First, I'd like to say that today's discussion was very fruitful, as we identified a number (if not most) of the major themes which are present in the current Shakespearean piece we are investigating; especially for its dealing(s) with literary character(s)...
Second, for this journal entry I would like each of you to PROPOSE A POSSIBLE THESIS STATEMENT for your second Short Paper. That is, all you need write for this journal is a few sentences which introduce and offer your thesis statement, nothing more...
As classmates, you may (and should) comment and help explicate your fellows' thoughts and ideas. That is, provide page numbers; specific act(s) and scene(s) and line numbers... all for the purpose of easing the production of the upcoming short paper assignment.
Here are some of the primary lines-of-thought when it comes to The Tempest and the various number of themes that we as critics can expound upon...
1) Nature v. Art (these terms need to be capitalized; think Civilization v. Non-Civil... aka read the Introduction for more on this topic, as it should help ground this line of interpretation)
2) renewal and rebirth (on an individual level, yes; but also consider the island as the "seat of change")
3) illusion v. reality (those scenes which are deliberately fabricated, both for the players and for the audience are VERY significant)
4) (self-)control v. fate --- who IS REALLY in control? (consider this: Ariel as an "elemental spirit" v. Caliban as a "base creature")
5) righteousness v. corruption (i.e., contrast Gonzalo v. Antonio and/or Sebastian)
6) the "drunken" monarchy as a parody of "true" monarchy
7) the isle as the center and source of change (think ALCHEMICAL/MERCURIAL change; that is, the isle could be viewed as a lead chuck placed into a pool of mercurial water, the sea, to become gold, hence altered and purified)
8) discuss Ariel's androgyny
9) any (dis)connection that can be drawn between the physical production (@ BAM) of the play and the written tex; that is, offer a comparison or contrast between the performance and the text
10) discuss the "habit" (i.e., one's clothing) in which one appears and how their character or personae is affected or changed when they "inhabit" new or different garments
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I was thinking about the right way to govern, order and chaos. i.e. Propsero and Ariel VS Prospero and Caliban. They both serve Prospero in different ways and each of them has a different objective. It's kind of good vs evil battle throughout the play. For example, when we first meet Ariel, he listens to Prospero with great pleasure and always replies "Ay, sir" after every errand he runs for Prospero. Caliban, on the other hand, when we first meet him, he is disrespectful and curses in front of Prospero. He even speaks about taking Miranda's virginity in which Prospero is quoted as saying "in mine own cell till thou didst seek to violate/The honor of my child" (1.2.348-349).
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteWilliam Shakespear's play "The Tempest" displays example of sibling vivalry, hunger for power and cruelty toward slaves to show one's willingness to betray others, including members of one's own family, where power is involved. So I guess that would fit under righteousness v. corruption.
ReplyDeleteIn The Tempest, Prospero is the master over two forces of Nature. On one side is the calm and pure Ariel that will obey Prospero orders and on the other hand is the wild Caliban that does not listen to nor respects Prospero. Even though these two characters are different in Nature, they both have the same goal, which is to get be freed of Prospero
ReplyDeleteIn the Tempest, Prospero appears as a character with power of various forms. He believes controlling the past enables one to control the present as well, and quite possibly the future. In act 1, scene 2, this idea is brought out as he tells stories of the past to Ariel and Miranda, convincing them of his version of past events and ostensibly enabling himself to control their views on the present as well.
ReplyDeleteI'm not to sure on a thesis at the moment. However, Eric Haver really brings up a good topic that could be used on the paper. Just like in the Inferno their are two sides in the story. Two conflicting characters in their nature, but have similar wants and needs, and that makes it interesting.
ReplyDeleteDavid: A good comparison indeed; consider too how Prospero is equally as firm with both of his servants when they feign disobedience by complaining.
ReplyDeleteAnna: You are right on. Look for key words in the text which signify these characters' elemental alignments (e.g., "earth" for Caliban is used frequently).
Barbara: Power struggles dominate this play. You should analyze these relationships between family members and, importantly, between servants.
Eric: Nice comparison. Perhaps describe each of the relationships Prospero has to his servants and then argue for their similarity. Does Miranda not desire to be freed too?
Michael: Excellent thesis proposal as it intriguingly offers a new spin on the "control" topic. The success of the thesis will heavily rely on an apt analysis of a number of important scenes and dialogues. As devil's advocate I'd argue against your piece by pointing to the apparent theme/motif/trope of Fate and Destiny in the play. How will you deal with the characters' believe in the wheel of Dame Fortune?
In The Tempest, power and control seem to be dominant issues in the play. Taking on to what you said Prof. Damato in power struggles, I already had this in mind where, I’ve seen many characters locked into a power struggle for their freedom and for control of the island, forcing some characters (both good and evil) to abuse their power. For instance: Prospero enslaves and treats Caliban badly where there is also a framework around Antonio and Sebastian plotting to kill Alonso or maybe looking at Antonio and Alonso aiming to get rid of Prospero.
ReplyDeleteI am intrigued by the by the whole "servitude or out of love" aspect between Prospero and Ariel. Yes Ariel obeys Prospero but is he/she just carrying out the orders in order to gain freedom or out of care for Prospero. The text can be used to back up either of these arguments.
