Customer Reviews

King Lear (Folger Shakespeare Library)

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This is a review of this specific edition, not of the actual play. If you haven't read King Lear, read it. Simple as that.

As for the actual physical product, I am very pleased with it. Everything about it is of high quality, and it feels wonderful in your hands. The size is much larger than the typical Folger Shakespeare release, allowing the text to be easily read and ample room for annotations. I would definitely recommend this specific edition to any student (in college or, like myself, high school) wanting a nice copy of King Lear for yourself to read and study. Of course, if you are only looking for a copy to read for pleasure, this is excellent for that purpose as well.

The accompanying essays are very interesting and insightful, but I believe they are also available with the smaller Folger edition, so they should not be the deciding factor in purchasing this more expensive edition over the smaller, less expensive one.

Overall, this is a very well-made product. The cover and pages are high quality, and the book is a pleasure to hold. Highly recommended!

Now I wonder if plays count as books, but that is the beauty of the Bard. He has an all-encompassing reach for both the English and Theater worlds with influences on everything in between. There is so much going on that there is no way for me to cover it all in a little 300 or so word blurb but I shall try my best.

I have read this one twice for school and both times I was struck with how powerful it was. It deals with love and all of it's forms, with the fears of old age, with the battle for power everything needed to create an amazing story. Written toward the end of his life, I believe that a lot of Lear is Shakespeare's own personal fear and struggle of growing old and losing the respect that he feels he deserves. Lear is one of the most complex characters simply because of how dynamic he is. He begins Act 1 as a spoiled man who doesn't know himself, who is not wise enough to know what love and devotion really are. From there he descends into madness until finally being able to see the truth only in time to die himself. (Sorry if I spoiled but it's a Shakespearean tragedy, you know that everyone is going to die.)

I could go on about Regan and Goneril as the first evil (step)sisters that I have come across - they certainly make Anastasia and Drisella look like perfect angels. Or about Edmund a truly evil character rarely to be rivaled in literature. Shakespeare manages to capture human nature in all of its interesting shades so wonderfully that it is impossible to do him justice.

Read (or if possible watch) this wonder of Shakespeare, it will leave you satisfied and, hopefully, thinking.

The Folger edition is wonderful because of the notes on the sides and the fact that it can be one of the most complete plays out there.

William Shakespeare's play "King Lear" is a story that tells us to beware of flatterers. The title character King Lear disinherits his favorite daughter after she fails to flatter him when he asks each of his daughters how much they love him. King Lear is a foolish king who just goes with his first impressions and doesn't look deeper into people's words. The play takes place in England before the time of Merlin. The time period of the setting however is irrelevant to the play and the play could take place in any time period. King Lear is not an actual historical king, he is rather a king of British legend.

The play teaches parents to beware children who love them superficially. Flatterers fool those who love to be flattered.

The character King Lear is according to what I have heard, a rather difficult and demanding character to play for an actor. The Folger edition of this play has lots of explanatory notes to help the reader to understand the play.

I liked this book because it was much larger than the normal size of a Folger Shakespeare Library book. It provided ample amounts of space for notes and the text went along with most copies of King Lear, at times providing more text.