Best of Week: King Lear/Edgar Relationship

When I was trying to reflect on what insightful comments or ideas we discussed in class, only one stuck out in my mind. I forget who brought up the topic to begin with, but I remember discussing the relationship between King Lear and Edgar. During the discussion, a few important observations were made, leading us to establish several conclusions:

1. Lear is actually going mad, while Edgar is only pretending
2. Lear benefits from seeing aspects of himself (or who he is becoming) reflected in Edgar
3. Edgar benefits when Lear looks after him

While these points may seem obvious, organizing them like this really helped me understand the Lear/Edgar relationship better. I think these observations show Shakespeare's brilliance with character development and contrast.

This also connects to another good point of the week, which was one of Mr. Allen's. He said something to the effect of, "As writers, we always want to look after our characters, make sure they take the right path. To be a good writer, you have to let go and see where the characters take you."

I think Shakespeare did exactly that. He probably didn't map out all this madness beforehand, but since that's where the story took him, he decided to place characters in Lear's path that would help him see who or what he was turning into. This is only one of the thousands of reasons Shakespeare is still considered some sort of literary god.

Connection: Cordelia and Cinderella

While trying to understand the family dynamic of King Lear and his daughters, I thought of Cinderella. In the well-known fairytale, Cinderella is kindhearted, but her stepsisters are greedy and insincere. Even though Cinderella is the only pure one of the three, her sisters are favored and showered with gifts, while she is left with nothing, forced to stay at home doing housework. Eventually, with the help of a fairy godmother, she attends a ball and meets her Prince Charming, and one lost slipper later, she lives happily ever after.

Although this differs from the storyline of King Lear, I saw a strong connection between the characters Cordelia and Cinderella. In the beginning of King Lear, the king decides to divide his land among his three daughters. His only requirement is that they all proclaim their love to him. Cordelia's older sisters, Goneril and Regan, immediately rant about how much they love their father, without the faintest sincerity. Cordelia, on the other hand, refuses. She believes that it is dishonest and wrong to exaggerate just to please someone else or just to get some reward. When she doesn't say what her father wanted to hear, he withdraws his offer, and Cordelia gets nothing. Despite this misfortune, Cordelia eventually is married to a man who loves her despite her lack of possessions.

Clearly, the plots and settings of King Lear and Cinderella are entirely different, but the central characters share similar qualities and endure similar situations. Both are honest and good, despite being surrounded by fake, selfish people. Both suffer unfair consequences, regardless of their good natures. Both eventually find their true loves, who appreciate the kindness that they possess. This connection helped me better understand Cordelia as a character and appreciate the circumstances she struggles through. I haven't finished King Lear, so I don't know what will become of Cordelia, but I can only hope that she will have the same fairytale ending that Cinderella did.

TED Presentations

Overall, I think the TED presentations were a success. I was sick for the presentations last year, so I can't really make specific comparisons between last year and this year. Nevertheless, I can generally say that the process was much smoother this year. The criteria for grading was less subjective, so we were more aware of what was expected of us. Google sites was an efficient tool that we learned to use to communicate with our group members and organize our thoughts.

Still, the project wasn't without complications. First of all, the video selection process seemed inconsistent, since many got their first choice topics, but some people didn't get any of their three choices. In addition, there was a lot of confusion among the upperclassmen. Juniors and seniors seemed to think less was expected of them, so in the earlier stages, they didn't feel the need to contribute as much.

I also disagreed with some aspects of the grading system. I don't think it's fair for this grade to have such a huge influence in some of our subjects, especially foreign language. We didn't use Spanish at all throughout the whole process, so I don't think it makes sense to make the TED project worth a test grade in that class.

Despite these issues, the presentations were interesting to watch and listen to. I think we all were inspired by these TED presenters and their ideas to improve our future. I would be interested in continuing this project in the coming years, as long as these issues are addressed and solutions are developed.