Harvard ENGL E-129 - Lecture 12: The Tempest

Recorded on Dec 19, 2007.

[@beccathebruh]

I wish I could read literature like her. She has so many thoughtful, complex, and beautiful analyses, yet she expresses them with such eloquence

[@halitdirekci8103]

nerd

[@christopherbrookfield4785]

Very well put! I think I could listen to her talk about literature, probably, forever. 👏

[@Laocoon283]

​@@halitdirekci8103lmao

[@shogunchitown]

It's entirely possible that with the same amount of time and effort she's put into it, you could too.

[@rosedebrantes28]

To the people discontent with the content of the lecture: I take the same course at another university and it's normal that she's stating the obvious. The goal of this lecture is to be rather informative and insightful. She's making sure that everyone is on the right track before they start to think about their essays. The discussion she mentioned at the beginning of the video, that is supposed to follow next, is where stuff is supposed to get insightful, because the students are supposed to already prepare their essays and discuss they ideas and remarks together. This is just making sure everyone is on the right track. There's only so much you can say in a hour or two, and as a student that studies the same thing, i found it incredibly helpful.

[@plekkchand]

What's the right track, pray?

[@ashleighfay6258]

@@plekkchand To make sure everyone understands the basis of the play and the characters! The themes and ideas explored, as well as the context behind Shakespeare's decisions! :)

[@nusopa7553]

់់។ ់.. ់់ ,. , .... ់់់់់់់់់ើ់់ើើើើ

[@rrammay]

I prithee do tell

[@slay3040]

To all who are asking, I believe the lecturer is Professor Marjorie Garber! Great lecture, thank you prof!

[@NickHiltermann]

The days before social distancing. Great lecture.

[@kirbycairo]

I have a different kind of outlook toward literature than she, but I still find her lectures interesting and appreciate listening to them because, unlike so many English profs, she doesn't seem pompous or egoistic in her opinions.

[@deokaps8605]

I don’t even like English, but the way her perspectives on the play are out of the box makes this so interesting

[@vinm300]

The lecturer does excellent well for almost 2hrs, with what looks like no notes. 24:00 "Prospero is like ?" He is like Rudolf II (1576- 1612) who shut himself away, invited scholars and artists, dabbled in alchemy and astrology, and decorated his palace with saucy paintings. 25:00 "Magic and science are imbricated." Newton is a good example : he wrote more on the bible than he did on science, dabbled with astrology, and I think alchemy. 25:30 "Science - which means knowledge and knowing" Francis Bacon's method. It is knowledge based on observation : the orbit of the planets etc. "Science which means rational enquiry"

[@johnbetancourt8691]

She is simply amazing.

[@zakirullahkhan1188]

It's really a good one for developing critical analysis of the text of the play. liked it very much. thanks for it.

[@livandavidson8497]

Those you here debunking her discourse and insights are clearly seeking "insight" that is often accessed through your own readings of the plays. Her task, as it stands, especially in this course, seems to be an introduction to Shakespeare which is meant -- regardless of the institution -- to touch upon certain themes, tropes, characters, and conflicts that she finds particularly interesting along with a literal reading of the play -- essential to understanding Shakespeare. "She offers superficial insight," I would clearly disagree; this professor is pays keen attention to interesting modes that make not only The Tempest, but also, the rest of Shakespearean plays great and timeless works. The professor is clearly well-versed and has wonderful interpretive approaches. Don't expect her to offer every-possibe reading of The Tempest in two hours, as it is impossible.

[@FidesAla]

I just wish there were more in-depth lectures and discourses available online without having to enroll in a university.

[@charlychips]

Now I can understand why Harvard is Harvard. Magnificent lecturer. Thank you.

[@criticalcookie2579]

Thank you for posting this. It's of great value to me.

