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The tempest christian influence shakespeare
An essay about The Tempest
The life and works of William Shakespeare
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Searching for Meaning in Shakespeare’s Tempest
Shakespeare lived and wrote in the Elizabethan age, a time when his
society was branching out and making itself known throughout the world by
colonizing other cultures. Great Britain was reaching for new heights of power.
In the play Shakespeare questions the value of this new concept of British
imperialism. The Tempest is called Shakespeare's American play, because he
calls into question England's right to colonize other nations, much as American
colonists did with America 200 years later.
The Tempest was Shakespeare's last play. For his entire life he had
written plays to please the Queen. For this play it appears he made a
controversial statement by challenging the values of his Queen and his country.
Evidence of this is abundant in the play. The story rotates around the
fact that Prospero, a European noble, had imposed himself on an island, already
inhabited. Prospero is depicted as a worthy man, who was usurped from his throne.
The reader has automatic sympathy for the character. This allows him more leeway
for wrong doing by creating room for it within the reader's mind. Prospero came
to the island with his daughter to find it already inhabited by two savages.
Upon arrival, Prospero brought his “new” ideas with him, and began to force them
upon these two savages, Sycorax and Caliban. He believed that his new ideas were
better, such as slavery opposed to freedom, which he imposed on Caliban.
“Dull thing, I say so; he, that Caliban,
Whom now I keep in my service.”
(Act. I, Sc. II, Ln. 285,6)
This view of whose ideas were better is an obvious matter of opinion, one of
the biggest drawbacks to transforming old ideas into new.
Prospero was the first male that Caliban had seen in his life. As a “
lower being” Caliban worshipped and praised Prospero, as the quote below shows,
until Prospero began to mistreat him.
“I know it by thy trembling: now Prosper works upon thee”
(Act II, Sc. II, Ln. 81-3)
This worship caused Prospero to act as a ruler above him, eventually
pushing him to be the tyrant over Caliban, including robbing Caliban of his
freedom. Keeping within his worship, Caliban lost his self-confidence and any
drive for good deeds. Because Prospero had imposed himself upon Caliban,
Caliban's life began to decline. Without drive, or freedom for that matter,
Caliban turned to a vegetable only working as a slave to Prospero. Again, the
act of asserting that your ideas are superior can cause indelible harm to the
With the semester coming to an end, many students are excited. This especially includes those who will be graduating soon. However, graduation can be seen as a bittersweet moment. On one hand, the graduates enter into a new chapter in their lives. On the other hand, they may lose communication with some of their friends. Unfortunately, this is a natural aspect of each person’s life. Everyone will experience some kind of loss in their life, whether it is person or an object. In The Tempest, Shakespeare discusses the topic of loss. While this theme is not talked about much compared to other themes in the play, it is very important since it is a theme that is included in the 1956 movie adaptation Forbidden Planet. While both works illustrate the ways people deals a loss, the later work demonstrates how the advancement in the world have affected the way modern society
Which brand of soda tested spews the most liquid when three Mentos are doped into a 2-liter of each brand? We know that the reaction between Mentos and soda is an explosion, but what we are trying to figure out is which brand causes the biggest reaction.
The first scene of Shrek starts off with him in his swamp having fun to an upbeat track (All Star by Smash Mouth), which presents Shrek to be a laidback, peaceful character. After the opening scene, there were a bunch of nearby villagers, who have negative stereotypes about ogres, headed towards Shrek’s swamp to try to drive him away from there (Constructivism). The usage of stereotypes set a theme for the film, to never judge a book by its cover. Once Shrek met Donkey and Fiona, neither one of them assumed that because Shrek was an ogre, it meant he is an evil monster. In addition, everyone else in the movie does not call him Shrek. Everyone calls him “Ogre” instead, further confirming the stereotype. In another scene after Fiona goes into a cave at night to sleep, Shrek and Donkey have a conversation of the aftermath of their quest to rescue Fiona. Shrek goes off on a tangent about how people hate him despite not even getting to know him. Donkey shows an example of personal construct by telling Shrek that he never thought of him as an ugly monster. This scene shows the bipolar dimensions aspect, where people who never tried to know more about Shrek would have a default negative view about him. Donkey, who learned more about Shrek during their journey, does not characterize him as any type of villain and
The costumes in Shrek The Musical were the cherry on top of an already well produced play. Shrek and Fiona looked like actual ogres and looked very realistic with the green face and body paint. From head to toe, Shrek looked like a real life ogre. His clothing topped of him ogre like look and made him look very far from human. Similarly, when Fiona turned into an ogre she envisioned an ogre from head to toe. Donkey’s costume was also very realistic. He looked very similar to Donkey in the movie and his ears brought the whole costume to life. Lord Farquaad’s costume was the most interesting in my personal opinion. His costume was made very creatively to make him look oddly short. He was left walking on his knees throughout the show and there was a black piece of fabric with short legs on the front to hide his actual legs. His makeup, especially his eyebrows made him look more sassy which fit his character very well. The flashy gems and fabric of his costume made him look like royalty which was very well fitting since he is a king in the play. Another costume that stood out to me was Pinnochio’s. His nose that lengthened when he lied was very creatively made and also very realistic. The body paint on his face and arms made him look like a real life doll and his shoes were a good touch in my opinion to the costume.
