A Level Literature: (0) King Lear – Introduction to the Text

Shakespeare’s classic tragedy forewarns of vanity and its fleeting values, explores the concept of aging and the decline of control, power and identity. In an age of social media, its vanity and its attached fleeting values, our individual lack of control and our ever-changing identities in the post-modern world, this text remains relevant and essential. I have taught this text many times in the last 20 years and I have used this specific resource (revised in 2020): to lead my teaching in class, as a distance learning material/homework assignment and even as a tool of revision – all have worked well for the students.

This dynamically presented PowerPoint lesson provides a detailed and engaging introduction to the text through a series of structured discussion and writing tasks, looking at the following areas.

The life and work of William Shakespeare.
The leading themes within the text and their baring on the post-modern world.
The characterisation of the leading personalities within the text.

This is a complete resource with no additional work required from the teacher. Enjoy!