King Lear Famous Quotes

Nothing will come of nothing: speak again.

Lear pressing Cordelia in Act 1, Scene 1 after she refuses to match her sisters' flattery. She says she loves him as a daughter should — no more. His response sets everything in motion.

How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is To have a thankless child!

Lear cursing Goneril in Act 1, Scene 4, after she begins stripping away his knights — the first time he registers that dividing his kingdom may have been a mistake.

I am a man More sinn'd against than sinning.

Lear on the storm-battered heath in Act 3, Scene 2, half-mad and completely exposed — the line is his first honest self-assessment, though still not a full admission of his own failures.

As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods. They kill us for their sport.

Gloucester speaking in Act 4, Scene 1 after being blinded, led by an old man he cannot see. He has given up on divine justice — the universe he describes here is indifferent rather than cruel.

Who is it that can tell me who I am?

Lear's question in Act 1, Scene 4 as Goneril's household begins refusing to obey him — he gave away his crown and his identity turned out to be the same thing.

O, reason not the need: our basest beggars Are in the poorest thing superfluous.

Lear arguing in Act 2, Scene 4 that his daughters should not count his knights — his point is that human dignity depends on having more than the bare minimum, and the argument is one he is about to lose.

Poor naked wretches, whereso'er you are, That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm.

Lear on the heath in Act 3, Scene 4, suddenly aware of the homeless poor he ignored during his reign — his own exposure to cold and wind has produced something that looks like empathy.

We two alone will sing like birds i' the cage.

Lear to Cordelia in Act 5, Scene 3, just before they are taken prisoner — he imagines their imprisonment as a kind of retirement from politics, content to be with her. It is one of the play's most piercing moments.

Ripeness is all.

Edgar to his blind father Gloucester in Act 5, Scene 2, talking him out of despair after a battle lost — three words that compress the play's lesson about endurance into the smallest possible space.

The wheel is come full circle: I am here.

Edmund dying in Act 5, Scene 3, acknowledging that Edgar has beaten him — even Shakespeare's most calculating villain can see the shape of what happened to him.

I am bound Upon a wheel of fire, that mine own tears Do scald like moulten lead.

Lear waking in Act 4, Scene 7 and not yet understanding where he is or that Cordelia is with him — the wheel of fire is a medieval image of hell, and he believes he is still in it.

When we are born, we cry that we are come To this great stage of fools.

Lear to Gloucester in Act 4, Scene 6, in one of his moments of clarity — a ruined king and a blinded man meeting on a clifftop, sharing a view of human life as absurd rather than tragic.

Men must endure Their going hence, even as their coming hither.

Edgar to Gloucester in Act 5, Scene 2 — the line that precedes 'Ripeness is all', offering stoic acceptance of death as the partner of birth. Edgar has learned this the hard way.

Thou shouldst not have been old till thou hadst been wise.

The Fool to Lear in Act 1, Scene 5, after Lear has already divided his kingdom, exiled Cordelia, and insulted his host. The jester is the only one permitted to say plainly that Lear got things in the wrong order.

Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel.

Lear urging himself in Act 3, Scene 4 to experience poverty directly — a king who never left his palace now standing in a storm, suddenly understanding that wealth had kept him from knowing his own people.