ReplyDeleteI am interested in what Patrick has to say about Ariel obeying Prospero. However, I am not sure if I fully agree that he is doing so just to gain freedom. I feel that he really does care for Prospero, perhaps in a way that would lead readers to question his sexuality. Hence, my thesis statement with regards to the theme of Ariel's androgyny would be the following:
ReplyDelete"Ariel is the central spiritual being in William Shakespeare's "The Tempest." Considering that in literature, spirits, angels, and other mystical creatures are said to have no sex, I conclude that these creatures have both feminine and masculine characteristics. Hence, like these creatures, Ariel has androgynous features as well."
In the Tempest, Prospero greatly depends on his control of Caliban and Ariel in order to maintain his power. For example, Prospero threatens Ariel to imprison him for 12 years if he dares to question his orders. Prospero also threatens Caliban, He tells him that he will suffer with pain if he disobeys his master. Ariel follows orders without question because he hopes to be free, Caliban on the other hand hates following Prosperos orders. But both Ariel and Caliban desire freedom from Prospero so there is defiantly an issue of power struggle in the text.
ReplyDeleteI was thinking about a thesis for The Inferno. Dante seems particularly attracted to certain types of characters and emphasizes the episodes concerning them. In the eighth circle (Malebolge), the fourtunetellers are punished a certain way that attracted Dante. He is drawn to them because he as the author thinks they are important and places them in this way.
ReplyDeletefrom watching the play one thing that was hard to distingush, is the spread of illusion over reality in various cases. We can observe the use of magic and sourcery throughout the play, but it is somewhat hard at some points to make out the illusions from the reality. We can also bring in ariel and caliban into this argument as to which one is affected by more, illusion or reality.
ReplyDeleteI was never their to look at the play but from what I read arial and calbin are into an argument as to which one is affected by more lilusion or reality. Prospero is hoping on his control of caliban and asrial to maintain his power.
ReplyDeleteThe theme of wilderness versus civilization is clearly portrayed in "The Tempest. two characters that define wilderness and the natural in this play are Caliban and Ariel. Eventhough the two individuals are considered to be total opposites of each other, it is seen that the two have more in common with each other then with any other characters in the play.
ReplyDeleteDiana Nekrasov said via email on 3/17:
ReplyDeleteMy next paper is going to be about the servant-master relationship in The Tempest.The play portrays both psychological and social aspect of power and relationships from the different angles, such as the mostly positive relationship between Prospero and Ariel, the negative relationship between Prospero and Caliban, as well as Alonso’s relationship to his nobles.
I agree with Barbara that the play portrays many characters hungry for money and power. I think that will be a good paper topic as there are many examples of this in the Tempest. For example, Antonio Prospero's brother is a hypocrite and takes away his power. I look forward to writing my paper about this because there are many characters in the book that are associated with this.
ReplyDeleteI already wrote short paper 2 around a different thesis but an interesting point to write about would be the need for power that Prospero displays on the island as a result of being exiled from Milan. He had been banished from the main land and finds retribution in the power he holds over Ariel, Caliban and fate in general.
ReplyDeleteThe issue of fate vs. control is lacking in Shakespeare's Tempest. The control Prospero has over Ariel basically makes Prospero a god on the island and eliminates the chance intervention of fate.
ReplyDeleteI like the whole theme of the power struggle and was especially intrigued by what Allison wrote. However, for my paper I want to focus on Ariel and his androgyny. Throughout the play Shakespeare leaves us constantly questioning Ariel's gender and uses contracting terms within one sentence structure such as "harpy" and "his". I do not have an exact thesis as of yet, but it will center around the gender-neutral characteristics exhibited by Ariel.
ReplyDeleteI would like to do a paper on around the same topic as david. This is in refrence to the relationship between prospero and caliban and the relationship between prospero and ariel, both beneath him but in very different ways.
ReplyDeleteIt is interesting to see Trinculo and Stephano attempt to utilize Caliban's power/experience about the island to achieve their own ambition but at the same time being used by Caliban to help him finish his plot of revenge against Prospero. Caliban's indulgence with wine is a vivid description of so many people in the real world have waste and negatively affect their own lives as long as the ones around them.
ReplyDeleteIn the Tempest, Ariel is portrayed as Prospero’s slave. Ariel is a spiritual figure that Prospero rescued. Maybe the reason for Ariel to be brought back to reality is to actually help Prospero. It is possible that Ariel is not just a slave. I would like to compare control Vs. fate.
ReplyDeleteIn the tempest I noticed how much there were like rules and how certain people had to obey certain people and its strange because their on a island that does not belong to anyone but prospero,caliban,and stephano claim they own it but I just find that interesting and that's what I'm leaning towards.
ReplyDeleteIn "The Tempest" there are so many things going on at once. I find in interesting how there are righteous people and corrupt people. You have pure people like Miranda and people who are completely the opposite, like Antonio. Then you have characters like Prospero, who in my opinion is a little bit of both at times.
ReplyDeleteIn "The Tempest", the idea that strikes me the most is "righteousness vs. corruption". You can correlate it most instances in the play. The prime example being Gonzalo vs. Antonio. Gonzalo being the good hearted kind fellow, meanwhile Antonio is the scheming rat.
ReplyDeleteA possisble thesis statement for my second short paper will involve Cantos 18-34. It will have an emphasis of differences between previous circles to circles 8 and 9. I would most likely focus in the way the souls are punished towards these circles and compare them to those in the other circles. I will also follow up with the relationship of Virgil and Dante towards the end of these circles.
ReplyDelete