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CHAPTER 1
The Tempest
Pisces and its Ruler Jupiter (Neptune)
Now I will believe That there are unicorns ... (III, iii, 21-2)
The Story
Twelve years before the opening of the play the scholar and rightful Duke of Milan, Prospero, was deposed by his ambitious brother Antonio with the collaboration of Alonso, King of Naples. Though Prospero and his three-year-old daughter Miranda were placed in a small boat to die on the open sea, Prospero's faithful counselor Gonzalo put supplies (as well as Prospero's beloved books) on board so that they arrived safely on an isolated island.
In the following twelve years there, Prospero becomes an accomplished magician, able to free the airy spirit Ariel from a tree in which he was trapped by the evil witch Sycorax. Ariel now serves him but longs for freedom. Prospero's other servant is the earthy, ugly, and resentful Caliban, son of Sycorax, who complains that he is the rightful master of the island and who wants freedom too. Upon his arrival on the island, Prospero tried to teach Caliban, but after Caliban attempted to rape Miranda, Prospero keeps tight control over him.
As the play opens, Prospero knows that his brother Antonio, along with the King of Naples and their entourage, are in a ship passing near the island. Using Ariel as the instrument of his developed powers, Prospero raises a violent tempest that drives the ship to the island, and separates the ship's passengers into three isolated groups. One, all by himself, is Alonso's son Ferdinand, who encounters the lovely Miranda. The two immediately fall in love, but Prospero, fearing a too-hasty romance, enchants Ferdinand by his magic art. The second group is the nobles. Antonio, along with Alonso's brother Sebastian, begins plotting the murder of Alonso so that Sebastian can usurp his brother's place. The last is the jester Trinculo and the drunken butler Stephano, who has rescued wine casks from the shipwreck. They encounter Caliban, and the three, more and more intoxicated, plot to destroy Prospero and return the island to Caliban's control.
Prospero's magic thwarts the evil intentions of the nobles, as well as those of the inebriates. He celebrates the impending marriage of Miranda and Ferdinand with a conjured masque, featuring the goddesses Juno and Ceres to bless their union. At the end of the play, Prospero forgives his brother, frees Ariel, guarantees safe voyage back to Italy for all, and renounces his magic art.
Pisces and its (Traditional) Ruler Jupiter
The first clues to the sign associated with the play are its title and its opening with a tremendous storm. Appropriately, since the element of water symbolizes human emotions, the tempest can be interpreted as a manifestation of Prospero's rage at having been ousted by his usurping brother and his co-conspirators. Only now can he direct his anger through the medium of nature to the very persons who betrayed him, since they are sailing nearby.
So a WATER sign is likely to be the key to understanding this play. Pisces, the third of the water signs and the last and twelfth sign of the zodiac, is entirely apt. One of its chief symbols is the OCEAN, ruled by the Greek god NEPTUNE. The ocean is the largest body of water on our planet, filled with sleek swimming FISH as well as other odd-looking creatures. In line with this, references to fish abound within the play. Alonso, grieving for his presumed-drowned son, muses, "O thou mine heir / Of Naples and of Milan, what strange fish / Hath made his meal on thee?" (II, i, 111–3) In the droll scene of Trinculo encountering the prone Caliban, Trinculo tries to determine what the bundle on the ground actually is:
What have we here, a man or a fish? Dead or alive? — A fish, he smells like a fish; a very ancient and fish-like smell; a kind of not-of-the-newest poor-john [dried hake commonly eaten by the poor]. A strange fish!
(II, ii, 23–6)
To gain shelter from the returning storm, Trinculo creeps under Caliban's cloak, laying his body next to Caliban's, but facing the opposite direction. This creates a puzzling visual spectacle, unlike anything in any other Shakespearean play. This strange image suddenly reveals its meaning when we note that the primary symbol for the sign Pisces is two fish, connected by a cord, swimming in opposite directions. Trinculo and Caliban literally create this symbol with their bodies, as they lie on the ground facing opposite directions.
That the action transpires on an island, surrounded by water (and thus removed from ordinary life) is significant. Commentators have noticed Ariel's reference to fetching dew from an island in the New World, the "still-vexed [ever-stormy] Bermudas" ("Bermoothes" in some editions) (I, ii, 230). This has led to an interpretation of the play as a commentary on Western Europeans' colonialism. But Ariel establishes the location of Prospero's island as somewhere in the Mediterranean between the coast of northern Africa and Italy. Whatever the precise location, the island on which the action of The Tempest takes place has no name and is unidentifiable. This indeterminacy of location accords with the nebulousness of Pisces, associated with places that exist outside of time and space.
