George Washington University
Discourse and the Individual: The Case of Colonialism in "The Tempest"
Author(s): Meredith Anne Skura
Source: Shakespeare Quarterly, Vol. 40, No. 1 (Spring, 1989), pp. 42-69
Published by: Folger Shakespeare Library in association with George Washington University
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Discourse and the Individual: The
Case of Colonialism in The Tempest
MEREDITH
ANNE SKURA
FOR
MANY YEARS IDEALIST READINGS OF THE TEMPEST presentedProsperoas
an exemplaroftimelesshumanvalues. Theyemphasizedtheway in which
his hard-earned"magical" powersenable himto re-educatetheshipwrecked
Italians, to heal theircivil war-and, even moreimportant,to triumphover
his own vengefulnessby forgivinghis enemies;theyemphasizedthe way he
achieves, if not a wholly "brave," at least a harmoniouslyreconcilednew
world. Withinthe last few years, however,numbersof criticshave offered
similarcritiquesof thisreading.Thereis an essay on The Tempest
remarkably
in each of threerecentanthologiesof alternative,political, and reproduced
Shakespearecriticism,and anotherin the volumeon estrangingRenaissance
criticism;The Tempestwas a focus forthe 1988 SAA session on "Shakespeare and Colonialism" and was one of the mastheadplays in the Folger
Institute's1988 seminaron newdirectionsin Shakespearestudies. Together,
1 Two of the
earliestof thesecritiqueswereactuallywritten,althoughnotpublished,by 1960:
George Lamming, "A monster,a child, a slave" (1960) in The Pleasures of Exile (London:
Allison and Busby, 1984); JamesSmith, "The Tempest" (1954) in Shakespearian and Other
Essays, ed. E. M. Wilson (Cambridge:CambridgeUniv. Press, 1974), pp. 159-261. Two more
articles,less politicized,followedin the sixties:PhilipBrockbank,"The Tempest:Conventions
of Art and Empire" in Later Shakespeare, eds. J. R. Brown and B. Harris (London: Edward
Arnold, 1966), pp. 183-201; and D. G. James,"The New World" in The Dream of Prospero
(Oxford:ClarendonPress, 1967), pp. 72-123.
The recentgroup, returningto the political perspectiveof the firsttwo, includes: Stephen
Greenblatt,"Learning to Curse: Aspectsof LinguisticColonialismin theSixteenthCentury"in
FirstImages ofAmerica,ed. Fredi Chiappelli, 2 vols. (Los Angeles: Univ. of CaliforniaPress,
1976), Vol. 2, 561-80; BruceErlich,"Shakespeare's Colonial Metaphor:On theSocial Function
of Theatrein The Tempest,"Science and Society,41 (1977), 43-65; Lorie Leininger,"Cracking
the Code of The Tempest,"BucknellReview, 25 (1980), 121-31; PeterHulme, "Hurricanesin
the Caribbees: The Constitutionof the Discourse of English Colonialism" in 1642: Literature
and Power in theSeventeenth
Century,Proceedingsof theEssex conferenceon the Sociology of
Literature,eds. Francis Barkeret al. (Colchester:Univ. of Essex, 1981), pp. 55-83; Paul N.
Siegel, "Historical Ironies in The Tempest," Shakespeare Jahrbuch,119 (Weimar: 1983),
104-11; FrancisBarkerand PeterHulme, "Nymphsand reapersheavilyvanish: the discursive
con-textsof The Tempest" in AlternativeShakespeares, ed. JohnDrakakis (London and New
York: Methuen, 1985), pp. 191-205; Terence Hawkes, "Swisser-Swatter:makinga man of
Englishletters"in AlternativeShakespeares,pp. 26-46; Paul Brown, " 'This thingof darkness
I acknowledgemine': The Tempestand thediscourseof colonialism" in Political Shakespeare:
New essays in culturalmaterialism(Ithaca, N.Y., and London: CornellUniv. Press, 1985), pp.
48-71; Peter Hulme, Colonial Encounters: Europe and the native Caribbean, 1492-1797
(London and New York: Methuen,1986), pp. 89-134; ThomasCartelli,"Prosperoin Africa:The
Tempestas colonialist text and pretext" in Shakespeare Reproduced: The textin historyand
ideology,eds. JeanHoward and Marion O'Conner (New York: Methuen,1987), pp. 99-115; I
would include two essays by StephenOrgel somewhatdifferent
in theirfocus but nonetheless
related: "Prospero's Wife" in Rewritingthe Renaissance, eds. Margaret Ferguson et al.
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THE CASE OF COLONIALISM IN THE TEMPEST
43
the revisionistscall for a move to counteractsome "deeply ahistorical
readings" of The Tempest,2a play that is now seen to be not simply an
allegory about "timeless"3 or universal experience but rathera cultural
phenomenonthathas its originin and effecton "historical" events,specifically in English colonialism. "New historicist" criticismin general, of
whichmuchrecentworkon The Tempestis a part,has itselfbegun to come
underscrutiny,but thenumeroushistoricalreinterpretations
of The Tempest
deservecloserattentionin theirown right,4and theywill be thesubjectof the
restof thisessay.
In assessing the "new" historicistversionof the play, it is importantto
realize that here, even more than in other new historical criticism, an
historicalemphasisin itselfis notnew. Since theearlynineteenth
centuryThe
Tempesthas been seen in thehistoricalcontextof theNew World,and Frank
Kermode, citing the early scholars, argued in the fiftiesthat reportsof a
particularepisode in Britisheffortsto colonize NorthAmericahad precipitatedtheplay's majorthemes.5In 1609 nine ships had leftEngland to settle
the colony in Jamestown,Virginia,and theSea Venture,carryingall of the
colonial officers,
had disappeared.But its passengersreappearedin Virginia
one yearlater,miraculouslysaved; theyhad wreckedofftheBermudas,until
thenbelieved demonicallydangerousbutnow foundto be providentially
mild
and fruitful.These events,muchin the news in the yearjust precedingThe
Tempest,have long been seen as a relevantcontextforthe play by all but a
veryfewcritics.6These earlierhistoricalinterpretations
generallyplaced the
play and its immediatesourcein thecontextof voyagingdiscoursein general,
whichstressedtheromanceand exoticismof discoveriesin theOld as well as
theNew World.Even the "factual" reportsin thisdiscourse,as CharlesFrey
notes,werethemselvescoloredby theromanceof thesituation,forbetterand
forworse; and the traditionalview was thatThe Tempest'sstylizedallegory
abstractsthe romancecore of all voyagers' experience.7
Nor had traditionalcriticismentirelyignoredeitherProspero's flaws8or
theirrelation to the dark side of Europe's confrontation
with the Other.
(Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1986), pp. 50-64, and "Shakespeare and the Cannibals" in
Cannibals, Witches,and Divorce: EstrangingtheRenaissance, ed. MarjorieGarber(Baltimore
and London: JohnsHopkins Univ. Press, 1987), pp. 40-66.
2 Hulme, Colonial Encounters,p. 94.
3
See, forexample, Paul Brown, "This thingof darkness," p. 48.
4
In factEdward Pechter,in one of the earliestof such scrutinies,cited several of the recent
Tempestarticles as especially problematic.See "The New Historicismand Its Discontents:
PoliticizingRenaissance Drama," PMLA, 102 (1987), 292-303. See also Howard Felperin,
"Making it 'neo': The new historicismand Renaissanceliterature,"TextualPractice, 1 (1987),
262-77; Jean Howard, "The New Historicismin Renaissance Studies," English Literary
Renaissance, 16 (1986), 13-43; and AnthonyB. Dawson, "Measure for Measure, New
Historicism,and TheatricalPower," Shakespeare Quarterly,39 (1988), 328-41.
5 The
Tempest,The ArdenShakespeare,ed. FrankKermode(London: Methuen,1954), p. xxv.
For an accountoftheworkofearlierscholarsexploringtheconnectionbetweentheplay and these
documents,see Kermode,pp. xxv-xxxiv,and CharlesFrey,"The Tempestand theNew World,"
SQ, 30 (1979), 29-41.
6 E. E. Stoll and Northrop
Frye are the only exceptionsI have seen cited.
7
Recentlytherehas been a renewedemphasison theromanceelements.See GarySchmidgall,
"The Tempestand Primaleon:A New Source," SQ, 37 (1986), 423-39, esp. p. 436; and Robert
Wiltenberg,"The 'Aeneid' in 'The Tempest,' " ShakespeareSurvey,39 (1987), 159-68.
8 See, for
example, Harry Berger's importantessay, "Miraculous Harp: A Reading of
Shakespeare's Tempest," Shakespeare Studies, 5 (1969), 253-83.
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44
SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
Kermode had identifiedCaliban as the "core" or "ground" of the play,
of "uncivilized" man
withthisstrangerepresentative
insofaras confrontation
human
nature.HarryLevin,
of
"civilized"
reexamination
the
prompts play's
Leslie Fiedler, Leo Marx, and othershad suggestedthatin tryingto underof "uncivilized" humannature,Prosstandthe New World representatives
had
like
other
imposedOld (and New) Worldstereotypesof
Europeans,
pero,
on the Native Americans,distortingperception
innocence and monstrosity
withhope and fear.9Fiedler's landmarkbook had indeedplaced The Tempest
suggestivelyin thecontextof a seriesofplays abouttheOther(or, as he called
it in 1972, the "Stranger") in Shakespeare,showingCaliban's resemblance
to the demonized women, Moors, and Jews in the canon. 0. Manoni had
added that,in this process, Prosperodisplayedthe psychologyof colonials
who projectedtheirdisownedtraitsonto New World natives.10
Why, then,so manyrecentarticles?In part theyare simplyshiftingthe
emphasis.Revisionistsclaim thattheNew Worldmaterialis notjust present
but is rightat the centerof the play, and thatit demandsfarmore attention
than criticshave been willing to grantit. They argue thatthe civil war in
Milan thathad oustedProsperoshouldbe recognizedas merelyan episode in
a minordisputebetweenItalian dynasties,of littleimportcomparedto the
transatlantic
action;" theyshow how thelove storycan be seen as a political
maneuverby Prosperoto ensurehis returnto powerin Milan,12and how even
Caliban's attemptedrape of Mirandacan be seen as an expressionnotmerely
of sexual but also of territorial
lust, understandablein its context.13
These recentcriticsare notsimplyrepeatingtheolderones, however;they
are makingimportantdistinctions.First and most explicitly,they are not
calling attentionto historyin generalbut ratherto one aspect of history:to
powerrelationsand to the ideologyin whichpowerrelationsare encoded.14
The revisionistslook not at the New World materialin the play but to the
play's effecton power relationsin the New World. What mattersis notjust
the particularBermudapamphletsactuallyechoed in the play but ratherthe
whole "ensemble of fictionaland lived practices" known as "English
colonialism," which, it is now being claimed, provides the "dominant
discursivecon-texts"'5 forthe play. (Though the term"colonialism" may
allude to theentirespectrumof New Worldactivity,in thesearticlesit most
oftenrefersspecificallyto the use of power, to the Europeans' exploitative
treatmentof the New World and its inhabitants-and I
and self-justifying
shall use it in thatsense.) If Caliban is thecenterof theplay, it is notbecause
9 HarryLevin, The Mythof the GoldenAge in theRenaissance (Bloomington:Indiana Univ.
Press, 1969); Leslie A. Fiedler,The Strangerin Shakespeare(New York: Stein and Day, 1972);
Leo Marx, "Shakespeare's AmericanFable," The Machine in the Garden (London and New
York: OxfordUniv. Press, 1964), pp. 34-72.
10 0. Manoni, Prospero and Caliban: The Psychologyof Colonization,trans.Pamela Powesland (1950; rpt. New York: Praeger, 1964).
11 Hulme, Colonial Encounters,p. 133.
12 Hulme, Colonial Encounters,p. 115; Barker and Hulme, p. 201; Orgel, "Prospero's
Wife," pp. 62-63.
13
Orgel, "Shakespeare and the Cannibals," p. 55.
14
As Paul Werstinewrotein thebrochureannouncingtheNEH HumanitiesInstituteon "New
Directionsin ShakespeareCriticism" (The Folger ShakespeareLibrary,1988), "To appreciate
The Tempest. . . today . . . we must understand discourses of colonialism, power,
legitimation."
15 Barkerand
Hulme, p. 198.
