SHAKESPEARE is my Homeboy

King Lear criticism.

Grady, Hugh. "What Comes of Nothing: Reification and the Plebeian in King Lear" from Shakespeare's Universal Wolf

Grady's essay addresses the theme of reification, specifically the concept and treatment of legitimation, throughout King Lear. Grady frames his argument within the context of Foucault's theories of power, and the work of Jurgen Habermas. Grady begins his essay by defining a framework though which we can understand the theme of legitimation in Lear within the context of Foucault and Habermas. Specifically, Grady argues, "In King Lear sex and power are linked through the depiction of sadism and sexual domination at work in the otherwise impersonal subjectivities of the three principled rulers" (Grady 142).

Grady begins his discussion of Lear at the same place that Kastan does, by analyzing the significance of the power dynamic which is represented in scene 1, at which time Lear divides his kingdom, while maintaining "the name" of the king. analyzes the significance of this moment within the context of a Foucaultian-Machiavellian theory in which "power without a name is the reified logic of domination" (Grady 143). Grady thus defines the thematic work of Lear "to give, if not a name, then a face, or set of faces) to reified power, to explore its logic, and its concequences, and coolly depict its destruction of a world" (Grady 143).

Grady then goes on to explain the significance of the repetition and meaning of "nothing" within the context of this theme of reification. For example, the Fool serves to remind Lear that the name of the King, without the concomitant power, is a shadow." Likewise, the argument over the 100 knights serves to establish "a new order" in which the empty symbolism of the old order is unmasked, and a "new order" is defined.

Grady next explores the significance of the reification/sexuality link. He explores the link between the king in name "Here, reified power, severed from its symbolic signifiers, quickly goes to work in that paradoxical non-subjective intentionality defined so memorably by Foucault" (Grady 148). Grady frames his discussion of this theme within the context of the Renaissance meaning of "nothing" as a woman's sexual genetelia. First, Grady discusses the daughters motivations in which there is a link between sexual lust and a lust for power. ("a sexual will-to-power" in which sex and power are not compared; they are causally linked" (Grady 150-151).

Grady then explores the theme of reification as it is represented in the characters of Edmund and Edgar. The character of Edmund, (as a bastard), challenges the notion of the "symbolic"natural order. "Edmund understands….the Symbolic order is not 'natural,' but a human creation open to human modification" (Grady 157). In terms of Edgar, Grady defines one of the critical questions of the play as follows:: "whether there are indeed alternatives to instrumental power in the new situation of 'nothing.'"(Grady 160). In response to this question, Grady cites Greenblatt's essay "Shakespeare and the Exorcists" in which Greenblatt argues that theatricality doesn't reify or affirm anything but its own performance. Grady seeks to reexamine this theory of theatricality in relation to Edgar and his scene with Lear on the heath.

The main question which Grady seems to raise is this: what happens to power after the breakdown and disintegration of traditional power systems? In response, Grady argues that "the play poses the reality of the suffering of the context of a breakdown of ideologies or cultural forms which at one time legitimated or contained such suffering; and it identifies the communal response to suffering as among the most important sources for a regeneration and redemption of humanity" (Grady 167). Grady argues that there is a political power which works its will regardless of "constraints of the human cultural signifying systems" (Grady 169).

In conclusion, Grady discusses the ways in which Habermas's work seems to reflect the resistance to power that we see in Lear, and the political implication of the play in terms of the reification of power. First, Grady argues that Lear's plan of succession "strips away the aura of symbolic meaning" and secondly, "the workings of reification reveal that raw power alone cannot command allegiance" (Grady 172).