A POSTCOLONIAL READING OF SHAKESPEARES TEMPEST

The Tempest by William Shakespeare is one of the most famous as well as controversial plays of all time. In this paper, we will focus on a postcolonial reading of the same play. In doing so, we will take a look at the very nature of colonialism, and how it has been incorporated in the play. This paper will also shed light on the different areas in which colonialism can be divided, how those areas work within the play, and offer a detailed insight on the same. William Shakespeare needs no introduction. One of the greatest playwrights of all time, he has captured the imagination of millions of readers through his works. One of his works which has achieved great popularity along with creating lots of controversies is his famous play, The Tempest. This play has been looked at, analyzed, criticized, admired, and has ignited a lot of interpretations. A work of genius no doubt, The Tempest has also had its share of harsh criticism due to its postcolonial interpretations. The Tempest is the story of Prospero, the wronged duke of Milan, who is betrayed by his own brother and sent to be executed. With the help of a righteous minister Gonzalo, Prospero is able to flee the state along with his two year old daughter Miranda. He lands upon a deserted island, occupied by only two people. A witch called Sycorax and her son Caliban, are the only inhabitants of the island when Prospero lands on the island. The other, important character, which is the spirit called Ariel, was a captive of Sycorax. Prospero, apparently frees Ariel from a tree, after defeating Sycorax and imprisoning her inside a tree. Caliban is treated as a slave, after the initial good relationship with Prospero. Twelve years later, Prospero along with the help of Ariel, creates a Tempest in order to teach the ones who had wronged him a lesson. In the process, Miranda meets the prince of Naples, Ferdinand. At the end, Prospero forgives all the people who conspired against him, and marries off Miranda to Ferdinand. Ariel is set free at the end, as it had been promised. Caliban is punished for plotting to kill Prospero along with two drunken men of the courtship. Prospero leaves for Milan, leaving the island, and announces his retirement from magic, and looks forward for death. This is the traditional view of The Tempest that shows Prospero as the protagonist, who is betrayed and has to suffer a lot. Even on the island, he is under a huge pressure of protecting his

daughter from the threat of the natives. He imprisons Sycorax and tries to educate Caliban, but Caliban tries to rape Miranda. So he is forced to treat him as a slave and behaves rudely with him. The equation of revenge comes into play here. After all the heinous crimes done upon him, Prospero deserves revenge. So he, along with Ariel, makes the criminals suffer. But at the end, Prospero chooses virtue over vengeance, and forgives all to achieve a happy closure. Postcolonial writers all over the world have argued against the play, saying that The Tempest has all the ingredients and indications of which point towards a play which deal with colonization. These writers have a different version of this play. One of the foremost postcolonial writers, Aime Cesaire, also wrote an entire version of the play from the point of view of a black audience. It was named Une Tempete, and it shows the play in a whole new light. It does acknowledge the hardships Prospero has had to go through, but the main focus is on what Prospero does once he is on the island. He starts ruling over the island which was not his in the first place, and colonizes Caliban, Sycorax, and Ariel. He makes Caliban do all the menial chores when he should have been the king, and forces Ariel to work for his own revenge, with the promise of setting Ariel free. They have no choice but to be under his rule. It is a mix of colonialism and patriarchy, where even Miranda, his own daughter, is no more than a slave. This view of The Tempest is what the postcolonial writers keep in view while doing a postcolonial interpretation of the play. It changes the whole perspective of the reader towards the play. It gets divided into traditional and postcolonial reading, and the reader has to choose between them. Colonialism in The Tempest can be divided in three areas. The characters of high rank, power and class, dominate the ones in a lower position. Secondly, the characters that are considered to be weak on the basis of their gender are also seen to be subservient. The people in the higher ranks consider their race to be the superior one, obviously. So the direct attack is on the race difference between the characters. So there are race divisions, divisions based on power relations, and divisions based on their gender, which also includes the different angles of sexuality. Power is what the colonizer wields over the colonized. Without having power, there would be no line of demarcation between the colonized and the colonizer. The term power can have different forms. In the play, Prospero has the power. He has the power over every character. Prospero is a powerful colonizer for Caliban and Sycorax. He is a powerful colonizer and master

