TEMPEST Essay -- essays research papers

The Other in the violent storm In order to understand the characters in a play, we have to be able to distinguish what exactly makes them different. In the case of The Tempest, Caliban, the sub-human striver is governed largely by his senses, making him the animal that he is portrayed to be and Prospero is governed by sound mind, making him human. Caliban responds to nature as his instinct is to follow it. Prospero, on the other hand, follows the art of justifiable rule. Even though it is easy to vex assessing The Tempest in view of a colonialist gaze, I have elect instead to concentrate on viewing Caliban as the monster he is portrayed to be, due to other characters that are not human, but are treated in a more humane fashion than Caliban. in the first place we meet Caliban, we meet Ariel, Prosperos trusting spirit. Even though Ariel is not human either, he is treated kindly and lovingly by his operate who calls him my quaint Ariel. Caliban, on the other hand, is called a to rtoise and a poisonous slave by Prospero. As Caliban enters in Act 1 Scene 2, we infer his fury at both Prospero and Miranda. He is rude and insulting and Prospero replies with threats of torture. Prospero justifies his punishment of Caliban by his ira at the attempted rape of his daughter, something Caliban shows no self-reproof for. Miranda distinguishes herself from Caliban by calling him a thing most brutish and inadvertently, a thing that has only bad natures. She calls his speech gabble, but doesnt impede to wonder whether it was she that didnt understand him because she didnt know how to speak his language. sure Caliban communicated verbally with his mother for the twelve years before Prospero killed her? It seems that Prospero and Miranda expect Caliban to be grateful for the companionship of their language, but Caliban has just learned how to curse and justifies his anger by claiming rights to the island. Even though they obviously detest each other, Prospero inevitabl y him, as he tells Miranda We cannot miss him he does make our fire/ buzz off in our wood, and serves in offices/That profit us, Caliban stays on because he is afraid of Prosperos artof such power, making Prospero the feared conqueror ad dictator. Prospero is the right duke of Milan and Caliban is the savage and deformed slave. They represent two different extremes on the social spectrum that of the natural linguistic rule,... ...e will let Stephano rule- showing himself to be of course ruled, not ruler. At the end of the play, when he recognises that his choice of Stephano as ruler was foolish, it is not mental reasoning that has led him to this conclusion, but the evidence of his senses and experience. Caliban had mid(prenominal) enough to function as part of society, but training him to drive part of that society cannot be abstract, like Prosperos failed attempt at educating him with Miranda Calibans education must be practical and hammered station with his own senses. If t he senses represent something natural and the mind represents an art like knowledge or in Prosperos case, magic, then we can say that Caliban represents temper and Prospero Art. While the need for control over nature is asserted continually, the ending suggests that art must ultimately come to terms with nature (hence Prosperos this thing of darkness I/Acknowledge mine) for while Calibans limitations are apparent, his wish to improve himself is promising, and his new relationship with Prospero seems to be more stable and more reassuring than the resentment-filled and extremely uneasy jailer-prisoner/master-slave relationship shown prior