Out of all the plays that I’ve read from Shakespeare, The Tempest by far is my favorite. The play
itself is an easy read and it is not dragged out compared to his other plays, in my opinion. Prospero, the former duke of Milan was overthrown by his younger brother Antonio. Similar to Hamlet, Shakespeare is no stranger when it comes on to war/disputes against brothers. It was also Lion King themed but ultimately feuds between brothers derived from Cain and Abel. Because Prospero was always locked away in a room studying and educating himself on magic, he made it easier for his brother to dethrone him. Had Prospero been more active amongst his people and getting to know them he probably wouldn't have fallen as hard as he did. He made it seem like he was entitled because since he was in power he probably felt that no one could challenge him or nothing else needed to be done. In other words just wanted the title of Duke but didn't want to work for it. As a result of that, he designed an extraordinary, aggressive storm leaving a ship containing the king of Naples and his party the center of attention, all with the help of Ariel. Of course it's not a real storm but instead an illusion created by Ariel. To me thats what made the play interesting. The way how I look at it is you have a man, Prospero, dictating what he wants painted and Ariel, the spirit creature, is the one actually creating the image. With all of the commotion that was going on, everybody being on separate parts of the island, and Prosper having to keep tabs on everyone, his ultimate goal was for his daughter Miranda to be married to Ferdinand. Mind you he's doing everything within a 6 hours time frame. With so much to accomplish it came to a point where Ariel was basically telling him "sir remember my freedom" and Prospero was saying "remember you owe me". I didn't really appreciate that part because I feel that if you're going to do something for someone do it out of the goodness of your heart and stop thinking that they owe you something just because of your kind gesture. Ariel continued to fulfill his duties and his loyalty to Prospero until his work was done.
But overall what prospero did was art. Art comes in different form and what he did was way more than anyone could've ever imagined. He created a story and what’s even better was he made that story come to life. In the end he did the unexpected and forgave his brother instead of killing him. Forgiveness is always the right thing to do because it shows how great of a person you are and that you are able to lift that type of burden from off of your heart. His daughter also got married to Ferdinand. If it wasn't for Ariel, Prospero wouldn't have gotten so far. From reading and understanding this play, I realized that all artist paint, draw, dance, etc. to tell a story. Whatever their story may be, they use their artistic skill to communicate to their audience. Art is such a beautiful thing and life without art would just be dull and bland. We all should appreciate art and never take it for granted because without it life wouldn't even exist.
