The Tempest

I came to The Tempest after two heavy months with Hamlet and Macbeth. One would not stop talking. The other would not stop killing. A friend said to try the late island play because it reads fast and ends almost kindly. I wanted short scenes, music, and a father and daughter to carry the plot. What I found was stranger than I expected. The play is short but the middle wanders. The ending forgives men who hardly say sorry. I kept thinking about who owns the island after the ship sails.

For this reread I used the Folger edition text as printed in the Simon and Schuster paperback, the one listed at 272 pages with ISBN 9780743482837. The Tempest was first recorded at court on 1 November 1611 before King James, and it was first printed in the 1623 First Folio published by Edward Blount and Isaac Jaggard. Like Macbeth, it had no earlier quarto, so the Folio is our only early source. The Folger text follows that Folio printing with modern spelling and clear notes on the ship, the magic, and the Milan and Naples names.

Prospero was Duke of Milan. He loved his books and left rule to his brother Antonio. Antonio learned the office, then joined with Alonso, King of Naples, to seize the dukedom for tribute. They put Prospero and his small daughter Miranda out to sea in a rotten boat. Miranda was then about three. Gonzalo, an old councillor, stocked the boat with food, water, clothes, and books from Prospero's library that Prospero says he prizes above his dukedom. They reached an island and have lived there twelve years. Miranda is now about fifteen and has seen almost no other people.

The island had a past. Sycorax, a witch from Algiers, died there. Her son Caliban remained and claims the ground through her. Sycorax had pinned Ariel, an airy spirit, in a split pine for refusing her. Ariel stayed there twelve years. Prospero freed him soon after landing, and Ariel has served him since for promised freedom. Caliban first showed Prospero springs and berries. After Caliban tried to force himself on Miranda, Prospero set him to hard wood service under threat of cramps by night. Caliban says Prospero taught him language and his gain is skill in cursing. That bargain hangs over the whole play.

The storm and the split court

The play opens at sea. Alonso sails home from Tunis, where his daughter Claribel has married the King of Tunis. With him are his son Ferdinand, his brother Sebastian, Antonio, Gonzalo, Adrian and Francisco, the sailors, plus butler Stephano and jester Trinculo. Prospero learns they pass near and raises a tempest with Ariel to drive them ashore with no loss of life. The Boatswain shouts at the nobles to work or keep below, since rank means nothing to wind. Ariel boards as flame, runs along the rigging, and the crew leap into foam. All reach shore alive but split into groups.

Miranda pleads for the sufferers from the beach. Prospero says no harm is done, puts her to sleep with art, and tells the Milan tale in full. He says Antonio came to believe he was duke indeed, that Alonso helped for payment and homage, that Gonzalo saved them. Miranda asks why he raised the sea now. He answers that fortune has brought his foes near and this day will not come again. He lays his cloak aside and calls Ariel.

Ariel reports with joy. Ferdinand sits alone on one stretch. The king's party sits wet on another, clothes fresh as at Tunis. The rest of the fleet rides safe and has turned for Naples thinking the king lost. Prospero sends Ariel to keep the groups apart and lead Ferdinand to the cell. When Ariel presses for liberty, Prospero turns sharp. He names the pine and the twelve years of torment and asks if Sycorax is forgotten. Ariel yields and goes off invisible, ready to sing men where Prospero wants them.

Then Caliban enters cursing. He claims the island from Sycorax and says Prospero first stroked him, taught him to name sun and moon, then penned him in rock. Prospero answers that he housed Caliban in his own cell until the attack on Miranda. Miranda adds that she taught him speech and he turned it to foul ends. Caliban says he wishes the act had succeeded and peopled the isle with Calibans. Prospero sends him for wood with threats of night pains if slow. Caliban obeys, muttering that art binds him and he must wait.

Ferdinand, Miranda, and the trial of logs

Ferdinand follows Ariel's song across the sand. The song tells of a father full fathom deep, with pearls for eyes and coral for bones. It means Alonso drowned, which is false, but it draws him to the cell. There he sees Miranda. She has seen no young man but Caliban. She tells her father this is the third man she ever saw and the first she could love. Ferdinand takes her for a goddess and says he will make her Queen of Naples if unwed. Prospero plays harsh master. He calls Ferdinand a spy, charms his arm so he cannot lift his sword, and sets him to carry logs.

The harshness is a test. Prospero says aside that the trial will fix their bond. Ferdinand bears the piling because Miranda's sight eases it. She comes while Prospero is supposedly at study and offers to carry wood for him. He refuses her help. They exchange names. He is Ferdinand, son of Alonso. She weeps for his lost father. They pledge love and join hands. Prospero watches unseen and approves.