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THE CASE OF COLONIALISM IN THE TEMPEST
45
ofhis role in theplay's self-contained
and noteven because of what
structure,
he reveals about man's timeless tendencyto demonize "strangers," but
because Europeanswereat thattimeexploitingthereal Calibans of theworld,
and The Tempestwas partof theprocess. It is no longerenoughto suggestthat
Europeans were tryingto make sense of the Indian; rather,the emphasisis
now on the way Europeans subdued the Indian to "make sense/order/
money-not of him, so muchas out of him."16 Revisionistsarguethatwhen
the English talked about these New World inhabitants,they did not just
innocentlyapply stereotypesor project theirown fears: they did so to a
particulareffect,whetherwittinglyor unwittingly.The various distortions
werediscursivestrategiesthatservedthepoliticalpurposeof makingtheNew
World fit into a schema justifyingcolonialism.17 Revisionists therefore
emphasize the discursive strategiesthat the play shares with all colonial
discourse, and the ways in which The Tempest itself not only displays
or justiprejudicebut fostersand even "enacts" colonialismby mystifying
fyingProspero'spowerover Caliban.'8 The new pointis thatThe Tempestis
a political act.
entails
Second, thisshiftin our attitudetowardtheobject of interpretation
a less explicit but extremelyimportantmove away fromthe psychological
thathad previouslyseemedappropriatefortheplay (even to its
interpretation
detractors)largelybecause of itscentralfigurewho, so like Shakespeare,runs
the show. Whereearliercriticismof Prosperotalkedabout his "prejudice,"
themorerecentrevisioniststalkabout"power" and "euphemisation." Thus,
a criticwritingin 1980 arguedthatThe Tempest's"allegorical and Neoplatonic overlay masks some of the most damaging prejudices of Western
had changed: "The Tempestis
civilization";'9 but by 1987 the formulation
. . .fully implicatedin the process of 'euphemisation',the effacementof
even as they,
power," in "operations[that]encode struggleand contradiction
or because they,striveto insiston thelegitimacyof colonialistnarrative."20
at best; one recent
Psychologicalcriticismof theplay is seen as distracting
critic,forexample,opens his argumentby claimingthatwe need to conceive
The Tempestin an historicalcontextthat is not "hamstrungby specious
speculationsconcerning'Shakespeare's mind'."21 Even in less polemical
examples the "political unconscious" oftenreplaces, ratherthan supplements,any otherunconscious;attentionto cultureand politics is associated
16 Hawkes, "Swisser-Swatter," p. 28.
17
Thus stereotypes,
forexample,servedas partof a "discursivestrategy... to locate or 'fix'
a colonial otherin a position of inferiority. ." (Paul Brown, modifyingEdward Said on
orientalism,p. 58).
18 Actually,this pointtoo is a matterof emphasis. R. R. Cawley ("Shakspere's Use of the
Voyagersin The Tempest,"PMLA, 41 [1926], 688-726) and Kermode,amongothers,had noted
in passingsome similaritiesbetweentheplay's view of Caliban and thedistortionsof colonialist
self-servingrhetoricalpurposes; but revisioniststake this to be the importantpoint, not to be
over.
passed
19
Leininger,"Cracking the Code of The Tempest," p. 122.
20
Paul Brown,pp. 64, 66. Brownalso contendsthatThe Tempest"exemplifies... a moment
of historicalcrisis. This crisis is the struggleto produce a coherentdiscourse adequate to the
of Britishcolonialismin its initialphase" (p. 48).
complex requirements
21 Hulme, Colonial Encounters,p. 93. Laterhe does granta littlegroundto thepsychological
of ProsperowithShakespeareyet
criticsin allowingthattheir"totally spurious" identification
"half graspsthecrucialpointthatProspero. . . is a dramatistand creatorof theatricaleffects"
(p. 115).
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46
SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
with an implicitquestioningof individualityand of subjectiveexperience.
Such a stance extends beyond an objection to wholesale projections of
twentieth-century
subjects,or to psychoassumptionsonto sixteenth-century
thattotallyignoretheculturalcontextin whichpsyches
logical interpretations
exist. As FrederickJamesonarguedin a workthatlies behindmanyof these
specificstudies,it derivesfromthe desire to transcendpersonalpsychology
altogether,because Freud's psychologyremains"locked intothecategoryof
the individualsubject."22 The emphasisnow is on psychologyas a product
of culture,itselfa political structure;
theveryconceptof a psycheis seen to
be a productof the culturalnexus evolved duringthe Renaissance, and
the
indeed, psychoanalysisitself,ratherthanbeing a way of understanding
Renaissancepsyche,is a marginaland belatedcreationof thissame nexus.23
Thus therevisionists,withJameson,maylook fora "political unconscious"
and makeuse of Freud's insightsintothe "logic of dreams"24-the concepts
of displacement,condensation,themanagementof desire25-but theydo not
accept Freud's assumptionsabout the mind-or the subject-creating that
?logic.26The agent who displaces or manages is not the individualbut the
"collective or associative" mind;at timesit seems to be thetextitself,seen
as a "libidinal apparatus" or "desiring machine"27 independentof any
individualcreator.
The revisionistimpulsehas been one of themostsalutaryin recentyearsin
correctingNew Critical"blindness" to historyand ideology. In particularit
has revealedtheways in whichtheplay has been "reproduced" and drafted
intotheserviceof colonialistpoliticsfromthenineteenth
centurythroughG.
Wilson Knight'stwentieth-century
celebrationof Prosperoas representative
of England's "colonizing, especially her will to raise savage peoples from
and theattendantfears
and blood-sacrifice,taboos and witchcraft
superstition
and slaveries, to a moreenlightenedexistence."28But here, as criticshave
been suggestingabout new historicismin general, it is now in danger of
fosteringblindnessof its own. Grantedthat somethingwas wrong with a
commentarythatfocused on The Tempestas a self-containedproject of a
22
"From the pointof view of a political hermeneutic,measuredagainstthe requirementsof
remains
a 'political unconscious,' we must conclude that the conceptionof wish-fulfillment
locked in a problematicof the individualsubject . . .which is only indirectlyuseful to us."
is thatit is "always outside of time, outside of narrative"
The objection to wish-fulfillment
and history;"what is moredamaging,fromthe presentperspective,is thatdesire . . . remains
locked intothecategoryof the individualsubject,even if the formtakenby the individualin it
is no longertheego or theself,buttheindividualbody. . . .the need to transcendindividualistic
is in manyways thefundamentalissuefor any doctrine
categoriesand modes of interpretation
of thepolitical unconscious" (The Political Unconscious:Narrativeas a Socially SymbolicAct
[Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell Univ. Press, 1981], pp. 66, 68, italics added).
23 StephenGreenblatt,"Psychoanalysisand Renaissance Culture," LiteraryTheory/Renaissance Texts,eds. PatriciaParkerand David Quint(Baltimore:JohnsHopkinsUniv. Press, 1986),
210-24.
24 Jameson,p. 12. So, too, Freud's "hermeneutic
manual" can be of use to thepoliticalcritic
(p. 65).
25 "Norman Holland's suggestiveterm," Jameson,p. 49.
26
Jameson,p. 67. Cf. Paul Brown, "My use of Freudiantermsdoes not mean thatI endorse
its ahistorical,Europocentricand sexist models of psychicaldevelopment.However, a materialist criticismdeprivedof such conceptsas displacementand condensationwould be seriously
.. ." (p. 71, n. 35).
impoverished
27
JamesondiscussingAlthusser(p. 30) and Greimas(p. 48).
28 The Crown
of Life (1947; rpt. New York: Barnes & Noble, 1966), p. 255.
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THE CASE OF COLONIALISM IN THE TEMPEST
47
self-contained
individualand thatignoredthepoliticalsituationin 1611. But
somethingseems wrongnow also, somethingmore than the rhetoricalexcesses characteristicof any innovativecriticalmovement.The recentcriticism not only flattensthe text into the mold of colonialist discourse and
eliminateswhatis characteristically
"Shakespearean" in orderto foreground
whatis "colonialist," but it is also-paradoxically-in dangerof takingthe
fromthe particularhistoricalsituationin England in 1611 even
play further
as it bringsit closer to whatwe mean by "colonialism" today.
It is difficultto extrapolateback fromG. Wilson Knight's colonialist
discourseto seventeenth-century
colonialistdiscoursewithoutknowingmore
abouttheparticularsof thatearlierdiscourse.Whatis missingfromtherecent
articlesis theconnectionbetweenthenew insightsaboutculturalphenomena
like "power" and "fields of discourse" and thetraditionalinsightsaboutthe
text, its immediatesources, its individualauthor-and his individualpsychology.Thereis littlesense of how discourseis relatedto theindividualwho
was creating,even as he was participating
in, thatdiscourse. The following
discussion will suggesthow such a relationmightbe conceived. Sections I
and II brieflyelaborateon The Tempest'sversionsof problemsraised by new
historicisttreatmentof the text and its relationto the historicalcontext;
sectionsIII and IV go on to suggestthatthe recognitionof the individuality
of the play, and of Shakespeare, does not counterbut ratherenrichesthe
of thatcontext.Perhaps by testingindividualcases, we can
understanding
avoid the circularityof a definitionthat assumes that "colonialism" was
presentin a given groupof texts,and so "discovers" it there.
I
How do we know that The Tempest "enacts" colonialism ratherthan
merelyalludingto theNew World?How do we know thatCaliban is partof
the "discourse of colonialism"? To ask such a questionmayseem perversely
naive, buttheplay is notoriouslyslippery.Therehave been, forexample,any
numberof interpretations
of Caliban,29 includingnot only contemporary
post-colonialversionsin whichCaliban is a VirginianIndian but also others
in whichCaliban is playedas a black slave or as "missinglink" (in a costume
"half monkey,half coco-nut"30), with the interpretation
drawingon the
issues thatwere being debated at the time-on the discursivecontextsthat
were culturallyoperative-and articulatedaccordingto "changing AngloAmericanattitudestowardprimitiveman."31 Most recentlyone teacherhas
suggestedthatThe Tempestis a good play to teachin juniorcolleges because
studentscan identifywithCaliban.
is made even more problematichere because, despite the
Interpretation
in English colonialism,32we have no
claims about the play's intervention
audiences thoughtthe play reexternalevidence that seventeenth-century
ferredto theNew World.In an age whenreal voyageswereread allegorically,
"
29 See TrevorR.
Griffiths, 'This Island's mine': Caliban and Colonialism," Yearbook of
English Studies, 13 (1983), 159-80.
30
p. 166.
Griffiths,
"
31
VirginiaMason Vaughan, 'SomethingRich and Strange':Caliban's TheatricalMetamor36
(1985), 390-405, esp. p. 390.
phoses," SQ,
32
Erlich, "Shakespeare's Colonial Metaphor," p. 49; Paul Brown, p. 48.
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48
SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
the statusof allegorical voyages like Prospero's can be doubly ambiguous,
especiallyin a play like The Tempest,whichprovidesan encyclopediccontext
forProspero'sexperience,presentingit in termsof an extraordinary
rangeof
classical, biblical, and romanticexiles, discoveries, and confrontations.33
difficult
Evidence fortheplay's originalreceptionis of courseextraordinarily
we do
that
to
Caliban
to find,but in the two nearlycontemporary
responses
know about, the evidence fora colonialistresponseis at best ambiguous.In
BartholomewFair (1614) Jonsonrefersscornfullyto a "servant-monster,"
and the Folio identifiesCaliban as a "salvage and deformedslave"34 in the
rootedin the discourse
cast list. Both "monster" and "salvage" are firmly
of Old World wild men, thoughthe latterwas of course also applied to the
New Worldnatives.In otherwords,thesetwo seventeenth-century
responses
tendto invokethe universaland not the particularimplicationsof Caliban's
condition.A recentstudyof theplay's historysuggeststhat"if Shakespeare,
howeverobliquely,meantCaliban to personifyAmerica's natives,his intention apparentlymiscarriedalmostcompletely."35
testimony,the obvious reason for our
Despite this lack of contemporary
feelingthatthe play "is" colonialist-more so than The Winter'sTale or
HenryVIII, forexample,whichwerewrittenat roughlythesame time-is, of
course, the literal resemblance between its plot and certain events and
attitudesin Englishcolonial history:Europeansarrivein theNew Worldand
assume theycan appropriatewhatproperlybelongsto theNew WorldOther,
who is then "erased." The similaritiesare clear and compelling-more so
thanin manycases of new historicalreadings;theproblem,however,is that
while there are also many literal differencesbetween The Tempest and
colonialistfictionsand practice,thesimilaritiesare takento be so compelling
that the differencesare ignored. Thus Caliban is taken to "be" a Native
Caliban from
Americandespitethefactthata multitudeof detailsdifferentiate
theIndianas he appearedin thetravelers'reportsfromtheNew World.36Yet
it does seem significant
that,despitehis closeness to nature,his naivete,his
devil worship, his susceptibilityto European liquor, and, above all, his
33 Even St. Paul in his travels(echoed in the
play) metnativeswho-like Caliban-thought
him a god.
34
Hulme producesas evidenceagainstShakespearethesefourwordsfromthecast list, which
Shakespearemay or may not have written("Hurricanes in the Caribbees," p. 72).
