Fathers and Children in King Lear

William Shakespeare handles the historical story of Lear, one of the British kings of pre-Christian era, with his own interpretation in King Lear (1605). King Lear unfairly divides his country among his three daughters, and this tragic mistake initiates the process of him settling a score both with his daughters and the nature, which eventually leads him to madness and death. In addition to this narrative, Shakespeare embeds the stories of Gloucester and his two sons into the text as a sub-plot in parallel with Lear and his daughters. Furthermore, the notion of nature which is located at the center of the narrative and which has a direct impact on all of the characters points out another father figure that has been almost characterized, and gives birth to a superstratum of the story. This reading discusses Lear and Gloucester characters in King Lear in their relations with both their children and nature (gods) which we can consider as their fathers. Multi-layered and concurrent narrative structure is reviewed within this theme, and the grotesque and absurd elements in the play are tried to be analyzed in terms of such relation