How Prospero repents.

As my soul prompts it.

This was a question raised at one of the recent Shakespeare book cubs. Why does Prospero repent like that? It seems rather sudden. Here’s an attempt at an answer. It’s a good question and helps us think about the whole play.

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Introduction: Who is human?

The plot of The Tempest is simple: Prospero fled Milan many years ago, usurped by his brother; he is now a magician on an island, and shipwrecks his brother, and imprisons him, in revenge. By marrying his daughter, Miranda, to Ferdinand, the son of his enemy the King of Naples, Prospero can find not just revenge, but a secure future for Miranda. Eventually, he must choose between the love plot and the revenge plot. He must repent for his anger against the people his shipwrecks. He has to choose love over power (even though he becomes Duke of Milan again: good leaders are not vicious.)

Who counts as human is the central question of the play. Prospero is reminded throughout The Tempest that he is not a true lord: “I am all the subjects that you have”, Caliban taunts him. Prospero’s human superiority over Caliban is worth less than he thinks: he left Milan to become the high mage of the island—and for what? The control of Caliban and Ariel! Some kingdom!

Eventually, his cruelty to them is revealed as a diminution of himself. He repents because he realises he has made himself base by treating others are less than human.

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Ferdinand: Man or Spirit?

The “who is human?” theme come out strongly when Miranda first sees Ferdinand. She says,

What is’t? a spirit?
Lord, how it looks about! Believe me, sir,
It carries a brave form. But ’tis a spirit.

Prospero corrects her,

No, wench; it eats and sleeps and hath such senses
As we have, such. This gallant which thou seest
Was in the wreck; and, but he’s something stain’d
With grief that’s beauty’s canker, thou mightst call him
A goodly person: he hath lost his fellows
And strays about to find ’em.

Prospero tells Miranda that Ferdinand is human, not spirit. This is a familiar theme from The Merchant of Venice, where Antonio’s treatment of Shylock as less-than-human is the basis of their tragic feud. But Prospero will not treat Ferdinand as an equal. (The line “hath such senses/ As we have” recalls Shylock “if you prick us do we not bleed?”)

She replies,

I might call him
A thing divine, for nothing natural
I ever saw so noble.

Prospero, like many a father, thinks this is a sign that he is in control.

It goes on, I see,
As my soul prompts it. Spirit, fine spirit! I'll free thee
Within two days for this.

To make sure this is understood, Shakespeare has Prospero repeat himself a few lines later. He expects to control Ferdinand through Miranda, and to free Ariel in reward. (He has said it earlier too.)¹ Of course, whatever control he had in bringing them together is now in free-fall. Ferdinand becomes a prisoner but he and Miranda continue to fall in love and she tells him to ignore the work he has been given: Prospero is too busy studying magic to notice. Real power often eludes Prospero without his immediate presence to inflict cruelty.

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Revenge or love?

Meanwhile, Prospero andAriel torment his enemies who have been captured and imprisoned.

My high charms work
And these mine enemies are all knit up
In their distractions; they now are in my power;
And in these fits I leave them, while I visit
Young Ferdinand, whom they suppose is drown'd,
And his and mine loved darling.

He is torn between the true affection between Ferdinand and Miranda and his zeal for revenge. But note the contradiction. It cannot last that Prospero expects Ferdinand to marry Miranda while he imprisons Ferdinand’s relative.

After the betrothal of Ferdinand and Miranda, he says to Ariel, “I must use you/ In such another trick… I must/ Bestow upon the eyes of this young couple/ Some vanity of mine art.” This is the masque, a parade of spirits for their entertainment. At the end, Prospero says he had forgotten about the “foul conspiracy/ Of the beast Caliban”, who is plotting against his life.