for Ariel. He is a powerful father and mentor for Miranda. He proves to be a powerful taskmaster in the brief encounter with Ferdinand. His almighty power is too much to handle for the travelers of the ship, as their ship is wrecked and all are made to suffer till the end. Prospero is the master and all are puppets in his hands, and all work and play according to his whims and orders. The way Prospero talks with the other characters, the way he manipulates them, the way he takes control of the entire event, and at the end emerges the clear winner and gets what he wanted from the beginning, shows the power of Prospero. The way he admonishes Miranda from time to time, Dost thou attend me? (Shakespeare 12) Thou attend'st not. (Shakespeare 12) Dost thou hear? (Shakespeare 13) All these show the kind of paternal authority with which Prospero deals with Miranda. The same authority, along with a kingly indifference and anger, is showered upon Ariel when Ariel reminds him of his promise. Thou liest, malignant thing! Hast thou forgot The foul witch Sycorax, who with age and envy Was grown into a hoop? hast thou forgot her? (Shakespeare 23) It is also followed by threats. If thou more murmur'st, I will rend an oak And peg thee in his knotty entrails till Thou hast howl'd away twelve winters (Shakespeare 25) Prospero does not yield to any of the characters. Ariel knows magic, yet cannot raise a voice against Prospero. The fate of Sycorax was sealed in a tree by Prospero, and Ariel knows his power. So he decides to be subservient and follow his orders. The main protagonist according to the postcolonial writers, Caliban, is the one who suffers the most in these power relations. Not only is he dominated and rebuked by Prospero, but also by

Miranda. One factor that leads to this is language. It plays a very important part of the dehumanizing of Caliban by the two colonizers. Man is made human by the things he knows. (Gandhi 42) Caliban knows nothing. He does not possess the knowledge that Prospero has. He does not know how to speak, and is taught language by Miranda and Prospero. 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! (Shakespeare 29) And in the end, all he says to them on their face is curses. He is powerless in front of Prospero. The one time he tried to exert his power over Miranda which was the alleged rape, he was forced to leave the cave and lived the rest of his life tied to a rock. He has no power over anything. The rape he tries is his impulse, which shows Prospero what an uncivilized man will do. So Caliban is no longer tried to be taught. The master-slave equation is right there, out in the open. He is the slave, and Prospero is the master. A slave can never have any power. All he can have is the desire to be the master. I had peopled else This isle with Calibans. (Shakespeare 29) The regret, the lament, and the helplessness of this statement show the worth of the colonized in front of the colonizer. All the power of Prospero is focused on Caliban, as Caliban gives the reason for his tyranny on him. For I am all the subjects that you have. (Shakespeare 28) Here, a passage from Aime Cesiares Une Tempete is relevant to the plight and anguish of the colonized. All the teachings, the knowledge, the language imparted to the colonized, exist only till they benefit the colonizer.

In the first place, that's not true. You didn't teach me a thing! Except to jabber in your own language so that I could understand your orders: chop the wood, wash the dishes, fish for food, plant vegetables, all because you're too lazy to do it yourself. And as for your learning, did you ever impart any of that to me? No, you took care not to. All your science you keep for yourself alone, shut up in those big books.(Cesaire 11) Knowledge is equal to power. Language is a vital part of knowledge. And that is exclusively for the colonizers. The colonial condition can work only till the colonizer benefits from it .The colonized will not have access to it, because then there will be no difference between them. It might be interesting to note that the same books and knowledge led to his downfall in Milan, which make him the ruler here. The colonial situation chained the colonizer and the colonized into an implacable dependence, moulded their respective characters and dictated their conduct (Gandhi 11) Caliban can learn enough to serve Prospero. Prospero depends on Caliban for all the menial chores which are below his dignity to perform. We cannot miss him: he does make our fire, Fetch in our wood and serves in offices That profit us. (Shakespeare 26) But the colonized cannot learn anything that might upset the power equation. That must stay in the hands of the colonizer, and Prospero takes ample care that it does. I must eat my dinner This island is mine, by Sycorax my mother Which thou takst from me. (Shakespeare 28) Caliban is conscious of his claim over the island, but it is the powerful Prospero rules over him and the island, and who decides the fate of each and every character in the play.

