The Tempest: Overview
Genre
- The Tempest is listed in the 1623 First Folio as a ‘comedy’, and it conforms to the
comedy template in many ways
- However, since the end of the 19th century it has been classified as a romance,
and sometimes even a ‘tragicomedy’
Theoretical approaches
- Marxist reading
• Concerned with the relationship between the lower working class (proletariat)
and upper class (bourgeoisie) and how this is represented in the text
• Examines the ways in which ruling influencers of society oppress the lower
class, for instance exploitation of labour
• The oppression of the proletariat is shown in Prospero’s exploitation of the
native inhabitants of the island, Ariel and Caliban, they are forced to submit to
his power and serve him
• Characters such as Antonio and Sebastian, or Stephano and Trinculo, attempt
to uproot the class system and gain more power for themselves through attack
of the bourgeoisie (Antonio and Sebastian plot to kill King Alonso, Stephano
and Trinculo assert themselves over Caliban and plot to kill Prospero)
- Postcolonial reading
• Investigates the relationship between the colonisers and the colonised subjects
• Caliban and Ariel can be read as indigenous people who are colonised by
Prospero (symbolic of the West)
• This reading imagines the island as a concrete place (as opposed to a symbolic
space) which Prospero can overpower and enforce the values of patriarchal
Jacobean England
• Caliban’s physical presentation does not conform Western standards of beauty,
creating a sense of alienation and ‘otherness’
• The colonised subjects are forced to take on the language of their oppressors,
Caliban resents Prospero for this, “You taught me language, and my profit on ’t
is I know how to curse. The red plague rid you for learning me your language.”
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, • Prospero often uses possessive language indicating an ownership of Ariel “my
Ariel”, “my brave spirit”, however this could also be indicative of a fatherly
affection on Prospero’s part, a fond familial relationship between them (this can
be used as a counter-interpretation to a post-colonial reading of their
characters)
- Feminist reading
• Lisa Tuttle has defined feminist theory as “asking new questions of old texts”
• A feminist reading is interested in how women are portrayed in the text and
how the text displays power relations between the sexes, exploring patriarchal
oppression, the mechanisms of male control and women as commodities
• Miranda is a complex character to analyse from a feminist perspective, she
displays traits which both challenge and conform to the patriarchal Jacobean
standard of femininity
- She is often commanding and critical towards her father “You have put the
wild waters in this roar, allay them.”
- However Prospero generally maintains authority over her, orchestrating her
romance with Ferdinand throughout the play and even using magic to put her
to sleep in Act 1, scene 2 “Thou art inclined to sleep” (reinforcing the
stereotype of woman as hysterical, his male power is required to calm her
down)
- Psychoanalytic reading
• Interprets texts as allegorical, with the different characters representing
symbolic parts of the protagonist’s consciousness
• A Freudian interpretation reads different characters as parts of Freud’s model of
the mind, the id, the ego and the super-ego (Caliban embodies the instinctive
and primal urges of the id, Ariel acts as Prospero’s moral conscience or the
super-ego)
• A Jungian interpretation reads Caliban as the “shadow” or “animus” part of
Prospero’s mind which he must learn to accept and integrate in order to
experience psychological transformation and access his truest self “this thing
of darkness I acknowledge mine”
- Christian reading
• Shows how the text follows, or deviates from, the Christian moral framework of
sin, repentance, and forgiveness/redemption/salvation
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