Book Club Guide

The Tempest

by William Shakespeare · 1611 · Classics

Key themes

Power, art and the ethics of colonialism
Forgiveness as a choice — and its limits
Freedom and what it costs to give it

About this book

The magician Prospero, exiled on an island with his daughter Miranda and two servants, orchestrates the arrival of the enemies who usurped his Milanese dukedom. Shakespeare's last solo play meditates on power, art, forgiveness and the ambiguous freedom of the imagination.

Written around 1610-11 and believed to be one of Shakespeare's last plays, The Tempest has been intensively re-read since the postcolonial turn, with Caliban reinterpreted as its moral and political centre.

Discussion questions

Prospero controls everything on the island through magic. Is he a benevolent ruler, a tyrant, or something in between — and what does his mastery of the situation say about the ethics of art and power?
Caliban has been read as an indigenous person colonised, as a monster, as a slave, as a natural man corrupted by civilisation. Which reading do you find most productive — and does the play support or complicate each?
Prospero's famous speech — 'We are such stuff as dreams are made on' — is the play's most quoted passage. What is he saying about the nature of reality and art — and why does he choose this moment to say it?
The play ends with Prospero renouncing his magic. This has been read as Shakespeare's farewell to the theatre. Whether or not that's true, what does the renunciation of power mean within the play's world?
Miranda says 'O brave new world that has such people in it' — an expression of wonder that Prospero qualifies: ''Tis new to thee.' What does this exchange say about innocence, experience and the costs of knowledge?