very Earth must groan. And we see with horror and Indignation the Death of the King, "Cordelia" and "Kent". The translator and author Thomas Cooke also gave Tate's version his blessing: in the introduction to his own play "The Triumphs of Love and Honour" (1731), he commented that Lear and Gloucester "are made sensible or their Errors, and are placed in a State of