35 Alden T.
Vaughan, "Shakespeare's Indian: The Americanizationof Caliban," SQ, 39
(1988), 137-53. He arguesthattheintentionmiscarriednotonlyat thetimebutalso forthethree
centuriesfollowing. He adds, "Rather, fromthe Restorationuntil the late 1890s, Caliban
but an Indian" (p. 138).
appearedon stage and in criticalliteratureas almosteverything
36 Hulme, while noting Caliban's "anomalous nature," sees the anomaly as yet another
colonialist strategy:"In ideological terms [Caliban is] a compromise formationand one
achieved, like all such formations,
onlyat theexpenseof distortionelsewhere" ("Hurricanes in
the Caribbees," pp. 71, 72). This begs the question: Caliban can only be a "distortion" if he
is intendedto representsomeone. But thatis preciselythe question-is he meantto representa
Native American?SidneyLee notedthatCaliban's methodof buildingdams forfishreproduces
on theresemblance,therest
theIndians'; thoughhe is oftencitedby laterwritersas an authority
of his evidence is not convincing("The Call of the West: Americaand ElizabethanEngland,"
Elizabethan and OtherEssays, ed. FrederickS. Boas [Oxford:Clarendon Press, 1929], pp.
essay abouttherelationshipbetweenCaliban
263-301). G. WilsonKnighthas an impressionistic
and Indians ("Caliban as Red Man" [1977] in Shakespeare's Styles, eds. Philip Edwards,
Inga-StinaEwbank, and G. K. Hunter[London: CambridgeUniv. Press, 1980]). Hulme lists
Caliban's resemblancesto Caribs ("Hurricanes in the Caribbees"), and Kermodecites details
takenfromnativesvisitedduringboththe Old and the New World voyages.
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THE CASE OF COLONIALISM IN THE TEMPEST
49
"treachery"-characteristicsassociated in writingsof the time with the
Indians-he nonethelesslacks almostall of thedefiningexternaltraitsin the
manyreportsfromthe New World-no superhumanphysique,no nakedness
or animal skin (indeed, an English "gaberdine" instead), no decorative
no arrows,no pipe, no tobacco, no body paint, and-as Shakefeathers,37
speare takespains to emphasize-no love of trinketsand trash.No one could
mistakehim for the stereotyped"Indian with a greattool," mentionedin
passing in Henry VIII. Caliban in fact is more like the devils Strachey
expectedto findon theBermudaisland(butdidn't)thanlike theIndianswhom
did findin Virginia,thoughhe is not whollya monsterfromthe
adventurers
wild
tales either.38
explorers'
In other ways, too, it is assumed that the similaritiesmatterbut the
do not: thusProspero'smagic occupies "the space really inhabdifferences
itedin colonial historyby gunpowder"39(emphasismine); or, whenProspero
has Caliban pinchedby thespirits,he showsa "similar sadism" to thatof the
Haitian masterswho "roasted slaves or buried them alive";40 or, when
Prospero and Ariel huntCaliban with spiritdogs, theyare equated to the
Spaniardswho huntedNative Americanswithdogs.41 So long as thereis a
in fact,
are irrelevant.The differences,
core of resemblance,the differences
are themselvestaken to be evidence of the colonialist ideology at work,
rationalizingand euphemizingpower-or else inadvertentslips. Thus the
case forcolonialismbecomes strongerinsofaras Prosperois good and insofar
as Caliban is in somewaysbad-he did tryto rapeMiranda-or is himselfnow
caughttryingto falsifythepast by occludingtherape and presentinghimself
as an innocentvictimof Prospero's tyranny.Prospero's goodness and Caliban's badness are called rationalizations,justificationsfor Prospero's tyranny.Nor does it matterthattheplay seemsanti-colonialistto thedegreethat
it qualifiesProspero's scornby showingCaliban's virtues,or thatProspero
seems to achieve some kindof transcendenceover his own colonialismwhen
at the end of the play he says, "This thing of darkness I acknowledge
of Caliban is considereda mistake,a
mine."42 Prospero'sacknowledgement
momentof inadvertentsympathyor truth,too briefto counterProspero's
underlyingcolonialism: in spite of the deceptivelyresonantpoetryof his
Prosperoactuallydoes nothingto live up to the meaning
acknowledgement,
whichthatpoetrysuggests;43ithas even been arguedthatProspero,in calling
37 The Indians who would
appear in Chapman's 1613 masque would be fullyequipped with
feathers.See R. R. Cawley, The Voyagers and Elizabethan Drama (Boston: D. C. Heath;
London: OxfordUniv. Press, 1938), p. 359, and Orgel, "Shakespeare and the Cannibals," pp.
44, 47.
38
Shakespearehad apparentlyread up on his monsters(R. R. Cawley, "Shakspere's Use of
the Voyagers," p. 723, and Frey,passim), but he picked up the stereotypesonly to play with
themostentatiously(in Stephano's and Trinculo's many discreditedguesses about Caliban's
of Caliban as "devil").
identity)or to leave themhanging(in Prospero's identification
39
Hulme, "Hurricanesin the Caribbees," p. 74.
40
Lamming(n. 1, above), pp. 98-99.
41
Lamming,p. 97; Erlich, p. 49.
42
The play also seems anti-colonialistbecause it includes the comic sectionswithStephano
and Trinculo, which show colonialism to be "nakedly avaricious, profiteering,
perhaps even
pointless"; butthistoo can be seen as a rationalization:"This low versionof colonialismserves
on to the
civil authority
to displace possiblydamagingcharges. . . againstproperly-constituted
alreadyexcrementalproductsof civility,the masterless" (Paul Brown, p. 65).
43
Greenblatt,"Learning to Curse," pp. 570-71; Leininger(n. 1, above), pp. 126-27.
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50
SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
Caliban "mine," is simplyclaimingpossessionof him: "It is as though,after
a public disturbance,a slaveowner said, 'Those two men are yours; this
darkie's mine.' "44
Nonetheless, in addition to these differencesthat have been seen as
rationalizations,thereare many otherdifferencesas well thatcollectively
raise questionsaboutwhatcountsas "colonialist discourse" and aboutwhat,
if anything,mightcountas a relevant"difference."Thus, forexample, any
attemptto cast Prosperoand Caliban as actorsin thetypicalcolonial narrative
(in whicha Europeanexploitsa previouslyfree-indeed a reigning-nativeof
an unspoiled world) is complicatedby two othercharacters,Sycorax and
Ariel. Sycorax,Caliban's mother,throughwhomhe claims possession of the
island, was notonlya witchand a criminal,butshe came fromtheOld World
herself,or at least fromeastern-hemisphere
Argier.45She is a reminderthat
Caliban is onlyhalf-native,thathis claim to theisland is less like the claim
of the Native Americanthanthe claim of the second generationSpaniardin
the New World.46Moreover,Caliban was not alone when Prosperoarrived.
Atiel eithercame to the island with Sycorax or was already living on the
island-its true reigninglord47-when Sycorax arrived and promptlyenslaved him, thus herselfbecomingthe firstcolonialist, the one who established the habitsof dominanceand erasurebeforeProsperoever set footon
the island. Nearly all revisionistsnote some of these differencesbefore
disregardingthem, thoughthey are not agreed on their significance-on
whethertheyare "symptoms" of ideological conflictin the discourse, for
example, or whetherShakespeare's "insights exceeded his sympathies."48
But howevertheyare explained,thedifferences
are discarded.For thecritic
interestedonly in counteractingearlier blindnessto potentiallyracist and
is understandideological elementsin theplay, such ignoringof differences
for
his
or
her
out
The
it
is
to
that
able;
enough point
Tempesthas
purposes,
a "political unconscious" and is connected in some way to colonialist
discoursewithoutspecifyingfurther.
But if the object is, rather,to understandcolonialism, instead of simply
it or condemningit, it is important
to specify,to noticehow the
identifying
colonial elementsare rationalizedor integratedinto the play's vision of the
world. Otherwise,extractingthe play's political unconscious leads to the
same problemsFreudfaced at thebeginningof his careerwhenhe treatedthe
personalunconsciousas an independententitythatshould be almost surgically extractedfromconscious discourse by hypnotizingaway the "defenses." But, as is well known,Freudfoundthatthe conscious "defenses"
were as essential-and problematic-as the supposedlyprior unconscious
44 Leininger,p. 127.
As Fiedler's book implies (n. 9, above), she is less like anythingAmericanthanlike the
FrenchwomanJoan of Arc, who also triedto save herselffromthe law by claiming she was
pregnantwitha bastard;Joansimplywasn't as successful(see pp. 43-81, esp. p. 77).
46 See
Brockbank,p. 193. Even thesedetailscan be discountedas rationalizations,of course.
Paul Brown, for example, explains Sycorax's presence as a rationalization:by degradingher
black magic, he argues,ShakespearemakesProsperoseem betterthanhe is (pp. 60-61). Hulme
notes that Sycorax may be Prospero's invention,pointingout that we never see any direct
evidence thatshe was present(Colonial Encounters,p. 115). Orgel links Caliban's claims of
legitimacyby birthto JamesI's claims ("Prospero's Wife," pp. 58-59).
47 See
Fiedler, p. 205.
48
Erlich, "Shakespeare's Colonial Metaphor," p. 63.
45
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THE CASE OF COLONIALISM IN THE TEMPEST
51
"wish," and thattheyservedpurposesotherthancontainment.49
Indeed, in
most psychoanalyticpracticesince Freud, the unconscious-or, rather,unconscious mentation-is assumed to exist in textsratherthan existingas a
reified"id," and interpretation
mustalways returnto the text.
As in thecase of thepersonalunconscious,thepoliticalunconsciousexists
only in texts, whose "defenses" or rationalizationsmust be taken into
account. Otherwiseinterpretation
not onlydestroysthetext-here The Tempest-as a unique work of art and flattensit into one more example of the
masterplot-or masterploy-in colonialist discourse; it also destroysthe
evidence of the play as a unique culturalartifact,a unique voice in that
discourse. Colonialist discourse was varied enough to escape any simple
even in a groupof textswithapparentthematiclinks. It ranged
formulation,
fromthelived Spanishcolonialistpracticeof huntingNew Worldnativeswith
dogs to BartholomewLas Casas's "factual" accountlamentingand exposing
theviciousnessof thathunt,50to Shakespeare'spossible allusion to it in The
Tempest,whenProsperoand Ariel set spiritdogs on Caliban, to a stillearlier
Shakespeareanallusion-or possible allusion-in theotherwisenon-colonialist A MidsummerNight's Dream, when Puck (who has come fromIndia
himself) chases Greek rude mechanicals with illusory animals in a scene
evokingan entirelyEnglish conflict.The same "colonialist" huntinforms
fictionsand practices,some of which enact colonialism,
radicallydifferent
some of whichsubvertit, and some of whichrequireothercategoriesentirely
to characterizeits effect.
It is not easy to categorize the several links between The Tempestand
colonialist discourse. Take the deceptivelysimple example of Caliban's
name. Revisionistsrightlyemphasizetheimplicationsof thecannibalstereotype as automatic mark of Other in Western ethnocentriccolonialist
discourse,51 and, since Shakespeare'snamefor"Caliban" is widelyaccepted
as an anagramof "cannibal," manyread the play as if he were a cannibal,
with all that the term implies. But an anagram is not a cannibal, and
Shakespeare's use of the stereotypeis hardlyautomatic.52Caliban is no
cannibal-he barelytouchesmeat,confining
himselfmoredelicatelyto roots,
berries, and an occasional fish; indeed, his symbioticharmonywith the
island's naturalfood resourcesis one of his mostattractivetraits.His name
49 The trend,moreover,is to move
termslike "repression" or
away fromanthropomorphic
on whichFreuddrewforhis
"censorship," themselvesinheritedfromthepoliticalterminology
own. Like thevocabularyof "scientific" hydraulicson whichFreudalso drewforhis notionsof
libido flowingand dammingup, the older termsare being replaced by contemporary
terminolratherthan
ogies more appropriateto describinga conflictamong meaningsor interpretations,
betweenanthropomorphized
forcesengaged in a simple struggle"for" and "against."
50 Spaniards,he writes,"taughttheirHounds, fierceDogs, to teare [theIndians] in peeces"
(A briefeNarrationof thedestructionof theIndies bytheSpaniards [1542 (?)], Samuel Purchas,
Purchas His Pilgrimes,20 vols. [Glasgow: Maclehose and Sons, 1905-1907], Vol. XVIII, 91).
This was apparentlya commontopos, foundalso in Eden's translationof PeterMartyr'sDecades
of theNewe Worlde(1555), includedin Eden's Historieof Trauaile (1577), whichShakespeare
read for The Tempest. It was also used by Greene and Deloney (Cawley, Voyagers and
Elizabethan Drama, pp. 383-84).
51 Hulme, "Hurricanes in the Caribbees," pp. 63-66; see also Orgel on this "New World
topos" in "Shakespeare and the Cannibals," pp. 41-44.
52 Neitherwas
Montaigne'sin theessay thathas been takenas a source fortheplay. Scholars
are still debatingabout Montaigne'sattitudetowardcannibals,thoughall agree thathis critical
attitudetowardEuropeans was clear in the essay.
