After reading Jenna's and Derick's comments on his blog, I feel like I understand the deaths that occur in the end of King Lear. Jenna explained the death toll as "a cleansing that leaves the best characters left" While some characters who are mostly "good" do indeed die--such as Cordelia--they do not die as pure innocents. By creating such a large death toll, Shakespeare effectively communicates the disastrous outcome of a society that accepts evil and shuns goodness.