Death by Grief

In looking through some literary criticism about King Lear, I found this interesting article that compares King Lear mourning over Cordelia to the Virgin Mary mourning over Jesus, which was shown very dramatically in a lot of medieval passion plays. We've already talked a little about Cordelia being a Christ figure, but I had a hard time seeing in in Act V. Not only does she not come back to life, but her death causes Lear to die of grief. However, the point that the article made was that Lear's mourning of Cordelia shows the incredible complexity of grief, especially the grief of a parent mourning a child. The comparison was more about the grief of Mary than comparing Cordelia with Christ.
Another thing from the article that I found really interesting was that it talked about how Lear's mourning was based purely on his true feelings rather than being some sort of performance or mourning ritual for those watching. In a way, his redemption has really come full circle, because at the beginning of the play he placed value only on superficial expressions of love. In his mourning for Cordelia he shows the true depth of his love for her. Even though he dies in the process, it seems that from a Christian perspective, he did achieve redemption.

The article I talked about is called "Inverting the Pietà In Shakespeare's King Lear" by Katherine Goodland.