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King Lear

Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage...

Overview

Character
Gender
Male
Playing Age
Mature Adult, Elderly
Style
Dramatic
Act/Scene
Act 3, Scene 2
Time & Place
A desolate, stormy heath in ancient Britain during a torrential downpour and thunderstorm.
Length
Medium
Time Period
Classical
Show Type
Play
Age Guidance
Thirteen Plus (PG-13)

Context

Text

Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow!

You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout

Till you have drench'd our steeples, drown'd the cocks!

You sulphurous and thought-executing fires,

Vaunt-couriers to oak-cleaving thunderbolts,

Singe my white head! And thou, all-shaking thunder,

Smite flat the thick rotundity o' the world!

Crack nature's moulds, an germens spill at once,

That make ingrateful man!

[...]

Rumble thy bellyful! Spit, fire! spout, rain!

Nor rain, wind, thunder, fire, are my daughters:

I tax not you, you elements, with unkindness;

I never gave you kingdom, call'd you children,

You owe me no subscription: then let fall

Your horrible pleasure: here I stand, your slave,

A poor, infirm, weak, and despised old man:

But yet I call you servile ministers,

That have with two pernicious daughters join'd

Your high engender'd battles 'gainst a head

So old and white as this. O! O! 'tis foul!

Performance Tips

Emotional Beat Breakdown

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