Mother Paula’s Pancake House is being sabotaged by a young boy. They don’t know who’s doing it and they think it’s just a prank. It’s not just a prank. The person behind it all is Mullet Fingers, a runaway kid who cares a lot about some endangered owls who live on Mother Paula’s building site. He even goes so far as to spray paint a police car’s windows black and put alligators in port – a – potties! Mullet Fingers has a sister who goes to school with Roy. Roy goes through many troubles with the school bully, Dana. One day, Roy was being choked by Dana and to get free, Roy slugged him in the nose! Dana was home for awhile with a broken nose and Roy got suspended from the bus. Roy and Mullet ...
The Tempest by William Shakespeare, among other themes, is a play very centered around rivalries, an important one being the one between Prospero and Caliban. As one would naturally expect, the triumphs and failures of the ongoing conflict yield different reactions for the two different characters. The conflict illustrates a dichotomous view of the way in which people respond to failure or defeat. Whereas Caliban responds to defeat instinctively with furious acts of retaliation, Prospero reasons that when those kinds of acts are examined under the scope of logic, they appear to be unlike that of a noble and therefore, should not be undertaken.
Tempest is Shakespeare’s last play written in 1610. Prospero is The Tempest main protagonist. He is exile to an isolated island after his brother (Antonio) conspires to kill him for the desire of taking his position as a duke of Milan. Prospero manages to escape with his three-year-old daughter to the island. The play starts after 12 years of Prospero’s living in the Isle. The play is more like a test for Prospero to discover his wickedness and find a typical way to adjust them. In the beginning, Prospero has two servants: Ariel, who has a godlike power and serves him in fulfilling his magical plan, and Caliban, half human half beast, supports him in fetching wood and water. Later on in the play,
“The Tempest” is a play written by William Shakespeare in early 1600s that has been previewed in different kinds of movies, such as the one made in 2010, directed by Julie Taymor. It is a play containing themes such as; revenge, allusion, retribution, forgiveness, power, love and hatred. When it is compared to the play, there are specific differences seen in the movie, such as; Prospero is reflected as a woman in the movie. The time differences between the play and the movie and how the spirit Ariel is shown as a white man in the movie. The play starts with the story of Prospero, the Duke of Milan. He gets banished from Italy and was cast to sea by his brother Antonio. He has perfected his skills during twelve years of exile on a lonely island. Prospero creates the tempest to make his enemies’ ship to wreck and lead them to the island. Meanwhile, Antonio takes Prospero’s place and starts to make everyone believe he is the duke and makes an agreement with the King of Naples, Alonso. Besides the drama happening in the island, Prospero forgives Alonso and the others.
The first design hurdle that needs to be conquered right off the bat is how the magic will be depicted. In a film, CGI takes care of this tricky aspect of the play. However, in a stage adaptation, this will have to be tweaked. If Furman did The Tempest, lighting design would produce of many of these effects. I envision Robert’s original plan for Pillowman, with a scrim that allows either shadow-like projections, or shadow puppets for Katurian’s stories as a perfect solution for scenes in the Tempest involving magic. Instead of taking an actor and giving him/her extensive prosthetic makeup, there should instead just be a voice actor that plays Ariel. On stage, Ariel would be seen as a shadow on the scrim, instead of a living entity.
