King Lear: Act 4, Scene 4 Translation

A side-by-side translation of Act 4, Scene 4 of King Lear from the original Shakespeare into modern English.

Original Text	Translated Text
Source: Folger Shakespeare Library
Enter with Drum and Colors, Cordelia, Doctor, Gentlemen, and Soldiers. CORDELIA Alack, ’tis he! Why, he was met even now As mad as the vexed sea, singing aloud, Crowned with rank fumiter and furrow-weeds, With hardocks, hemlock, nettles, cuckooflowers, Darnel, and all the idle weeds that grow 5 In our sustaining corn. A century send forth. Search every acre in the high-grown field And bring him to our eye. Soldiers exit. What can man’s wisdom In the restoring his bereavèd sense? 10 He that helps him take all my outward worth.	We learn from Cordelia that Lear has run off from his caretakers and was last spotted in a wheat field, covered over with all sorts of plants. Cordelia sends a century (literally, a hundred soldiers) to find him, and confers with a doctor to figure out if there's any way to cure Lear's madness.
DOCTOR There is means, madam. Our foster nurse of nature is repose, The which he lacks. That to provoke in him Are many simples operative, whose power 15 Will close the eye of anguish.	The doctor promises a long sleep will do the trick (but as we know in Shakespeare, sleep is a hair's breadth from death, so this doesn't bode too well).
CORDELIA All blest secrets, All you unpublished virtues of the earth, Spring with my tears. Be aidant and remediate In the good man’s distress. Seek, seek for him, 20 Lest his ungoverned rage dissolve the life That wants the means to lead it.	Cordelia prays for her father's recovery.
Enter Messenger. MESSENGER News, madam. The British powers are marching hitherward. CORDELIA ’Tis known before. Our preparation stands 25 In expectation of them.—O dear father, It is thy business that I go about. Therefore great France My mourning and importuned tears hath pitied. No blown ambition doth our arms incite, 30 But love, dear love, and our aged father’s right. Soon may I hear and see him. They exit.	A messenger enters to inform Cordelia that her sisters' British troops are marching towards the French army. Sibling rivalry is about to be played out through full scale civil war. Cordelia explains that she has brought an army from France on behalf of her father, and not because she wants power for herself.