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Chapter 23
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
After making copies of his cast list, Felix collects Anne-Marie and drives to the prison. She’s a little daunted by the grim atmosphere. Felix quips that while The Tempest says “thought is free,” this quote occurs in a song sung by untrustworthy fools. Jokingly, Anne-Marie tells him he’s a “downer.”
Felix’s joke shows that while he knows he’s helping the prisoners with his work, he can’t do much to alleviate the concrete reality of their imprisonment and the grim circumstances they’ll face upon release.
Themes
Felix introduces Anne-Marie to Dylan and Madison as a well-regarded actress. Politely, they give her a security pager; however, the knitting needles in her bag set off the metal detector and she has to surrender them. Felix is surprised to think that such a tough woman enjoys such domestic pursuits.
Felix presents an illusory version of Anne-Marie to the guards and prisoners. However, over time she grows into the persona Felix imagines, becoming more confident and thinking of herself as someone with potential, rather than a failed actress.
Themes
Felix shows his new actress around his classroom wing and she immediately claims one of the rooms for choreography practice. In the classroom, the men are waiting eagerly to meet her. Today, she’s dressed in a conservative cardigan and jeans; smiling distantly, she sits primly in the back of the classroom. It’s clear that everyone is trying not to stare at her; Felix feels protective, and reminds himself to stay alert.
Clearly, Anne-Marie thinks carefully about the version of herself that she wants to put forward. In the sense that she’s constantly acting, even in her “real” life, Anne-Marie is much like her mentor Felix.
Themes
Before announcing the cast, Felix reminds the actors that they have to accept the decisions, even if they don’t like them. When he passes out the list, everyone starts arguing. Red Coyote doesn’t want to play Stephano and thinks that Caliban should be First Nations, while Leggs triumphantly tells everyone to “suck it.”
While Felix often presents his work in the prison as seamlessly collaborative, moments like this are a reminder that he has a lot of difficulties to overcome as a teacher.
Themes
Get the entire Hag-Seed LitChart as a printable PDF.
The newly-assigned actors and their teams move into different rooms to start practicing their scenes. Anne-Marie stretches and asks uncertainly what she should start doing. To ease her into the routine of the class, Felix starts to run through their scenes together until 8Handz appears at the door, looking for something to do. Saying he needs to confer about special effects, Felix sends Anne-Marie to supervise the other rehearsals.
Even though Anne-Marie has technically been hired to play Miranda, she’s already taking on a directorial role in the play as well. While she will become like a daughter to Felix, she’s a daughter with much more agency and independence than his shy, meek Miranda.
Themes
Once she’s gone, Felix asks 8Handz what he knows about the prison’s surveillance systems; he wants to “see without being seen,” all over the classroom wing. 8Handz says that with some tools smuggled in, he can arrange it. Pleased, Felix says that if he succeeds, Felix can help get him early parole; after all, he has “foes in high places.”
In The Tempest, Ariel earns freedom from Prospero by assisting in his revenge. Similarly, Felix promises 8Handz early parole—but unlike Prospero, he’s not the one who imprisoned the young man in the first place.
Themes
