William Shakespeare (1564-1616) was about 41 years old when he wrote King Lear, the tragedy that many deem his greatest. He created the play to be performed for King James, who had assumed the English throne shortly before, in 1603. Featured in the tragedy is a ruler who in some ways diverged sharply from James. James showed a commitment to peace and to preserving the integrity of and even unifying Britain, in contrast to Lear’s fatal division of his kingdom, which prompted bloodshed and war. Shakespeare wrote this tragedy well after the halfway point of his twodecade career, at a time when his acting company, the King’s Men, was cementing its position as London’s preeminent theatrical troupe. Shortly thereafter, he would stop writing tragedies altogether. King Lear is therefore one of Shakespeare’s last great statements on the tragic potential in human life. Set in a kingdom of ancient Britain, the play is also one of his wildest, darkest, and most anarchic.
Layers of time. The exact time period in which King Lear takes place remains imprecise. One of Shakespeare’s sources, Raphael Holinshed’s Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland (1587), places the story of King Lear at around 800 B.C.E., but the play shows few traces of early times.
