The Masque, Forgiveness & Endings

The Masque (Act 4, Scene 1)

Prospero stages a masque to celebrate Ferdinand and Miranda’s betrothal. The goddesses Iris, Ceres, and Juno descend to bless the couple with prosperity and fertility. The masque is beautiful, orderly, and controlled — a vision of harmony that reflects Prospero’s ideal world. For a Jacobean audience watching at court, the masque within the play would have mirrored the real court masques they enjoyed under James I.

However, the masque is abruptly interrupted when Prospero remembers Caliban’s conspiracy. He dissolves the vision: “Our revels now are ended. These our actors, / As I foretold you, were all spirits and / Are melted into air, into thin air.” The interruption is significant — the perfect world of art cannot survive contact with the messy reality of human plots and ambitions.

Prospero’s Renunciation of Magic (Act 5, Scene 1)

In his most powerful soliloquy, Prospero catalogues his magical achievements: he has dimmed the sun, raised storms, opened graves, and commanded spirits. Then he renounces it all: “But this rough magic / I here abjure. And when I have required / Some heavenly music — which even now I do — … / I’ll break my staff, / Bury it certain fathoms in the earth, / And deeper than did ever plummet sound / I’ll drown my book.”

The renunciation is the play’s turning point. By destroying his staff and book, Prospero gives up the tools of his power. He chooses to be human — limited, mortal, dependent on others — rather than a god-like controller. Many scholars read this as Shakespeare’s own farewell to the theatre: the playwright, like Prospero, surrendering the power to create worlds from words.

Forgiveness and Reconciliation (Act 5)

Prospero confronts his enemies one by one. To Alonso, he reveals that Ferdinand is alive and in love with Miranda — a moment of joy that comes only after genuine repentance. To Antonio, he offers a conditional forgiveness: “For you, most wicked sir, whom to call brother / Would even infect my mouth, I do forgive / Thy rankest fault.” The language is hardly warm — ‘infect,’ ‘rankest fault’ — suggesting that forgiveness is a moral choice rather than an emotional impulse.

Caliban is also released. Prospero acknowledges him: “This thing of darkness I / Acknowledge mine.” The line is profoundly ambiguous. Does it mean Prospero claims Caliban as his responsibility? Or does he recognise the darkness within himself? A postcolonial reading sees it as the coloniser finally admitting ownership of the suffering he has caused.

The Epilogue

Prospero’s epilogue is one of the most personal moments in Shakespeare. Standing alone on stage, stripped of magic, Prospero addresses the audience: “Now my charms are all o’erthrown, / And what strength I have’s mine own, / Which is most faint.” He asks for the audience’s “indulgence” (applause) to “set me free.” The boundary between character and playwright dissolves: is this Prospero asking for freedom, or Shakespeare asking for one final ovation?