Women Are Cunning And Beast Like From The Waist They Are...

With a riotous appetite. Down from the waist they are centaurs, Though woman all above. But to the girdle do the gods inherit; Beneath is all the fiend’s. There’s hell, there’s darkness [4.6.121-125] Why call women centaurs? Aren’t Centaurs male? This use of the word makes the passage lose all of its intended meaning. To justify the use of this word, readers jump to the easy conclusion that Lear is trying to say that women are cunning and beast-like or that analyzing this may be going a little too deep. But, if King Lear chooses to overlook the entire picture that surrounds centaurs, there will be those who choose to question his choice of words and his credibility; which weakens his plea for pity and tarnishes his image as the wronged father. By referring to his daughters as centaurs, he fails to take the history and the entire construct of centaurs and creates a very distorted image, unintentionally proving to himself and the audience that he is weakened, scared and undeserving of sympathy. With the use of one word, he has tarnished his image as a king and a wronged protagonist on many levels. To start, the history and etymology of the word needs to be taken into consideration. According to the OED, a centaur referred to â€Å"A member of a people of ancient Thessaly renowned for their skill with horses†. The OED also mentions that that the Greeks coined this term to refer to a partnership that was not familiar to them; a partnership between man and horse that would become