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52
SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
and in
seems morelike a mockeryof stereotypes
thana markof monstrosity,
our haste to confirmthe link between"cannibal" and "Indian" outside the
text, we lose trackof the way in which Caliban severs the link withinthe
text.53While no one would denysome relationbetweenCaliban and theNew
World nativesto whom such termsas "cannibal" were applied, what that
relationis remainsunclear.
To enumeratedifferencesbetween The Tempest and "colonialist discourse" is not to reduce discussionof theplay to a countingcontest,pitting
similaritiesagainstdifferences.Rather,it is to suggestthatinherentin any
analysis of theplay as colonialistdiscourseis a particularassumptionabout
the relationbetweentext and discourse-between one man's fictionand a
collective fiction-or, perhaps,betweenone man's fictionand whatwe take
for"reality." This relationmattersnot only to New Criticstryingto isolate
textsfromcontextsbutto new historicists(or just plain historicists)tryingto
put them back together.The relationis also vital to lived practices like
of opinionabout what
censorshipand inquisitions-and thereare differences
need to be acknowledgedand examcountsin thesecases. Such differences
ined, and themethodforreadingthemneeds to be made moreexplicitbefore
the implicationsof The Tempestas colonialistdiscoursecan be fullyunderstood.
II
of the "discourse" itself,the means
Similarproblemsbeset thedefinition
of identifying
the fictional-and the "lived"-practices constituting"Englishcolonialism" in 1611. Giventheimpactof Englishcolonialismover the
last 350 years, it may again seem perverselynaive to ask what colonialist
discoursewas like in 1611, as opposed to colonialismin 1911 or even in 1625,
the year when Samuel Purchas asked, alluding to the "treachery" of the
VirginianIndians, "Can a Leopard changehis spots? Can a Savage remayning a Savage be civill?" Purchasadded thiscommentwhenhe publishedthe
1610 documentthatShakespearehad used as his sourceforThe Tempest,and
Purchashas been cited as an example of "colonialist discourse."54 Purchas
does indeed display the particularcombinationof exploitativemotivesand
self-justifyingrhetoric-the "effacementof power"55-that revisionists
identifyas colonialist and which theyfindin The Tempest.But, one might
reasonablyask, was the discursivecontextin 1611, when Shakespearewas
writing,thesame as it would be fourteenyearslater,whenPurchasadded his
marginalcomment?56
53 This blend of Old and New World characteristics,earlier seen as characteristicof New
World discourse,is acknowledgedin manyof the revisioniststudiesbut is seen as one of the
rhetoricalstrategiesused to controlIndians.
54
WilliamStrach[e]y,"A truereportorie. . . ," Purchas, Vol. XIX, p. 62. Forthecitationof
Purchasas colonialist, see Hulme, "Hurricanesin the Caribbees," p. 78, n. 21.
55 Paul
Brown, p. 64.
56
This is an entirelyseparatequestionfromanotherthatone mightask: How comparablewere
Purchas's remarks,takenfromthe collectionof travelers'tales whichhe edited, censored,and
used to supporthis colonialist ideal, on the one hand, and a play, on the other?In Purchas,
modulatesandreinforcesa single
ofinterpretations
RichardMarienstrasargues,"the multiplicity
ideological system.The same can certainlynotbe said of ... The Tempest" (New perspectives
on theShakespeareanworld,trans.JanetLloyd [Cambridge:CambridgeUniv. Press, 1985], p.
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THE CASE OF COLONIALISM IN THE TEMPEST
53
There seems, rather,to have been in 1611 a varietyof whatwe mightcall
"New Worlddiscourses" withmultiplepointsof view, motives,and effects,
among which such commentsas Purchas's are not as commonas the revisionistemphasisimplies. These are "colonialist" only in the most general
sense in whichall ethnocentric
culturesare always "colonialist": narcissisticallypursuingtheirown ends, obliviousto thedesires, needs, and even the
existenceof theOther.That is, if thisNew Worlddiscourseis colonialist,it
is so primarilyin thatit ignoresIndians, betrayingits Eurocentricassumptionsabouttheirrelevanceof anypeople otherthanwhite,male, upper-class
Europeans, preferablyfromEngland. It thus expresses not an historically
specificbut a timelessand universalattitudetowardthe "stranger," which
Fiedler described in so many of Shakespeare's plays. We mightsee this
discourse as a precondition57
forcolonialism proper,which was to follow
withtheliteralratherthanthefigurative
colonizingofNew Worldnatives.But
to assumethatcolonialismwas alreadyencodedin theanomaloussituationin
1611 is to underminethe revisionisteffortto understandthe historical
specificityof the momentwhen ShakespearewroteThe Tempest.
It is noteasy to characterizethe situationin 1611. On theone hand, Spain
had long been engagedin thesortof "colonialist discourse" thatrevisionists
findin The Tempest;and even in England at the time therewere examples
of colonialistdiscourse(in therhetoric,if notyetoftenin thelived practices)
producedby those directlyinvolvedin the colonialistprojectand expecting
to profitfromit. The officialadvertisements
in the firstrush of enthusiasm
about Virginia,as well as the streamof defenseswhen the Virginiaproject
began to fail, oftenhave a euphemisticring and oftendo suggesta fundamentalgreedand implicitracismbeneathclaims to be securingtheearthlyand
spiritualwell-beingof the Virginianatives.58("[We] doe buy of themthe
pearlesof earth,and sell to themthepearlesof heauen. ,59) These documents
169). This entirebook, whichdevotesa chapterto The Tempest,is an excellentstudyof "certain
aspects of Elizabethanideology and . . . the way these are used in Shakespeare" (p. 1).
57 See Pechter
(n. 4, above). This kind of "condition," he argues, is really a precondition
in the sense thatit is assumed to be logically (if not chronologically)prior. It is assumed to
have the kind of explanatorypower that"the Elizabethanworldview" was once accorded (p.
297).
58 See, forexample, the
tractsreprintedin Tracts and OtherPapers
followingcontemporary
RelatingPrincipallyto the Origin, Settlement,and Progress of ... NorthAmerica, ed. Peter
Force, 4 vols. (1836-47; rpt.New York: PeterSmith,1947): R. I., "Nova Brittania:OFFERING
MOST ExcellentfruitesbyPlantingIN VIRGINIA. Excitingall suchas be well affectedto further
the same" (1609), Vol. 1, No. 6; "Virginia richlyvalued" (1609), Vol. 4, No. 1; "A TRVE
DECLARATION of theestateof theColonie in Virginia,Witha confutation
of such scandalous
reportsas haue tendedto the disgraceof so worthyan enterprise"(1610), Vol. 3, No. 1; Sil.
Jourdan,"A PLAINE DESCRIPTION OF THE BARMVDAS, NOW CALLED SOMMER
ILANDS" (1613), Vol. 3, No. 3.
In The Genesis of the UnitedStates, ed. AlexanderBrown, 2 vols. (New York: Russell &
Russell, 1964), see also: RobertGray,"A GOOD SPEED to Virginia" (1609), Vol. 1, 293-302;
"A True and Sincere declarationof thepurposeand ends of thePlantationbegunin Virginiaof
the degrees whichit hathreceived; and meanes by whichit hathbeene advanced: and the . . .
conclusionof His Majesties Councel of thatColony . . . untillby the merciesof GOD it shall
retributea fruitfulharvestto theKingdomeof heaven, and thisCommon-Wealth"(1609), Vol.
1, 337-53; "A Publicationby the Counsell of Virginea,touchingthe Plantationthere" (1609),
Vol. 1, 354-56; R. Rich, "NEWES FROM VIRGINIA. THE LOST FLOCKE TRIUMPHANT . .. " (1610), Vol. 1, 420-26.
59 "A Trve Declaration," p. 6.
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54
SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
effacenot only power but most practicalproblemsas well, and they were
supplementedby sermonsromanticizinghardshipsas divine tribulation.60
thisdiscourseare righteousdefensesof takingland from
Scatteredthroughout
the Indians, muchin the spirit-and tone-of Rabbi Zeal-of-the-LandBusy
defendinghis need to eat pig. (This was also the tone familiarfromthe
anti-theatrical
critics-and, indeed, occasional colonialistsermonsincluded
at
the
"Plaiers,"
along withthe Devil and the papists, as particular
snipes
enemies of the Virginiaventure.61)
On the otherhand, even in these documentsnot only is the emphasis
movements.For examelsewherebutoftenthereare important
contradictory
Bermudawreck,refers
the
of
record
official
the
"A
True
Declaration,"
ple,
once to the Indians as "humane beasts" and devotes one paragraphof its
pages to the "greedy Vulture" Powhattanand his ambush. It
twenty-four
notes elsewhere,however,thatsome of the English settlersthemselveshad
"created the Indians our implacable enemies by some violence they had
offered,"and it actuallyspends farmoretime attackingthe lazy "scum of
men" amongthe settlers,who had underminedthecolonyfromwithin,than
demonizingthe less relevantIndians.62
rhetoricis only one
And on the whole, the exploitativeand self-justifying
elementin a complexNew Worlddiscourse.For muchof thetime,in fact,the
mainconflictin theNew Worldwas notbetweenwhitesand NativeAmericans
but between Spain and England. Voyages like Drake's (1577-80) were
motivatedby this internationalconflict,as well as by the romance of
discovery and the lure of treasure-but not by colonizing.63Even when
Raleigh received the firstpatentto settle and trade with the New World
(1584), necessitatingmore extended contact with Native Americans, the
he startedin the 1580s were largelytokensin his play
settlements
temporary
AlexanderBrown,in The Genesis of the UnitedStates, reprintsextractsfromthefollowing
pertinentdocuments:William Symonds, "VIRGINIA: A SERMON PREACHED AT WHITECHAPPEL.. ." (1609), Vol. 1, 282-91; Daniel Price, "SAVLES PROHIBITION STAIDE . .
And to the Inditementof all thatpersecuteChristwith a reproofeof those that traduce the
WilliamCraHonourablePlantationof Virginia" (1609), Vol. 1, 312-16; and, mostimportant,
shaw's sermon titled "A New-yeeres Gift to Virginea," and preached, as the title page
announced,before "Lord La Warre Lord Governourand Captaine Generall of Virginia, and
othersof [the] Counsell . . . At the said Lord Generall his . . . departurefor Virginea . . .
Whereinboth the lawfulnessesof thataction is maintainedand the necessitythereofis also
demonstrated,not so much out of the grounds of Policie, as of Humanity,Equity and
Christianity"(1610), Vol. 1, 360-75.
(in "A New-yeeres
61 In AlexanderBrown, see William Crashaw fortwo of thesereferences
Giftto Virginea" [1610], and "Epistle Dedicatory" to AlexanderWhitaker's"Good Newesfrom
Virginia" [1613], Vol. 2, 611-20); and see Ralphe Hamor in A True Discourse of thePresent
Estate of Virginea(1615), VirginiaState LibraryPublications,No. 3 (Richmond:VirginiaState
Library,1957).
60
62
Pp. 16, 17.
63
For the generalhistoryof the period, see David Beers Quinn, England and theDiscovery
of America, 1481-1620 (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1974); Alexander Brown's Genesis
motivesin thehistoryofcolonization.Such voyagesweremade famous
identifiessimilarshifting
accounts,especiallyin collectionsbyRichardEden and RichardHakluyt,both
by often-reprinted
material
of whose anthologiesShakespearewould consultforThe Tempest.In the introductory
is obvious but so mixedwith
in thesecollections,as in thevoyagesthemselves,theself-interest
excitementand utopianhopes, and so focusedon competitionwithSpain, thattheissue ofrelation
to Indians was dwarfedby comparison.
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THE CASE OF COLONIALISM IN THE TEMPEST
55
forfameand wealthratherthanattemptsto take over sizable portionsof land
fromthe natives.64
Only whenthe war withSpain was over (1604) and ships were freeagain
did colonization really begin; and then "America and Virginia were on
everyone'slips."65 But thisNew Worlddiscoursestill reflectslittleinterest
in its inhabitants.Otherissues are muchmorewidelydiscussed. For example,
whatwould the New Worldgovernment
be like? Would Jamestryto extend
his authoritarianism
to America?Could he? This was theissue, forexample,
mostenergizingHenryWriothesley,Shakespeare'sSouthampton,who led the
"Patriot" factionon the London VirginiaCouncil, pushingformoreAmerican independence.66(As forJames'sown "colonial discourse," it seems to
have been devotedto worriesabout how it would all affecthis relationswith
Spain,67and to requestsforflyingsquirrelsand otherNew World"toyes. ,68)
Of more immediate interest,perhaps, to the mass of real or armchair
werethereportsof New Worldwealththatat firstmade Virginia
adventurers
as well as for wild
known as a haven for bankruptsand spendthrifts,
dreamers-followed by the accounts of starvation,rebellion, and hardship
broughtback by those who had escaped fromthe realityof colonial existence. Now the issue became "Is it worthit?" The officialpropaganda,
optimisticabout futureprofits,was soon counteredby a backlash fromless
optimisticscofferschallengingthevalue of theentireproject,one whichsent
money,men, and ships to frequentdestructionand broughtback almost no
profit.69
Even the settlersactuallyliving withthe nativesin the New World itself
were-for entirely non-altruisticreasons-not yet fully engaged in
"colonialist" discourse as definedby revisionists.In 1611 they had not
managed to establish enough power to euphemize; they had little to be
defensive about. They were too busy fightingmutiny,disease, and the
64
If he didn't succeed in establishinga settlement,he would lose his patent.His interestin
thepatentratherthanthecolony was shownby his apparentnegligencein searchingforhis lost
colony (Quinn, n. 63, above, p. 300). He could hold onto his patentonly so long as therewas
hope thatthe colonists were still alive; clearly the hope was worthmore to Raleigh than the
colony.