[@aditisingh1828]

The intro is like the ending ...themes and all, but great The more I get to know, about it the more I how afar I am from the truth (whole of it )

[@christineweatherby7053]

Thank you for sharing this lecture. :-)

[@artstwinned184]

It's also important to reference Montaigne as a source for Shakespeare. In this play, Montaigne's idealistic notions of the noble savage (see On Cannibals ... [N.B. Caliban]) are ironically placed in the mouth of Gonzalo, who is then lampooned by his corrupt companions. Also see see the beginning of Florio's translation of 'On Cruelty' which inspires Shakespeare to incorporate some of Montaigne's reflections on virtue and Florio's vocabulary, to give us gems like: "The rarer action is in virtue than in vengeance" The Tempest is partly a laboratory, - and comment on, Montaigne's humanistic essays...

[@MaartenVHelden]

That is actually not entirely overlooked as Rousseau and the "noble savage" theme are spoken about in broad terms at the start of this video. Here Montaigne is indeed not mentioned specifically but in her book in the chapter about The Tempest, she does mention him and the fact that Caliban is (almost) an anagram of cannibal, which the essay of Montaigne is all about.

[@vinm300]

1:28 "The wedded pair who turned out not to be so happy but that's another story". Elizabeth (Charles I's sister) married Frederick of the Palatine. At the start of the 30yrs war the Bohemians offered Frederick the crown (after ousting Ferdinand II), against all good advice he accepted, lost the battle of White Mountain, and lost the Palatine to Spanish forces. Elizabeth (& Frederick) were exiled to the Dutch provinces. The Calvinist ministers complained about glamorous Elizabeth's décolletage. Elizabeth's court included theatre-players, which the Calvinists also complained about, Maurice of Orange replied, "If you made your sermons more interesting the people wouldn't attend the theatre".

[@na.my.an.cat-u6]

I am surprised about an association rising up watching this lesson while having just watched "Don Quichote" shortly before...or may be more a question than an association: "Can it be that Shakespeare's Prospero could be a higher octave or the other side of the same coin, or both in one of Don Quichote who is protectively wrapped into the role of a crazy romantic knight by fate/ God's Will to fulfill his destiny of interrupting the "common" ?" Please meditate on this question, that has rosen up by itself and is not an essence of my willing act....thank You readers of this commentary for some thought-over answers !

[@felipediogenes7539]

Prospero says the word "slave" to Ariel as well. (Act 1, Scene 2)

[@nicholasjohnfranklin7397]

Yes, and Shakespeare uses it 130 times, primarily in European contexts. Its principal meanings in Early Modern English were "villain", "rascal", on the one hand, and "servant" on the other. The automatic association with enslaved-and-trafficked Africans is a later - primarily American usage.

[@raykarush186]

Thanks for sharing this lecture.

[@blackpinkluv9869]

Some would say that Prospero is the embodiment of Shakespeare himself. It is his last farewell to writing as it is Prospero’s farewell to magic. Prospero controls and manipulates everything that goes on in the play like Shakespeare does with his writing. At the end he is able to get everything that he wants.

[@debanjanabanerjee8422]

Also Prospero drowning his book and burying his shaft and bidding farewell to magic can be seen as Shakespeare bidding farewell to the stage(as The tempest is assumed to be his last great plays)

[@camilagrgicevic2890]

The epilogue does indeed feel as if they were Shakespeare's words to his readers, not Prospero's.

[@Absynthius]

Fabulous lecturer.

[@matthewkramer5702]

I enjoyed the presentation, but I'll offer a couple of observations. First, Claribel was married in Tunis rather than in Algiers. (Algiers was the city from which Sycorax was banished.) Second, not only does Caliban make no effort to assert that Sycorax was beautiful, but in addition he himself characterizes her as decidedly unattractive. In Act III scene ii, Caliban declares that Miranda "as far surpasseth Sycorax/As great'st does least."

[@SKNm83]

Thank you!!

[@HighKingTurgon]

Odd that Prof. Garber insists here as in other lectures that All Is True is singly authored-I thought that consensus held it to be a collaboration with Fletcher, like Cardenio and Kinsmen. Was that not settled scholarship in '07? I was a mere high school Shakespeare nerd in those days, and authorship was only vaguely defined as "not antiStratfordian because that way lies nutters."

[@thezentrader]

@CosmosLearning why did you let people comment on this? Thank you for posting!!

[@xmaseveeve5259]

Well done.

