ENG 445: Shakespeare
The Tempest

Course Information

• When are we reading this play?
• What are the assignments with this play?

Background

Dating and Texts of the Play

The Tempest was first performed at court on November 1, 1611 (Wright and LaMar viii) and was Shakespeare's last complete play (he collaborated with Thomas Fletcher on Two Noble Kinsmen in 1613-14). It appeared in print for the first time in the First Folio in 1623. The First Folio edition was "given the place of honor at the beginning of the volume" and was very carefully edited, so virtually all modern editions reflect this text with very few changes (Bevington 1528).

Shakespeare's Sources

Scholars have been unable to identify any single main source for this play. It is possible that it was largely invented by Shakespeare. However, a few possible sources for limited themes have been suggested. For example, there was a German play, Die Schöne Sidea by Jakob Ayrer, that features "a magician whose daughter falls in love with his enemy's son" that appeared before 1605 (Wright and LaMar ix). Scholars believe that Shakespeare may have drawn on a number of travel accounts of the new world for some of the fantastic elements of the text: Richard Eden's History of Travel (1577; the story of Magellan's circumnavigation of the globe); accounts of a 1609 shipwreck in Bermuda (for which "no direct literary source is known"); Florio's translation of Montaigne's essay "Of the Caniballes;" Sylvester Jourdain's A Discovery of the Bermudas, Otherwise Called the Isle of Devils (1610); Richard Rich's News from Virginia (1610) (Bevington 1526; Wright and LaMar xi). Some scholars have even speculated that Shakespeare used William Strachey's A True Reportory of the Wreck and Redemption . . . from the Islands of the Bermudas (1625) -- "which Shakespeare must have seen in manuscript since it was not published until after his death" (1526). Though some scholars prefer to have a clear source for each play, The Tempest is a remarkable work of imagination and certainly more than the sum of its source material.

Important Themes

The Tempest raises issues about authority. A number of rulers are shown in the play: Prospero as ruler of the island, the King of Naples, Antonio, the ruling Duke of Milan. Think about what each of these men is like as a ruler. When considering Prospero, think too of his various subjects, from his daughter Miranda to his very different (and differently treated) servants Ariel and Caliban.

The characters of Miranda and Caliban address issues--quite current in the day--about the role of nature and nurture in the development of a person's character. To this day, it is unclear which human characteristics are owed to genetic inheritance or to social surrounding; look for statements in this play that address this issue.

There is also a great deal of doubling in The Tempest: Caliban and Ariel are certainly meant as parallel characters to be contrasted with one another; the two brothers, Antonio and Prospero, are another pair, along with two more brothers, Sebastian and Alonso; and there are thematic pairs, the most important of which, perhaps, is dream and waking contrasted with reality and fantasy.

In addition to these concerns, think also about the relation of the parent to the child: it could be argued that Prospero acts in a parent role for Miranda, Ariel, and Caliban; the King and his son are also featured in this sort of relation.

Recently, scholars have been looking at this play through a post-colonial lens--that is, considering the influence of imperialist doctrine (what countries in the 1500s to--arguably--the present consider as a right: the "discovery," colonization, conversion, and otherwise "civilizing" of other countries) in this play. Caliban can be seen as a new world native, and Prospero as the colonizer. Bedford/St. Martin's has published the Tempest as part of their "Case Study in Critical Controversy" series looking in detail at this post-colonial viewpoint (ed. Graff and Phelan; 2000; ISBN: 0-312-19766-7 (paper)). This edition also reprints excerpts from a number of the probable sources listed above.

Works Consulted