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Chapter 19
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Hag-Seed, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Theater and The Tempest
Vengeance
Imprisonment and Marginalization
Transformation and Change
Grief
Summary
Analysis
The class’s consolidated list of prisons is laid out in a table. Sycorax is exiled to the island by the government of Algiers, her native land. Ariel is trapped in a pine tree by Sycorax. Prospero and Miranda are jailed in a leaky boat and, later, the island by Antonio and Alonso. Prospero goes on to trap Caliban in some rocks on the island. Later, when he brings his enemies to the island with a storm, Prospero jails Ferdinand through Ariel’s illusions; he also imprisons Antonio, Alonso, and Sebastian by having Ariel cast enchantments on them. Finally, Stephano and Trinculo are imprisoned in a pond by Ariel, on Prospero’s orders.
Almost everyone in the play is incarcerated at some point; it’s notable that the most prominent jailer is Prospero, who himself is imprisoned. This phenomenon can suggest that it’s actually freedom which is illusory and unusual, while imprisonment is the norm. In Felix’s modern interpretation, it can also argue that it’s impossible to exile and stigmatize one group of people without affecting the freedom of the general society.
Themes
