During the play Prospero is for ever searching for power. He creates the tempest to regain his former power as Duke of Milan. Both Ariel and Prospero are able to watch the movements of others unseen this gives him the power and the knowledge to know what others are planning.
‘The Tempest’ opens with a dramatic storm the language used reflects this:
“Let’s all sink wi` the king” This immediately grips the audience. The scene is one of confusion which in turn causes confusion for the audience. However, Miranda later hints that the storm was caused by the magic of Prospero. “If by your art, my dearest father, you have put the wild waters in this roar, allay them.” Prospero lives on the island (the setting for the play) he’s lived there since he was usurped from his position as Duke of Milan. Prospero raises the tempest to achieve his plan. He wants to take revenge on his brother Antonio who took his dukedom from him. The audience discovers this when Prospero explains to Miranda that he is no longer Duke “By foul play” “My brother and thy uncle, call`d Antonio” Therefore the tempest brings Antonio to the island, within reach of Prospero. The storm is very important to the plot; it results in disorder and separation. The audience may think that Prospero is not evil but harsh; in creating the tempest he causes unhappiness to others. For example Alonso the king of Naples is separated from his son Ferdinand and presumes him to be dead. “No, no he’s gone”. Where as Francisco believes him to be alive “he came alive to land” The audience would think that Prospero is neither benign nor malignant, that he craves on power and his ambition may take hold of him.
There is more to Prospero’s plans as he wants Ferdinand and his daughter Miranda to fall in love. He uses magic to encourage this. Miranda came to the island at a very young age and remembers very little of life before. The only men she has seen are her father and Caliban - who is hardly a man but a beast as Trinculo refers to him “What have we here – man or fish? Dead or alive?...”
Prospero is aware of this and knows that the next man Miranda sees she is very likely to fall in love with. Prospero makes sure this man is Ferdinand and gets Ariel to entice Ferdinand toward Miranda. Sure enough it worked and the pair almost immediately fell in love. “I might call him a thing divine, for nothing natural I never saw so noble” “At the first sight they have chang’d eyes” Prospero says this and an original audience would have recognised this as true love. However, a contemporary audience may see this differently. They may feel that Ferdinand is simply the first man Miranda saw and that it can’t be true love, the audience would question how long the ‘love’ would last.
Prospero’s magic and powers do have limitations. He has been able to control over the natural world, but his “rough magic” as he calls it does not have the force to affect the hearts and minds who came under his influence. Prospero was able to bring Miranda and Ferdinand together, but it was their own volition that they fell in love. The audience would be unconvinced if they fell in love as a result of Prospero’s magic rather than their own free will.
In Act 3 Scene 3 Prospero uses his magic to create a banquet. King Alonso and his courtiers including Sebastian and Antonio appear they are exhausted from walking the island with little food and water. They then see a magical banquet created by Prospero who is watching unseen by the other characters high up above the stage. Before they can eat the banquet it disappears. Then a strange apparition (Ariel) speaks to them. He talks of the “three men of sin” he condemns them for what they did to Prospero. He then tells them that their only hope now is in repentance and amendment of their ways. Alonso at once acknowledges his guilt “o it is monstrous, monstrous!” Sebastian and Antonio however are defiant and aggressive. However, Prospero feels the men are truly in his power “they now are in my power” – this is what he wants. Prospero relishes the effect his spells are having upon those that conspired against him twelve years earlier. At this point the audience must feel that Prospero’s magical powers are showing a more sinister side.
A contemporary audience might feel that Prospero abuses his powers by imprisoning Caliban and referring to him as “slave”. However this sympathy for Caliban may disappear when they find out that Caliban tried to rape Miranda. He would loose sympathy too in his treatment and manipulation of Ariel. Prospero uses Ariel to carry out his plans and has promised him his freedom, but also threatens him. At the end of act four Prospero is at his most scary he has shown that he is willing to inflict pain on anyone that opposes him and openly expresses pleasure at inflicting such fear upon his enemies. “At this hour, Lies at my mercy all mine enemies” Both a contemporary and a Shakespearean audience might picture evil magicians in this way.
By Act 5 Prospero is fully in command. When Ariel describes the condition of the king and his courtiers, Prospero takes pity on them. He even becomes ashamed of himself and the extremes to which he pursued his revenge.
This makes him a stronger and more appealing character to the audience. Prospero then releases them from his spell, and extends his forgiveness. When everything is restored to natural order by the end of the play, Prospero vows to give up his magic. “…This rough magic I here abjure; and when I have requir’d Some heavenly music – which even now I do – To work mine end upon their senses that this airy charm is for I’ll break my staff…”
Magic plays an important part in the Tempest, it sets the scene and it is unpredictable these things excite and interest an audience. Prospero, the magician manipulates and enslaves characters through his magical powers seeking revenge and by the end of the fourth act is abusing his power. By the end of the play the former magician is now powerless: his staff broken, his books drowned and Ariel free. Prospero was worried that he nearly abused his power and when he returns to be a Duke and no longer needs his magic. Just like when he stopped using his magic in order to be a father and comfort Miranda and explain why he had caused the tempest: “Tis time I should inform thee farther. Lend thy hand And pluck my magic garment from me. Lie there my art. Wipe thou thine eyes; have comfort.”
