Can we make a list of all the different displays of Prospero’s magical powers?

1) He knows that a ship full of his enemies is approaching the island. How long has he known that? Were they coming near his island originally or did he have something to do with them coming that way?

2) He doesn’t actually cause the tempest, ironically enough — Ariel does.

3) Speaking of which, he’s got whatever powers he needed to not only free Ariel from his imprisonment, but to keep the spirit as his own servant. Consider how powerful Ariel must be – not only causing the Tempest, but keeping all the sailors safe and unharmed – and what sort of power Prospero has over him.  Or is it a power at all?  Is it just repayment for freeing him from the tree? Ariel certainly seems like he’d leave if he could, at some points.

4) He regularly causes Caliban physical pain (“pinches” and “cramps”).

5) He puts Miranda to sleep at will.

6) He “charms” Ferdinand, whatever we choose for that to mean. I like to imagine Prospero actually animating Ferdinand’s frozen limbs like a puppet master, walking him around against his will. He tells Ferdinand “I can disarm you with my stick from here” but that doesn’t necessarily mean that he does.  But how cool would a martial arts sword-versus-staff battle have been?

7) When he wants to watch the vanishing banquet and Ariel’s harpy act, he turns invisible.  Unclear how much of that is Ariel and how much is Prospero.

8) He and Ariel chase Caliban and the others with hounds that appear out of nowhere. Unclear if this is suppose to be a trick of Ariel’s, or Prospero’s.

9) He brings forth the goddesses to bless his daughter’s marriage, as a show of his power.

Are there any other overt displays of his work?

He gives us another list of things that he can do, when he’s talking about leaving the island:

I have bedimm’dThe noontide sun, call’d forth the mutinous winds,And ‘twixt the green sea and the azured vaultSet roaring war: to the dread rattling thunderHave I given fire and rifted Jove’s stout oakWith his own bolt; the strong-based promontoryHave I made shake and by the spurs pluck’d upThe pine and cedar: graves at my commandHave waked their sleepers, oped, and let ’em forthBy my so potent art.

My favorite part of that speech is “graves at my command have waked their sleepers, oped, and let ’em forth.”  So, basically, zombies?  Awesome.

How much of Prospero’s magic is the from the island itself, do you think?  Even if he didn’t break his staff and drown his books, would he have retained his powers after he returns to Milan?

Went over to talk to a coworker today who is getting married at the end of the month.  Another coworker was also there.

“How was your weekend?” asked coworker #2 of engaged coworker, whose fiance travels.

“Good,” she replied, “Scott’s home. He told me he wants to read The Tempest.”

My arms shot into the air, fists raised, like I’d just scored the winning goal.  “Woo!” I exclaim, “Tempest!” I tend to do that.  “Is there a particular reason, or is that entirely random?”

She informs me that he “heard there’s a boat in it.”  I’m ok with that. The boat may only be in one scene, but it’s a good one. 🙂

Original coworker then comments something to the effect of, “I could only ever read Shakespeare when it was assigned to me. If I just pick it up and start reading I get totally lost.”

“You’ll need to read my next book,” I tell her.  “It comes from this very situation that’s happened to me so many times, where grownups tell me that they’ve got nothing against Shakespeare, it’s just that they feel like if they walked into trying to read it or see it they’d be completely lost because they have no idea what’s going on.”

Coworker nods, “Well, exactly.”

“So what I’m doing is working on a series of small guides, just a few dozen pages, that speak directly to this situation. They describe character, plot, famous quotations, important concepts and ideas to watch out for, that sort of thing.  Not in a help-you-study-for-your-English-exam kind of way, but just enough so that you can go to a performance of The Tempest and actually feel like you’re going to understand what the heck is going on, and maybe even enjoy it.”

Engaged coworker tells me that maybe her soon-to-be-husband should read it.  Other coworker tells me that it’s an idea that “sounds awesome.”

I should have asked for their credit card numbers. 🙂  Always Be Closing!

Surely you’ve heard the misquote, “We are such stuff as dreams are made of.”  It’s actually “on”.  “We are such stuff as dreams are made on,” says Prospero near the end of The Tempest, “And our little lives are rounded with a sleep.”

If Google is to be believed, the ratio is about 5 to 1 (200k or so misquotes to about a million instances of the actual quote).

I got to thinking, is this just a typo? What makes people think it’s one over the other?  Who reads it as “on” and thinks, “No, that’s not right, it should be of?” Does it mean the same thing and this is just a minor nit?

We are such stuff as dreams are made of.

Dreams, like the magical spirits Prospero conjures forth, are just little bits of nothingness. They don’t exist. They are an illusion. If we are the stuff that dreams are made of, then our lives too are little more than illusion that will one day end.

We are such stuff as dreams are made on.

Dreams follow reality. You dream because you are conscious of what you experience. If we are the stuff that dreams are made on, then we are the source of limitless creative possibility.

Am I reading too much into this?

You may have noticed this week that Caitlin Griffin’s 2012 “Everbody Dies” poster has gone viral (again) this week. Caitlin’s been a reader/contributor to this blog for quite some time, so if you’re talking about that graphic please make sure to give her the proper credit and links!

Of course with that much Shakespeare content all in one place it’s got to stir up some conversation. I was curious about “The Fool just disappears”.  I thought he was hanged?  I went back to the text:

Lear. And my poor fool is hang’d! No, no, no life!
Why should a dog, a horse, a rat, have life,
And thou no breath at all? Thou’lt come no more,
Never, never, never, never, never!
Pray you undo this button. Thank you, sir.
Do you see this? Look on her! look! her lips!
Look there, look there!

And then Lear dies.  It’s even in Sir Ian McKellen’s version of King Lear that came out on video a few years ago. Not the quote, the quote’s always there – I mean you witness Fool being hanged in that one.   (Found a link!)

But I asked Bardfilm and he pointed me to the Arden footnotes (and I mean that literally, he messaged me a picture of him pointing to the footnote) that says Lear is referring affectionately to Cordelia (who, obviously, was hanged). It seems odd that all of a sudden he’d pull out a pet name for his daughter that wasn’t used previously in the play, that also happens to be the name of a character. But, the footnotes argue, Lear is basically confusing the two characters at this point and thinks them to be the same person. (I imagine this to be much like when you visit a relative who suffers from Alzheimer’s and discover yourself being called by the name of someone long dead).

Until right now I’d just always assumed that the fool was hanged, possibly even right in front of him.  I don’t know when or where or how (it’s strangely awkward in the McKellen version, and really dark), but it just always seemed to me like one more sorrow to be heaped upon us.  After all, what exactly did the fool do to deserve hanging?  He’s not even a soldier who could or would have defended himself. It’s like hanging a child. I just always imagined Lear having to watch his fool die.

What do you all think? Isn’t Shakespeare typically better at tying up his loose ends? Would he have just forgotten to tell us the fate of that character? Or is this his way of finding a place to squeeze it in? Have you just always read it as referring to Cordelia?

We can talk about whose button it is later. 🙂