Lear: Right or Wrong?

And so, we reach the end of a tragedy. It seems that end of tragedy would a good thing; the misery is over and we begin to see things rebuild. However in King Lear it appears that everyone just dies; there is one person left to rule the kingdom. I found that it did indeed lack the catharsis of a normal tragedy but I think that is what I liked about it. That’s how it made its point: some things are just too wrong to ever be fixed. Some things such as universal social and family structure are what help establish right and wrong. Parents should be respected. Kings should be respected even more. Obviously Regan and Goneril and Edmund missed this memo. Or they decided that they were above it. No matter who you are, right and wrong exists. However some people are under the impression that these are somehow different for them. Like we talked about in class, some politicians being believing that the normal rules do not apply to them. Sure, they can cheat on their wives. They have power. So in their minds it is not wrong. Regan and Goneril both seem to be having similar thoughts. They think that they can treat their father as they wish because all of the sudden they are in power. They do not need be faithful to their husbands and can instead lust after Edmund. Their worlds are warped. And so, we see that power has the ability to warp right and wrong. Or it has the ability to warp perspective on such matters. Either way, power is one of those funny things that can throw off the balance of society or families. It changes people and it changes what they think about right and wrong. The universal truths of what we believe to be right and wrong are changeable based on perspective.