A lot of pain has been taken by postcolonial writers to bring out the plight of the colonized and make readers see them in a new light. The colonized suffer a lot, but the colonized women suffer a lot more. In Can The Subaltern Speak? Gayatri Chakravarthy Spivak has talked in great detail about the condition of women. The colonized woman has to deal with double the torture. Firstly, she has to deal with the racial discrimination. And secondly, she has to suffer from gender discrimination. The black woman is the lowest in the hierarchy. The colonized woman is a victim of both, colonialism and patriarchy. Though Prospero is doing the same thing that Sycorax did, which is ruling over the island with the help of magic and nurturing a kid, Prospero leaves no ends unturned to portray Sycorax as the dark side, the bad witch. Her magic is black magic, and his magic is knowledge. The names she is given in the play are old hag, witch, blue eyed hag. She has been banished from Algiers the same way Prospero came to the island. But she is the darker side of Prospero, as he is the light. She is no doubt powerful, as Prospero describes her to his country people, His mother was a witch, and one so strong That could control the moon, make flows and ebbs, And deal in her command without her power (Shakespeare 136) But she is just mentioned in the play, in derogatory terms. Her power and her magical powers are just mentioned in the last few dialogues. All throughout the play, she is dismissed and demeaned. Miranda, being the only existing female on the island, has a lot to do with the gender issues, the issues related to sexuality in the play, and the part she plays in the colonization. She no doubt exerts power over Caliban. He and her father are the only people she ever sees. They are her world.as the play progresses, one comes to know about the alleged rape that Caliban tries on Miranda. Ferdinand comes in the picture solely for Miranda. And during many conversations with Ariel, and at the end, the reader can realize that it was Miranda for whom, and due to whom the whole event took place. I have done nothing but in care of thee (Shakespeare 8)

These lines spoken by Prospero when Miranda asks him why he created the tempest, is the gist of the whole play. Everything is done for her. The tempest is created because of her, to get Ferdinand to meet her, and for her to get married to him and go to a place where she truly belongs. The situations that Prospero creates are for Miranda, for her care as Prospero puts it. This care and concern for Miranda is related to all the sexual tension on the island. Prospero feels, as a father, the urgent need to protect her from Caliban. Apparently, he has already tried to violate her honour once. Prospero does not want to wait for it to happen again. On the other hand, there is a strong possibility of Prospero trying to protect Miranda from his own pent up sexuality. It has been 14 years, and Prospero has never been with a woman. The taboo aspect of sex needs to be prevented by Prospero. It could be a double blow for his colonial image. Not only would he commit a sin of incest, but he would also degrade himself right down to where Caliban is. A mans integrity, his civility is many times judged by his selfcontrol, and his conduct. Caliban is deemed savage because he could not resist his primitive urges and tried to rape Miranda. What different will Prospero be if he tried doing the same? The line of demarcation between the civilized colonizer and the savage colonized will be erased forever, which Prospero cannot afford. The image of Miranda which is portrayed throughout the play associates purity with beauty and power. She is beautiful, modest, and tender, and she is these only; they comprise her whole being, external and internal. She is so perfectly unsophisticated, so delicately refined, that she is all but ethereal. She has been kept away from her royal roots for 12 years. Yet she has all the finesse and grace of a princess, along with the naivety due to no exposure to the outer world. The treatment and characterization of both the women in the play is the opposite of each other. Miranda is kept away from knowledge. The colonial bondages do not apply to her, but the patriarchal reins are still on her. She is not given any knowledge, not taught magic, not considered enough to tell her the truth about her past till she is fourteen years old, and all the tasks she is given are to teach Caliban the menial chores. These chores which, ideally a woman ought to do are taught to Caliban by Miranda, not by Prospero. On the other hand, one can see what happened to the woman who had knowledge. She was imprisoned for life in a tree. Sycorax is silenced forever by Prospero, and all her magic, and her knowledge is laid to waste.

