King Lear

(Words and Music Con O'Drisceoil)

Some of Shakespeare's plays have been condensed into song-form in recent years, notably the "Four-minute Hamlet." Con O'Drisceoil from County Cork continues this trend with some wry comments throughout the play "King Lear." Think of it as the play plus Coles Notes, those invaluable pages we used to cram before exams.

You scholars of English one question I'll ask
To answer you won't find a difficult task
Of Shakespeare's great heroes, which one would you pick
To award him first prize for being totally thick
Othello you know was a gullible dupe
And Hamlet's delaying landed him in the soup
But the stupidest moron in all of Shakespeare
Was that old King of England, the man they call Lear

Three daughters he had in the course of his life
Although we're not told what befell his poor wife
I'll bet she ran off to avoid going insane
After years of enduring that pompous oul pain
At the Donkey and Crown where he drank every night
The locals all knew poor old Lear wasn't bright
When they said your "Royal Highness we love and revere"
The oul fool lapped it up and bought everyone beer

At the age of four-score and in fear of expiring
King Lear told his girls he intended retiring
Of loss of his faculties sadly he moaned
As if he could forfeit what he'd never owned
He said that his kingdom he planned to partition
Provided his daughters fulfilled one condition
"Before I hand over this rich legacy
You must tell me how much you admire me," said he

Now the two eldest daughters named Goneril and Regan
Knew well what he wanted, so promptly they began
To swear how they always did love and respect him
They thought that the sun rose each day from his rectum
Says Cordelia the youngest, being honest and true
"Can't you see Da they're taking the piss out of you"
King Lear lost the head and began to scream at her
But still she refused her oul father to flatter

Then says the bould Lear, "I swear on my honor
I'll split my estate between Regan and Goneril
I've nothing for Delia, not land nor finance
She can pack her belongings and shag off to France"
If that wasn't enough that pathetic oul jerk
Left himself without home, without income or perk
The two vixens took all and their Da the oul dunce
Was to lodge in their houses in alternate months

These daughters of course were both nasty oul shrews
But in fairness King Lear gave them every excuse
His boiled eggs were too hard or his gravy too thin
Or he got too much tonic and not enough gin
So they both found their Dad an unbearable bore
Ere the first month was over they showed him the door
In those far-off days there was no county home
So ould Lear like a tramp 'round the country did roam

Up to this he was lacking in guile and in craft
But now the old geezer went totally daft
He ran through the fields and he crawled through the bogs
He was screaming and howling and barking at dogs
But in spite of his faults and ridiculous foibles
He still had a band of devoted disciples
Young Edgar was there and the loyal Duke of Kent
And a man called 'the fool', quite a sensible gent

One other wayfarer I'll add to this roster
Twas Edgar's blind father, the old Duke of Gloucester
He disowned his son who he thought was untrue
In fact Lear and himself were of equal IQ
Then they heard the news as they wandered all over
Cordelia arrived off the ferry in Dover
Being now Queen of France she assembled an army
Avenging her Da though she heard he was barmy

So thousands of men in the battle were slaughtered
And victory it went to the two vicious daughters
But they never got to be powerful and rich
Overcome as they were by a lecherous itch
For Edgar's half-brother they both wished to own
The same man for the power of his pelvis was known
So one of them poisoned the other one's lager
Then did herself in with a seven-inch dagger

Since tragedies must have their audiences crying
There followed a terrible outbreak of dying
Edgar stabbed his half-brother, that devious oul crook
And the shock killed his Daddy, that's Gloucester's oul Duke
Cordelia was hanged by a treacherous jailer
Lear died when it struck him that he was a failure
If he only had snuffed it a few years before
He'd have saved everybody all this suffering and gore