Aisha Zaraei’s series of three poems shows an unusual degree of sympathy and compassion for the characters in The Tempest. Normally when we produce literary scholarship, we end up treating all the characters as symbols, allegories, or figures for larger concepts about human nature, social structures, and world historical forces. By choosing to respond to the play in a series of first-person-narrated poems, rather than in a traditional scholarly essay, Zaraei is able to retain the characters’ humanity. This form also allows her to give each of the three characters an equal voice, subtly shifting the focus of this project toward the more marginalized characters as Miranda and Caliban are able to address the audience directly, a privilege Shakespeare reserves for Prospero. Each poem takes as its focus the emotional motivations of the characters, and in “Caliban’s Cry” Zaraei subtly indicates how similar their motivations are when we focus on that emotional element: Caliban, like Miranda, “dreams” of another life; Caliban, like Prospero, is “plotting” his revenge. Read Zaraei’s reflection here.

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