[@Lucian_Ghita]

12:16 Prospero does indeed refer to Ariel as "my slave"1.2.323 (Folger edition)

[@maheiramkhan]

Correct!

[@liney5605]

But what about the next line? Prospero is basically annoyed that Ariel calls themselves a slave ("as thou reportest thyself")

[@maheiramkhan]

@@liney5605 I think the tone is not of annoyance but of taunt. Like, 'you call yourself my slave, but still you forget my favors to you and ask for freedom when there is so much work to do(execution of Prospero's plan) .

[@Lucian_Ghita]

​@@liney5605 "Thou, my slave,/ As thou report’st thyself, was then her [Sycorax's] servant,/And for thou wast a spirit too delicate..." The way I read it, the line "as thou report'st thyself" is a reference to the Sycorax backstory and Ariel's (more or less reliable) account of her "vicious" actions, which becomes the source of Prospero's information and stories about Sycorax. I think overall there's an interesting and revealing pattern in how Prospero treats and calls both Ariel and Caliban "slaves," "things," and "malignant/malice."

[@Rakhi.account]

this lady has true love for tempest

[@d34dch1n4d0ll]

Canan Karatay, is that you ??

[@tracksuitjim]

lecture starts at like 2:05 lol

[@plekkchand]

It never starts.

[@merch1159]

what is the name of this professor? great video, helped me organize my thoughts for an essay :)

[@slay3040]

Professor Marjorie Garber!

[@PastelPonch]

good ol marj

[@Davod2139]

For me, this is a bowdlerisation.

[@liambuckley1760]

Loved the lecture, but feel the need to point out a mistake in your arguement: Prospero does refer to Ariel as his slave, telling him "Thou, my slave, /As thou report’st thyself" (1.2.273-274). Sorry!!

[@Lol56308]

He does not refer to Ariel as his slave, so much as complain that Ariel describes himself his as his slave.

[@bucketlisttrek3863]

Please clarify ; Prospero is male or female.

[@warrenwessels2843]

Male - In an adaptation film, ProsperA, is a female.

[@bucketlisttrek3863]

@@warrenwessels2843 thanks, I was pretty much nervous.

[@cuttysnark7]

how is it that no one in this harvard class knew what humanism meant?

[@connorjohnston591]

First year class, they don't teach it in highschool. Also linguistically "humanism" is simple parts, so a smart person may not have felt the need to look it up and get an academic definition.

[@Laocoon283]

Do these sound like college students to you?

[@kanishkaxagarwal]

2:07

[@maheiramkhan]

She has a habit of licking her fingers! As if she were going to flip pages of a lofty book with thin pages that stick together.

[@bhatwasi2853]

I noticed that too. She is flipping pages recalling her preparations for the lecture.

[@Laocoon283]

You should see what she's doing with those fingers behind that lectern. Has nothing to do with books.

[@Fjesilva]

