The Tempest

William Shakespeare

• Publisher: Dover Publications
• Year: 2012
• Topic: Literature
• eBook ISBN:
  9780486113845
• Subtopic: British Drama
• Index: Literature

This bewitching play, Shakespeare's final work, articulates a wealth of the playwright's mature reflections on life and contains some of his most familiar and oft-quoted lines. The story concerns Miranda, a lovely young maiden, and Prospero, her philosophical old magician father, who dwell on an enchanted island, alone except for their servants -- Ariel, an invisible sprite, and Caliban, a monstrous witch's son.
Into their idyllic but isolated lives comes a shipwrecked party that includes the enemies who usurped Prospero's dukedom years before, and set him and his daughter adrift on the ocean. Also among the castaways is a handsome prince, the first young man Miranda has ever seen. Comedy, romance, and reconciliation ensue, in a masterly drama that begins with a storm at sea and concludes in joyous harmony.
Students, poetry lovers, and drama enthusiasts will treasure this convenient, modestly priced edition of one of Shakespeare's greatest plays and one of literature's finest comedies.

Dramatis Personæ¹

ALONSO, King of Naples.
SEBASTIAN, his brother.
PROSPERO, the right Duke of Milan.
ANTONIO, his brother, the usurping Duke of Milan.
FERDINAND, son to the King of Naples.
GONZALO, an honest old Counsellor.

CALIBAN, a savage and deformed Slave.
TRINCULO, a Jester.
STEPHANO, a drunken Butler.
Master of a Ship.
Boatswain.
Mariners.

 

 

MIRANDA, daughter to Prospero.

ARIEL, an airy Spirit.

Other Spirits attending on Prospero.

SCENE—A ship at sea: an uninhabited island.

 

¹The Tempest was first published in the First Folio of 1623, and is the opening play of that volume. It is there divided into Acts and Scenes, and the stage directions are exceptionally full. At the close of the piece “The Scene” is described as “an uninhabited island,” and a list of the dramatis personæ is given under the heading “Names of the Actors.”

ACT I.

SCENE I. On a ship at sea: a tempestuous noise of thunder and lightning heard.

Enter A SHIP-MASTER and A BOATSWAIN.

MAST. Boatswain!

BOATS. Here, master: what cheer?

MAST. Good, speak to the mariners: fall to ’t, yarely,¹ or we run ourselves aground: bestir, bestir.

[Exit.

Enter MARINERS.

BOATS. Heigh, my hearts! cheerly, cheerly, my hearts! yare, yare! Take in the topsail. Tend to the master’s whistle. Blow, till thou burst thy wind, if room enough!²

Enter ALONSO, SEABASTIAN, ANTONIO, FERDINAND, GONZALO, and others.

ALON. Good boatswain, have care. Where’s the master? Play the men.

BOATS. I pray now, keep below.

ANT. Where is the master, boatswain?

BOATS. Do you not hear him? You mar our labour: keep your cabins: you do assist the storm.

GON. Nay, good,³ be patient.

BOATS. When the sea is. Hence! What cares these roarers for the name of king? To cabin: silence! trouble us not.

CON. Good, yet remember whom thou hast aboard.

BOATS. None that I more love than myself. You are a counsellor; if you can command these elements to silence, and work the peace of the present, we will not hand a rope more; use your authority: if you cannot, give thanks you have lived so long, and make yourself ready in your cabin for the mischance of the hour, if it so hap. Cheerly, good hearts! Out of our way, I say.

[Exit.

GON. I have great comfort from this fellow: methinks he hath no drowning mark upon him; his complexion is perfect gallows. Stand fast, good Fate, to his hanging: make the rope of his destiny our cable, for our own doth little advantage. If he be not born to be hanged, our case is miserable.

[Exeunt.

Re-enter BOATSWAIN.

BOATS. Down with the topmast! yare! lower, lower! Bring her to try with main-course.⁴ [A cry within.] A plague upon this howling! they are louder than the weather or our office.

Re-enter SEBASTIAN, ANTONIO, and CONZALO.

Yet again! what do you here? Shall we give o’er, and drown? Have you a mind to sink?

SEB. A pox o’ your throat, you bawling, blasphemous, incharitable dog!

BOATS. Work you, then.

ANT. Hang, cur! hang, you whoreson, insolent noise-maker. We are less afraid to be drowned than thou art.

CON. I ’ll warrant him for drowning;⁵ though the ship were no stronger than a nutshell, and as leaky as an unstanched wench.

BOATS. Lay her a-hold, a-hold! set her two courses;⁶ off to sea again; lay her off.

Enter MARINERS wet.

MARINERS. All lost! to prayers, to prayers! all lost!

BOATS. What, must our mouths be cold?⁷

GON. The king and prince at prayers! let ’s assist them,

For our case is as theirs.

SEB. I ’m out of patience.

ANT. We are merely cheated of our lives by drunkards:

This wide-chapp’d rascal,—would thou mightst lie drowning

The washing of ten tides!⁸

CON. He ’ll be hang’d yet,

Though every drop of water swear against it,
And gape at widest to glut⁹ him.
[A confused noise within: “Mercy on us!”—
“We split, we split!”—“Farewell my wife and children!”—
“Farewell, brother!”—“We split, we split, we split!”]

ANT. Let ’s all sink with the king.

SEB. Let ’s take leave of him.

[Exeunt Ant. and Seb.

CON. Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an acre of barren ground, long heath, brown furze, any thing. The wills above be done! but I would fain die a dry death.

[Exeunt.

SCENE II. The Island.

Before PROSPEROU’s Cell.

Enter PROSPERO and MIRANDA.

MIR. If by your art, my dearest father, you have

Put the wild waters in this roar, allay them.
The sky, it seems, would pour down stinking pitch,
But that the sea, mounting to the welkin’s cheek,
Dashes the fire out. O, I have suffer’d
With those that I saw suffer! a brave vessel,
Who had, no doubt, some noble creature in her,
Dash’d all to pieces. O, the cry did knock
Against my very heart! Poor souls, they perish’d!
Had I been any ...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Note
• Table of Contents
• Dramatis Personæ1
• ACT I.
• ACT II.
• ACT III.
• ACT IV.
• ACT V.
• EPILOGUE
• DOVER · THRIFT · EDITIONS