What is most magical about the isle ... is that in being many places at once, geographically, culturally, and mythographically hybrid, it eludes location and becomes a space for poetry, and for dream. It is not found on any map. Prospero's enchanted island, while drawn from real explorations and published accounts, is ultimately a country of the mind.
There is a long-established tradition of enchanted islands in Western literature. Some of the most notable are the Isles of the Blessed, the Western Isles to which King Arthur of Celtic legend has gone and from which he is expected to return at some future time (as the "once and future king"). This fits the trajectory of the story: Prospero has vanished from Milan, has sailed away to a mysterious island, and will return at the end of the play to take his place as rightful ruler.
Of the many universal symbols on which The Tempest is erected that of the island is fundamental. An island is a bit of a higher element rising out of a lower — like a fragment of consciousness thrusting up out of the ocean of unconsciousness. Like a clearing in the wilderness or a walled city, like a temple or a monastery, it is a piece of cosmos set over against chaos and ready to defend itself if chaos, as it will be bound to do, tries to bring it back under its old domination. It is a magic circle, a small area of perfection shutting out all the rest of infinite space. What wonder that an island has come to be a symbol of birth and of rebirth, or that from the fabled Atlantis and that earthly island, the Garden of Eden, to the latest Utopia, an island, literal or metaphorical, is more often than any other the spot the human imagination chooses for a fresh experiment in life!
Ferdinand intuitively recognizes that the ideal or mythic has transformed this mundane island: "Let me live here ever! / So rare a wondered father and a wise / Makes this place paradise." (IV, i, 122–4) That an island is shaped like a magic circle and that this particular island is a place of magic and enchantment also directs our attention to the sign Pisces.
Another clue to the associated sign comes from the fact that Prospero and his daughter Miranda have been on this unnamed island for the significant figure of twelve years. The planet Jupiter, traditional ruler of the sign Pisces, has a twelve-year cycle (that is, it takes approximately twelve years for it to appear to circle the Earth, as it travels along the ecliptic, the apparent path of the Sun). Jupiter has been described as the GREATER BENEFIC, the planet of LUCK AND GOOD FORTUNE. Prospero is obviously alluding to Jupiter as "bountiful Fortune" and a "most auspicious star" in a key speech in Act I. As he explains to Miranda:
By accident most strange, bountiful Fortune,
(I, ii, 179–185)
This same number is mentioned again in the drama, for the spirit Ariel was imprisoned by the witch Sycorax in a cloven pine for twelve years before being released by Prospero. Analogous to Ariel's period of captivity, Prospero and Miranda spend the same amount of time on this isolated isle before themselves being released to go home to Milan. The type of tree in which Ariel was confined is also revealing, for the pine tree and the oak, in which Prospero threatens to re-incarcerate Ariel, are both sacred to Jupiter.
Prospero is obviously the embodiment of certain Jupiterian qualities. Even his name, Prospero, recalls a key idea associated with the planet: it signifies abundance, wealth, and PROSPERITY. Too, Prospero describes himself as "the prime duke — being so reputed / In dignity, and for the LIBERAL ARTS / Without a parallel — those being all my study ..." (I, ii, 72–4). Devoted to these studies, the seven liberal arts, he neglected "worldly ends, all dedicated / To closeness and the bettering of my mind" (I, ii, 89–90). He valued his library above all else and is grateful that, once deposed and set adrift in a small boat on the sea, his trusted counselor Gonzalo provided him with volumes that Prospero prized above his dukedom. (I, ii, 166–9) This study has paid off, since Prospero has become a master of esoteric arts while stranded on this island — an illustration of Jupiter as a kind of GUARDIAN ANGEL bestowing some positive development even in the midst of dark events. The blessing is that Prospero has made good use of his time there.
Astrologers interpret a good Jupiter as a force that prevents the worst from happening. That is definitely so for Prospero, for he acknowledges that a "Providence divine" saved himself and Miranda from death, especially since the small boat he and his infant daughter were placed in was nothing more than "A rotten carcass of a butt, not rigged, / Nor tackle, sail, nor mast — the very rats / Instinctively have quit it." (I, ii, 146–8) It was a miracle that they landed safely on the island. Jupiter was operant first in that the conspirators did not kill Prospero and his daughter outright; instead they set them adrift on the sea. Second, the conspirators' long-term goal, of the two dying at sea, was frustrated by Prospero's and Miranda's survival. Clearly a beneficent force is at work in their lives.
However, the negative side of Jupiter is obvious too: Jupiter's propensity for laziness. Prospero admits that he was not doing the job of Duke, but passed off his responsibilities to his brother while he "to my state grew stranger, being transported / And rapt in secret studies." (I, ii, 76–7) No wonder that the brother, "being thus lorded" (I, ii, 97), receiving the revenues of the state, and "executing th' outward face of royalty /With all prerogative"(I, ii, 104–5), began to believe that he was in fact the Duke. Why not, since he was doing all the work?
