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RHETORICAL AND POETICAL CONVENTIONS
shed teares, will turne away their face as a countenance vndecent for a man to
shew, and so will the standers by till they haue supprest such passion, thinking
it nothing decent to behold such an vncomely countenance.”*!®
The Characters’ Diction
From a dramaturgical point of view, the mock trial scene is supposed to
illustrate that King Lear is mad or, in Kent’s words, “his wits are gone,” but, in
contrast with the storm scene, here his madness is manifest not in the form
of passion, but through his behavior in a situation which mimics the utmost
public event, during which he completely violates courtly etiquette. Therefore,
this scene becomes the climax of the play, as it provides the parody of public
speech and behavior and is in sharp contrast with the ceremonial public
discourses at the beginning and the end of King Lear. The comic elements are
also strengthened by the indecent features I mentioned earlier and, last but
not least, by the non-referential utterances of Lear’s companions.
What we can see after the comparison of the Quarto and Folio versions
of the text is that the omitted passages include some sort of direct contact
with the courtly audience in the form of entertainment such as the Fool’s
joint-stool joke or Edgar’s songs and vision of the foul fiend that is the devil,
which, according to twentieth-century scholar Roger Warren, all lead to “a
generalized sense of chaos.”*” Nevertheless, Puttenham reminds us that for
the Early Modern audience, indecency was the main source of laughter:
But most certainly all things that moue a man to laughter, as doe these scurrilities
& other ridiculous behauiours, it is for some vndecencie that is found in them;
which maketh it decent for euery man to laugh at them. And therefore when we
see or heare a natural foole and idiot doe or say any thing foolishly, we laugh not at
him: but when he doeth or speaketh wisely, because that is vnlike him selfe: and a
buffonne or counterfeit foole, to heare him speake wisely which is like himself, it is
no sport at all, but for such a counterfeit to talke and looke foolishly it maketh vs
laugh, because it is no part of his naturall, for in euery vncomlinesse there must be
a certain absurditie and disproportion to nature, and the opinion of the hearer or
beholder to make the thing ridiculous.*"8
Consequently, when the buffoon (Shakespeare’s Fool) and the counterfeit fool
(Edgar) talk and look foolish, the audience of the 1606 performance most
certainly found it entertaining. Obviously, this was a rather indecent sort of
316 Puttenham: The Arte, 243.
317 Warren: The Folio, 46.
318 Puttenham: The Arte, 243-244.
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