The Tempest. This is the literary testament of Shakespeare 403 years later. That I have deducted in one night. I do not know why the Shakespearean experts speak of the island as an imaginary place, or the Bermuda Islands, and another hypothesis. The island of The Tempest, Is England. The tests are here. Shakespeare wanted, and prayed, for Spain to invade England, and Catholics to be liberated. Although he feels very English. Nobody wants to imagine that Shakespere, the most universal English, wanted Spain to invade England, because England builds its national identity remembering the year 1588. But this is the truth: Precisely because Shakespeare secretly practiced Catholicism, and his family had been recused and impoverished, he wrote the Tempest to vent, because of the Protestant intolerance against Catholics. It was the last play, and he risked reprisals and left the theater. The tempest that disperses the ships (not the English action, because later there were more invincible navies, 2nd and 3rd, of 1596 and 1597, dispersed by storms). But the tempest could also bring an army to rescue the Catholics of the island. Who lives on the island of Shakespare's Tempest? They had lived Sycorax before. Look for Sycorax in Wikipedia, for example: "An especially odd and early guess at a meaning by one critic was sic or rex, a Latin homophone alluding to Queen Elizabeth's pride". Elisabeth Sycorax only appears in the named text. She is described as a ruthless witch who has already died. Now there is Caliban, which is a cannibal transformation. Caliban is the son of Elisabeth (who brought Protestantism again after the death of Maria Tudor). Protestant cannibals are "eating" Catholics. Shakespeare is very cruel to Caliban, who is a deformed being, "like Protestantism then?" But who lives abandoned on that desert island of the Tempest? (It can be deserted if they kill us all, thinks Shakespeare). Live Miranda (María Tudor), "daugther" of Prospero, Duke of Milan (Felipe II of Spain was Duke of Milan, and before King of England, and the great protector of Catholicism in Europe) Who commanded the invincible army of 1588 ?: Alonso Pérez de Guzmán (who was captain general of Lombaría , Milan). Who commanded the navy in the text of Shakespeare? a man named Alonso, king of Naples. Always Italy, where the Pope is, and always Spanish territories in Italy. Who is the greatest traitor in Spain in history? Antonio Pérez, who betrayed Felipe II, and traveled to England to ally with Elisabeth. Shakespeare met Antonio Pérez. Shakespare makes a caricature of Antonio Pérez in "Lovers of Verona", and called him Mr. Armada. Who is the greatest traitor in the Tempest? Antonio, who has stolen Prospero (Felipe II) the title of Duke of Milan, has usurped the name of Spain. The daughter of Alonso (head of the real and fictitious army) is called Claribel. How could Spain invade England? Taking troops from the Netherlands, to embark them in the army. Who was the Spanish sovereign of the Spanish Netherlands, daughter of Philip II, king who sent the army? Isabel Clara Eugenia. Isabel Clara Eugenia was proposed to be queen of France. The King of France rejected the proposal, but in return he made France Catholic. "Paris is worth a Mass". Shakespeare was thinking that this was a solution for England, a wedding like that of Philip and Mary, an invasion, or the solution that there was in France, to bring Catholicism to England. In addition, Claribel comes from Tunisia, where the uncle of Isabel Clara Eugenia, had just left the Moors expelled from Spain by infidels. Sycorax (Elisabeth) fue expulsada de Argel, por hacer brujería, era menos cristiana que los argelinos. Who is the servant of Prospero and Felipe II: Ariel, the wind, who has a childish spirit, and does not always obey Prospero. But Prospero reminds him of Ariel, that he rescued him from Sycorax. When? When Philip II of Spain was king of England he brought Catholicism. So in The Tempest, Ariel brings the ships to England. Shakespare could not go further without discovering his intention. The text of the Tempest is full of much more subtle allusions, almost on each page, showing the suffering and relief of Shakespare. The text talks about the barrels of wine from Jerez (Spain) that the fleet brings to fill the whole island, and that are hidden in a cave (wine for Catholic Masses, which were hidden in the 17th century? )He wanted what he thought was best for England. What is the last sentence of the Tempest, the farewell phrase of Shakespeare from the theaters? A Catholic phrase.

[@sebastianulfvengren6420]

Francisco Escudero Silva Fascinating. Sources, further reading etc?

[@Fjesilva]

@@sebastianulfvengren6420 Sources? I know the history of Spain, and of Europe in general, in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. I saw The Thempest characters, and I saw it clearly. Then I read the text four times, and several books on history, to confirm and expand the work. My conclusion is: Shakespeare calls Spain, to invade England to restore Catholicism. Elisabeth is the witch Sycorax, Caliban are the Anglicans, Felipe of Spain is Prospero, Miranda is María Tudor ...

[@papagen00]

She's wrong about there being another single-author play after The Tempest

[@romacabanas1032]

expand?

[@tricksterhoisington1470]

It depends on the particular study you're citing. There's some disagreement. It's generally considered that The Tempest didn't reach its esteem as Shakespeare's final masterpiece until the Romantic period. The Romantic poets really wanted it to fit their interpretation as Shakespeare's big farewell to the stage.

[@chipthequinn]

She is wonderful at finding contrasts, connections, and parallels and terrible at reading Shakespeare's lines. Here is John Gielgud, who strikes me as the champeen at this sort of behavior, once you get used to him:kzbin.info/www/bejne/Z2PYhJ1vbsZqmKs

[@abigailbruner5790]

Does this professor have a name?

