In the final scene of the Tempest, all the characters have assembled onto the stage together for the first time for the climax to the end of the play. Prospero states his intention of “relinquishing his magic” nevertheless its presence pervades the scene. Prospero enters in his magical robes, He lures Alonso and the other main characters into his self created charmed circle and holds them there; almost paralysed whilst he recaps. Once he releases them from the magical spell he created, he makes the magic-like spectacle of unveiling Miranda and Ferdinand who are playing chess. This is the first time that Alonso has seen Ferdinand since the tempest Prospero created at the start of the play. Only in the epilogue, when he is alone on-stage, does Prospero announce definitively that his charms are “all o’erthrown”
Prospero passes great judgment on his enemies in the final scene, however we are no longer put off by his power, both because his love for Miranda has radically changed his and humanised him to a vast degree. He welcomes and praises the men stood before him “honourable man”. Alonso is shocked by this comment and is perplexed as to why he was greeted this way, as he is well aware that his actions towards Prospero before were “most cruelly”.
Caliban, Stefano and Trinculo are led in sheepishly in their stolen apparel at line 258 are all in anticipation as to finding out exactly what punishment they are to endure. Accusing his enemies neither more nor less than they deserve, and forgiving them instantly once he has been restored to his dukedom, Prospero has at last come to seem judicious rather than arbitrary in his use of power. Of course, it helps that Prospero’s most egregious sins have been mitigated by the outcome of events. He will no longer hold Ariel and Caliban as slaves because he is giving up his magic and returning to Naples. Moreover, he will no longer dominate Miranda because she is marrying Ferdinand.
In this scene Prospero helps to portray the characters clearly and accurately. Miranda is overwhelmed by everything that has taken place and exclaims, “”How many goodly creatures are there here! / How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world / that has such people in’t!” This is all a new experience for Miranda for she had never fell sight on any other person in her lifetime than her father. She is depicted to be innocent and in her innocent perspective, such a remark seems genuine and even true. But from the audience’s perspective, it must seem somewhat ridiculous. After all, Antonio and Sebastian are still surly and impudent; Alonso has repented only after believing his son to be dead; and Trinculo and Stefano are drunken, petty thieves. However, Miranda speaks from the perspective of someone who has not seen any human being except her father since she was three years old. She is merely delighted by the spectacle of all these people.
In a sense, her innocence may be shared to some extent by the playwright, who takes delight in creating and presenting a vast array of humanity, from kings to traitors, from innocent virgins to inebriated would-be murderers. As a result, though Miranda’s words are to some extent undercut by irony, it is not too much of a stretch to think that Shakespeare really does mean this benediction on a world “that has such people in’t!” After all, Prospero is another stand-in for the playwright, and he forgives all the wrongdoers at the end of the play. There is an element in the conclusion of The Tempest that celebrates the multiplicity and variety of human life, which, while it may result in complication and ambiguity, also creates humour, surprise, and love.
If The Tempest is read, as it often is, as a celebration of creativity and art, the aging Shakespeare’s swan song to the theatre, then this closing benediction may have a much broader application than just to this play, referring to the breadth of humanity that inspired the breadth of Shakespeare’s characters. Similarly, Prospero’s final request for applause in the monologue functions as a request for forgiveness, not merely for the wrongs he has committed in this play.
It also requests forgiveness for the beneficent tyranny of creativity itself, in which an author, like a Prospero, moves people at his will, controls the minds of others, creates situations to suit his aims, and arranges outcomes entirely in the service of his own idea of goodness or justice or beauty. In this way, the ambiguity surrounding Prospero’s power in The Tempest may be inherent to art itself. Like Prospero, authors work according to their own conceptions of a desirable or justifiable outcome. But as in The Tempest, a happy ending can restore harmony, and a well-developed play can create an authentic justice, even if it originates entirely in the mind of the author.
The plot of The Tempest is organised around the idea of persuasion, as Prospero gradually moves his sense of justice from his own mind into the outside world, gradually applying it to everyone around him until the audience believes it, too. This aggressive persuasiveness makes Prospero difficult to admire at times. Still, in another sense, persuasion characterises the entire play, which seeks to enthral audiences with its words and magic as surely as Prospero sought to enthral Ariel.
And because the audience decides whether it believes in the play-whether to applaud, as Prospero asks them to do-the real power lies not with the playwright, but with the viewer, not with the imagination that creates the story, but with the imagination that receives it. In this way, Shakespeare transforms the troubling ambiguity of the play into a surprising cause for celebration. The power wielded by Prospero, which seemed unsettling at first, is actually the source of all our pleasure in the drama. In fact, it is the reason we came to the theatre in the first place.
