Sam Heilshorn

Lear's Fool

In all honesty I do not understand the role of the "fool" in this play.  I tried very hard to figure out why he was in the play at all.  Now I know that I should have done more research to figure out why he was included in this play, but then thought to myself that he was such a minor character that I was not going to bother with the research.  He was such a minor character that when he was written off towards the end of the third act that I did not even notice.  In my opinion the role of the fool in this play was to add comic relief.  Also, I have no idea to why he disappeared when he did or why he would disappear at all.