Hagseed AND THE Tempest Essay PDF

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ESSAY INTRODUCTION: Through critically exploring the dissonances between archetypal and reimagined texts, an audience is invited to consider the emergent textual conversations that stand as critiques of authors’ resonant contextual concerns. Shakespeare's 1611 tragicomedy 'The Tempest' contextually explores the attitudes of Jacobean England concerned with exaggerating an image of foreign 'otherness', challenging coloniser-foreigner power dynamics. As a metafictional palimpsest drawing from the originality of Shakespeare's canonical play, Margaret Atwood's 2016 'Hag-seed' re-conceptualises 'Otherness' through the inmates, reflective of Atwood's Canadian colonisation context. Shakespeare further explores Renaissance Christian Humanist thought through the individual’s digression from entrenched revenge to catharsis, enhancing its portrayal through a profound experimentation with metatheatricality. Resonating with the hypo-text, Atwood reveals intricacies of revenge in both fueling an obsessive mindset catalysed by betrayal and exposing a candidly emotional catharsis, thoughtfully heightening her dramatic representation in participatory meta-theatre. In examining complex textual features that refashion meaning, audiences analytically engage with the textual interventions between The Tempest and Hag-seed, heightening our appreciation of the dimensionality of colonialism and retribution reflective of evolving social commentary. In contextual exploration of colonial expansionism, Shakespeare delves into the Jacobean ostracism of foreigners in collision with Atwood's reframed post-modern pastiche on prisoner stigmatisation, demonstrating an enhanced reinvention of foreigner representation reflective of authorial values. Influenced by Michel de Montaigne's 'Of the Canibales' ideas on the savagery of primitive societies, Shakespeare exemplifies the negative insinuations associated with Indigenous groups in Caliban's zoomorphic formation as "…A freckled whelp, hagborn - not honoured with human shape..", satirising the Eurocentric perspective on native inferiority. Highlighting cultural imperialist attitudes towards native communities and inviting contemporary conversation by modern audiences on negative indigenous representation in modern contexts, Shakespeare’s utilises biblical symbolism within “… Come, swear to that!...Kiss the book …”. Signifying alcohol as a method for subjugating native communities, Shakespeare profoundly reflects Jacobean anxieties of cannibalistic behaviour as consciously subversive acts threatening to destabilise the European body politic. Shakespeare's construction of Prospero and Caliban's relationship extends the colonizerforeigner dichotomy to be further characterised by bigoted fear elucidated within “In mine own cell, till thou didst seek to violate the honour of my child…” Shakespeare frames an abrasive character dynamic through reprimanding dialogue accusatory of rape, suggesting Prospero’s entrenched objection to miscegenation engrained from Act 1, apprehensive of an ethnic, virile Caliban who is sexually focused on his daughter. Shakespeare extensively explores the complexities of foreigner representation in delineating European ethnocentrism, enhancing the audience’s understanding of expanding textual communication reflective of resonant contexts.

In transposing Shakespearean cultural hierarchies, Atwood enlightens a dissonant representation of a multi-dimensional ‘Otherness’, behaving as a modern critical discourse on incarceration in textual conversation with the Tempest. Prospero’s judgemental epithet toward

Caliban as a 'Hag-seed' intricately aligns with Atwood's title, as she appropriates Shakespearian vernacular to indirectly expose post-coloniality’s treatment of subaltern societies.. Highlighting a dissonant perception of colonialization within the metatextuality “…There’s more to Caliban, he’ll tell them, than just an ugly face…”, Atwood scrutinises the stereotypical discernment of the alienated through metonym, re-inventing Caliban’s figurative imprisonment to the inmate’s literal incarceration, resonating with her Canadian context's mistreatment of prisoners within the penitentiary system. . In enhancing Caliban's complexity as an exploited minority in collision with Shakespeare's monstrous representation, Atwood utilises antimetabole as an inversion of Caliban's song within “…We know what you took! White-collar crook! / White-collar crook! We know what you took!...” Here, Atwood adopts a meta-textual appropriation of rap-music as an artform empowering the marginalised. By representing inmates as ‘emancipated’ victims of oppression, an audience’s understanding is heightened through her representation of changing social context chastising “White Collar Crimes” in 21st century politics amongst individuals in bureaucratic positions exploiting their privilege. Atwood thoughtfully creates a textual conversation with The Tempest, reframing Jacobean values introspective of contemporary prisoner marginalisation within her secular liberal context and prompting audiences to reconsider antagonistic illustrations of marginalised communities.

