Theme Of Vision And Insight In King Lear

Williams Shakespeare’s tragedy, King Lear, presents the importance of clear vision and insight, or the lack there of, as a significant theme throughout the play. This theme is rendered through Gloucester’s character once he becomes physically blind. Without doubt, Act 4, Scene 6, also known as the Dover Cliff scene, is a pivotal event within the play that offers this theme to be true. Within the act, we recognize the humiliation of the recently blinded Gloucester at the hands of his supposedly loving son, Edmund, as a turning point and transformation for Gloucester’s future. Oddly enough, Gloucester is incapable of seeing the vengeance of his son, Edmund, until after he is blinded. Furthermore, as the scene opens, we understand that Edgar, who is disguised as a peasant, leads Gloucester to the place where Gloucester intends to commit suicide by jumping off of Dover Cliff. In order to convince his father, Edgar describes the cliff in fear-provoking terms just before stepping away from his father, whose attempt to jump off of a cliff only result in a simple fall to the ground. Although Edgar says that the humiliation of his father is an attempt to cure him of his misery, it is clear that for Gloucester, the picture is much bigger. Although the gouges of eyeballs seems gruesome and horrific, the knowledge and understanding Gloucester gains to achieve clear vision and insight on new life, and as a result is directed towards a future to see unquestionably by the means of the heart and mind to see as a replacement for the absence of his eyes.

In a metaphorical sense, Gloucester’s loss of sight allows him to finally see what is happening around him. After Cornwall plucks out his eyes, Gloucester’s vision becomes clear for the remaind...

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...play, Gloucester’s poor judgment and false beliefs show that it is evident that we need to look beyond what we see through our eyes and pay more attention to what is really being presented to us. We must avoid the inevitable, that is, seeing what we should not see, and not seeing what we should see. While going through the play before the loss of his vision, Gloucester was heavily blinded by his son Edmund’s lies and failed to see the goodness within his other son, Edgar. It is only until Gloucester loses his eye sight that his insight increased as he began to realize the mistakes he has made and the fact that he took his son, Edgar, for granted. As shown throughout the play and within the two adaptations presented, Gloucester, with the help of Edgar, takes on a new understanding of the world at large by the means of the heart and mind, rather than through the eye.