[@arrystophanes7909]

More than likely

[@slay3040]

Professor Marjorie Garber!

[@abooswalehmosafeer173]

I had not the foggiest notion that this Tempest stuff was such an Atomic Pandora Box.. Or is it just a matter of The Death of the Author/Playwright as the readers interpolate and extrapolate,interrogate and expliquate leaving Me Dumbest of the seriously dumbest species on this Elemental Sphere.

[@nicholasjohnfranklin7397]

14 years later describing a case of "date rape" as "he said, she said" jars. To read against the text - Prospero and Miranda say there was an attempted rape and Caliban implies that he wishes he'd been successful - is just perverse. Similarly, it's perverse to suggest that the description of Sycorax is "in the words of the conqueror". It's not. It's in the words of the victim, Ariel. Where Prospero describes Sycorax he is explicitly asking Ariel for confirmation of the description. Where two people agree on something in a play, and there is no indication that what is agreed on is untrue (in this case some sort of denial from Caliban), then we have to accept this as fact within the fiction of the play. Otherwise you can just invent what you want because you have to reach a predetermined conclusion and on literary epistemology is possible.

[@camilagrgicevic2890]

I think that she uses "words of the conqueror" refering more to a concept than to the literal "conqueror" in the play. Sycorax is described by a colonial point of view, that's what the professor means. (in my opinion).

[@nicholasjohnfranklin7397]

@@camilagrgicevic2890 What "colonial point of view"? Why is Prospero a colonist but Sycorax not? Neither chose to be on the island. Did Prospero exploit the indigenous inhabitants more than Sycorax? No. Did Prospero aim to exploit the natural resources of the island in the interest of the metropolis? No. Does Prospero stay on the island a minute longer than he has to? No. I don't think she is using "the words of the conqueror" - which conqueror ever used the expression "he said, she said". It's just that 15 years ago we were all a lot less "woke".

[@aclark903]

@@nicholasjohnfranklin7397 Exactly. Feminists like to see witches as the good guys but Shakespeare takes a fairly Catholic/Christian view of them. Cf #Macbeth.

[@sharonhales2952]

Tempest shskespeate

[@Laocoon283]

Ignore everything this dope has said. All you need to know is: Caliban = ID Prospero = Ego Ariel = Super Ego And every character and conflict is a personification of one's inner psyche. As well as prospero setting Ariel free at the end is Shakespeare himself saying good bye to story telling. He is relinquishing his grasp over his muse.

[@jessicabhadreshwar3277]

that is... that is not how english literature works. at all.

[@Laocoon283]

@@jessicabhadreshwar3277 you have been brainwashed unfortunately

[@newterraradio7196]

stop licking your fingers

[@80thiconoclast]

um, is this really a Harvard lecture? Everything here is really obvious. Nothing insightful. And why do most of the students who ask questions sound so old? Is this some type of 'community lecture,' with some vague, tenuous relation to Harvard exploited for marketing purposes?

[@carrie4594]

+80thiconoclast I was thinking the exact thoughts as I listened.

[@80thiconoclast]

+carrie haha nice to know someone feels the same way. Cheers.

[@raykarush186]

+80thiconoclast Answer to your question: Doubt."129"; not the graduate class... Obviously; nothing "obvious" at the undergraduate level at any University or college... The professor hopes for the best when asks a question; "a wondrous lovely storm," no expectations at this level. None at all.... Every answer is a little miracle.

[@bookwormaddict3933]

it is an undergrad English lecture E-129

[@IslandofTrains]

@80thiconoclast. We get it. Your'e smart. Please, enlighten us with your deep and insightful knowledge! Reveal to us your divine Shakespearean wisdom that we're not gaining from this discussion. For an undergraduate class, isn't best to touch on the 'obvious' before attempting a closer a reading. What is obvious to you, may be completely alien to others, oh wise one.

[@TheWhitehiker]

Boring and woke. Nothing to do with the play's meaning; move on.

[@aditisingh1828]

The intro is like the ending ...themes and all, but great The more I get to know, about it the more I how afar I am from the truth (whole of it )