Prospero's responsibility for his current situation lies in his negligence of duty, his abrogation of the responsibilities associated with his rightful place in the grand scheme of things. The ensuing twelve years of exile stem from this fault. It is the equivalent of the tragic hero's fatal flaw — generating uncomfortable consequences, but of lesser magnitude in a comedy than the tragic hero's error. Fittingly, Prospero lacked the qualities of a positive Saturn: performance of duty, faithful fulfillment of responsibilities, consistent hard work, restriction of pleasure in favor of slow-attained success — characteristics that balance a too-active Jupiter. Jupiter and Saturn represent diametrically opposed qualities: while Jupiter likes the pomp and title of position, Saturn is usually the one getting things done. Ideally, you should balance both.
A lesser Jupiterian figure is the good Gonzalo, who embodies that planet's characteristic OPTIMISM and GOOD HUMOR. Even as the tempest rages, Gonzalo comforts himself with his intuitive perception that the Boatswain has "no drowning mark upon him" (I, i, 26); that is, fate does not intend the fellow to die a watery death — and hopefully that means that Gonzalo will not either. Three times — a significant number in myth and fairy tale as a number of completion — he asserts that the ship's officer is destined to hang.
Gonzalo is the only one to keep his head during the storm, while those higher up in the scale (the nobles Antonio and Sebastian) resort to screaming insults at the sailors ("A pox o' your throat, you bawling, blasphemous, incharitable dog!" is a good example [I, i, 36–7]). When the ship seems to split, Gonzalo assumes a typically Jupiterian religious attitude; though he wishes for a bit of dry land, he gives himself over to the Divine: "Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an acre of barren ground ... The wills above be done ..." (I, i, 58–9, 60). Gonzalo, of course, earlier had the foresight, loyalty, and generosity (all qualities associated with Jupiter) to supply Prospero and his daughter with food, water, and other "necessaries" for their survival in that miserable boat.
Once on land, of all the nobles and their associates who are grouped together in one part of the island, Gonzalo alone strives to be cheerful. He takes the stance of the PHILOSOPHER who reasons that however bad your own situation is, others may have it worse. He attempts to comfort the King of Naples, saying,
Beseech you, sir, be merry. You have cause,
(II, i, 1–9)
The good and faithful counsellor Gonzalo, who helped save Prospero and Miranda, is in turn "rescued" by Prospero. The conspirators have drawn their swords, intending to stab Gonzalo and the others who are asleep, but Prospero's agent Ariel wakes them with music and song. How appropriate is this karmic turn-about, with the Jupiterian figure of Gonzalo himself rewarded for his loyalty and compassion by being saved by the Jupiterian intervention of Prospero.
So, early in the play many of the customary associations with Jupiter are emphasized: THE HIGHER MIND, LEARNING, BOOKS/LIBRARIES, and even LONG-DISTANCE TRAVEL, especially to exotic or unusual places (in this case Prospero's journey over the sea, his arrival on the island itself with its strange inhabitants, and the nobles' voyage to Africa for Claribel's wedding).
The important theme of EDUCATION, also related to Jupiter, crops up repeatedly in the play. We first see this in the long scene crops up repeatedly in the play. We first see this in the long scene of exposition in which Prospero finally enlightens Miranda as to her real identity. He has for many years been her TEACHER: "here / Have I, thy schoolmaster, made thee more profit / Than other princes can, that have more time / For vainer hours and tutors not so careful." (I, ii, 172–5) She is a most grateful learner. Not so the earthy Caliban; though he admits that Prospero did "teach me how / To name the bigger light, and how the less, / That burn by day and night" (he means, of course, the Sun and Moon) (I, ii, 337–9), he is predominantly resentful. Prospero chastises him:
I pitied thee,
Took pains to make thee speak, taught thee each hour One thing or other. When thou didst not, savage,
(I, ii, 356–61)
Caliban's retort is "You taught me language, and my profit on't / Is I know how to curse. The red plague rid you / For learning me your language!" (I, ii, 366–8) In fact, Caliban's first words upon entering the play are a string of curses! "As wicked dew as e'er my mother brushed / With raven's feather from unwholesome fen / Drop on you both! A southwest blow on ye, / And blister you all o'er!" (I, ii, 324–7) Commentators have mused about the implications of Caliban's resistance to learning. Are some beings truly uneducable? Does Caliban represent a primitive type that simply cannot absorb modern information? Is Shakespeare commenting on experiences Europeans were having as they colonized the New World?
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "The Tempest"
by .
Copyright © 2018 Priscilla Costello.
Excerpted by permission of Ibis Press.
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