Lear’s Feminine Side

Lear is a man who struggles with emotion. From the beginning of the play he seems to not understand how to handle emotion. First of all, he tries to compare the love of his daughters and reward them accordingly. When his favorite daughter does not suck up to him like he expected her to, he lashes out in anger and banishes her. Then, on a roll, he banishes Kent, his confidant, and clings to his "evil" daughters for comfort. Why does he seem to be so immature and naïve? According to Kahn, Lear's inability to embrace femininity is the problem.

It is apparent that there seems to be no mother figure in Lear's family. He no longer has a wife and his daughters no longer have a mother. We, as the readers, know nothing about the mother or how family life was like with her. She may well have been a tyrant or in some way the cause of the present family contention. We can assume though, that because of her no longer being around we have a dysfunctional family in the Lear household. Goneril and Regan seem to be altogether heartless. Goneril herself not only plotted against her father, but against her husband and her doting sister. Lear prefers to ignore womanly feelings and instead chooses to be manly or angry. Then there is Cordelia.

Cordelia seems to be the only one that is feminine or motherly. Is this why she was Lear's favorite daughter? Because she complemented his masculinity and offered him a sense of security? And is this also another reason why he banished her? Maybe he felt that the only way to not be hurt by her supposed betrayal was to repress all chances for feminine feelings, like Kahn said, by banishing her, thus symbolically banishing the female influence.

All that we readers can really do is make guesses and form our own opinions about the impact the wife and the loss of the wife made on Lear's family. However, this is not the only reason Lear may seem to deny the woman side of himself. He is a king and a leader. This role requires him to be manly and powerful. It also requires him to be rational, though we know he is not. Lear knows his duty as King and, as a prideful man, he does not want to look weak or unable to properly fulfill his role.

After he learns of the betrayal of Goneril and Regan, he yells and curses them and then vows that they will not see him cry. However, as he is continually placed in humbling situations, and with the help of his Fool, he sees that it is he who is the fool. His pride and blind masculinity led to his humiliation and wrong decisions. He wronged Cordelia, the only true woman in his life. He accepts this fact and in turn begins to accept his feminine side. He even runs around at one point dressed up in nothing but nature, embracing femininity.

When Lear is reunited with Cordelia he begs her to forgive him and admits that he has been foolish. Then when Cordelia dies, his true colors come forth. He is a more balanced person. He is still a man and still acts like the king he is, but at the same time he is not afraid to show his sorrow and vulnerability. He learned that feminine qualities are okay. They are what make his beloved Cordelia so admirable and lovely and they are what help him to grow and make him more happy in the end. Kahn is right that Lear's problem was his suppression of female qualities and that his solution was learning to embrace said qualities. We can come up with no sure reasons as to why he was the way he was in the beginning, but does it matter?

Political Sentiments

When I hear the quote "Politics and sentiment don't mix," I immediately think of Marxism. Satrapi and her family were self-proclaimed Marxists and so I would understand why Marji's father would make this statement. One of the main ideals of Marxism, besides that of the necessary revolting, is that the needs of the people are taken care of, rather than the wants. Heeding the wants of the people can not be afforded. Individualism must be sacrificed for the greater good of the whole. Without greed being an issue, the society is one unit. Great things can be accomplished and everyone is taken care of. Sentiments can not come into play here because the issue is about what is necessary, not what is wanted.

When politics becomes personal, leaders may think irrationally. They think of what it is that is personal to them and not about what might be good for their country. Rash decisions are made and the whole country may suffer as a result. I believe Marji's father saw the truth in this. He means to say that politics and sentiment should not mix because it makes for ill leadership and is jeopardizing for the whole country.

I think Marji's father's statement was meant to have another meaning as well. Satrapi's family, while interested in Marxism, does not practice it, and neither does the country in which they live. Their country is run by a dictator and they are in the midst of revolutions and wars. In situations like these, emotions are fragile and also frequent. However, in cases of dictatorship, the sentiments of the people are trivial and only power seems to matter. Many lives are lost and wasted because of war and the greed of leaders. From looking at the past political history of Iran and of many other countries, it is obvious to Marjane's father that the leaders do not have time or interest in caring for their people.

The ethics of politics aside, sentiments, especially in the case of the people of Iran, will be a prime issue. In Persepolis, Satrapi's family could not put their emotions aside, nor should they have. Their lives were in danger and they had to be ever careful of everything they did so as to not get in trouble with the "law." They tried to live as best they could in the given circumstances. It is obvious that Marji, her mother, and her grandmother were more sensitive when it came to politics and that they believed that if they felt strongly enough about the issues, it might do some good. They went to demonstrations for a time but I think they stopped because they knew this was a battle they could not win. Although they hated that they were even in a position that would cause them to worry for their lives and freedom, they knew the cold truth of what Marji's father had said. Politics and sentiment do not and should not mix. However, it is also a truth that politicians are not dealing with a country full of robots; they are dealing with humans. Sentiments will be present no matter what. While leading a country should never be personal, in the case of the people of Iran, politics seem to be the cause of sentiment.