Shakespeare’s exploration of the individual’s desire for revenge transforming into an illuminating catharsis is heightened through a profound experimentation with meta-theatrical form as appropriated by Atwood, demonstrating how composers textually communicate ideas in versatile manners. Shakespeare’s precise portrayal of the meta-theatricality of the thunderstorm in media-res illustrates Prospero’s vengeful desires from the protasis, dramatically establishing his characterisation as a motivator of action throughout the 5-act dramatic structure. Consumed by indignation, “…off all the world I loved, he was the ivy which sucked my verdure…” (Act 1) Shakespeare constructs Antonio as a metaphorical ‘ivy’ parasitically draining Prospero’s rationality, directly addressing the audience in providing justification for his ‘role’ as the manipulator. Prospero’s consumption by vengeful tyranny is metaphorically demonstrated by “…My high charms work, And these, mine enemies, are all knit up… They now are in my power…” (Act 3) imperatively highlighting the metatheatricality of Prospero’s orchestrated manipulation with his enemies ‘knit-up’, indicative of his self-reflexive possession of control and merciless hubris. Shakespeare transcends the ideals of Providentialism to Christian humanism, contextually backing Prospero’s gradual catharsis in Act 5 by extoling Renaissance humanist virtues of forgiveness and ‘philanthropia’. Prompting a rediscovery of humanity, , Shakespeare’s epilogue featuring a dramatic rhyming couplet of“…But release me from my bands, With the help of your good hands...”, exposes the audience to the meta-theatricality of Prospero’s liberating moment pleading for exemption from his self-directed manipulation, in collision with a less selfrecognising Felix. Shakespeare explicates betrayal catalysing a revenge-driven mindset and ultimately a transformation towards catharsis in purging personal agendas of retribution, textually communicating a resonating context of Christian humanist thought.

Atwood intricately explores the multifaceted nature of the individual’s struggle for retribution as both overwhelmingly controlling and fostering futility through the tool of mise-en-abyme, creating explicit character parallels and dramatic structural components in textual conversation with The Tempest. Atwood textually intervenes with The Tempest through an appropriation of Shakespeare’s 5-act-structure, creating an articulate representation of the

individual’s conflict between vengeance and redemption. Felix’s hubristic voice facilitates the cyclical revenge meta-production, indicated by free indirect discourse gelled with tri-partite congery within “…The secrecy, the sabotage. The snake-like subterfuge. …”(Act 1), This imprisonment of past betrayals - resonant to Prospero’s confined contemplations of past disloyalties- plagues Felix’s conscience, propelling his staging of The Tempest as an apparatus to drive his plot, in alignment with Atwood’s personal appreciation for post-modern theatrical realism and staunch advocacy for artistic expression in Canadian literary culture, engaging with the Hogarth Shakespeare project. However, dissonant from Prospero’s eventual realisation of forgiveness, Atwood explores the entrenched trauma inhibiting Felix’s internal realignment through the heterodiegetic presence of his daughter within, “…hold their feverish hands and stroke their foreheads in the hospital room…they slip gently away from you, into the dark backward and abysm of time…” Atwood euphemistically represents the unfathomable pain experienced by Felix and the passing of his daughter through flashback, highlighting the engrained suffering experienced by Felix inhibiting his real progression. Ultimately aligning with Shakespeare, Atwood presents the satisfaction of revenge disintegrating as it “…feels like a let-down?..”, anti-climatically indicating the pointlessness of vengeance. Atwood textually communicates Shakespeare through indicating a multi-dimensionality to desires for revenge, allowing an audience to appreciate the dissonances in contexts that enlighten new perspectives.

