How does act 3, scene 2 of The Tempest explore the theme of power?
In this scene, Caliban offers Stephano and Trinculo earthly, carnal power in return for exacting revenge on Prospero. Caliban tells Stephano that he can become ruler of the island and have the beautiful Miranda for his wife if he will only kill Prospero. Stephano responds by saying:
Monster, I will kill this man. His daughter and I will be king and queen—save our graces!—and Trinculo and thyself shall be viceroys
Caliban presents violence as the sure route to power. He states that all Stephano has to do is drive a nail into Prospero's head or bash in his head in some other way and burn his magic books, and the island will be his.
What is notable is that power, as understood by Caliban and the other men, is completely carnal: it is obtained through violence, and it brings purely worldly rewards, namely, a kingdom and a woman. It is not surprising that this viewpoint comes from Caliban, a "monster," or that the drunken Stephano and Trinculo fall for it. These three characters are tied too strongly to earthly pleasures. In the next scene, Ariel will present a version of power that is much different: one based on sincere repentance for one's misdeeds. This form of power, Ariel will demonstrate, is more potent than violence. The kind of violence Caliban and the others contemplate leads, Ariel notes, to divine punishment, which may be delayed but will doubtless come.
How does act 3, scene 2 of The Tempest explore the theme of power?
Stephano's absurd exploitation of Caliban is a parody of the relationship between ruler and subject. At the same time, Caliban, who is willing to fulfill the role of servant to Stephano, tells of his tyrant master, Prospero. If Stephano agrees to murder Prospero, Caliban will serve Stephano, or so he says. Stephano relishes the idea of ruling a kingdom with Caliban and Trinculo as "viceroys." All the while, the three malefactors are under the control of Ariel, who knows their every move and ultimately foils their plot.
How does act 3, scene 2 of The Tempest explore the theme of power?
This scene explores the theme of power in many ways. First, it shows a portrait of scheming to get power. Second, their drunkenness is a metaphor for the intoxication a desire for power carries. Third, the interactions of Caliban, Stephano, and Trinculo show us a society in microcosm: how different individuals claim power and authority, and how they threaten violence almost casually. Fourth, the inability to see Ariel demonstrates the blindness of many who plot for power.
Who seeks power in The Tempest?
More than anyone else in The Tempest, it's Prospero who strives for power of one sort or another. It was a loss of power that led to Prospero being banished to a remote island. Back home, he was the Duke of Milan. But because he neglected his duties to spend time with his books and his magic, he was usurped by his brother Antonio and cast adrift at sea.
Once established on the island, Prospero tries to reclaim some of his old power by controlling Ariel and Caliban. Having been deprived of earthly power, he resorts to the power of magic to exert authority over his new subjects. Although he treats Ariel somewhat better than Caliban, Prospero never hesitates to make it clear to the tricksy spirit just who is in charge.
So long as Prospero is deprived of what he believes is rightfully his—the duchy of Milan—he will continue to exercise power in his own way, combining the authority of a nobleman with the magical powers of a skilled sorcerer. It is only when he is eventually restored to his throne that he finally renounces his magic and consigns his books to the sea.
How does "The Tempest" reflect power and control in Elizabethan society?
By most estimates Shakespeare wrote The Tempest in 1610 or 1611, during the reign of King James. At this time Britain was endeavouring to establish overseas colonies, beginning unsuccessfully, in 1585, while Queen Elizabeth was on the throne, with Roanoke Island in North Carolina, and including, in 1607, and more successfully, Jamestown, in Virginia.This mission to establish overseas colonies provided the British with access to needed raw materials, but was also justified as what Rudyard Kipling later, in 1899, called "The White Man's Burden." In other words, the British, as well as other European countries, most notably Spain, felt justified in claiming foreign land from indigenous natives because they were supposedly civilizing these primitive, uncivilized natives. Stories circulated in Britain that many of these colonized natives practised cannibalism.
