King Lear, one of Shakespeare's darkest and most savage plays, tells the story of the foolish and purblind Lear, who divides his kingdom, as he does his affections, according to vanity and whim. Lear's failure as a father engulfs himself and his world in turmoil and tragedy.<BR>Eminent linguist and translator Burton Raffel offers generous help with vocabulary, pronunciation, and prosody and provides alternative readings of phrases and lines. His on-page annotations give readers all the tools they need to comprehend the play and begin to explore its many possible interpretations. Raffel provides an introductory essay, and in a concluding essay Harold Bloom examines Lear, who, though possessed of Jobean dignity, is rather unlike Job, since Lear so determinedly brings about his own suffering.