65 MatthewP. Andrews,The Soul of a Nation: The Foundingof Virginiaand theProjection
ofNew England (New York: Scribner's, 1943), p. 125. An entirepopularliteraturedeveloped,
so muchso thattheArchbishopof York complainedthat"of Virginiatherebe so manytractates,
divine,human,historical,political, or call themas you please, as no further
intelligenceI dare
desire" (quoted in Andrews,p. 125).
66 It is this issue ratherthan colonialism that stimulatedan earlier period of political
on the New Worldmaterialin The Tempest:Charles M. Gayley, Shakespeare and
commentary
theFounders of Libertyin America(New York: Macmillan, 1917); A. A. Ward, "Shakespeare
and themakersof Virginia," ProceedingsoftheBritishAcademy,9 (1919); see also E. P. Kuhl,
"Shakespeare and the foundersof America:The Tempest," Philological Quarterly,41 (1962),
123-46.
67 Contributing
discourseswas theSpanishambassador'sflowof
to thewelterof contradictory
lettersto Spain insisting,not irrationally,thatthe whole purpose of maintaininga profitless
colony like Jamestownwas to establisha base forpirateraids againstSpanish colonies.
68 LetterfromSouthampton
to theEarl of Salisbury,15 December 1609, in AlexanderBrown,
Vol. 1, 356-57.
69 The quantityand qualityof theobjections,whichhave noton thewhole survived,has been
judged by thenatureof themanydefensesthoughtnecessaryto answerthem.See notes 58, 60,
61.
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56
SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
stupiditiesof theLondon Council to have muchenergyleftover forIndians.
It is truethatno writerever treatedNative Americansas equals-any more
thanhe treatedMoors, Jews,Catholics,peasants,women,Irishmen,or even
Frenchmenas equals; travellerscomplacentlyrecordedkidnappingnativesto
exhibitin England, as if thenativeshad no rightsat all.70 And it is truethat
some of theirdescriptionsare distortedby Old Worldstereotypesof wild men
or cannibals-though these descriptionsare oftenconfinedto earlierprecolonial explorers'reports.71Or, farmoreinsidiously,thedescriptionswere
distortedby stereotypesof unfalleninnocentnoble savages-stereotypesthat
inevitablyled to disillusionmentwhen the settlershad to realize that the
Indians, like theland itself,werenotgoingto fulfilltheirdreamsof a golden
worldmade expresslyto nurture
Englishmen.The "noble savage" stereotype
thusfueledtherecurring
accusationofIndiantreachery,
a responseto betrayal
of settlers'fantasiesas well as to anyreal Indianbetrayal,72and one to which
I will returnin discussingThe Tempest.
But, given theuniversalityof racial prejudicetowardsNew Worldnatives
along withall "Others," in thisearlyperiodthemovementwas to loosen, not
to consolidate,theprejudicesbroughtfromthe Old World. The descriptions
of these extendedface-to-faceencounterswithNative Americanswere perhaps even morevariedthancontemporary
responsesto Moors and Jews,who
were usually encounteredon the whiteman's own territory,
whereexposure
could be limitedand controlled.The verytermsimportedfromtheOld World
to namethenatives-"savages" or "naturals"-began to lose theiroriginal
connotationsas the differing
descriptionsmultipliedand even contradicted
themselves.The reportsrange fromHarriot'swidelyrepublishedattemptat
scientific,objective reporting(1588), which viewed natives with great respect, to Smith's less reliable adventurestories(1608-31), disputedeven in
his own timeby Purchas.And althoughthesedo notby any means live up to
our standardsfornon-colonialistdiscourse,theirtypicalattitudeis a wary,
oftenpatronizing,but live-and-let-livecuriosity,ratherthanthe exploitative
erasurewhichwould laterbecome themarkof colonialistdiscourse. So long
as theconflictsremainedminimal,NativeAmericanswereseen as beingslike
the writers;73further,tribes were distinguishedfrom one another, and
formsof government,class strucrecognitionwas grantedto theirdifferent
ture,dresscodes, religion,and language.74And whenconflictdid triggerthe
A practicethatShakespearedid not admireif Stephanoand Trinculoare any indication.
As are the two monsterscited as possible prototypesfor Caliban by GeoffreyBullough
(Narrativeand Dramatic Sources of Shakespeare, 8 vols. [New York: Columbia Univ. Press,
1958], Vol. 8, 240). There were exceptions,of course, as in George Percy's Observations. . .
of thePlantationof ... Virginia(1606), in Purchas, Vol. XVIII, 403-19.
72 See Karen Ordahl
Kupperman,SettlingWiththeIndians: TheMeetingofEnglishand Indian
CulturesinAmerica,1580-1640 (Totowa, N.J.: Rowmanand Littlefield,1980), pp. 127-29. The
are of coursemultiple,rangingfromthe
originsof thisnearlyuniversalbeliefin Indiantreachery
readiness of the English to project theirfears onto any available victim,whetherIndians or
mariners(who were also regularlyaccused of treacheryin these narratives),to the prevailing
stereotypesof theOther,to specificEnglishacts of provocation,to thegeneraltensionsinherent
in the situation.Withoutarguingforany one of these, I merelywish to suggestthatthe notion
of "colonialist discourse" simplifiesa complex situation.
73 Even as
proto-whitemen, their skin as tanned ratherthan naturallyblack, etc. See
Kupperman,and Orgel, "Shakespeare and the Cannibals."
74
Greenblatt,in his studyof the ways in whichwhitemen verbally"colonialized" Indians,
emphasizes the degree to which whites assumed thatthe Indians had no language. Although
70
71
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THE CASE OF COLONIALISM IN THE TEMPEST
57
recurringaccusationof "treachery,"thewritersneverpresentedtheIndians
as laughable Calibans, but ratheras capable, indeed formidable,enemies
whose skill and intelligencechallengedthatof the settlers.
Horrors had already been perpetratedby the Spanish in the name of
colonialism; not learningfromthese-or perhapslearningall too well-the
theirown. But thatlay in the future.
Englishwould soon begin perpetrating
WhenThe Tempestwas written,whattheNew Worldseems to have meantfor
themajorityof Englishmenwas a sense of possibilityand a set of conflicting
fantasies about the wonders to be found there; these were perhaps the
preconditionsforcolonialism-as formuchelse-but notyetthethingitself.
To place colonialist discourse as precisely as possible within a given
moment(like stressingthe differences
betweenThe Tempestand colonialist
discourse)is notto reducethediscussionto a numbersgame. Whatis at stake
hereis nota quibble aboutchronologybutan assumptionaboutwhatwe mean
bythe"relevantdiscursivecontext,"abouthow we agreeto determineit, and
about how we decide to limitit. Here too thereare differencesof opinion
aboutwhatcounts,and thesedifferences
need to be acknowledged,examined,
and accountedfor.
III
My pointin specifyingShakespeare's precise literaland temporalrelation
to colonialist discourse-in specifyingthe unique mind throughwhich the
discourse is mediated-is not to deny thatthe play has any relationto its
contextbutto suggestthattherelationis problematic.In theeffort
to identify
Caliban as one morecolonialistrepresentation
of theOther,we fail to notice
how remarkableit is thatsuch a Caliban should exist. In 1611 therewere in
England no literaryportrayalsof New World inhabitantsand certainlyno
fictionalexamplesof colonialistdiscourse.75Insofaras The Tempestdoes in
he notesthattherewereexceptions,he makesit sound as if theseexceptionswererareand were
forgold trinkets
largelyconfinedto the"rough,illiteratesea dog, bartering
on a farawaybeach,"'
ratherthanto the "captains or lieutenantswhose accountswe read" ("Learning to Curse,"
pp.
even theearliesttravelershad oftenincludedglossariesof Indianterms
564-65). On thecontrary,
in theirreports(e.g., theGlossaryin theintroductory
materialof Eden's translationof Martyr's
Decades [1555], as well as in variouslaterEnglishreportsreprintedin Purchas His Pilgrimes
[1625]); and in readingthroughPurchas's helter-skelter
collection,one is struckby the number
of writerswho grantautomaticrespectto theIndians' language. A possiblyfigurative
ratherthan
literalforceforcommentson theIndians' "want of language" is suggestedby Gabriel Archer's
accountof a 1602 voyage. Here itis theEnglish,nottheIndians,who are deficientin thisrespect:
they"spake diversChristianwords,and seemed to understandmuchmorethenwe,for Wantof
Language, could comprehend"("Relation of CaptainGosnold's voyage," Purchas, Vol. XVIII,
304, italics mine).
75 See R. R.
Cawley, Voyagers and Elizabethan Drama, passim, and Unpathed Waters:
Studies in theInfluenceof the Voyagerson Elizabethan Literature(Princeton,N.J.: Princeton
Univ. Press, 1940), pp. 234-41. Neitherof R. R. Cawley's two books about the voyagers'
influenceon contemporary
cites anypre-1611passage of morethana fewlines.
Englishliterature
It is truethatin the 1580s Marlowe's plays took offfromthe general sense of vastness and
possibilityopened up by voyages to the New as well as to the Old World. In additionDrayton
wrotean "Ode to theVirginiaVoyage," perhapsexpresslyforthesettlersleavingforJamestown
in 1606; and one line in Samuel Daniel's "Musophilis" has a colonialist ring: he
speaks of
"vent[ing]thetreasureof our tongue. . T' inrichunknowingNationswithour stores." True,
too, thatin a quite different
spiritJonson,Marston,and Chapmancollaboratedin Eastward Ho
(1605) to make funof gallantsflockingto Virginiawithexpectationsas greatas those bringing
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58
SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
some way allude to an encounterwitha New Worldnative(and I will forthe
remainderof this essay accept this premise), it is the very firstwork of
literatureto do so. There may be Indians, more or less demonized, in the
discourse.Outsideof Shakespeare,however,therewould be none
nonliterary
in literatureuntiltwo yearsafterThe Tempest,whentheybegan to appearfeathersand all-in masques.76 And Shakespeare went out of his way to
inventCaliban: Strachey'saccountof thewreckon theuninhabitedBermuda
islands-Shakespeare's main New World source-contains, of course, no
island natives.77For theseShakespearehad to turnelsewherein Stracheyand
in otherswho describedthemainlandcolonyin Virginia.Shakespearewas the
firstto show one of us mistreating
a native,thefirstto representa nativefrom
theinside,thefirstto allow a nativeto complainonstage,and thefirstto make
thatNew Worldencounterproblematicenoughto generatethe currentattention to the play.
To argue forShakespeare's uniquenessis not to argue thatas fictionThe
Tempestis above politics, or that as a writerof fictionShakespeare transcended ideology. It does imply,however,thatif theplay is "colonialist,"
it mustbe seen as "prophetic" ratherthandescriptive.78
As such, theplay's
statusimmediately
raises important
questions.Whywas Shakespeare-a man
who had no directstake in colonization-the firstwriterof fictionto portray
New World inhabitants?Why then? Shakespeare had shown no signs of
interestin the New World untilThe Tempest,despitethe factthattherehad
been some colonial activityand some colonialistrhetoricfor several years
amongthosewho did have a stakein it. How did thecolonialistphenomenon
spread?
To hasten over Shakespeare's relationto colonialism as if it were not a
bits of data we
questionbut a conclusionis to lose one of themostimportant
may ever have about how such thingsas colonialism-and discourse-work.
Problematicas itmaybe to speculateaboutan individualmind,itis even more
problematicto speculateabout the discourseof an entirenationor an entire
period. One way to give substanceto such largegeneralizationsis to trace,in
as muchdetail as maybe available, theparticularson whichtheyare based.
Here theparticularsinclude the individualswho produced,as well as reproduced, thelargerculturaldiscourse-especially individualslike Shakespeare,
who, more than almost any other,both absorbed and shaped the various
conflictingdiscoursesof the period.
To do this, as I have been arguing,it is necessaryto considerthe entire
foolishvictimsto Face and Subtle's alchemicalchimeras.But whileMarlowe participatesin the
and Eastward Ho
spiritof romanticadventureassociated withvoyagingand treasure-hunting,
satirizesit, neitherdeals at all withthe New World or withthe New World natives.
