Prospero's Daughter

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The daughter of Prospero, Miranda was brought to the island at an early age and has never seen any men other than her father and Caliban, though she dimly remembers being cared for by female servants as an infant. Because she has been sealed off from the world for so long, Miranda’s perceptions of other people tend to be naïve and non-judgmental. She is compassionate, generous, and loyal to her father. Leininger also argues that Miranda's sexualisation is a weapon used against her by her father, stating that Prospero uses Caliban's attempted assault and Ferdinand's romantic overtures to marginalise her, simplifying her into a personification of chastity. In Leininger's analysis, Caliban is treated in a similar fashion, forced into the role of an uncivilised savage without heed for his individual needs and desires—much in the same way that Miranda is expected to marry Ferdinand and reject Caliban's advances simply because her father wishes it. [11] In the season 30 episode of The Simpsons titled " I'm Just a Girl Who Can't Say D'oh", Sideshow Mel leaves a play Marge is directing to play Prospero and is replaced by Professor Frink. Slights, Jessica. "Rape and Romanticization of Shakespeare's Miranda." SEL: Studies in English Literature 1500–1900. 42.2 (2001): 357–379. Timothy West, 1992 (voice of Prospero in abridged animated production for Shakespeare: The Animated Tales)

I'm all in favor of authors changing original plot points and characters to fit in with their retelling of the story. I don't think that happened enough in Prospero's Daughter, and when it did, I wasn't sure why the story changed. For example, I found it strange that Peter is portrayed as a mad scientist and Carlos describes him putting on a robe decorated with stars to do magic. I didn't get this. At first, I thought it was Carlos's imagination, but later, I wasn't sure. Though he's supposed to be a stand-in for Prospero, this didn't make sense to the story in general, and I think that Peter would have been a perfect Prospero without the "magic robe." Especially since The Tempest is directly mentioned in the story and Carlos blatantly calls Peter Prospero. One thing that changed that I didn't like was the fact that Carlos teaches Virginia to read, whereas in the play, Miranda teaches Caliban. I'm not sure what purpose this change was supposed to serve, especially when other things are so strictly adhered to, even when it doesn't make sense within the world that Nunez has created. Kuiper, G. P., The Fifth Satellite of Uranus, Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, Vol. 61, No. 360, p. 129, June 1949 Sycorax, a witch, was abandoned on the island and gave birth to a son, Caliban. When she died, he was left alone on the island with only the invisible spirits for company. When Prospero and Miranda arrive on the island, Caliban lives with them as part of the family but when Prospero catches him about to sexually assault Miranda, he throws Caliban out and treats him as a slave. Caliban wants revenge on Prospero but is afraid of his magical powers. When he meets Stephano, Caliban believes the drunken butler can kill Prospero and become a better master to him. He tries to lead Stephano to kill Prospero but Ariel and Prospero defeat his plans. Peter Gardner, no longer using his skill as a physician, flourishes as a botanist, experimenting on the island’s flora. Afraid of being recognized, he cannot receive recognition or a return for his new found interest. Therefore, he lives off Carlos’s money.

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The Tempest's second scene begins with Miranda, begging her father to spare the lives of the men at sea. She's fully aware of the powers Prospero possesses and begs him to cease the storm. In an act of bravery she challenges her father's wisdom, arguing that: "Had I been any god of power, I would / Have sunk the sea within the earth or ere / It should the good ship so have swallow'd and / The fraughting souls within her." [2] As the scene progresses it is revealed to her that she is, in fact, the high ranking daughter of the Duke of Milan. Trinidadian-American author Elizabeth Nunez’s novel Prospero's Daughter (2006) is a loose retelling of William Shakespeare's The Tempest, transplanting the action to a leper colony off the coast of the Caribbean island of Trinidad. It tells the story of fifteen-year-old English girl Virginia whose father files a false rape allegation against the mixed-race boy she loves. However, others feel that Miranda's speech here is correctly attributed. As the play progresses, Caliban refers to Miranda as his "mistress", [17] saying that it was Miranda who explained to him what the moon and stars are. [18]

Prospero is the rightful Duke of Milan, whose usurping brother, Antonio, had put him (with his three-year-old daughter, Miranda) to sea on a "rotten carcass" of a boat to die, twelve years before the play begins. Prospero and Miranda had survived and found exile on a small island. He has learned sorcery from books, and uses it while on the island to protect Miranda and control the other characters. In the comic book series The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen by Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill, Prospero appears as a founding member of the first such grouping in 1610, alongside his familiars Caliban and Ariel. Miranda is the daughter of Prospero, another of the main characters of The Tempest. She was banished to the Island along with her father at age three, and in the subsequent twelve years has lived with her father and their slave, Caliban, as her only company. She is openly compassionate and unaware of the evils of the world that surrounds her, learning of her father's fate only as the play begins. In the manga series One Piece, a character with the name Perospero appears in chapter 834, partly inspired by Prospero. His mother, Charlotte Linlin also seems to be inspired by the character as she is the one to use magic to control everything on the Island with her soul. Critic Lorie Leininger argues that Miranda fits into the colonialist interpretation of The Tempest in that Prospero's use of Miranda as an unwitting player in his political revenge is expressive of the play's sexist attitude towards women. [10] Leininger equates that the sexist attitudes displayed towards Miranda are equitable to the undercurrents of racism shown in the treatment of Caliban. She states that Prospero's treatment of Miranda is in essence the same as his treatment of Caliban, describing his attitude towards both as indicative of their subjugation within the social hierarchy of the Island.Melon Cauliflower, by New Zealand playwright Tom McCrory, is about a man Prospero, in his late sixties, who struggles to come to terms with the death of his wife and has mistreated his daughter Miranda. [11] Critic Jessica Slights creates claims that although many declare that Miranda only reflects the image of an obedient and subservient woman; she argues Miranda's character is independent. Miranda's upbringing shapes her character and the view of the world around her. She is not confined to social constructs as she did not grow up within a conventional society. This leads Miranda to view the world without preconceived ideas. Prospero is the main guardian in her life, but she developed personality traits such as kind-heartedness that are, as many describe, distinct in comparison to Prospero’s. In addition, she challenged the rules of traditional courtship when she pursued Ferdinand. In Act I, Scene II, the lines spoken by Miranda to Caliban rebuking him for his ill-treatment of Prospero are frequently reassigned to Prospero. Editors and critics of the play felt that the speech was probably wrongly attributed to her either as a printing error or because actors preferred that no character would remain silent too long on stage. [15] Simon Russell Beale (2016), a production directed by Gregory Doran that used Digital technology to create many of the special effects.

I didn't particularly like Nunez's choices on which plot points in the Tempest to change to her fitting in the story. Some of which irked me such as Carlos teaching Virginia to read when it was Miranda that taught Caliban. It might not bother some people but it did bother me from a feminist point of view. The Tempest is believed to be the last play Shakespeare wrote alone. [1] [2] [3] In this play there are two candidate soliloquies by Prospero which critics have taken to be Shakespeare's own "retirement speech".

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Worth reading just for the wonderfully painted picture of the Caribbean going through the decolonization process.