Monday, January 17, 2011

tragic characters: lear and willy

I do believe that Willy and Lear are tragic characters.
 Willy put his whole life into his sons, Biff and Happy, and they turned their backs on him. Willy always believed that biff would be this great, successful businessman and it turned out that Biff is still searching to find himself, which disappoints Willy. He feels he is responsible for Biff's failure and that his favorite son hates him. This guilt eventually leads Willy to commit suicide believing that this was the only way to restore Biff's respect for him. This is tragic because Willy truly hopes this is the answer but in reality he does nothing but hurt his son and family further.
Lear does not learn his mistake until it is too late. He has given his kingdom to his two greedy daughters and banished the one who truly loves him. This causes him to suffer from regret; it is so intense that Lear eventually goes mad. Lear thinks he has lost Cordellia's love, just as Willy thinks he has lost Biff's. He then tries to rectify this but in the end, all his daughters die and he dies from grief. 

1 comment:

  1. I do agree with the argument you have brought up, where you stated that Willi centered his life on his sons but in the end had the wrong mindset of life. Also, you stated that Lear made mistakes that could not have been change din the end but turned into misery. However, I thought you could have elaborated on your points more, so that a clearer meaning could have been depicted.

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