The Tempest

General
- Published in 1610
- Concerned with the human experience
- People being able to transform their human mechanisms
- Interest in new worlds and incorporates ways of thinking
o Trying to infiltrate their way of thinking into the new
worlds
- Renaissance as the idea of rebirth and human potential being
explored
- Tragic comedy
- Based on the idea of a magical island
o Island as a microcosm; allowing for concentration (of
tension) of transformation through introspection
o Crystallises all of the main issues and values within that
world
o Island allows a crystallised perspective of Prosperos
past
o A place of transformation, challenges and a place of
magic
o Individuals can be transformed if they wish
- Masque costumes, clever staging, discovery of the eternal
laws of the universe beyond the physical
- Commedia dellarte
- Displacement
o Characters become exiled and displaced
o Removal from the ordinary world
- Illumination
o The idea of renewed vision into the future
o Through dreaming, Prospero is able to reignite a sense
of illumination for most characters
o Enemies in a state of dreaming that come to a sense of
illumination in their ways
- Play starts with a confession from Prospero
- Storm is a dramatic device used to show an unsettled state
within Prospero
- Discoveries of new worlds can lead to a sense of power
structures being confirmed
Prospero
- The tutor
- Ignite memories in Miranda through questioning
- Clarifies his own memories
- Starts to recognise his own weaknesses
- Comes to a sense of illumination
- Realises that virtue and reconciliation make take place
- Goes through transformation
- Appropriate and exploit Calibans resources

Affirm a power structure

Offers Miranda as a gift to Ferdinand
o Willing to sacrifice his only child for the future good of
his country
Becomes the main focus of the end of the play
Discovers through his own journey the value of humanity and
leadership
Prospero discovers humility and the idea of responsibility,
discovery of something that is more than the physical
Uses the language of a magician, continuing the idea of magic
o My charms crack not, my spirits obey
Moves from the ethereal to the human, the idea of magic to
the idea of being a humanist
o Your affections would become tender
Discovered forgiveness and the importance of progressing
forward
Renounces his magic
o Ill break my staff Ill drown my book
He is burying his past and rediscovering the idea
of human emotion and compassion
Rediscovers leadership

Caliban
- Discovery by Prospero leads to his exploitation
- Caliban lists the qualities of the island and shows regret due to
this
o Shows a sense of intimacy
- Uses the word cursed which shows his discovery by Prospero
lead to him being entrapped
- A thing most brutish animalist image
- The idea of him being the other
o Being the animal sometimes like apes, that mow and
chatter at me
- Discovery of alcohol leads to his disempowerment
- Hands over the island to a new master
Ferdinand
- Comes to a discovery of love
- Miranda refers to Ferdinand as being a magical and divine
creature
- At first sight they have changed eyes
o Seeing things with new sight and vision, they are
transformed
o Sharing qualities
- Metaphor of a temple
o A place of worship, a deity
o Classical allusion
- Ferdinand is being revitalised by the relationship

Gonzalo
- Idea of perception
- The idea of optimism and Christian values
- Shows the idea of hope
- Interested in the idea of utopia
- His word is more than the miraculous harp
o He is an optimist
- Our garments that were drenched in the sea hold
notwithstanding their freshness and glosses, being rather
new-dyed
o A sense of optimism and hope
- Describes the golden age, the island as a new type of society
o Harmonious, peaceful and equal, virtuous
o No overwork or exploitation of resources
- Discoveries can be based on values that show a sense of
communal worth
- Image of compassion that provokes Prosperos change
- Acknowledges Caliban as being his responsibility
Antonio
- Contrast to Gonzalo
- Always interested in opportunities to do with power
- Tries to make Sebastian take over as leader
- Sees discovery of opportunity as a chance to reinforce power
structures
- Take a chance to enforce your own power
Audience Discovery
- Caliban has been a despised character yet is poetic and
inspirational in his language
- Tempest and colonialism
o Status and power
o Based on colonial elements people having freedom
taken away from them
Act 1
Scene 1
- Unrest and turmoil
- Created as a result of revenge from Prospero (On Alonso and
Antonio)
o Example of his inner turmoil
- Exclamatory language, short utterances
o Cathartic experience
Scene 2
- Example of a deliberate and carefully planned discovery
o The impact it has on perceptions
- Prospero leading Miranda through memory

The
ear
o
o
o
o

hours now come, the very minute bids thee ope thine

A time where she needs to be receptive

Temporal imagery
Didactic tone
Metaphor of open open her senses and be ready to
receive the news
o Repeats the idea of time
Gives her questions that are prompting
Repetition of question and answer
Discovery of emotions, memory and a relationship between
the two
Prospero retrieving something from the darkness of her past
o Pulling something out and making it come to the surface
o Rediscovering shown through provocative questions
and the juxtaposition between dark and light
Alas. Poor Milan to most ignoble stooping
o Despairs of what he did to his own country
Volumes that I prize above my dukedom
Miranda feels a sense of sadness
o That strangeness of your story put heaviness in me
Memories being rediscovered have become a
burden for her
Entrenched power structures and disempowerment through
language

Act 3
Scene 3
- Another storm created by Ariel
o Accuses the men of guilt and corruption
o Uses the power of speech to confront them with their
sins