Adaptations of The Tempest
Comments(3) I became a little curious about the history of The Tempest and its reception during the time it was performed and after it was published, so I decided to research and write about a brief history of The Tempest. While researching The Tempest, I was surprised to find out that there were several adaptations of this play. Sir William Davenant (a close companion of Shakespeare) owned the rights to Shakespeare’s play, The Tempest, and he wrote and adaptation along with John Dryden called The Tempest, or the Enchanted Island. They added two female characters (Miranda’s sister Dorinda and Caliban’s sister Sycorax) and Prospero was also given a son named Hippolito. Like Miranda, Hippolito has never seen a woman. Another adaptation of The Tempest was then created by Thomas Duffet called The Mock Tempest, or The Enchanted Castle. This adaptation was more of a parody of John Dryden and Sir William Davenant’s The Enchanted Island. It takes place in a brothel and its main characters consist of prostitutes, wealthy Johns and Pimps. Unlike in The Enchanted Island and the original version of Shakespeare’s play, Miranda and Dorinda have had multiple sex partners but they can’t quite understand marriage marriage.
Credit:
Keiser, Melissa. Pre-twentieth Century Productions of The Tempest. http://www2.cedarcrest.edu/academic/eng/lfletcher/tempest/papers/MKeiser.htm. online
Credit photo openlibrary.org
Credit photo: Credit photo: Bauman Rare Books
I really like the fact that a close companion of Shakespeare’s owned the rights of his play. I wonder how he came to obtain them.
I feel that the adaptations seem to stray far from the original but then again they are adaptations and they sound really interesting, especially the parody one.
I feel like Dryden’s Tempest of the Enchanted Island is like some bad parody movie like The Starving Games on Hulu which is a 2-star movie trying to make some money off of a huge blockbuster (The Hunger Games). It doesn’t work when you do it that way.
If you want to make a parody, keep it short and simple. A short 5 minute skit will do but a whole movie/play is just overkill.
But if you want to talk about adaptations, I mentioned in my first essay that Shakespeare was influenced by Thomas More’s Utopia. This is like from my own hypothesis, based off of similar lines.
“PATIENT IOURSELF, GOOD MAISTER FREARE (QUOD HE)..AND BE NOT ANGRY” (More, 1551) similar to Titus saying to Tamora “Patient yourself, madam, and pardon me.” (1.1.121) It might be a far stretch, I admit that, but Sparknotes claims that More’s History of Richard III, was a huge influence in Shakespeare’s Richard III. Anyway, Utopia, is about More meeting two intellectuals and their discussions mainly about the New World, the travels of Amerigo Vespucci, the fallibility of mankind, society’s ideals and it also tells the story the island of Utopia which to me is much like this island that Prospero tries to rule with egalitarian authority. I think Shakespeare really is highlighting the importance of the a fair and proper judgement in dealing with savagery, lawbreakers, or dissenters. I think Shakespeare was a good student of More, and followed the belief of Humanist and rational thought rather than in Titus Andronicus which was a comically radical way to oppose the idea of peaceful resolution.
I really wanted to learn some more about Sycorax! Thanks for posting this, will have to take a closer look as soon as finals are over. Usually these adaptations lack substance from adding additional characters and the story becomes difficult to read. I was never truly that familiar with The Tempest and any productions or stories that expanded from ti.
Still is surly ironic that Miranda is not able to understand marriage when Prospero was o’ so deeply set on getting her a good man!