| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立臺灣師範大學 === 英語研究所 === 87 === This thesis examines how Edward Bond's play, Lear, is influenced by its Shakespearean original, King Lear, but manages to be a brilliant play in itself. Bond firmly believes that the issues Shakespeare proposes in his play are worth contemplating; however, the solutions provided are unsatisfactory to Bond. At best, they are but a myth to modern audiences. Therefore, Bond intends his new play to be a dialogue with its parent work. Aside from presenting the same plot in different ways, Bond adds a new story line to show the way his characters respond to the problems raised in the Shakespearean text. In the thesis, I try to explore the Oedipal relationship between Bond and his predecessor Shakespeare with the use of influence theories, and I will read Lear's and King Lear's learning processes by means of ritual study.
Chapter One introduces Bond's theater and his unique theatrical technique: Rational Theatre and the aggro-effect. The former serves as a criticism of Bond's contemporary theater, while the latter is a typical Bondian theatrical effect. Both find a full expression in Lear. Chapter Two focuses on the parent-son relationship between Shakespeare the precursor and Bond the ephebe by adopting Harold Bloom's influence theory. Bond develops an unavoidable anxiety under the shadow of Shakespeare, but as a belated playwright he endeavors to create his own imaginative space. The third and the fourth chapters interpret the ordeals King Lear and Lear have undergone in their respective plays as processes of initiation. The individual initiation interacts with social transitions. Ritual studies by anthropologists, Victor Turner in particular, are used here to analyze how Lear's ritual initiation completes what King Lear leaves incomplete. By the last chapter, we will have seen how Bond has become a Bloomian "strong playwright."
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