In the play King Lear, by Shakespeare, the King's Fool disappears from the play entirely in the play in Act III, scene vi. At this point Lear had just been out in the storm rambling about his suffering and then he took shelter with the Fool, Edgar (disguised), Kent (disguised), and Gloucester. Lear is totally insane by this point in the story, and I believe the Fool gives up trying to help Lear and plays into his craziness (e.g. Lear was putting his daughter on trial and the Fool went along with it).
The Fool's role toward 'King Lear was simply, just to make him laugh. However, the Fool would try to help Lear and bring him back to the wise man he once was through verse. I thought of the Fool as Lear's sanity trying to come back to him. The Fool kept trying to show Lear reason and to see the deception from his daughters Goneril and Regan rather than Cordelia. In Act III, scene vi, someone asks who the King and Fool are. The Fool responds with "A wise man and a fool". This made me question at this point in the book who is really the Fool? Lear or the Fool himself? I say Lear, because he has gone completely mad and has exiled the one daughter who truly loved him.
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