Fool for Lear

Of all of Shakespeare’s plays, King Lear has a special attraction for me. Besides the fact that it is one of the greatest of Shakespeare’s plays, it is the only Shakespeare play that I have actually been in. I was an attendant to the king of France in a college production my freshman year. It’s also one of the greatest live performances that I have seen--Kenneth Branagh’s 1990 production. I have also enjoyed multiple variations of the same story, from Kurisawa’s Ran to Jane Smiley’s A Thousand Acres, not to mention a couple film versions and four or five other stage productions. So when I saw that Christopher Moore had written the book Fool, I had to admit that I was a fool for Lear and read it.

I don’t know who was the first to come up with this idea of what I call derivative fiction, where an author retells a story from a different character’s viewpoint. Perhaps it was Mark Twain’s “Extracts from Adam's Diary” or “Eve's Diary.” Sixty years later Tom Stoppard retold Shakespeare's Hamlet from the point of view of two minor characters in his play Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead. Although I am sure there are several other examples, the most recent (and quite successful) one is Gregory Maguire, he of Wicked fame (and fortune). So now Christopher Moore seeks to retell the story of King Lear from the perspective of his fool.

Most commentators on Shakespeare’s play give the fool a lot of credit for being quite clever. Moore goes well beyond that by making the fool, who is given the name Pocket, the instigator behind much of what is going on in the story. Or at least he thinks he is behind everything. What is certain is that Moore’s fool is an extremely clever and bawdy fool. This is not a story for Victorians; it’s a story for Elizabethans. If you don’t like to hear about bonking, bollocks and shagging, then this is not the book for you. Die-hard Shakespeare fans will be quick to point out that old Will was rather bawdy in his own way as well, which I certainly don’t deny. Perhaps we are so used to it in the plays that we simply don’t notice it any more.

Regardless, the author seems to believe with Emerson that a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, and he does not let such things as the original plot stand in the way of a fun story. Again, the die-hards will point out that this is not the first time that King Lear has been rewritten. For example, a key element in this story, the three witches in Birnam Woods, is extracted from the Scottish play, not King Lear. There are also many bawdy elements which are not from the original play.

Moore’s Lear story is much more manic, and at times more desperate, than the Bard’s. A lot of the original dialogue is there as well, which just sort of adds to the fun of the whole story. And a lot of bawdiness is added, too.

Shakespeare lovers should love this story. And while you don’t have to be a Shakespeare fan to enjoy the story, I don’t think you would find it quite as funny if you don’t have a basic understanding of the story. So my recommendation is to go see the play or get a film version of the play and watch it first to understand the story. Then read the book. Did I mention that it was bawdy?