The emphasis on chastity and virginity again and again by Prospero also shows the paranoia of Prospero regarding being civilized, and above the natives, above the savage. The same is said by Ferdinand, which shows the mentality of the people of the same kind. O, if a virgin, And your affection not gone forth, I'll make you The queen of Naples (Shakespeare 35) The too direct warning that Prospero gives to Ferdinand and Miranda before leaving them alone, If thou dost break her virgin-knot before All sanctimonious ceremonies may With full and holy rite be minister'd, No sweet aspersion shall the heavens let fall To make this contract grow: but barren hate, Sour-eyed disdain and discord shall bestrew The union of your bed with weeds so loathly That you shall hate it both: therefore take heed, As Hymen's lamps shall light you (Shakespeare 102) The colonized are always seen as savages, ones who are at the basest level, who cannot control themselves and their sexuality. The colonizer cannot degrade his self to their level, and be sexually promiscuous or rapacious, as they are the signs of uncivilized behaviour. Sexuality, and the control of it, is very closely linked with the savage and civilized image of the colonized and the colonizer respectively. That is why Sycorax is addressed as a whore because she was banished from her country as she was pregnant out of wedlock.

The issue of race is the most dangerous, and sadly, the most quoted one when it comes to colonization. One will always remember the Holocaust, the erasing of six million Jews of the face of the earth by Adolf Hitler, in the name of creating a pure race. .to reveal to the very distinguished, very humanistic, very Christian bourgeois of the twentieth century that without his being aware of it, he has a Hitler inside of him, that Hitler inhabits him, that Hitler is his demon (Cesaire 36) Colonialism delves on the same principals. Domination by their race, and wiping out any traces of the culture of the race which they colonize, is the basic rule. In The Tempest, Prospero being the colonizer wipes out the past of Ariel and Caliban. Ariel can hardly remember what his past was, and just vaguely recalls and agrees with whatever Prospero tells him. Caliban though remembers, has no option but to forfeit his past. It is the story-teller, who makes us what we are, who creates history. The storyteller creates the memory that the survivors must have- otherwise their surviving would have no meaning. (Achebe x) Ariels past is created by Prospero. The story about Sycorax may very well be a creation too. Not once in the conversation between Ariel and Prospero does Ariel add to the information. The very significant mention that Sycorax is from Algiers talks a lot about her race. She is considered to be savage, a woman banished from her land because she was pregnant with a child out of wedlock. Her race is savage and uncivilized. They do not possess the common knowledge or sense of the world, according to the colonizer. Caliban is the hag-seed, which is the fruit of the same race. Here the notion of the self and the other defines the race issue. Edward Said, in his much acclaimed book Orientalism deals with this issue in detail. The self and the other are the two opposites that Orientalism, and also colonialism, are based on. The self cannot exist unless and until there is an other. In the same way, a colonizer cannot exist until and unless he has a colonized to point to. The qualities of the colonized will directly be in negation to the qualities of the colonizer. The same happens with Caliban and Sycorax. They are referred to as thing of darkness, whore, whelp etc. they are dehumanized, and thingified in order for Prospero to

