PS Forgot to say that Shakespeare's idea of mercy and prayer here is
most certainly not a Christian one, if God's mercy is one of the
central staples of Christendom: assaulting mercy might even be
tantamount to a blasphemy in that sense, an assaulting of God. One
of the many interesting twists of the speech. It's fascinated many a
more prominent Shakespeare student than those here, btw, partly
because it's often read as Shakespeare's own abandonment of his art,
if it's true that The Tempest is his last play.
Best
A
>At 3:10 PM -0800 1/26/03, Jon Corelis wrote:
>>I'm rather surprised so much is being made of the brief reference to
>>prayer and mercy in Prospero's epilogue. That epilogue always
>>struck me as a nod to Christianity tacked on as a play-it-safe
>>afterthought to a play which is so thoroughly pagan in spirit that
>>it could have been written by Ovid.
>
>So much is made because so much is there. It is after all a thorn in
>what otherwise might be the kind of rose you describe: and it is not
>"tacked on" so much as an astonishing flowering out of the play.
>
>People so often talk about Shakespeare's plays as if he were not a
>playwright - he is a playwright first, a theatre practitioner (he was
>an actor and producer too) working consciously with the conventions
>of theatre, and it seems to me crucial that isn't forgotten. In
>Prospero's speech he is playing with the actual literal situation of
>theatre, and in such interesting ways. Much as Brecht did centuries
>later. And theatre, yes, is pagan in its soul.
>
>Best
>
>Alison
>--
>
>
>
>Alison Croggon
>Home page
>http://www.users.bigpond.com/acroggon/
>
>Masthead Online
>http://au.geocities.com/masthead_2/
--
Alison Croggon
Home page
http://www.users.bigpond.com/acroggon/
Masthead Online
http://au.geocities.com/masthead_2/
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