The Tempest (play)

The Tempest is one of William Shakespeare's last plays. Its first known performance was on November 1, 1611 at Whitehall Palace in London. It would also have been performed at the Globe Theatre and the Blackfriars Theatre.

Themes / Tropes

Tempe-

The play repeatedly extols the virtues of temperance. Prospero repeatedly urges Ferdinand and Miranda to not indulge in lust but be temperate in their love, warning Ferdinand that "If thou dost break her virgin knot before / All sanctimonious ceremonies may / With full and holy rite be minister'd.../ Sour-ey'd disdain, and discord, shall bestrew / The union of your bed". Similarly, the masque with which Prospero entertains the couple centres around Juno, goddess of chaste marriage, and explicitly excludes Venus and Cupid, deities of lust. The masque concludes with "watery naiads" joining with "sunburned sicklemen", in an allegorisation of the idea that humors - associated with the elements - need to be balanced in order to create a virtuous temperament, in the individual or in a union: water and fire balance each other out.

Related Topics:
Masque - Juno - Venus - Cupid - Naiad - Humors - Elements

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The play likewise warns against intemperance; most noticeably with the drunkards Stephano and Trinculo being brought to justice, but also through Prospero's punishment of Caliban when the latter attempted to rape Miranda. Prospero himself - whose magic is repeatedly linked with alcohol - is said to be "with anger so distemper'd", and learns through the play the need to control his violent temper, ultimately clearing the sky of the tempest, which had been its principal manifestation.

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The Theatre

The Tempest is overtly concerned with its own nature as a play, frequently drawing links between Prospero's Art and theatrical illusion. The shipwreck was a "spectacle" "performed" by Ariel; Antonio and Sebastian are "cast" in a "troop" to "act"; Miranda's eyelids are "fringed curtains". Prospero is even made to refer to the Globe Theatre when claiming the whole world is an illusion: "the great globe... shall dissolve... like this insubstantial pageant". Ariel frequently disguises himself as figures from Classical mythology, for example a nymph, a harpy and Ceres, and acts as these in a masque and anti-masque that Prospero creates.

Related Topics:
Play - Globe Theatre - Classical mythology - Nymph - Harpy - Ceres - Masque - Anti-masque

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Early critics saw this constant allusion to the theatre as an indication that Prospero was meant to represent Shakespeare; the character's renunciation of magic thus signalling Shakespeare's farewell to the stage. This theory has fallen into disfavour; but certainly The Tempest is interested in the way that, like Prospero's "Art", the theatre can be both an immoral occupation and yet morally transformative for its audience.

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Kingship

The concept of usurping a monarch occurs frequently throughout the play: Antonio usurped Prospero; Caliban accuses Prospero of having usurped him upon the latter's arrival on the island; Sebastian plots to kill and overthrow his brother the King of Naples; Stephano has designs to depose Prospero and set himself up as "king o'the isle". As such, the play is simultaneously concerned with what constitutes virtuous kingship, presenting the audience with various possibilities. in the twentieth century, post-colonialist literary critics were extremely interested in this aspect of the play, seeing Caliban as representative of the natives invaded and oppressed by Imperialism.

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