Essay Comparing The Tempest and King Lear

Comparative Essay In William Shakespeare’s timeless play King Lear and in Akira Kurosawa’s critically acclaimed film Ran, Tragic heroes Lord Hidetora and King Lear experience the rotation of power due to their major character flaws. In the renditions of King Lear preformed by James Earl Jones and Lawrence Olivier, the elements of tragedy are well demonstrated through exceptional acting and great character development.

The Tempest is about an ousted Duke of Milan ,Prospero, who has been living in exile on a remote island for the past twelve years with his daughter Miranda. He is a powerful magician, who happens to be the master of Ariel and Caliban, and a guy who really likes his books. When Prospero's enemies wash up on shore, he uses his black magic to seek revenge and restore himself to power. The Tempest belongs to the genre of Elizabethan romance plays. It combines elements of tragedy with those of romantic comedy, and like one of Shakespeare's plays previously, it asks deeper questions that are not completely resolved at the end. The tone that seeps into the play is one of wonder, amazement, and admiration. Mystery is still present , but the magic performed is not black and scary. The version that seems to grasp my attention more, would have to be the Utah Valley University interpretation because it takes Shakespeare’s main purpose and tone but shows it in its own unique way. Furthermore, with its silly drunkards, the play has a certain lightness to it and even the so called killers of the King tell hilarious jokes and are lighthearted. But there is also the tone of revenge and reconciliation in the play. We feel a revenge burning in Prospero while, at the same time, a wish for forgiveness and reconciliation with those who have wronged him.

     In Shakespeare's The Tempest, Prospero's magic is the means that Prospero teaches his lessons to the plays various characters. Whether or not those lessons were learned or not is irrelevant. The main issue is that Prospero's character is indeed a complex one, and one that deserves much attention. Two essays that look at the complexity of Prospero and his magic are Stephen Miko's "Tempest," and Barbara Mowat's "Prospero, Agrippa, and Hocus Pocus." Both of these essays, in dealing with Prospero and his magic reveal things about Prospero that only enhance the mystery of his character.

    William Shakespeare wrote The Tempest, arguably his finest work, on the eve of European colonization of the New World in 1611 (Hollander and Kermode 445-46). As a result, common European ideas about the New World in the early 1600s are alluded to throughout the play (446). Through the propagandistic writings of explorers like Captain John Smith, who authored a sensational and unsubstantiated account of his dramatic rescue from death at the hands of Indians by the Indian chiefís beautiful daughter, Pocahontas, many Europeans developed an interest in the inhabitants of the New World (Smith 24-25). Indeed, from the various explorers' stories that trickled hack to Europe, two different

Aime Cesaire’s A Tempest is a ‘new world’ response to Shakespeare’s The Tempest. In Cesaire’s adaptation, the characters and plot are generally the same. However, there are a few small deviations from Shakespeare’s The Tempest that make a significant impact on the play as a whole, and lead the play to illustrate important social issues occurring in the time of the adaptation.

     Shakespeare uses subplots to dramatize the action of the play and give spark on the contrast for the themes in King Lear. Sub plots usually improve the effect of dramatic irony and suspense. The latter, which is used in King Lear, gives us the understanding of the emotions of the characters in the play. This follows the parallelism between Gloucester and King Lear.

The play, The Tempest, by William Shakespeare is a very cleverly thought out piece of work. Shakespeare very deliberately inter-relates several different forms of power during the course of the play. There is political power, shown through the plethora of political characters and their schemes, while at the same time parodied by the comic characters. The power of magic and love, and its ability to reunite and absolve also plays a major role in the play. Throughout the play, Prospero, the main character, takes great advantage of his power and authority, both properly and improperly. The epiphany of this however, is realized at the end of the play.

   A production of The Tempest should emphasize the idealized methods in which Prospero uses magic to solve the problem of revenge which is so prevalent throughout his tragedies, perhaps the production might be a direct allegory for the magic of the theatre itself.   In this conception of the play, the scattering and bringing together of the characters in the script is significant in that theatre also could be said to bring people together and allow them to share in an experience of emotion, magic, and finally, of resolution. In this way the production could be used as a vehicle for conveying the idealistic virtues of forgiveness, compassion, and of course knowledge. In his book, A

Theater and film do both reflecting changes in society and changing society, forcing it to push past it’s limits. When films, televisions and plays are produced, their authors include and reflect the events that are taking place in society during that period. All positive and negative events are included. The events, which are shown, reflect the outcomes on society and its people. For example in the play King Lear, written by William Shakespeare, the play talks about certain events going on during the time which the play took place which are disobedience of parents, greed and jealousy. Both the kings’ daughters represent the greed which people are exposed to. People harm the closest people they have just to maintain money and power. Because

Among Shakespeare’s many works, Hamlet and The Tempest both have unique qualities to them. Hamlet is considered by many to be the bard’s magnum opus, his finest work. The Tempest meanwhile is known as his last work. Interestingly, they also both have similar themes, primarily revenge and fate. However in this regard they are opposite- Hamlet fails utterly, while Prospero is met with outstanding success. It is this juxtaposition that lead me to believe that The Tempest was meant to be a foil for Hamlet- Shakespeare’s last work serving as a foil for his greatest.

Through the initial flattening and destabilization of the once existent social hierarchy in both texts, characters are forced to examine their attitudes to power, dominance and through self-examination, discover that power comes from within. The eponymous tempest that occurs in Act 1 of Shakespeare play, the illusion of a storm, which places everyone In Prospero’s power, reveals that the courtly order of Milan becomes meaningless when everyone is in the same boat and that true nobility is based on an inner quality and not an outer rank.

have been used invidious media since our earlier times. They have been used to instill fear in us,

Throughout the years since The Tempest was first published in the 1623 Folio, there has been much debate among Shakespeare’s contemporaries and critics as to the significance of the figure of Prospero and other major characters featured in the work. In this paper, I want to examine the figure of Prospero and his relationship with the character Ariel. In doing this, I want to show how Prospero is a figure for the artist, how Ariel is a figure for the poetic imagination, and how the relationship between Prospero and Ariel explores the relationship between the artist and his or her poetic imagination. By showing this, I wish to argue that Shakespeare’s intention in portraying

Dale Carnegie once said “when life gives you lemons, make lemonade.” The ability to transform something appalling to alluring is a true indication of appreciation for life, but can at times result in consequences. In Shakespeare’s play The Tempest, Prospero commands one of his spirits, Ariel, to summon a tempest as an act of revenge for being deposed as the rightful Duke of Milan by Antonio and Alonso. Although the tempest causes isolation between characters, Ferdinand, Miranda and Ariel are blessed by the tempest; receiving opportunities achieve a better life.

Gonzalo states: "We are people of our own minds and no one else's," by this Gonzalo is telling everyone that no one can control what someone sees or does. This is true unless one is using magic to alter the minds and reality of anyone under the influence of magic. In the Tempest, by William Shakespeare, Prospero uses magic to alter the reality and delude the minds of characters. Love or guilt is a form of magic that naturally occurs in one's life. Prospero creates another magic that is placed in the audience's mind when he asks them to become the master magicians.