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King Lear ▾
contents
  1. Dramatis Personae
  2. Act I
  3. Act II
  4. Act III
  5. Act IV
  6. Act V
English ▾

King Lear

William Shakespeare

free · 27,929 words · 3 h 23 m audiobook, read by volunteers for LibriVox · first published 1608

text from Standard Ebooks

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Dramatis Personae

  • Lear, king of Britain

  • King of France

  • Duke of Burgundy

  • Duke of Cornwall

  • Duke of Albany

  • Earl of Kent

  • Earl of Gloucester

  • Edgar, son to Gloucester

  • Edmund, bastard son to Gloucester

  • Curan, a courtier

  • Old Man, tenant to Gloucester

  • Doctor

  • Fool

  • Oswald, steward to Goneril

  • A Captain employed by Edmund

  • Gentleman attendant on Cordelia

  • A Herald

  • Servants to Cornwall

  • Goneril, Regan, Cordelia, daughters to Lear

  • Knights of Lear’s train, Captains, Messengers, Soldiers, and Attendants

Scene: Britain

Act I

restoring your place…

fetching the rest…

More by William Shakespeare

  • A Midsummer Night’s Dream
    You get a play that keeps changing its mind about love, from the quarrelling lovers in the forest to Bottom blundering through his amateur performance. The language is playful and slippery, and Puck gives the whole thing a mischievous sense that human beings are never quite in control.
  • All’s Well That Ends Well
    Helena chases a man who plainly doesn't deserve her, and the play knows it, which is what makes it interesting. If you like your comedies uneasy, with a bed trick and an ending that only half convinces, this one will stick with you.
  • Antony and Cleopatra
    These two aren't young lovers, they're middle-aged, vain, magnificent messes who keep wrecking empires over each other, and you half want to shake them. Stay for Enobarbus, the dry-eyed friend whose barge speech about Cleopatra is worth the whole play.

genres

  • Tragedy

appears in

  • Great Books of the Western World
  • Shakespeare: The Tragedies
  • Shakespeare: Where to Start

—

thank you for reading

King Lear by William Shakespeare. The text is in the US public domain, from the Standard Ebooks edition. Served from our own copy; read on their site for the full edition with images and typography.

Narrated by Ezwa, Kristin LeMoine, Andy Minter (1934-2017), Sean McGaughey, John Gonzalez, Denny Sayers (d. 2015), Kristin Hughes (1974-2021), Kirsten Ferreri, Julian Jamison, Andrew Lebrun, JemmaBlythe, Justin S Barrett, Simon Taylor, Rosalind Wills, Cori Samuel, David Barnes, Karen Savage, Kara Shallenberg (1969-2023), Esther, Ophelia Darcy, Carl Manchester, Scott Walter, Gesine, and Henry Frigon for LibriVox, also public domain.

First published in 1608.

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