The pair are simple and I liked them for it. Ferdinand is courtly to stiffness. Miranda is direct. She says she knows no woman but herself and no face but her father's and Caliban's. She gives her heart without play. The limit is clear too. They love at sight, part for logs, meet for vows. Shakespeare gives them no quarrel and little doubt. Their hope matters, but the weight sits with the fathers, one grieving at sea for a live son, one scheming behind a cell wall.

Alonso grieves while Antonio plots again

The king's party wanders in sorrow. Alonso thinks Ferdinand drowned. Gonzalo points to fresh clothes and sweet air to lift him. Adrian praises the grass. Antonio and Sebastian mock each line. Gonzalo spins his fancy of ruling the isle if he were king, with no work, no magistrates, no swords, nature bringing forth of itself. The mockers laugh at its holes. Alonso bids them quiet. With a son thought dead and a daughter wed far in Tunis, he has no taste for sport.

Ariel brings heavy sleep with music. All sink but Antonio and Sebastian. Antonio presses his second grab for a crown. Claribel in Tunis is too far to claim Naples, he says. Ferdinand is gone. Kill Alonso and Gonzalo now and Sebastian rises. Sebastian agrees and they draw. Ariel wakes Gonzalo with warning song. Gonzalo cries out. The sleepers start. The plotters claim they drew against lions heard roaring. Gonzalo seems unsure but lets it pass. They move on, still split.

The banquet seals the charge. Spirits set a table. The hungry men reach to eat. Thunder cracks. Ariel comes as a harpy, claps wings, and makes the food vanish. He names Alonso, Antonio, and Sebastian as three men of sin who drove Prospero and a small child to sea. He says the isle delays them and that Ferdinand was taken as payment. Then he is gone. Gonzalo calls it judgment from above. Alonso feels guilt rise and speaks of drowning himself to find his son. Antonio and Sebastian feel fear but show no remorse. Prospero watches above and tells Ariel their madness works. He will meet them once more when they are weakest.

Stephano, Trinculo, and Caliban's new king

The low plot runs close beside and gets most laughs. Trinculo finds Caliban flat under a gaberdine cloak in a storm. He smells fish, sees manlike legs, and cannot settle if this is man or monster. He crawls under for shelter. Stephano comes in drunk on wine from a cask washed ashore. He sings of Kate, sees four legs under cloth, thinks it a two headed monster with fever, and pours sack into Caliban's mouth as cure. Caliban never tasted wine. He calls it heavenly and begs for more. Trinculo calls out. Stephano takes him for a devil. Then they know each other, laugh, and drink together.

Caliban kneels to Stephano as god. He offers to show springs, crab apples, pignuts, jay nests, filberts, and ways to snare small game. He begs Stephano to be master in place of Prospero the tyrant. He lays the murder plan. Come to the cell in afternoon sleep. Seize the books first, for without them Prospero is powerless. Then knock out his brains, cut his throat, or paunch him with a stake. Burn the books. Stephano shall be lord and Miranda shall be queen. Trinculo laughs at both master and subject. Ariel listens unseen, reports to Prospero, and pipes them through briars and mud with no player in sight.

Drink makes them bold. Stephano calls himself king to be. Trinculo will serve as viceroy if he need not lug bottles. Caliban sings freedom and urges haste. Then bait breaks them. Ariel hangs bright coats and jerkins on a line. Stephano and Trinculo grab finery and quarrel over shares. Caliban begs them to leave trash and mind the killing, since waking Prospero will turn them to barnacles or apes. They stuff coats first. Prospero sets spirits as hounds and dogs on them. They run stung through gorse. I laughed at the cloak, then felt its point. Caliban trades one master for worse the moment wine speaks.

The masque that breaks

Prospero joins the lovers with warning. He tells Ferdinand not to break Miranda's virgin knot before rite. Ferdinand swears patience. Then Prospero calls Iris, Ceres, and Juno. They sing blessing for honor, wealth, lasting love, and issue. Nymphs and reapers dance. Ferdinand asks if these are spirits. Prospero says they are shades of his art. At the height he starts, recalls the plot on his life, and stops the show. The shapes melt.

Then comes the known passage. Prospero calms Ferdinand. The revels are over, he says. The actors were spirits and have melted into air. Towers, palaces, temples, and the great globe itself shall dissolve in turn and leave no trace. Men are made of dream stuff and life is rounded with sleep. I give the sense rather than the verse lines, since small terms slip in memory, but the drift is plain. Show, stone, and person all thin out. Ferdinand and Miranda go out soothed. Prospero stays troubled. He calls for hat and sword, sends Ariel to trap the drunkards, and admits his old brain churns and his anger sickens him.

The break splits readers I know. Some love the poetry over joy. Some feel the goddesses halt the tale for compliment, blessing a match already made. I stand between. Juno and Ceres sound stiff on the page, yet the stop tells truth. Prospero forgets murder while staging blessing, then turns cold in a breath. He can rule rain in show and still fear a butler, a jester, and a wood carrier. Wide power, narrow peace. The scene earns keep not for dance but for the crack it shows in the master.

