Act 4 Sc. 1 Flashcards
‘perform…another trick…bestow upon the eyes of this couple some vanity of my art’
AO1/2: Semantic field of performance, creates an air of metatheatricality. Implications of P as disingenuous, manipulative, creating illusions to trick.
frippery of P’s magic & the inconstancy of power - power and control is fleeting !!!!!
AO5: Prospero is ‘a stage director’
‘Do you love me, master? No?’
Rhetorical questions = desperation and plaintive nature of Ariel who wishes for his master to respect him. This line creates sympathy for the abused Ariel as it shows how truly powerless he is against Prospero, his colonial captor who he revers.
F: ‘white cold virgin snow upon my heart abates the ardour of my liver’
AO1/2: ‘white cold virgin’ triadic list of purity, metaphorical cooling of his passion shows that his adoration of Miranda is not performative or rooted in lust.
Contrast between the heart = genuine love and the liver = sensual passion
A03: Ferdinand’s rejection of the ‘lusty Italian’ stereotype, choosing to abide by ideas of courtly, chaste love.
AO5: the very purity of love
‘our actors…all spirits…melted into thin air…baseless fabric of this vision’
‘…faded…shall dissolve…’
A01/2: Nihilistic tone established.
SF of illusion & performativity which is reinforced by metatheatrical lang.
‘melted…baseless fabric….faded…dissolve’ - irreversible destruction of his role as a magus figure and the illusion of this perfect life on the isle.
- intangibility & insubstantial nature of the isle etc is revealed.
‘insubstantial pageant’
‘baseless fabric of this vision’
‘leave not a rack behind’
AO1/2: pageant = showing off, on display. - reflects P’s egotistical nature as he has constructed this ‘facade’ of joviality merely to exercise his own power and reaffirm his belief that he is an unchallengeable ruler.
- ‘pageant…baseless fabric…rack’ - metatheatrical motif of clothing and costume reflects the pointlessness of P’s power as it prone to dissolution - XP highlighting temp. nature of power and status.
‘We are such stuff as dreams are made on…our little life is rounded with sleep.’
AO1/2: nihilistic, existential ideas explored through reference to humanity as mere ‘stuff’ pointing out their insignificance.
- Dream like connotations of this sleep metaphor = trance-like state P lulled into by his divine art.
- safe naivety of sleep = p’s ignorance of threats he is facing (MURDER)
‘well done, my bird.’
AO1/2: Prospero praising Ariel - does demonstrate the capacity to have compassion for his ‘servants’
- Grants Ariel the ironic pet name of ‘my bird’ = ironic bc ‘bird’ suggests freedom but questionable as to how free ariel is. Does suggest a certain love and gratitude for Ariel’s service - highly contrasts with admonishments of C as a ‘born devil’ and a ‘freckled whelp’
- P only respects ‘servants’ who do not outright threaten to rebel against his rule - Ariel’s sycophantic loyalty to his ‘master’ is perhaps a form of self-preservation as he recognises that he will not suffer the same abuse Caliban does.
‘born devil…whose nature nurture can never stick.’
AO1/2: ‘born devil’ - introduced nature vs nurture idea, colonial assertion that the native cannot be changed or ‘civilised’ into the ‘correct’ way of behaving.
‘devil’ - immorality & sin inextricably linked to the native.
- ‘nurture can never stick’ - highly ironic bc Prospero’s colonial definition of ‘nurture’ seems to derive from abuse so arg. Caliban lashes out because has been conditioned to act this way because of the influences around him.
- Arguably the attempts to socialise Caliban are the root cause of his ‘immoral’ behaviour with him adopting P’s proclivity for abuse of others and nature.
- AO5: Post col lens, XP is imploring those who believe in colonisation to reexamine their ideas of what constitutes as moral and immoral behaviour as often the colonisers are less civilised than the natives they wish to ‘rehabilitate’.
‘his body uglier grows, so his mind cankers’
AO1/2: wounded, misshapen & flawed mind and body.
‘uglier’ - grotesque, malformed, unnatural.
This could also be a form of racial discrimination, as he is the only non-Neapolitan in the play, he is the only character where we are constantly reminded of his ‘ugly’ exterior; because of the intolerance and disgust for ethnicity minorities/ people of colour
AO3: Physiognomy - jacobean society thought you could determine the quality of a person’s character by their appearance.