William Shakespeare’s The Tempest provides dialogue that portrays the social expectations and stereotypes imposed upon women in Elizabethan times. Even though the play has only one primary female character, Miranda, the play also includes another women; Sycorax, although she does not play as large a roll. During many scenes, the play illustrates the characteristics that represent the ideal woman within Elizabethan society. These characteristics support the fact that men considered women as a mere object that they had the luxury of owning and were nowhere near equal to them. Feminists can interpret the play as a depiction of the sexist treatment of women and would disagree with many of the characteristics and expectations that make Miranda the ideal woman. From this perspective, The Tempest can be used to objectify the common expectations and treatment of women within the 16th and 17th Centuries and compare and contrast to those of today.
“Forgiveness is not an occasional act; it is a permanent attitude.” Martin Luther King. The concept of forgiveness comes easily to some people but hard for others. It is a choice that every human being is faced with in one’s lifetime. Forgiveness is a deep-rooted emotion that controls the process of forgiving or being forgiven. Forgiveness requires compassion and a caring heart; it is truly a selfless act. There are many views and effects when discussing the topic of forgiveness, some of these include, the religious views as well as the positive and negative effects of forgiveness.
It makes sense to me to see in this Shakespeare's sense of his own art--both what it can achieve and what it cannot. The theatre--that magical world of poetry, song, illusion, pleasing and threatening apparitions--can, like Prospero's magic, educate us into a better sense of ourselves, into a final acceptance of the world, a state in which we forgive and forget in the interests of the greater human community. The theatre, that is, can reconcile us to the joys of the human community so that we do not destroy our families in a search for righting past evils in a spirit of personal revenge or as crude assertions of our own egos. It can, in a very real sense, help us fully to understand the central Christian commitment to charity, to loving our neighbour as ourselves. The magic here brings about a total reconciliation of all levels of society from sophisticated rulers to semi-human brutes, momentarily holding off Machiavellian deceit, drunken foolishness, and animalistic rebellion--each person, no matter how he has lived, has a place in the magic circle at the end. And no one is asking any awkward questions.
The Tempest by William Shakespeare (1611) is a play about the manipulation of people who have a lack of knowledge of the current situation. Throughout the play Shakespeare uses Prospero a wizard as a master manipulator. The manipulation by Prospero, Ariel and Stephano are used to show that if you keep knowledge from others it is easy to take advantage of them. This was the case during the colonization of the New World by the English, Spanish and French. When first coming to the New World people from the old world uses manipulation and the lack of knowledge of the native people in order to overtake the land. By using manipulation Prospero is able to put into affect his plan to regain his dukedom.
So forgive and forget, huh? It appears forgiveness is quite an important force in the tempest, bringing the story together beautifully. Forgiveness helps us learn about the characters in the play. Forgiveness is also what brings the play to a happy ending, but not without making one wonder whether forgiveness was really achieved. The role of forgiveness in the tempest is so significant because it is only through forgiveness that the characters truly succeed, but also because it raises the question of the extent of human forgiveness and helps the reader learn plenty about the different characters in the play. Forgiveness is of great significance to the plot and thematic context of The Tempest.
Scholar Robert D. Enright ,believes that “ forgiveness is not condoning or excusing, because forgiving is not downplaying or distorting what has happened as if what one suffered is something no to be taken seriously “ (2001). Forgiveness is not forgetting evil acts nor condone offense or hatred but realising that when we hold on to horror and pain of every offense, it diminishes our lives. Furthermore, we should realize that we can’t change who offended us but can only change our physical, psychological and emotional response to the offense. Besides, I made a choice to accept the impact forgiveness had on me, and that has helped me regain my sense of wholeness and restore my inner light. It is crucial to remember and learn that forgiveness can’t be put off, but must be selfless and from the heart. We should learn to forgive from most of the things that life presented to us, from anger, loss, survival and even perseverance. For reasons best known to us, we may feel that it is difficult to forgive others who deeply hurt us. We insisted that, that person is not worthy of our forgiveness. That process of continuous crossing that bridge that held you over the pains you experienced, will lead you to a life of greater peace and acceptance. Furthermore, because I had continuously stepped on it, it has carried me and connected me to another side of life that I have discovered. If you’re