Pardon, chess, and the ask to the room

All but the drunkards gather charmed before the cell. Prospero in robes tells Ariel the time is come. He vows to break his staff, bury it, and drown his book past sounding. He enters the circle, honors Gonzalo first for past help, then names Alonso and Antonio as faults, and says he forgives the worst. Alonso, worn by guilt and grief for Ferdinand, asks pardon and restores the dukedom freely. Antonio and Sebastian give almost nothing. Sebastian stays mute. Antonio speaks a few cold lines and never clearly repents. Peace still covers him.

Ariel draws the cell curtain. Ferdinand and Miranda sit at chess. She teases him for cheating in play. He laughs that he would stake twenty kingdoms for her. Alonso cries out at his live son. Ferdinand kneels. Alonso blesses the match that joins Milan and Naples. Miranda greets the lords and wonders at the brave new world with such people in it. Prospero says softly it is new to her. Gonzalo weeps blessing. Sailors report the ship tight and trim as at launch. Prospero frees Ariel to fair winds and the elements with thanks.

Caliban, Stephano, and Trinculo are driven in wet, still decked in stolen coats. The lords stare at monster and men. Prospero calls Caliban his thing of darkness. Stephano pleads drink as excuse. Caliban sees his gods plain now. He says he was thrice double ass to love a drunkard and serve a fool. He vows to seek grace and grow wise. Prospero bids him trim the cell for the voyage and leaves his fate open. The text never settles if he stays alone on the isle or sails to scorn. That gap feeds much debate.

Prospero ends alone in epilogue. With art gone he says strength is gone. He must depend on prayer and the room. He begs breath from hands and mouths, meaning applause, to fill his sails for Naples, or his project fails. He asks pardon as they would be pardoned and asks to be loosed by clapping. The binder of winds begs wind from watchers. I found it moving and sly at once. He quits command and takes need. The house must free him or leave him on the isle with staff broke and book drowned.

What holds and what drags

Place holds first. No map is given, yet sand, bogs, drying line, cell with books, remembered pine, and unseen music make a whole. Song does work. It leads Ferdinand, sleeps courtiers, wakes Gonzalo, leads drunkards astray. The feast that vanishes teaches guilt faster than lecture. Hounds never seen chase thieves who chose coats over murder. Magic here is weather, hunger, sleep, and sound put to use.

Ariel and Caliban hold as pair. Ariel serves well, asks plainly for freedom, pities Gonzalo enough to warn him, and tells Prospero his own heart would soften if human, which turns Prospero toward mercy. Caliban knows food and water, curses hard, loves the isle sounds that give delight and hurt not, dreams of clouds opening on riches, yet plots murder and trades his service for wine. The text will not make him mere victim or mere villain. New stagings often center him, and the lines allow it, though rule never comes to him.

Two fair faults stand.

The rule over the isle reads as conquest on a small scale. Prospero takes command by stronger art, names the native devil and slave, binds labor with pain, gives language that comes back as curse, and bars him from his own ground. Gonzalo's kind dream of an idle isle still puts Gonzalo as king. Stephano would be king next with Caliban as foot. Even Miranda repeats her father's lesson on speech. Mercy at the close costs Prospero little. He regains his dukedom, wins a royal son for his daughter, keeps books till he chooses to drown them, and sets Caliban to clean. Antonio never repents aloud. Pardon comes from above, not between equals. It does not wreck the play for me, but it keeps the close from feeling clean.

Pace sags in the middle too. Alonso grieves in circles. Gonzalo talks long. Antonio and Sebastian jeer in one key through two acts. Ferdinand piles logs while high matters wait. The masque halts tale for blessing of a match already fixed. On stage music and dance lift these parts. In a chair I skimmed the commonwealth fancy and the coat fight. Cuts in school shows say the same.

Prospero can repel as well. He threatens Ariel with more years in oak, pains Caliban with stings, deals Miranda like state goods, warns Ferdinand off her knot in terms that shame both, and shames Antonio while pardoning him. I take this as design. A book prince who learned command on bare ground cannot lay it down till the last act. When he says virtue is rarer than vengeance, the claim lands because he has run vengeance through charms for four acts. He can still punish when he stays his hand. That check means more for being hard for him than easy for us.

Try it in two sittings. First through the log vows, with storm, Milan tale, pine, songs, and stopped murder in sleep. Then from harpy feast through masque break, coat theft and hound chase, circle of pardon, chess reveal, and the ask for hands. Keep Folger notes near for Tunis and Milan, harpy and Juno names, staff and book. Speak the dream stuff sense aloud once and Miranda's new world wonder once. Then face the open points. Who holds the isle when sails lift. What freedom means for Ariel who flies and Caliban who stays. Whether pardon frees any but the pardoner. The play leaves them open. That is why talk lasts after applause.