What about the Queens?

When I say the Queens, I mean Regan and Goneril, of course. Lear has no queen--he doesn't even make reference to one--and although neither daughter ever formally receives the title of queen, they certainly act like they run the show. Interestingly, Cordelia, who goes on to become the actual Queen of France, does not behave in ways which demand respect. In other plays, Shakespeare faults royalty for failing to live up to the authority invested in them; but in this play, acting with authority seems to be a bad thing.

I always used to get Goneril and Regan mixed up, and I had to adopt silly mnemonics to remember who was married to which duke (for example, to remember R+C, I'd think of RC Cola). Now that I've been through the play in detail, I find it easier to separate them in my mind. Goneril is the eldest, and the one who grows most quickly and naturally to command. At the end of Act 1, Scene 1, she corners Regan and starts dictating terms to her ("We must do something, and i'th'heat."). We see her issuing orders to her servants onstage (mostly Oswald), whereas Regan usually lets her husband Cornwall do the orders. And, of course, Goneril walks all over her husband, Albany--at least until Albany hears about the terrible things that have been done to Lear and Gloster, at which point he finally grows a spine (too little, too late). So, as the eldest, Goneril is clearly well suited to monarchy. She knows, I suspect, that if she had been born a male, there would be no division of the kingdoms and no pithy love-test; she'd be King, and that would be that.

Regan, by contrast, is a more subtle character. When Lear leaves Goneril's castle in Act 2, hoping to take refuge with his other daughter, Regan greets him warmly at first ("I am glad to see your highness," to which he replies, "Regan, I think you are."), and it's only gradually that she reveals her true colours (which happen to be the same as Goneril's colours, or at least a matching shade). From that exchange, I get the sense that, whereas Goneril was a demanding and bossy child (Veruca Salt from "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" springs to mind), Regan got what she wanted from Daddy by coddling and acting cute.

Regan is also the more sexual, and the more violent, of the two. Although it is Goneril who first suggests that Gloster's eyes be put out, she doesn't stick around to do the deed (more delegating; what a great CEO she would make). But Regan is in the room, and I think she really gets off on the sadistic acts. "One side will mock another--th'other too" she urges to her husband, after the first eye has been plucked. And when the First Servant intervenes, Regan doesn't hesitate: she grabs a sword and runs the poor schmuck through.

After Cornwall dies (from the First Servant's act of resistance), Regan seems to lose her way, and she becomes obsessed with marrying Edmund. She needs a partner in crime. Goneril, however, is a solo flier; she only seems interested in Edmund because Regan is; or perhaps because she thinks she can control him more effectively than Albany? (If that's the case, she's wrong--dead wrong, as things turn out)

In Act 5, Goneril poisons Regan, which is a very royal method of dispatching one's enemies. I suspect that, if Regan had beat her sister to the punch, she would have chosen a more visceral means of murder. And in a way, she gets to do exactly that, because Goneril's guilt (or possibly her grief at Edmund's fatal wounding?) drives her to suicide, and she chooses to use a knife for that.

She must have used every last drop of the poison on Regan, or else she would have had a friendly drop to use upon herself. Thorough to the last, she was.