Sound Magic and the Imperial Imagination in The Tempest 13 views

In The Tempest, Shakespeare's most "musical" play, the enchanted island is orchestrated through a variety of sound effects. Music and sound function as the very medium through which magic—conceived as power and control—is enacted. Performed twice at the royal court of Whitehall (1611 and 1612-13), with the kingly magician mirroring the seated monarch, The Tempest celebrates royal authority both within and through the play. But could such imperial grandeur be safely sustained, when the nature of sound and courtly spectacle was largely understood as elusive and ephemeral? I argue that The Tempest reveals a paradoxical doubleness of sound: Prospero's sound magic constructs an imperial imagination that simultaneously bears its self-undoing seeds. This doubleness is best embodied in the figure of Ariel, in whom the meanings of "sound" (air) and "magic" (spirit) converge. As Peggy M. Simonds contends, Ariel's "sweet music," set against Caliban's bestial, irrational noises, symbolizes both Prospero's and James I's sovereign power. Following David Lindley's exploration of the sound's rhetorical nature and Bruce Smith's detailed account of Shakespeare's acoustic world, this paper examines the political dynamics around sound and music—how they stage a self-questioning imperial order in both the theatrical world and its historical context. By situating The Tempest within its lived sonic environment, this paper thus contributes to broader conversations about early modern literature and its acoustic life.

MA (Master of Arts)

The Tempest; sound; music; court masque; imagination; materiality

English

2026-04-24