The Tempest Group

Question:

corapunkygirl
corapunkygirl
Student
College - Senior

Is it appropriate to describe "The Tempest" as a romantic play?

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Posted by corapunkygirl on Sunday July 5, 2009 at 4:39 AM and tagged with characters, genre, romantic, the tempest, themes.

Answers:


  1. kc4u Teacher
    College - Senior

    Best answer as selected by question asker.

    Yes, indeed. 'The Tempest' is labelled as one of Shakespeare's 'late romances'. You may draft your answer on the basis of the following points:

    a) Location/Setting: The action of the play takes place in some far-off, unknown island which is exotic and magical.

    b) Shipwreck: The motif of ship-wreck that brought Prospero, the banished Duke of Milan, and his little daughter, Miranda, to the forlorn island has been a typical motif of romance or fairy-tale.

    c) Magic: Prospero's white magic, casting a spell on the spirit, Ariel, and the sub-human, Caliban, as well as on all the happenings on the strange island, leading to the final tempest resolving the plot, greatly contribute to the essential romantic nature of the play.

    d) Love: The Miranda-Ferdinand love enhanced by the Prospero magic is another romantic component in the play.

    e) Chracters: The spirits like Ariel and others, the witch Sycorax, Sycorax's son, Caliban, belong to the domain of the remote and the mysterious.

    f) Culture/Civilisation Discourse: Prospero's magical control of the sub-human Caliban, his occupation of the island, his manipulation of the primitive and the uncivilised bring into the play the discourse of Nature vs. Culture, Primitive vs. Civilised. Romanticism has always prioritised the Natural & the Primitive over the Cultured & the Civilised. The discourse of Romanticism vis a vis the discourse of Post-Colonialism may also be an interesting comment.

    Sources:
    http://www.enotes.com/tempest

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    Posted by kc4u on Sunday July 5, 2009 at 6:06 AM