Also during the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, during the Elizabethan period, the British engaged in slave-trading voyages to Africa and the Caribbean. In 1562, James Hawkins was the first Englishman to travel to Sierra Leone on such a voyage. He burned the villages he found there and then captured and brought back to England Africans who would become slaves, interpreters or exotic exhibits to be publicly displayed.
With this in mind, one possible reading of The Tempest is that it is a reflection of Britain's efforts, during and after the Elizabethan period, to expand its power by establishing overseas colonies, and also of Britain's involvement in the slave trade. Prospero, according to this interpretation, represents the colonizer, and Caliban (whose name is almost an anagram of cannibal) and his mother, Sycorax, represent the indigenous, colonized natives. Prospero takes the island from Sycorax and Caliban, and enslaves and dehumanizes the latter, just as the English and European colonizers took land from, dehumanized and enslaved the indigenous natives of Africa, the Caribbean, and America.
Throughout the play Caliban insists, quite rightly, that, "This land is mine, by Sycorax, my mother," but he is powerless to take it back. Prospero, using his magic, exercises complete control over the island, reflecting how the colonizers exercised complete control over the indigenous peoples and territories that they colonized. Another interesting parallel between the relationship of Propero and Caliban on the one hand, and the colonizer and the colonized on the other, is that Prospero, like the European colonizer, justifies his actions in part by claiming that it is his burden and obligation to civilize the savage native. In this way, Prospero means not only to exercise a physical control over Caliban, but also an intellectual control. He, like the colonizer, attempts to educate the native and bring him around to his way of thinking, and that way of thinking dictates, of course, that the indigenous savage is beneath, and should, therefore, naturally be subservient to the white, supposedly civilized colonizer.
How does "The Tempest" reflect power and control in Elizabethan society?
One of the striking aspects of this brilliant play is the way that, on the island, Prospero is shown to have absolute control over everything that goes on through his magic. Many critics have likened him to a stage manager, or to the figure of Shakespeare himself, as he effectively uses his powers to separate the other characters and isolate them, and then trick and manipulate them. Prospero is presented as having control over his subjects, namely Ariel and Caliban, and he uses Ariel to carry out his plans and devices. Note how Ariel presents himself to Prospero in Act I scene 2:
All hail, great master! Grave sir, hail! I come
To answer thy best pleasure; be't to fly,
To swim, to dive into the fire, to ride
On the curled clouds. To thy strong bidding task
Ariel and all his quality.
We could relate the absolute rule that Prospero has and the way that he uses his minions to carry out his wishes to the way in which Elizabeth I was believed to be God's appointed ruler and therefore had the same kind of power in Elizabethan society. Whilst clearly she did not use magic to maintain this power and to control others, the belief of divine rule gave her the absolute authority that we see in Prospero.
Aside from Prospero, who seeks power in The Tempest?
This particular question refers to a theme embedded and recurring throughout The Tempest, which is manifested in several different contexts (which vary in presentation from the sinister to the ridiculous).
As one example, there is Antonio himself, who the play's backstory has established as a usurper, one who had stolen the dukedom of Milan from his brother, Prospero. As the play unfolds, history seems set to repeat itself as Antonio and Sebastian plot to murder Alonso, the present King of Naples, so that Sebastian himself might take the throne.
Meanwhile, a more ridiculous example of this theme can be found in the subplot involving Trinculo and Stephano, who run into Caliban (and who Caliban enlists to overthrow Prospero). Stephano is a drunkard who often makes for a ludicrous character within the play. Caliban prostrates himself before him, intending to make him the master of the island, although their efforts are undermined by their own dysfunction.
I would say these are the examples that most come to mind (alongside that of Prospero himself). However, if you were to widen your definition, then perhaps you can argue that Ariel might be counted as well (and as a positive example at that). The key here is that Ariel is interested more in agency than anything else. Rather than desiring to wield power and authority over others, what he wants is to hold power and authority over his own self. He wants freedom. Like Caliban, Ariel is under Prospero's power (although he is not maliciously inclined towards Prospero as Caliban is). He continues to loyally serve Prospero while awaiting the freedom Prospero has promised in return.
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