Lear

de Edward Bond

First produced at the Royal Court Theatre in 1971, 'Lear' is an epic and violent rewrite of Shakespeare's 'King Lear'. In Bond's play, Lear is a paranoid autocrat, building a wall to keep out imagined 'enemies'. His daughters Bodice and Fontanelle rebel against him, causing a bloody war. Lear becomes their prisoner and goes on a journey of self-revelation. He is blinded and haunted by the ghost of a gravedigger's boy, whose kindness towards the old King led to his murder. Eventually Lear makes a gesture toward dismantling the wall he began. This gesture leads to his death, which offers hope as an example of practical activism.