EXTRA PARAGRAPHS ON GENDER:

TEMPEST: Shakespeare’s representation of submissive femininity in the objectification of Miranda explores gender hierarchies of Jacobean England, reflective of Elizabethan values. Shakespeare’s construction of gender relationships profoundly comments on the commoditisation of females through a privileged, white patriarch voice through a five-act dramatic structure, confining Miranda as an archetype of pliant womanliness. As demonstrated within “…I am your wife, if you will marry me; It not, I’ll die your maid…” the traditional illustration of heterosexual relationships through antithesis emphasises Renaissance women’s subservience to patriarchal dynamics, confining the female archetype to embodying chastity and fertility. Influenced by pseudo-scientific ‘Galenic theory’ and the single-sex model positioning female bodies as imperfect and incomplete, Shakespeare exemplifies the male anxieties of women’s transformative capacities in emphasising the holiness of marriage and oppression of female sexual freedom within “…If thou dost break her virgin-knot…With full and holy rite be ministered…As Hymen’s lamps shall light you…” Prospero’s proclamation featuring a euphemistic double-meaning intertextually alluding to Hymen, Greek god of marriage and Miranda’s ‘virgin knot’ as her chastity elucidates an oppressive father-daughter dynamic. As she is demanded to “…obey and be attentive…” through an imperative tone, Shakespeare dramatically constructs a subjugated Miranda, divergent from Atwood’s representation of Anne-Marie who rather embodies resilient self-agency. The construction of Miranda as an ‘…unwitting object of exchange in a matrix of colonial and nuptial economies…’ (Jessica Slights) contextually comments on traditionalist gender expectations, allowing modern audiences to consider the importance of upholding feminist value in their contexts.

In transposing Shakespearean gender hierarchies, Atwood enlightens a dissonant representation of liberated female characterisation, behaving as a postmodern critical discourse on gender stereotyping in textual conversation with the Tempest. Atwood textually intervenes with The Tempest through an appropriation of Shakespeare’s 5-act-structure, creating an articulate reconceptualization of Elizabethan femininity through her female characters. Reflective of Atwood’s 2016, third-wave feminist context encouraging female autonomy, the audience engages with a contrastingly provocative female character as demonstrated within the metaphor “…talking as if Miranda is just a rag doll…lying around with her legs open…with a sign on her saying, Rape Me…” In collision with Prospero’s obsessive management of Miranda’s virginity, Atwood’s construction of Anne-Marie’s agency demonstrates a rejection of a placid, two-dimensional characterisation of Miranda. In allowing Miranda to break free from patriarchal values as a manifestation of empowered female characterisation in literature reflective of the emerging 4th wave feminism, Atwood heightens the audience’s appreciation by personally engaging them within her feminist literary criticism. Atwood further obliterates Shakespeare’s dainty definition of femininity, within the colloquialism “…I don’t blame them. Being a girl is the pits…” Here, Atwood demonstrates a candid rejection of shallow tropes categorising women, providing a perspective on the 21st century struggles of women, resonating with social modern conversation on the lack of female voices in diverse settings. In reviving Miranda’s prefeminist character, Atwood conveys colliding insights with Shakespeare through an experimentation with female characterisation within “… He was never ready when a slice of filth came out of her child-like mouth…” The synaesthesia emphasises a brash perspective on Anne-Marie’s ‘child-like’ appearance in juxtaposition with her ‘filthy’ dialogue, uncharacteristic of Shakespeare’s Miranda. Shakespeare thus allows for a challenging of Shakespeare’s typical representation of female ‘modesty’, dismantling innocence attributed to women in the Jacobean era. Furthered within the profanity of “…Don’t blame me, blame my f***ing hormones…”, Atwood transformatively modernises a female character through o demolish delicate female portrayal and criticise the entrenched patriarchal paradigms confined within Shakespeare’s text. Atwood’s appropriation of The Tempest is a thoughtful feminist revision transcending the Renaissance perception of femininity, enabling the audience to appreciate the dissonances in re-imagined texts that invite contemporary conversation on gender roles....