76 The threebriefexceptionsare references
to Spanish crueltyto Indians,all publishedbefore
the trucewithSpain. The Stationers'Registerlists "The crueltieof ye Spaniardestowardth[e]
Indians, a ballad" (1586) and "Spanishe cruelties" (1601), now lost. RobertGreene notes in
passing thatthe SpaniardshuntedIndians withdogs, while by contrastthe English treatedthe
nativeswith"such courtesie,as theythoughttheEnglishGods, and theSpaniardesbothby rule
and conscience halfe Devils" (The Spanish Masquerado [1589], Life and . . . Works, ed.
AlexanderB. Grosart,15 vols. [London and Aylesbury:privatelyprinted,1881-86], Vol. V,
282-83). See Cawley, Voyagersand ElizabethanDrama, pp. 385-86.
77 When
Stracheyfinisheswithhis accountof theBermudaepisode and turnsto a description
of Virginia,he does devote one sentenceto the Indians' treachery.
78
See Frey, p. 31.
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THE CASE OF COLONIALISM IN THE TEMPEST
59
whatis "only a distortion"or "only an
play, withoutdecidingprematurely
irrelevance." In addition,however,we mustalso look to a contextforThe
Tempestthatis as relevantas colonialist discourse and perhaps even more
essentialto thepresenceof colonialismin The Tempestin thefirstplace-that
is, to thecontextof Shakespeare'sown earlier"discourse."' Onlythencan we
see how thetwofieldsof discourseintersect.In makinguse of theNew World
vocabularyand imagery,Shakespearewas in partdescribingsomethingmuch
closer to home-as was Jonsonwhen he called the London brotheldistrict
"the Bermudas,"79 or as would Donne when he found his America, his
"new foundeland," in the armsof his mistress.Or as was Dudley Carleton
in a gossipyletterfromLondon about Lord Salisburyenduringa "tempest"
ofreprooffroma lady; or Sir RalphWinwoodin tryingto "begin a new world
by settinghimselfand his wifehere at home."80
Long beforewritingThe Tempest,Shakespearehad writtenanotherplay
about a rulerwho preferredhis books to government.Navarre's academy in
Love's Labor's Lost was no island, but,like an island, it was supposed to be
isolated fromterritorialnegotiations.And Navarre, oblivious to colonial
issues, thoughcertainlynot exempt fromtimeless aristocraticprejudice,
broughthis own versionof Arieland Caliban by invitingArmadoand Costard
to join him. Like Prospero,he asked his "Ariel" to make a pageantforhim,
and he imprisonedhis "Caliban" fortryingto "do" a wench.His relationto
thetwo is nota matterof colonizationbutratherof condescensionand ironic
recognition,as Navarreis forcedto see somethingof himselfin the conflict
betweenfieryArmado's over-activeimaginationand earthyCostard's lust.81
Only muchlaterdid thispatterncome to be "colonial."
The Tempestis linkedin manyotherways notonlyto Love's Labor's Lost
butalso to therestof thecanon, as continuedefforts
of criticshave shown,82
79 In his edition of The Tempest, Kermode notes this parallel with BartholomewFair
"
(2.6.76-77), "Looke into any Angle o' the towne, (the Streights,or the Bermuda's) ..
(p. 24, n. 223).
80
LetterfromCarletonto Chamberlain,August 1607, in AlexanderBrown,Vol. 1, 111-13.
81
Many othersimilaritieslink The Tempestto the earlierplay, includingsome whichmight
have been takento suggestThe Tempest'sfocuson theNew World. Thus, forexample, Stephano
cries out whenhe firstsees Caliban, "Do you put tricksupon's withsalvages and men of Inde,
ha?" (2.2.58-59). But Berowne, thoughrootedin the Old World, resortsto similarlyexotic
analogies to describethepassion whichRosaline shouldinspirein his colleagues. Who sees her,
he says,
That, (like a rude and savage man of Inde),
At the firstop'ning of the gorgeouseast,
Bows not his vassal head . . . ?
(Love's Labor's Lost, 4.3.218-20)
See Kermode's note on the line in The Tempest.
82
Specificresemblancesbetweensubplotshere and the plots of otherplays have been noted
(betweentheplotto murderAlonso and Macbeth,betweenFerdinand'scourtshipof Mirandaand
Romeo and Juliet,etc.). See AlvinB. Kernan,"The greatfairof theworldand theocean island:
BartholomewFair and The Tempest," in The Revels HistoryofDrama in English, 8 vols., eds.
J. Leeds Barroll,AlexanderLeggatt,RichardHosley, Alvin Kernan(London: Methuen,1975),
Vol. III, 456-74. G. Wilson Knighthas describedthe place of The Tempestin Shakespeare's
overarching
mythofthetempest.Even moresuggestive,Leslie Fiedlerhas tracedtheless obvious
thatprovidesa contextfortheplay. Drawingon marginaldetails, he shows
personalmythology
theplay's concernwiththemesthatpervadetheentirecanon, such as theinterracialmarriagethat
here, not accidentally,initiatesthe action of the play. His workis the startingpoint formine.
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60
SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
and it is revealing to see how, in each case, the non-colonial structures
become associated withcolonialistdiscourse.Indeed, theverydetailsof The
Tempestthat revisionistssee as markingthe "nodal point of the play's
imbricationinto this discourse of colonialism"83 are reworkingsof similar
momentsin earlierand seeminglyprecolonialplays. The momentI will focus
on for the rest of this paper is the one thatmany revisioniststake as the
strongestevidence in the play forthe falsenessof Prospero's position-the
momentwhen the hidden colonialist project emerges openly,84when the
"political unconscious" is exposed.85It occurs when Caliban's plot interrupts the pageant Prospero is staging for Ferdinand and Miranda, and
Prosperois so enragedthatMirandasays she has neverseen himso angry.The
explanation, it has been suggested, is that if psychologymattersat all,
Prospero's anger here, like his anger earlier when Caliban tried to rape
Miranda, derives from the politics of colonialism. It reveals Prospero's
political "disquiet at the irruptioninto consciousness of an unconscious
anxietyconcerningthe groundingof his legitimacy" on the island.86
But thedramaticcontextcounterstheassumptionthatpoliticsis primaryin
this episode. Like Caliban, Prospero differsin significantways fromthe
stereotyped"real life" charactersin colonial political drama. Unlike the
colonial invader,Prosperois bothan exile and a father;and the
single-minded
actionof theplay is initiatedwhenboththeseroles are newlyactivatedby the
arrivalof Prospero's old enemies, those who had exiled him as well as his
daughter'shusband-to-be.At themomentof Prospero's eruptionintoanger,
he has just bestowedMiranda on his enemy's son Ferdinand87and is in the
midstof presentinghis pageant as a weddinggift,wrappedin a three-fold
warningabout chastity.88If Prosperois to pass on his heritageto the next
generation,he must at this momentrepresshis desire for power and for
revengeat home,as well as anysexual desirehe feelstowardMiranda.89Both
desiresare easily projectedontothefishilyphallicCaliban, a walkingversion
of Prospero'sown "thing" of darkness.Not onlyhas Caliban alreadytriedto
rape Miranda;he is now out to kill Prosperoso thathe can turnMirandaover
to Stephano("she will give thee brave brood"); and Caliban does not even
feel guilty.Caliban's functionas a walkingscreenforprojectionmay help
explain why Caliban's sin does not consist in cannibalism,to which, one
assumes,Prosperowas nevertempted,butratherin Prospero'sown repressed
fantasiesof omnipotenceand lust.90Of course Prosperois also angrythat
on theislandand hisjustification
bothhis authority
Caliban is nowthreatening
83
Barkerand Hulme, p. 198.
Hulme, Colonial Encounters,p. 133.
85
Paul Brown, p. 69.
86
Barkerand Hulme, p. 202.
87
The last time Prosperogot so angrythatMiranda had to apologize was when Ferdinand
to courtMiranda.
began
88
See A. D. Nuttall's discussion of the blend of colonialist and sexual tensions in The
Studies
Tempest,"Two UnassimilableMen," in ShakespearianComedy,Stratford-upon-Avon
14 (London: Edward Arnold, 1972), pp. 210-40, esp. p. 216.
89 The incestuousimpulseimplicitin thesituationis even clearerin Shakespeare's own earlier
romances;bothFiedlerand Nuttall,amongothers,have exploredthesein thecontextof thevast
literatureof romancethatlies behind the play. See also Mark Taylor, Shakespeare's Darker
Purpose: A Questionof Incest (New York: AMS Press, 1982).
90
Fiedler, p. 234.
84
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THE CASE OF COLONIALISM IN THE TEMPEST
61
of thatauthority;but the extraordinary
intensityof Prospero's rage suggests
a conjunctionof psychologicalas well as political passion.
This conjunctionof the psychologicaland the political not only appears
here in The Tempestbut also characterizesa surprisingnumberof Prosperolike charactersin Shakespeare's earlier plays who provide a suggestive
contextfor The Tempest.All throughthe canon one findscharacterswho
escape fromactivelives to some kindof pastoralretreat,who stepaside from
power and aggression-and usuallyfromsexualityas well-and fromall the
forbiddenfantasiesin which these are enacted. But while each adopts a
disinterestedstance, as if havingretiredbehindthe scenes, each sees life as
a play and manipulatesothersstillon stagein a waythatsuggestsa fascination
withwhathe has rejectedand assignedto the"Others."' And each of thesehas
his "Caliban" and his moment of sudden, irrational anger when his
"Caliban" threatensto overstepthe limits defininghim as "other" and
boundseparatinghim from"Prospero." At this momentof confrontation,
aries threatento disappearand hierarchiesare menaced. And in each of the
earlier plays, this momentis indicative of inner conflict,as the earlier
"Prospero" figureconfrontssomeone who oftenhas neitherpropertynor
power to colonize, and whose threatis largelysymbolic.In all these plays
Shakespeare is dealing not just with power relations but also with the
psychologyof domination,with the complicated ways in which personal
psychologyinteractswithpolitical power.
As earlyas themid-1590s,twofiguresshowsomeresemblanceto Prospero.
Antonio,themerchantof Venice, sees theworldas "A stagewhereeveryman
must play a part, / And mine a sad one" (1.1.78-79). Almost eagerly
acceptinghis passive lot, he claims to renouncebothprofitand love. But, as
Marianne Novy suggests, a repressed self-assertionis hinted at in the
claims he makeson Bassanio and comes out clearlywhen
passive/aggressive
he lashes out at thegreedyand self-assertiveShylockwitha viciousnesslike
Prospero's towards Caliban, a viciousness he shows nowhere else.91 He
admitscalling the Jewa dog and says,
I am as liketo call theeso again,
To speton theeagain ....
(1.3.130-31)92
A relatedand similarlyproblematicexchangeoccurs in theHenryIV plays,
written
a yearor so later,whererole-playingPrinceHal, duringhis temporary
retreatfrompower,had founda versionof pastoralin Falstaff'stavern.After
reclaiminghis throne,when he findsthatFalstaffhas also come fromthe
tavernto claim a role in the new kingdom,Hal suddenlyrepudiatesFalstaff
witha crueltyas cold as Prospero'sangerat Caliban-and equally excessive:
91 Marianne
Novy, Love's Argument:Gender Relations in Shakespeare (Chapel Hill and
London: Univ. of NorthCarolina Press, 1984), pp. 63-82.
92
All Shakespearequotationsare fromThe RiversideShakespeare, ed. G. BlakemoreEvans
(Boston: HoughtonMifflin,1974). The earliergroup of criticswho had pointedout the racist
assumptionsin Antonio's behaviormade manyof the same pointsrecentlymade on Caliban's
behalf. The two cases are indeed similar, and althoughboth can be seen as examples of
"colonialism"-with the word "colonialism" used veryloosely as it is todayforany exploitativeappropriation-themorehistoricallyspecific"colonialistdiscourse" does notseemtobe the
appropriatecontextforShylock.
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62
SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
"I knowtheenot, old man." In boththesecases, thoughtheresemblanceto
Prosperois clear, therelationto an historicallyspecificcolonialismis hardto
establish.
Then in As You Like It (1599) and Measure for Measure (1604) come the
two exiled or self-exiledDukes who leave home-one to "usurp" thedeer in
theforest(2.1.21-28), theotherto "usurp" thebeggaryin theVienna streets
(3.2.93)-and who mostresembleProspero.Duke Seniorin As You Like It is
banishedto the pastoralforestof Arden,wherehe professeshimselfutterly
contentto live a life notable for the absence of both power and women (a
"woeful pageant," he calls it cheerfully[2.7.138]). He is saved fromhaving
to fightfor power when his evil brother(unlike the one in Shakespeare's
source) convenientlyrepentsand hands back the dukedom;but an ambivalence aboutsexualityis at least suggestedwhenthismildestof menlashes out
at Jaques, preciselywhen Jaques returnsfrommelancholywithdrawaland
claims thefool's license to satirizesociety's ills-to "cleanse the foul body
of the infectedworld."93 "Fie on thee!" says the Duke,
hastbeena libertine,
. . .thou thyself
As sensualas thebrutish
stingitself,
Andall th' embossedsores,andheadedevils,
Thatthouwithlicenseof freefoothastcaught,
Wouldstthoudisgorgeintothegeneralworld.
