The Enigmatic Nature of Shakespeare’s The Tempest (original) (raw)

International Journal of Language and Literary Studies

Prospero in Shakespeare's last play, The Tempest, written around 1611 and first published seven years after the dramatist’s death, in 1623, is not a duke who has failed in his task of ruling, but a man who has gained power to direct and discipline others. To that sense, he tends to be the god-man like who rightly castigates and strictly scourges. The magician appears to be so humane at times and too harsh at other times that he dazzles, leads astray or terrifies the island’s dwellers, an ambivalent mission that further intensifies the enigmatic nature of the play. While he has intentionally raised a storm to cause the disorder of the drunken sailors' minds and bodies, thus leaving them on shore at the mercy of chance, instead of winds and waves as before, he has laboriously established order towards the end of the play. Prospero's white magic helps him bring together characters speaking their true character irrespective of their social classes: princes, courtiers, and sa...