Warnings about Ferdinand and that he does not think that Ferdinand
Is worthy enough for his daughter and downgrades his social state by making him another of his slaves, he treats him much the same as Caliban. He is also loving and kind towards Miranda because he is her father and that is the role of a father. Prospero is full of kindness and tenderness not just harshness as he shows at the end of the play when he rightfully hands the island back to Caliban.
The book reveals to be much like a game of chess and Prospero uses many characters in the play as chess pieces. This is shown in the way that Prospero has has control of all his pieces as he does the characters. Prospero is the player and all the other characters are the pieces, some being more powerful and useful than others to help win the game. Caliban is like one of the pawns in the game not very powerful but is needed in order to win the game. Prospero needs Caliban to be his slave so he less to do himself. Miranda is like the Queen, the second most important piece in the game, but not as powerful as the King, yet more important than the bishops and Knights. Prospero is the King and is more powerful than anyone and the most important person to him is his daughter so she is the Queen. Ferdinand is the knight in this game because at the end he is a respected piece, with a small amount of power, but first he is downgraded to a pawn because Prospero makes Ferdinand his slave and slaves have no power. In the end he is worthy enough for Miranda and is therefore more powerful so is promoted back to being a knight in the game chess because he is eventually respected and excepted by the King, Prospero. Ariel is like a castle, because a castle has the potential to, move through many squares but is usually unable to do this due to other pieces. The King still has lots of control over the castle. The castle is a vital piece if you want to be in with a chance of winning l the game. This is like Ariel because Ariel is vital to Prospero in many ways. He helps Prospero by doing the tasks that he needs doing.
Finally at the end of the game it’s ‘checkmate’ and Prospero’ gets the King of the opponents side. This means that Prospero gets to become the King of Naples once again. Prospero relates to Shakespeare because Prospero controls all the people in the play and in reality Shakespeare controls what everyone does in this play including Prospero because Shakespeare wrote it.
Dramatic effectiveness is used throughout the play. Caliban adds a lot of conflict, tension and suspense to the play, especially in the relationship between himself and Prospero. Caliban is represented in the play as monster like, not a human and very uncivilised, therefore because he is less civilised he seems less Powerful when he is compared to Prospero. Caliban needs to be nurtured because he has a certain amount of evil in him that he cannot control. Everyone has evil in them but Caliban needs to learn how to control this evilness, which is why he is represented as a monster-like creature. Prospero says that “man must nurture nature’
And is therefore relating Caliban to nature, meaning that he is a living thing but that thing is not necessarily humanlike. Prospero dehumanises him by connecting him to animals and by doing this he’s lowering his social status although Caliban is thought of as a creature and therefore not clever, he actually is quite clever to a certain degree because he learns the language of Prospero, which today classed as a very impressive thing to be able to do. Caliban is only Prospero’s slave but is still vital to Prospero to do his labour work for him. Caliban learns very quickly that he is a slave and therefore realises his position, because Prospero addresses him as a slave immediately, which states his position. “Thou poisonous slave, come fourth” This strong language relates Caliban to evilness again, “poisonous” Furthermore this relates to black magic because evilness in a person often reflects on their physical form.
Throughout the play there are two forces of magic. Sycorax, the mother of Caliban uses black magic. The colour black is associated with the dark and night. This sense of dark and evilness makes us think of the devil, and the devil is connected with witchcraft. The audience will feel that Sycorax’s magic is evil, unlike Prospero’s magic, which is an art. His magic is therefore more accepted by the audience because it has been learnt and because it is an art form. Prospero then uses his magic powers to
Control nature. Although magic is not accepted as being real in today’s world, but in Shakespeare’s day magic seen upon as normal because nobody really understood how it worked and therefore didn’t find out that is was unreal.
Prospero has authority over Caliban and often orders him to do things, “come forth!” “Fetch us in fuel” We know that Caliban realises his position and understands the power that Prospero has because in reply to his orders Caliban says,” I must obey. His art is of such power, it would control my dam’s God Setebos.” When Prospero treats Caliban with violence, “Whom stripes are my mine not kindness,” this connects to the idea that if you are good you will be good in education and it is worth educating you, but if you are said to be ‘bad in blood’ then education is pointless therefore the only form of control is violence and that is why Prospero uses violence towards Caliban because he is not worth educating. When this play is dramatised Caliban could be represented as a creature that is grovelling on the floor next to Prospero showing a height difference meaning that Prospero is more powerful and human like. Prospero is more powerful than Caliban because they each try to curse each other but the curses from Caliban are empty because he has a lack of power.
The start of the play immediately fills the audience with suspense, because they do not know what is going on and there is a sense of chaos and action that adds to the dramatic effectiveness. This opening scene does not tell the audience much, and it also seems normal because there is nothing supernatural or strange about it.