affirm his own self as the colonizer. As told earlier, the quote can be seen in a different light here. Man is made human by the things he knows. (Gandhi 42) The colonized know nothing. They are savage. They are uncivilized. They are not human. Colonialism is not satisfied merely with holding a people in its grip and emptying the natives brain of all form and content. By a kind of perverted logic, it turns to the past of the oppressed people and distorts, disfigures and destroys it (Fanon 21) Different races require different treatment, in the context of colonialism. There is a race of the colonizer, a race of the colonized, and the hybrid. A hybrid is half of colonized, and half of the colonizer. A hybrid cannot choose between them, the loyalties cannot adjust to one. Outwardly, they maybe, usually, with the colonizer, as Ariel is. Ariel has been promised freedom, but Ariel lacks the hope that there ever will be. The colonizer can show things, but it is not necessary that he will provide what is shown. Ariel follows every command of Prospero. But there is not just the factor of freedom due to which he obeys him. There is also the threat lingering on his head all the time. It knows that Prospero has the power to shut it back in the bark of the tree where it lay imprisoned for twelve years. So, Ariel reluctantly enjoys the partial freedom it has now, rather than complete shutdown. ..the master and slave are initially, locked in a compulsive struggle-unto-death. This goes on until the weak-willed slave, preferring life to liberty, accepts his subjection to the victorious master. (Gandhi 27) Ariel, out of debt, or out of fear, does what is asked of it. It even tortures Caliban, its counterpart in slavery at Prosperos behest, as it cannot afford to upset the all-powerful Prospero. The songs of Ariel, which are an integral part of the play, are his way of rebellion. They can also be compared to the curses of Caliban. The difference in the rebellion of Ariel and Caliban is precisely the difference between the colonized race and the hybrid. The situation of the hybrid is far worse than the colonized or the colonizer, as there are both of these aspects living inside the hybrid. Ariel has not been given much space, or importance as it has always been Caliban and Prospero as the agents and victims of colonization who have got all the attention. Not to forget

Ariels most important contribution to the play, it is ariel who helps Prospero change his mind, and choose virtue over vengeance at the end. ARIEL That if you now beheld them, your affections Would become tender. PROSPERO Dost thou think so, spirit? ARIEL Mine would, sir, were I human. (Shakespeare 120) This conversation ends with Prospero deciding to forgive his culprits. So Ariel plays a major role in both, the traditional as well as the postcolonial Tempest. The end, brought by Prospero after a little push by Ariel, also points towards a colonialist mentality. Throughout the play, Prospero at heart is a colonist is seen by the fact that he hates the island in spite of his passing twelve years there. The island gave him shelter, provided him sustenance and created opportunity to accomplish his final mission. But in the play he seldom speaks about the island. He rarely mentions it and on the few occasions when he refers to his own abode on the island he calls it a poor cell, a poor court. It is true that the island is poor and bare compared with Milan, Prosperos home country. Prospero is openly critical of the island while others do not profess any hatred for it. Prospero is keen on returning to his home Milan, leaving the bare island behind while others are not driven by any hatred for the island. Milan or Naples does not appeal to them as it does to Prospero. Thus considering his negative attitude to the island which served him as a home for twelve years it can be assumed that at heart he always remains a colonist. All his thoughts and actions are governed by a deep tie to his old home. They failed him in the past, but he believes the lost order can be recovered if his restorative plan succeeds. He lived on the island in exile, and is happy to leave it. It reflects on the colonizers attitude, that no matter what, they will consider themselves and their mother land to be superior and closer than the colonized land. The end is like the final nail in the coffin. A white man came, colonized the

natives, and left as soon as he felt he doesnt need anything out of the place anymore. He came, he saw, he conquered, and he left.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. England: Penguin Books Ltd, 2001. Print.

Cesiare, Aime. A Tempest. tr. Richard Muller. Ubu Repertory Theatre Publications, 1985. Web. 20 Aug. 2011. http://www.ohio.edu/people/hartleyg/docs/Cesaire_A_Tempest.pdf

Cesaire, Aime. Discourse On Colonialism. tr. Joan Pinkham. NewYork: Monthly Review Press, 2000. Print.

Fanon, Franz. The Wretched Of The Earth. tr. Richard Phileox. United States Of America: Grove Press, 2004. Print.

Gandhi, Leela. Postcolonial Theory- A Critical Introduction. Allen & Unwin Press, 1998. Web. 20 Sep 2011. http://www.4shared.com/doc/Leela_Gandhi_-_Postcolonial-Th.pdf

Mannoni, Octave. Prospero And Caliban: The Psychology. 22 Oct. 2011. http://english.emory.edu/Bahri/Mannoni.html

Said, Edward. Orientalism. United States Of America: Random House Inc., 1978. Print.

Shakespeare, William. The Tempest. ed. Gerald Graff and James Phelan. London: Macmillan Ltd, 2000. Print.