(2.7.65-69)
Jaques seems to have toucheda nerve. ElsewhereJaques makes a claim on
behalfof thedeerin theforestratherlike theclaim Caliban makesforhimself
on the island, complainingthatDuke Senior has "usurped" these "velvet
friends";he even makesit "most invectively,"having,like Caliban, learned
how to curse. Justas in thecase of Caliban, we cannotlaugh away theclaim
the way the Duke does. But Jaques's complaintseems intendedmore as an
insightinto the Duke thana commenton the deer-whom Jaques laterkills
anyway.
The touchiestof these precursors,Vincentio in Measure for Measure
(1604), is theone who mostcloselyresemblesProspero.He too prefersstudy
and he turnsover his powerto Angelo, claiming"[I] do not
to government,
like to stage me to theireyes" (1.1.68)-but thenhe stepsbehindthe scenes
to manipulatethe action. Like Prospero,Vincentiosees his manipulationas
an altruisticmeans of educatinghis waywardsubjects into chastity,repentance, and mercifulmildness;but it seems to serve more privateneeds of
as well. For it firstallows him, as "ghostly father,"to deny
self-definition
any aggressiveor sexual motivesof his own, and thenallows himto returnat
the end to claim bothpower and sexual rewardsas he resumeshis dukedom
and claims Isabel.94 Vincentio's "Caliban" is the libidinous and loosetonguedLucio, who not only indulgeshis own appetitesbut openlyaccuses
the Duke of indulginghis, so thatit is unusuallyclear in this case thatthe
of the Duke's own disownedpassions.
"Caliban" figureis a representation
93 Nuttall (n. 88, above) notes the strangenessof the Duke's explosion and the fact that
Jaques's requestfora fool's license "has shakenDuke Senior" (p. 231).
94 See RichardP. Wheeler's
analysis in Shakespeare's Developmentand theProblemComedies: Turnand Counter-turn
(Berkeleyand Los Angeles: Univ. of CaliforniaPress, 1981).
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THE CASE OF COLONIALISM IN THE TEMPEST
63
Lucio's slandersincludetheclaim thattheDuke has "usurp[ed] thebeggary
he was neverborn to," but, like Jaques speakingforthe deer, he is more
concernedwith revealingthe Duke's contradictory
desires here than with
defendingbeggars' rights. Goaded by Lucio's insubordination,the Duke
lashes out at himas he does at no one else and threatensa punishmentmuch
worse thanthe one he assignedto the would-berapistand murdererAngelo
or to the actual murdererBarnardine.
In the case of all of these "Prosperos," it is hard to see the attack on
"Caliban" as partof a specificallycolonialiststrategy,as a way of exploiting
theOtheror ofrationalizingillegitimatepoweroverhimratherthanoverwhat
he representsin "Prospero" himself.To a logical observer,the Prosperoattackseems at best gratuitous-andthemorefrightening
forbeing so. It has
no politicalrationale.The "political" attackalways takes place outsidethe
play's old world,afterthecharacters'withdrawalto a secondworldthatis not
so mucha new worldas one thatprojects,exaggerates,turnsupside down, or
polarizes the conflictsthatmade the old worlduninhabitable.In the case of
each earlier "Prospero," the conflictsseem internalas well as external,so
thatwhenhe movesoutto meethis "Caliban," he is always meetinghimself.
Political exile is also presentedas self-estrangement,
a crisis of selfhood
expressedin social andgeographicaldivisions.Andin each case, Shakespeare
whethertheytake theformof the
exposes thefragilityof such arrangements,
pastoralizationof the forestof Arden,or of the scapegoatingof Shylock in
Venice, or ofFalstaff'scarnivalmisrulein thetavern,or of thetheatricalizing
of the prison in Vincentio's Vienna, or of Prospero's "colonizing" of a
utopianisland.
Whatevervaryingpoliticalrole each earlier"Caliban" plays as inhabitant
of his second-or second-class-world, each seems to embody a similar
thatthe
psychologicalquality.In each case he displaystheovertself-assertion
retiredor retiring"Prospero" cannot-or wishesnotto-muster forhimself,
andthatforShakespeareseemsto be themarkoftheOther.Each is an epitome
of what Shakespeare (perhaps in his own punningambivalence about acknowledgingit as his own) elsewherecalls "will."95 This "will" includes
a range of forbiddendesires and appetitesoftenattributed
to the Otherand
always associated withthe "foul body," as Jaques calls it; or withthe fat
appetitivebody, as in Hal's pictureof Falstaff;or with the body as mere
pounds of fleshand blood; perhapswithwhatwe mightcall, afterBakhtin,
the "grotesque" body. And it is definedin oppositionto theethereal,or ariel,
virtues such as "mercy," "honor," and "chastity" characterizingthe
various "Prosperos."
The "will" of these "Calibans" can carrysuggestionsof primitiveoral
greed,as in Shylock'sdesireto "feed fat" his revengewitha poundof human
flesh,in Falstaff'svoraciousappetite,or in Caliban's name. Or it emergesin
a rampantsexual greed, as in Falstaff,in Jaques's past, in Lucio, perhaps
even in Shylock's reproductivemiracles with sheep, and of course in
Caliban himself.But themostalien aspectof self-assertion
or "will" in these
plays emergesin a primitivevengefulness.This vengefulnessis associated
with an infantileneed to controland dominateand with the scatological
95
Primarilyof course in the sonnets,but in the plays as well. See Novy's discussion of
self-assertiveness
in Shylock.
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64
SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
imageryof filth-with a disgust at the whole messy, physical world that
always threatensto get out of control.Thus Shylock's drive forrevengeis
linkedto his Jonsonian"anal" virtues("fast bind, fastfind"), to his fecal
gold, and to his tightlylocked orifices("stop my house's ears, I mean my
casements" [2.5.34]). Thus, too, Duke Senior's descriptionof Jaques
"disgorging" his "embossed sores" suggests that he is projectingonto
Jaqueshis disgustat theidea of "the foulbody of theinfectedworld"-and
his fearthatJaqueswill "disgorge" and overflowhis boundariesratherthan
cleanse; Jaques's very name associates him with this scatological vision.
Caliban, verymuchconcernedwithrevenge,also takes on a taintof anality
throughthe words of Trinculoand Stephano. The lattersees Caliban hiding
underhis gabardinewithTrinculoand takesCaliban fora monsterwhose first
act is to "vent" a Trinculo-a Gargantuanact of defecation; Trinculo
elsewherecomplainsthatCaliban led themto a "foul lake" thato'erstunk
theirfeettill theysmelled "all horse-piss."96
Thus, althoughCaliban is like theNew Worldnativesin his "otherness,"
he is linkedat least as closely to Shakespeare's earlier"Calibans." Whatis
interestingin any attemptto understandThe Tempest'suniquenessin other
aspects is thatin Caliban for the firsttime Shakespeare shows "will," or
narcissisticself-assertion,in its purest and simplestformas the original
"grandiosity"or "megalomania" of a child;97forthefirsttimehe makesthe
representativeof bodily existence a seeming child whose ego is a "body
ego," as Freudsaid, a "subject" whose "self" is definedby thebody. There
is a childishlyamoral-and almostasexual-glee in Caliban's sexuality("O
ho, 0 ho, would't had been done!" he says of the attemptedrape
in his dreamsof revenge("brain him /
[1.2.349]) and a childishexaggeration
. . or witha log /Batterhis skull, or paunchhimwitha stake,/ Or cut his
wezand withthyknife" [3.2.88-91]).98 Like a childhe thinksoftenabouthis
and now thatshe is gone, he dreamsofrichesdroppingfromheaven
mother,99
and cries to dreamagain; like a child he was taughtlanguage and shownthe
man in the moon.100And like an imperiouschild he is enragedwhenhis pie
in the skydoes not appear. If he rebukesProsperoforfirststrokingand then
disciplininghim, if he objects to being made a subject when he was "mine
own king" (1.2.342), thisis therebukemade by everychild, who beginslife
as "His MajestytheBaby," tendedby his mother,and who is thensubjected
to thedemandsof thecommunity,101
representedby thefather.Childhoodis
theperiodin whichanyone-even themostpowerfulElizabethanaristocratcan experiencethe slave's side of the master/slave
relation,its indignities,
and the dreams of reversal and revenge it can imbue. Appropriateand
acceptablein a baby, all thesetraits(like Caliban himself)"with age [grow]
uglier" (4.1.191)-and farmoredangerous.
Caliban's childishnesshas been dismissedas a defense,anotherrationalCaliban laterjoins thetwo courtlyservantsin appropriately
scatological double entendres.
NormanHolland, "Caliban's Dream," The Design Within:PsychoanalyticApproaches to
Shakespeare, ed. M. D. Faber (New York: Science House, 1970), pp. 521-33.
98
CompareAntonio's cold calculationsas he plans to kill Alonso.
99 Albeit in a "My mommyis going to get you" fashion.
100
Nuttall,p. 225.
101
So, too, any child mightcomplainthathe was taughtto speak and now his "profiton 't"
is to be trappedin the prisonhouse of language.
96
97
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THE CASE OF COLONIALISM IN THE TEMPEST
65
ization of Prospero's illegitimatepower.102 But if it is a defense,it is one
whichitselfis revealing.Caliban's childishnessis a dimensionof the Other
in which Shakespeare seems extremelyinterested.103 It is a major (not
peripheral)source both of Caliban's definingcharacteristicsand of what
makes his relationto Prosperoso highlycharged. Caliban's childish innocence seemsto have been whatfirstattractedProspero,and now it is Caliban's
childishlawlessnessthatenrageshim.To a manlike Prospero,whose lifehas
been spent learninga self-disciplinein which he is not yet totallyadept,
Caliban can seem like a child who mustbe controlled,and who, like a child,
is murderouslyenraged at being controlled.ProsperotreatsCaliban as he
would treatthe willfulchild in himself.
The importanceof childishnessin definingCaliban is suggestedby thefinal
Tempestprecedentto be cited here,one thatlies behindProspero's acknowledgementof Caliban as his own thingof darkness-and in whichtheCaliban
figureis literallya child. This figureis foundin TitusAndronicus,where a
bastardchild, called "devil" and "slave," is cast out by his motherbut
rescued by his father,who promises-in language foreshadowingCaliban's
imageryin The Tempest-to raise himin a cave and feed himon berriesand
roots.104Here the fatheris black Aaron the Moor, and the childishthingof
darkness,whom Aaron is at some pains to acknowledge his, is his own
literallyblack son. Whatis remarkableaboutthisportraitof a barbarianfather
and son is thatAaron's is theonlyuncomplicatedparentallove in a play-world
wherecivilized whitemen like Titus kill theirown childrenon principle.It
is a world,by theway, whichcontainstheonlyliteral(if unwitting)cannibal
in Shakespeare's plays, the child's whitemother.Unlike Titus, Aaron can
love his child because he can identifywithhim; as an "uncivilized" black
man,he can acceptthegreedy,sensual,lawless childin himself:"This is my
self, the vigor and the pictureof my youth," he says (4.2.108). This love,
whichcomes easily to Aaron in acknowledginghis own fleshand blood, is
in The Tempestto Prospero'sstrainedand difficult
transformed
recognitionof
a tribalOtherwhose blacknessnonethelessfigureshis own.
The echoes of Aaron not only suggest the familyresemblancebetween
Prosperoand Caliban. They also suggestthathere Shakespeareis changing
his earliervision of authority.In the earlierplay it is whiteTitus who-like
Prospero-gives away his powerand is betrayed;butit is black Aaronwho is
102
See Leininger,p. 125, forthe mosteffectivepresentationof thisview; also Paul Brown,
p. 63.
103
Here, too, Shakespeareseems unusual. Not untilour child-centered,
post-Freudianage do
we findwritersso directlyrepresenting
the aliens on our galactic frontier
as children-whether
as innocentslike Steven Spielberg's E. T. or as proto-savageslike his Gremlins.Othershad
associated theprimitivewithmetaphoricalchildhood:De Bry's 1590 editionof Harriot'sBriefe
and truereportand, later,Purchas'sversionof StracheyassociatedtheprimitiveIndianswiththe
childhood of the English nation, and writersspoke of the Indians as "younger brethren"
(Kupperman,n. 72, above, p. 170). What is unusual in Shakespeare is the emphasis and the
detailedportrayalofemotionalas well as cognitivechildishness.Leah Marcus argues,in another
context,thatthe English in the chaotic and disorientingintellectualcontextof the seventeenth
centurywere especially susceptibleto dreamsof thegolden age-and to sympathetic
portrayals
of childhoodwholeness(Childhoodand CulturalDespair [Pittsburgh,
Pa.: Univ. of Pittsburgh
Most
of
the
instances
of such portrayalsdid not appear untillaterin the century,
Press, 1978]).
however.
