The Tempest: Effective Use of Humor In Shakespeare’s play The Tempest, the cast of characters are squeezed into some archetypal roles. Prospero is our noble hero, Miranda is the beautiful maiden, Antonio is the “villain”. Shakespeare gave each of the characters a sense of humor, a tool that allows us to see the subtle details of their minds; a glimpse at the inner workings of each character’s personality. It is through the humor that Shakespeare employs , that we are able to see “roundness” in characters that could be otherwise doomed to exist as “flat” characters. Shakespeare uses humor to give his players new life, to help them expand beyond the bounds off mere characters and turn into real people. Miranda is a good example of a character whose humor enriches her personality. At the beginning of the play, it is explained to us, largely through Prospero’s exposition, that Miranda is perfect child. She’s compassionate, beautiful, well educated and obedient; She’s the apple of Prospero’s eye. At the beginning of the play of Act I sc ii , however, she comes off s being too perfect. Perfect to the point of annoyance. Perfect to the point of being sterile. despite her assets , she’s no more then a china doll. Throw Ferdinad , our handsome prince, into the mix , ND she becomes much more interesting. Gone is the virtuous maiden, replaced by a goggly eyed , puppy headed, hormone stricken teenager, smitten with love. She is so ga-ga over Ferdinad that she refers to him as a ‘noble creature’. He is so perfect to Miranda that she insists that “ nothing ill can dwell within such a temple” (Act I, sc ii ) . She dotes on him s if he were a Conrad Birdie. It’s a wonderfully musing transformation, to watch Miranda, the envy of women around the world, go bananas over a boy to the point where she is volunteering to carry gigan...
