The Tempest By William Shakespeare

Since the beginning of civilization there have many stories and drawings of monsters. Where do the monsters come from and why are these tales told. Are we the ones who create the monsters? Today as adults we do not really have fear that a half human half bull will attack us but why did people of the past fear these creatures. As time progressed humans started to interpret and use the word monster in a different manner. In this essay I will be arguing that reader-response criticism is the best way to interpret William Shakespeare’s The Tempest by showing that we create the monsters. The best way to argue this play is to use the Toulmin model of argumentation. I think that Shakespeare argues that we create the monsters we fear and only we can
In his essay, “Monsters and the Moral Imagination” author Stephan T Asma states, “Monsters have a purpose – not merely to express our fears but also to test our sense of morality”. This is perfectly exemplified in The Tempest’s Prospero, he was created by the king when he was banished to island because he was a threat to his power. Shakespeare wrote “This King of Naples, being an enemy To me inveterate hearkens my brothers suit” basically stating that his brother the king saw Prospero as a threat so he banished him and his family instead of killing them for fear that his people would turn on him. In doing that King Alonso also created a monster out of fear. Towards the end of this play the King is forgiven by Prospero for his actions, to me this is not Prospero forgiving him it’s the king forgiving himself for the evil he committed and trying to do right by help by destroying the fear he had, the fear being Prospero. My interpretation of this is that the king’s fear has manifested as Island Prospero and to get rid of the fear he had to overcome it knowing consciously he was the root of the problem. I think that in this case King Alonso did create his own
In his essay “The Origins of Half-Human, Half-animal Creatures” Jorge states, “A monster is nothing but a combination of elements taken from real creatures and the combinatory possibility’s border on the infinite” This helps Shakespeare’s claim about creating the monsters because it happens in The Tempest not just with Prospero and the king. When Prospero is on this land he meets an island native named Caliban, Prospero teaches him English and I think that Prospero mistreats Caliban is because he does not want the same thing to happen to him twice so he makes sure he is now the one with power so he learns magic but with his mistreatment of Caliban, Caliban starts to develop some of these monstrous elements like hate and revenge. This is apparent because in of the scene Prospero explains that Caliban almost tried to rape his daughter Miranda and that act in of itself is monstrous and who knows if he would have done that if it wasn’t fueled by his hatred toward Prospero. Stephan T. Asma says in his essay Monsters and the Moral Imagination that “In our liberal culture, we dramatize the rage of the monstrous creature… then scold ourselves and our ‘intolerant society’ for alienating the outcast in the first place”. If Prospero would have treated Caliban more like a human and not a creature or a monster or slave then Caliban wouldn’t have tried to rape Miranda or even