“Who is it who can tell me who I am?” – Exploring Onomasiology and Source Study

“Who is it who can tell me who I am?” – Exploring Onomasiology and Source Study

Source study is currently undergoing a reimagination and reinvigoration. Many agree with Lori Humphrey Newcomb that earlier source studies “is implicated in a model of cultural history that is teleological, axiological, nationalist, evolutionary, colonial, and exploitative.” Whilst there is agreement that we need to find new ways to address sources of Shakespeare’s work, there is, as yet, no agreed way of doing so. This paper explores one potential approach.

Previously, in order to validate and explore sources, scholars sought consistencies – one-to-one correlations. Hence, Monmouth’s Leirus, Higgins’s Leire, Holinshed’s Leir, Warner’s Leir, Spencer’s Leyr, and the Queen’s Men Leir, teleologically formed the linear evolution of Shakespeare’s Lear. Their strong similarities in character and context justified the works as sources.

This paper suggests an alternative focus for source studies is to seek inconsistencies – to explore changes made with deliberate intent. I suggest we consider sources for Shakespeare’s King Lear as works which collectively drew on a long-established historical legend. I seek to identify how each work altered this legend. Specifically, I ask why the characters in Shakespeare’s King Lear are named as they are, particularly when many of these names differ from key sources, but potentially allude to people of the time.

What do we find when we explore the altering onomastic resonances within King Lear and its sources?

Newcomb, Lori Humphrey. “Towards a Sustainable Source Study.” Rethinking Shakespeare Source Study: Audiences, Authors, and Digital Technologies, edited by Dennis Austin Britton, and Melissa Walter, Routledge, 2018, p. 27.