‘Cordelia is admirable, but not entirely.’ Discuss.

To be entirely admirable in a whole sense is to be flawless in all motivations and to a lesser extent actions, this essay will contend that Cordelia in Shakespeare’s ‘King Lear’, despite popular criticism suggesting so, is not perfectly admirable. Critics such as Jameson suggest that Cordelia can be ‘pronounced altogether perfect’, and Mack suggests that Cordelia is not only a symbol of perfection in terms of herself, but that she is also shown to be praiseworthy as Lear’s abandonment of her ‘true love’, is what commits himself to tragedy through a pursuit of ‘false love in a variety of forms’. However, Greenfield suggests that there is a ‘paradox’ that occurs by pursuing such an idealistic view of Cordelia by attempting to ‘establish a simple allegorical relationship between Cordelia’s character and a conceptualized virtue’. This is because it suffocates the possibility of Cordelia being a character ‘extraordinarily subtle and infinitely complex’ (Greenfield), as the character can not be both ‘infinitely complex’ and constrained to a single ‘conceptualised virtue, as suggested by Mack (true love), Jameson (human perfection), and Danby (nature).
Cordelia can be seen as admirable throughout her apparent rebellion against the Love Test set up by King Lear, and therefore seems to have an admirable understanding of her familial bond, and has an admirable understanding of love. Jameson suggests that Cordelia presents herself as ‘consistent and natural’ in the first scene of ‘King Lear’, which seems to stem from Cordelia’s ‘sense of duty’. This is suggested as Cordelia acknowledges how Lear has ‘begot me, bred me, loved me’, and intends to ‘return those duties back as are right fit’. The tripartite list of ‘begot’, ‘bred’ and ‘loved’ shows that Cordelia recognises qualities that are praiseworthy, and Cordelia herself can be admired for this. Furthermore, it can be interpreted that Cordelia’s desire to fulfill her ‘duty’ to Lear is admirable, as it can be read in contrast to the dishonest speeches given by Gonerill and Regan. Gonerill claims to love Lear ‘more than words can wield the matter’, and then instantly undermines this statement by launching into an aggrandised speech, revealing Gonerill as having prepared a cold and dishonest speech. However, Cordelia’s honesty can be admired, as she seeks to express what Mack suggests is ‘true love’, by refusing to participate in Lear’s game, and reveals that she is able to say ‘Nothing’ that as Lear suggests her to say that is ‘more opulent’ than what Gonerill and Regan have already expressed. This response of ‘Nothing, my lord’ must be admired in some respects, as Danby suggests that this response encapsulates Cordelia’s demonstration of a ‘virtue that Lear wants’, an ability to act to ‘reconcile opposites; passion and order, … defenselessness and strength’. Danby is therefore suggesting that Cordelia is able to act with insight and awareness, which is shown by Cordelia’s perception of how love should be demonstrated, as she states that her ‘love’s/ more ponderous than my tongue’. This explicit reference to the public nature of the love test reveals an admirable quality of Cordelia. The line break separates the nouns ‘love’ and ‘tongue’, suggesting that these there is a predicated contradiction within a public display of love. Cordelia’s admirable insight is accentuated through her interaction with her suitors, as with seemingly bleak prospects, Cordelia’s insight into what love is remains, as she reacts to Burgundy’s insistence on a dowry by revealing his ‘respects of fortunes are his love’, and concludes that she will ‘not be his wife’. Therefore, it seems that Cordelia must be admired for not only her perceptiveness but also her conviction to her beliefs, as Greenfield concedes that if we were only to consider Cordelia’s ‘allegiance to duty’ then she would have to be considered as ‘wholly admirable’.
