ABSTRACT
In February 1613, as part of the extravagant celebrations held in London to celebrate the wedding of Princess Elizabeth and the Elector Palatine, a recent play by Shakespeare was staged: The Tempest. In the play, we learn of the history of Prospero, duke of Milan, who had been overthrown by his brother Antonio, with the help of the king of Naples, Alonso, who himself is nearly betrayed by his younger brother Sebastian (plotting with Antonio). Sebastian remarks: ‘I remember / You did supplant your brother Prospero.’ Antonio responds: ‘True. / And look how well my garments sit upon me, / Much feater than before. My brother’s servants / Were then my fellows, now they are my men.’ 1 In a sense, the play’s title reflected some of the feeling of unrest of the time, a tempest of passions, not just in England, but across Europe. Russia was deep in the midst of its ‘Time of Troubles’ after the disappearance of its ruling house in 1598; Habsburg rule in Portugal continued to be contested by pretenders; King Henry IV of France was assassinated by a fanatical Jesuit in 1610 and his widow’s rule was challenged by senior males from the late king’s family; and, in a scenario most reminiscent of Shakespeare, Emperor Rudolf II had been deposed by his own brothers in 1611. It has been suggested that The Tempest was mounted in 1613 in conjunction with the Stuart-Palatine wedding as a means of contrasting the situation of chaos in Europe with the dynastic calm of Stuart England, having peacefully transitioned from the reign of the childless Elizabeth I to that of the family man, James I. 2 To underline this point, in the play’s conclusion, harmony and ‘legitimate’ dynastic rule are re-established in both Milan and Naples through a wedding, that of Alonso’s faithful son Ferdinand and Prospero’s daughter, Miranda.
