In a way, it is pleasing that Shakespeare ended with The Tempest, for this marks a return to his sunny comedies written over a decade earlier. We may be glad that the great man ended his career on an upbeat.
What's more, The Tempest is Shakespeare's complete creation too, for it is one play in which he apparently made up his own plot.
The play opens with a ship struggling against a tempest. On board are a group of Italian noblemen, for here, as in so many of his other romances, Shakespeare uses Italy as the home of romance.
The crew is desperately trying to save the ship when the Italian aristocrats emerge from below. One speaks, saying:
—Act I, scene i, lines 9-10
The speaker is Alonso, King of Naples, and with him on the ship is his brother, Sebastian, and his son, Ferdinand. The kingdom of Naples was from about 1100 down to 1860 the political unit making up the southern half of the Italian peninsula, with Sicily usually (but not always) included. Its capital was the city of Naples.
Alonso is not a typically Italian name. It is a Spanish one, a variant of Alfonso. Both Sebastian and Ferdinand are names best known in history as belonging to Spanish and Portuguese monarchs, rather than to Italians. This is not surprising, for Naples in Shakespeare's time was closely connected with Spain.
In 1420 Naples was under the rule of the aging Queen Joanna II, who had no heirs and who feared that the French would seize her kingdom. Nearby Sicily was under the rule of Alfonso V of Aragon (see page I-545) and she made him heir to her rule. She changed her mind afterward, but Alfonso V had no mind to retire. After she died in 1435, he began a long struggle to fix himself on the Neapolitan throne. By 1443 he had succeeded and made Naples the capital of his entire dominion, including Aragon itself. He reigned as Alfonso I of Naples.
Aragon continued to rule Naples until 1479, when Aragon and Castile formed a dynastic union that gave rise to modern Spain. The united Spanish kingdom continued to rule Naples through Shakespeare's time and beyond. At the time The Tempest was written, Naples was ruled by a viceroy serving the Spanish King, Philip III…
In thinking of Naples, then, Shakespeare automatically thinks Spanish even when he treats it as an independent kingdom. (In Othello, such characters as Roderigo and Iago have Spanish names even though they are supposedly Venetians.)
Despite the royalty on board, the ship is apparently sinking and must be abandoned.
The events do not go unobserved, however. There is an island nearby -not one that can be pinned down on a map-but one that exists only in this tale. All we can say is that it ought to be located somewhere between Italy and the African shore.
Two individuals are all the truly human inhabitants the island of the play has: a man, Prospero, and his daughter, Miranda.
The daughter is terribly perturbed over the ship, which is being destroyed in the tempest, but Prospero calms her and assures her that no harm will be done. He says it is now time, at last, to tell her of their past and how they came to be on the island.
—Act I, scene ii, lines 53-55
Milan is a duchy in northern Italy (see page I-447).
Prospero, as Duke, had little interest in governing and left the actual conduct of affairs to his brother, Antonio, while he himself was concerned with scholarship:
—Act I, scene ii, lines 75-77
In the Middle Ages there were two kinds of studies: that of theology and related philosophy, which was considered the highest goal of reason; and that of the secular knowledge of the world.
The latter was suspect for a number of reasons. It had its roots in the pagan learning of the Greeks, for one thing. For another, the secular scholars (notably the alchemists) actually cultivated an air of mysticism that reinforced vague beliefs that they consorted with spirits and practiced magic. Naturally, the general public would fear such scholars and suspect that there was much more to their work than they could possibly admit.
And indeed, it becomes clear that Prospero's "secret studies" did indeed involve magic, that he could command spirits and control portions of the universe.
Prospero's preoccupation with his books and studies allowed his brother, Antonio, to intrigue for the throne. Antonio came to an understanding with Alonso of Naples (the same who was on the ship caught in the tempest).
Prospero says:
—Act I, scene ii, lines 121-22
The King of Naples therefore sent an army to Milan. Antonio treacherously opened the city gates so that Milan was taken and then ruled as new Duke, but tributary to Naples.
Though The Tempest is fictional throughout, there is an echo of history here. In 1535 the last native Duke of Milan, Francesco Maria Sforza, died without heirs. The duchy was taken over by Emperor Charles V (see page II-747), who in 1540 gave it to his son, who was later to be Philip II of Spain. Milan remained Spanish throughout Shakespeare's life and for nearly a century beyond. And since Naples had been Spanish before that, it is almost as though Naples had taken Milan.
As it happens, Antonio, the usurper, is also on the sinking ship, along with the King of Naples.
Once the coup d'etat had been effected, Prospero and Miranda were taken away, placed on a small ship, and set afloat on the Mediterranean. Fortunately, a sympathetic Neapolitan lord, Gonzalo, made it possible for them to survive the ordeal by secretly giving them clothing and other necessaries and, most of all, a number of the most valuable books from Prospero's library. And, as it happens, Gonzalo is also on the ship.
Miranda is affected by the tale but, in her gentle sympathy, does not think of her own danger then but only of the added trouble she must have been to her father. He denies that she was any trouble. Rather the reverse, for she was
—Act I, scene ii, lines 152-53
A cherub is a creature mentioned in the Bible. From the wording in some places, it would seem to represent the storm blast. Thus, in Psalms 18:10 it is written: "And he [the Lord] rode upon a cherub and did fly: yea, he did fly upon the wings of the wind."
The cherub is nowhere described in the Bible except for the indication that it had wings. It may have been represented as a fearsome creature along the lines of the eagle-winged, man-headed bulls that were so characteristic a feature of Assyrian sculpture.
Whatever its origins, however, the cherub came to be considered as an infant angel and took the place in Christian art of the cupids of pagan art. It is in the sense of infant angel that Shakespeare uses the word here.