Advice to King Lear Group

Question:

galgenius
galgenius
Student
High School - 12th Grade

In "King Lear," what do the motif of eyes symbolize?

Rate question:

Posted by galgenius on Tuesday March 11, 2008 at 10:20 AM and tagged with advice to king lear, eyes, lear, motif.

Answers:


  1. gbeatty Teacher
    College - Freshman

    eNotes Editor

    Good question. Eyes and all variations on this—physical sight, literal sight, vision, etc.—symbolize clear understanding. In other words, physical vision stands in for spiritual and emotional vision. Lear's great failing early on in the play is that he cannot "see" that Cordelia's love is the truest of all his daughters. The evil characters permanently blind good men, while good characters like Kent briefly take on disguises in order to do good works. But in general, eyes are true vision, and so intensely important and intensely vulnerable.

    Rate answer:

    Posted by gbeatty on Monday March 24, 2008 at 6:32 PM