104 Edward A.
Armstrong,Shakespeare's Imagination(Lincoln: Univ. of Nebraska Press,
1963), p. 52.
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66
SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
stigmatizedas thevengefulvillain. And Titusmaintainsthisblack-and-white
distinctioneven whilesavagelycarryingouthis own revenge.But distinctions
in The Tempesthave become less rigid. By merginghis fantasyabout a
"white" (butexiled and neuroticallypuritanical)dukewithhis fantasyabout
a villainous(butloving) "black" father,Shakespeareforthefirsttimeshows,
in Prospero,a paternalleader who comes back to power by admittingrather
than denyingthe "blackness" in himself. Prospero may not, as several
revisionistspointout, physicallydo muchforCaliban at the end; however,
whathe says mattersa greatdeal indeed,forhis originaltransgression,
when
he firstdefinedCaliban as the Other,was intellectualas well as physical.
WhenProsperofinallyacknowledgesCaliban, althoughhe is a long way from
recognizingthe equality of racial "others," he comes closer than any of
Shakespeare's other "Prosperos" to acknowledgingthe othernesswithin,
which helps generateall racism-and he comes closer than anyone else in
colonialist discourse. Prosperoacknowledgesthe child-likeCaliban as his
he movesforthefirsttime
own, and althoughhe does notthusundohierarchy,
towardsacceptingthechildin himselfratherthantryingto dominateand erase
thatchild (along withrandomvulnerablehumanbeings outside himself)in
orderto establishhis adult authority.
Thus, althoughShakespearemay,as therevisionistsclaim, to some degree
reproduceProspero's colonialist vision of the island, the play's emphasis
lies not so muchin justifyingas in analyzingthatvision,just as Shakespeare
had analyzed the originsof dominancein the earlierplays. The play insists
thatwe see Prospero'scurrentrelationto Caliban in termsof Prospero'sown
withintheframingstoryof
past; it containsthe "colonial" encounterfirmly
his own familyhistory.And thoughthathistorydoes notextendbackwardto
Prospero's own childhood, it does begin with familyties and Miranda's
memoryof "the darkbackwardand abysmoftime" (1.2.50), beforeeithershe
or Prosperohad knownthe Other. Prosperowas then,he thought,in total
harmonywithhis world and himself,happy in his regressiveretreatto his
fromreality,he thought,by a "lov'd" brother
library-Eden;he was buffered
so linkedto himselfand his own desiresthatProsperohad in hima trustwith
no "limit, / A confidencesans bound" (1.2.96-97), like the trustthat
Miranda musthave had in the women who "tended" her then. Only when
Antonio'sbetrayalshatteredthattrustand Prosperowas oustedfromEdennewlyaware of boththe brotheras Otherand of himselfas a willfulself in
opposition-did he "discover" the island and Caliban. In a sense, then,
Caliban emergedfromtheriftbetweenProsperoand Antonio,105
just as Ariel
emergedfromSycorax's rivenpine. Once thebrotherhas shownthathe is not
identical to the self, reflectingback its own narcissisticdesire, then he
becomestheOther-and simultaneously
rousesthevengefulOtherin theself.
In The Tempestthe distancethata "colonialist" Prosperoimposes between
self and Otheroriginatedin a recoil fromthe closest relationof all; it was a
recoil thatin factdefinedboththe "distant" and the "close," thepublic and
the private-the political and thepersonal-as separaterealms. When Prospero acknowledgesCaliban, he thus partlydefuses an entiredynamicthat
began long beforehe had ever seen the island.
105
Mightthebrothers'definition
by oppositionperhapshave influencedShakespeare's choice
of names: Prospero and Antonio?
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THE CASE OF COLONIALISM IN THE TEMPEST
67
IV
WhenShakespearecreateda childish"Caliban," he was himselfrounding
out a dynamicprocess thathad begun as long ago as the writingof Titus
Andronicus.We will never "know" why Shakespeare gave to this final
versionof his exile storya local habitationincorporating
aspectsof colonialist
discourse. But theanswerlies notonly in thatdiscoursebut also in him and
in whatwas on his mind. Some of the most "specious" speculationsabout
Shakespeare's mind have been stimulatedby his presumedresemblanceto
Prosperoat theend oftheplay: pasthis zenith,on thewayto retirement,
every
thirdthoughtturnedto his grave. Withouttryingspeciouslyto read minds,
however,it seems safe to say thatto some degreeShakespearehad been for
several yearsconcernedwiththe aging, loss, mortality,and deaththatrecur
in so muchof whatwe knowhe was writingand readingat thetime. To this
degree,boththeplay and its contextdeal withtheend of theindividualself,
the subject and the body in which it is located. It is the end of everything
associated with the discoveryof self in childhood, the end of everything
Caliban represents-andthusthegreatestthreatto infantilenarcissismsince
His Majesty the Baby was firstde-throned.JohnBender has noted thatthe
occasion of theplay's presumedcourtdebutin 1611 was Hallowmas, thefeast
of winterand thetimeof seasonal celebrationsfiguring
themorefinalendings
and death associated with winter.106As part of the celebrations,Bender
a communalresponseto the
suggests,theplay mighthave servedto structure
recurring"seasonal mentality"broughton by the reminderof mortality.
Whetheror notthisis true,thatwhich"recurs" in seasons and communities
comes only once to individuals;and as the finalstage in Shakespeare's own
"seasonal" movementfromA MidsummerNight's Dream to The Winter's
Tale, the play can be seen as staginga final "crisis of selfhood" and of
betrayallike thosein theearlierexile plays-but thistimea farmoreextreme
one.107 For those who rage againstthe dyingof the light,it is a crisis that
awakens the old infantilenarcissisticdemandforendless fulfillment
and the
narcissisticrage and vengefulnessagainst a world that denies such satisfactions. 108
To one on thethresholdof retirement
fromtheOld World,theNew World
is an appropriatestage on whichto enact thislast resurgenceof the infantile
self. We take forgrantedthehistoricalconditionsgeneratingutopianvisions
in the voyagers' reportsoutside the play. What the example of Caliban's
childishpresencein the play suggestsis thatforShakespearethe desire for
such utopias-the golden worlds and fountainsof youth-has roots in personal historyas well as in "history." The desirehas been shapedby themost
local as well as by thelargest,collective,materialconstraints:by being born
small and weak in a worldrunby large, strongpeople withproblemsof their
106
JohnB. Bender,"The Day of The Tempest,"EnglishLiteraryHistory,47 (1980), 235-58.
It also marksShakespeare's returnto the patternof withdrawalfromactive life used in
Love's Labor's Lost-but this time witha difference.The earlierplay had shown young men
thebodyand all it represents.The Tempestshows an old
hopingto conquerdeathby forswearing
man comingto termswithdeathby acknowledgingthe body and what it represents.
108 Elliot Jacquesoffers
a relatedaccount,in Kleinian terms,of therole of infantiledemands
and emotionsin the effortto come to termswithdeath in "Death and the Mid-life Crisis,"
InternationalJournalof Psychoanalysis,46 (1965), 502-14.
107
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68
SHAKESPEARE QUARTERLY
own; by being born in "a sexed and mortalbody"109 thatmust somehow
become partof a social and linguisticcommunity.Caliban's utopia of sweet
voices and clouds droppingriches (3.2.137-43) draws most directlyon the
infantilesubstratumthatcolored Columbus's reportwhen he returnedfrom
his thirdvoyage convinced "that the newly discovered hemispherewas
shaped like a woman's breast,and thattheEarthlyParadise was located at a
highpointcorrespondingto the nipple."110But the play's other"utopias"
draw on it too. Gonzalo's utopia is more socialized ("nature should bring
forth,/ . . . all abundance,/ To feed my innocentpeople" [2.1.163-65]);
Prospero'spageantutopiais moremythic(a worldwithoutwinter,blessed by
Ceres); but, like Caliban's, theirutopias recreatea union with a
nurturing
bounteousMotherNature. And, like everychild's utopia, each is a fragile
creation,easily destroyedby therage and violencethatconstituteits defining
of Prosalternative-a dystopiaof murderousvengeance; the interruption
is the
Each
such
of
in
a
series
last
the
l
interruptions.
pero's pageantis only
creationof a childishmindthatoperatesin binarydivisions:good mother/bad
mother,love/rage,brother/Other.
That Shakespearewas drawnto the utopianaspects of the New World is
suggested by the particularfragmentof New World discourse that most
directlyprecipitated(Kermode's suggestiveterm) the play-the Bermuda
pamphlets,which record what was "perhaps -the most romanticincident
associated withAmerica's beginnings."112WhatattractedShakespeare,that
protector,
is, was thestoryin whicha "mercifulGod," a lovingand fatherly
rescued a whole shipload of people fromcertaindeath; it was a storythat
counteredthoughtsof winterwith reportsof'magical bountyin the aptly
named "Summer Islands."
The concernsthatmade Shakespeare's approach to colonialist discourse
possible mayhave been operativelaterin othercases as well. In analyzingthe
colonialistdiscoursegrowingout of political motives,it is importantnot to
setof motives.
lose touchwiththeutopiandiscoursegrowingoutof a different
Withoutreducingcolonialismto "the merelysubjectiveand to the statusof
psychological projection,"113 one can still take account of fantasies and
motivesthat,thoughnow regardedas secondary,or as irrelevantto politics,
may interactwith political motives in ways we have not yet begun to
understand-and cannotunderstandso long as we are divertedby tryingto
reducepsychologyto politicsor politicsto psychology.The binarydynamics
of infantileutopianfantasiescan, forexample, help explain why frustrated
settlerssuccumbedso easily to thetwinstereotypesof theNative Americans
as innocentprimitiveswho would welcome and nurturethe settlers,and as
hopelesslytreacherousOthers.They can serve as a reminderthatthe desire
forfriendshipand brotherhoodcan be as destructiveas a desire to exploit.
109JohnForrester,
"Psychoanalysisor Literature?"FrenchStudies, 35 (1981), 170-79, esp.
p. 172.
110 Cited in Levin (n. 9, above), p. 183,
111See Bender(n. 106, above) on theway dreamsare always followedby violence in theplay;
the violence is not a cause of the problemon the island but ratheran effect.
112
Andrews(n. 65, above), p. 126.
113 Jamesoncites as being "very much in the spiritof [his] presentwork" the concern of
Deleuze and Guattari"to reassertthe specificityof thepolitical contentof everydaylife and of
and to reclaimit from. . . reductionto themerelysubjectiveand
individualfantasy-experience
to the statusof psychologicalprojection" (The Political Unconscious,n. 22, above, p. 22).
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THE CASE OF COLONIALISM IN THE TEMPEST
69
Referenceto irrational,outdatedinfantileneeds can help explain why the
settlers,once theyactuallydid begincolonizing,set out withsuch gratuitous
to "reduce" the savage to civility.As JamesAxtell describes
thoroughness
the process, "In European eyes, no native characteristicwas too small to
reform,no habit too harmlessto reduce."114 Such behavior seems to go
beyondany immediatepoliticalor materialmotiveand seems ratherto serve
moregeneralpsychologicalneeds stirredup by conflictwiththenatives. The
recentemphasison the colonists' obvious materialgreed and rationalselfinterest-or class-interest-hasunnecessarilyobscuredtherole of theseless
obvious irrationalmotives and fantasies that are potentiallyeven more
insidious.
Shakespeare'sassimilationofelementsfromhistoricalcolonialistdiscourse
was neitherentirelyisolated fromotheruses or innocentof theireffects.
Nonetheless, the "colonialism" in his play is linked not only to
Shakespeare's indirectparticipationin an ideology of political exploitation
and erasure but also to his directparticipationin the psychological aftereffectsof havingexperiencedtheexploitationand erasureinevitablein being
a child in an adult's world. He was not merelyreproducinga preexistent
discourse;he was also crossingit withotherdiscourses,changing,enlarging,
skewing, and questioningit. Our sense of The Tempest's participationin
"colonialist discourse" should be flexibleenough to take account of such
crossings;indeedour notionof thatin whichsuch discourseconsistedshould
be flexibleenoughto include the whole of the textthatconstitutesthe first
English example of fictionalcolonialistdiscourse.115
114
The Invasion Within:The Contestof Culturesin NorthAmerica (Oxford: OxfordUniv.
Press, 1985), p. 54.
115
The original version of this essay was presentedat a session on "Psychoanalysis and
RenaissanceHistory,"chairedbyRichardWheelerat the 1987 MLA annualmeeting.The current
versionhas greatlybenefitedfromcarefulreadingsby JanetAdelman, Anne and Rob Goble,
Carol Neely, MarianneNovy, MartinWiener,and several anonymousreaders.
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