However, Cordelia’s actions in Scene One of ‘King Lear’ cannot be seen as wholly admirable. This is because, Cordelia’s allegiance to duty seems callous compared to what love perhaps should be, and she is similarly flawed as Lear by considering a quantifiable characteristic of love. Furthermore, her actions cannot be said to be measured or considerate, as what is considered by Greenfield as a ‘deceptively simple fact’, is that Cordelia’s actions instigate a major crises in ‘King Lear’, namely the immense suffering of Lear himself. As Cordelia as an entirely admirable character would perhaps act as salvation to Lear, but instead, her actions of weakness which are mistaken by Lear as treachery, forces Lear to chose the treachery of Gonerill and Regan in his efforts to reject treachery. Critics have suggested a stark opposition to Jameson’s and Mack’s interpretations of Cordelia’s actions in response to Lear’s love test, with some suggesting that Cordelia is ‘immensely flawed’ in her ‘artificial’ response. Greenfield acknowledges how Lear’s request of trading loving comments for sovereignty of land as ‘appalling’, but suggests that Cordelia’s response is ‘equally appalling’. Cordelia suggests that her loving duties towards Lear are constricted to her ‘bond; no more no less’. This double negative seems to place an unnecessary emphasis on how Cordelia views her love for Lear as merely functional. Furthermore, the image of a ‘bond’ allows Greenfield to suggest that Cordelia is committed to an ‘ultraorthodox nature of her affections’, which allows that audience to find a deplorable quality to Cordelia’s character. This is because, unlike Jameson and Danby, Greenfield uses the term ‘ultraorthadox’, not realise an admirable source of fortitude and insight about Cordelia’s beliefs and motivations, but instead hyperbolises this resilience, and by utilising the term ‘ultraorthadox’, suggests that Cordelia is as ‘thoroughly immersed in her own misconception of love as Lear is in his’ (Greenfield). Perhaps, Shakespeare uses the superficiality of Lear’s and Cordelia’s conception of love as a satirical mirror to the trappings of the court of James I, suggesting that Cordelia cannot be seen as admirable considering that her reaction to the love test acts as a mouthpiece for the perfunctoriness and public nature of the court, in a similar way to the love test itself. This resemblance of stubbornness and rationality between Lear and Cordelia is shown by Cordelia’s mathematical apportionment of love between husband and father and its similarity to Lear’s measuring love in terms of allocating land between his daughters. Cordelia claims that when she marries, her husband will have ‘half my care, half my duty’. Whereas, Jameson utilises this speech to ‘establish her [Cordelia] as wholly blameless’, it could also be argued that this stubbornness, which is reflected in the perfectly balanced line showing a literal halving of love, showing how Cordelia is unwilling to yield on her view of love, represents how Cordelia is actually revealing an inability to rise to the needs of a crisis. Greenfield suggests that Lear requires the ‘compassion, sympathy, and strength’ he receives from her only in Act 4, suggesting that Cordelia cannot be seen as entirely admirable, as her own growth and change in character reveals her previous flaws.
The suffering and growth of King Lear is mirrored by Cordelia offstage, and results in a return of Cordelia as a more admirable character than when she was banished by Lear. This ‘new’ Cordelia is arguably a completely admirable character, but the process of growth in the character of Cordelia, reveals as a certainty that the motivations and actions of Cordelia in Act One are deplorable, and therefore it can not be said that Cordelia is completely admirable. Greenfield suggests that Cordelia is undergoing a ‘tremendous personal crisis’, which is reflected in a Gentleman’s recount of Cordelia, stating that ‘she started/ to deal with grief alone’. The adjective ‘alone’ suggests that Cordelia is undergoing a personal growth, and it can be suggested that Cordelia’s return in Act Four marks a distinct change in Cordelia’s character. Cordelia immediately expresses her compassion for Lear, and rises to the political crisis occurring, by commanding her forces to ‘seek, seek for him [Lear]’. The repetition of the verb ‘seek’ shows how Cordelia is expressing her concern for Lear directly and openly, as the repetition suggests an urgency, which was comparatively lacking in Cordelia’s stubborn actions in Act One. The contrast between Cordelia’s speech between Act One and her return is distinct, as she claims her not other motivation for ‘our arms incite’ other than ‘dear love, and our aged father’s right’. This clear and specific purpose shows how Cordelia has grown into an admirable self-chosen role of ‘protector, defender, and loving daughter of Lear’ (Greenfield), as by contrast, in Act One, Cordelia asked herself ‘What shall Cordelia speak?’, showing a weakness in conviction, which she has now replaced with an admirable purposefulness. Heilman suggests that Cordelia’s growth shows how she has become ‘part of the tragic substance’. This reveals how Cordelia cannot be seen as entirely admirable, as she undergoes a ‘shared growth’ with Lear, revealing how despite Cordelia laudable actions after her return, her own deplorable actions and motivations are what in part caused this crisis.
In conclusion, Cordelia is certainly admirable as she can be seen as directly opposing the unnatural intentions of Gonerill and Regan by assisting Lear even after her banishment. However, her similarities with Lear, in that she seems to stubbornly lack insight in a similar fashion, reveal how Cordelia cannot be seen as entirely admirable, and her offstage growth serves to emphasise how Cordelia is rash in her actions in Act One.