Tempest, The ~ William Shakespeare - PREDISCUSSION

[BarbStAubrey]

The Book Club Online is  the oldest  book club on the Internet, begun in 1996, open to everyone.  We offer cordial discussions of one book a month,  24/7 and  enjoy the company of readers from all over the world.  Everyone is welcome.

Please post below if you can join us on October 1.  

 October Book Club Online

The Tempest, Shakespeare's last play, was written in 1611 in the final period of his career.   The play is not really a comedy, but  combines elements of tragedy with comedy, a tragicomedy.    Shakespeare set the play on an unnamed island in an unidentified age. In it, he  portrays an aging magician, Prospero,  who has been living in exile with his young daughter on a remote island for the past twelve years. Over the course of a single day, Prospero uses his magic to whip up a tempest to shipwreck the men responsible for his banishment. He then proceeds to dazzle and dismay the survivors (and the audience) with his art as he orchestrates his triumphant return home where he plans to retire in peace. For a lot of audiences and literary scholars, Prospero seems like a stand-in in for Shakespeare, who spent a lifetime dazzling audiences before retiring in 1611, shortly after The Tempest was completed. Its epilogue seems to be a final and fond farewell to the stage. When Prospero (after giving up the art of magic he's spent a lifetime perfecting) appears alone before the audience he confesses, "Now my charms are all o'erthrown, / And what strength I have's mine own," we can't help but wonder of Shakespeare is speaking through this character here. From multiple sources, including Shakespearean Criticism, Gale Cengage

Discussion Schedule

Act I	October 1~7
Act II	October 8~14
Act III	October  15~21
Act IV	October 22~28
Act V	October 29~Nov.4

Relevant links:   BookTV: Hobson Woodward: A Brave Vessel

 

DLs: Barb,   JoanK , JoanP,  Marcie,  

[BarbStAubrey]

Deb we have Jonathon to thank for introducing us to The Brave Vessel - what a storehouse of information not only about the storm and the early populating of Jamestown along with description of Bermuda in such contrast to Jamestown but, most eye opening are the chapters describing how Shakespeare worked and how an author earned money from his work in London during the very early seventeenth century. Included in Strachy's narrative is a snapshot of London - letting us know who were the likely candidates to populate America -

John Rolfe at age 24 is aboard the Sea Venture who later married Pocahontas as his second wife - Two American Indians traveling back home with little more than their bow and arrows - a preacher, educated in Caius College,Cambridge - live animals are loaded, horses, cows, bulls, goats, hogs - The ship is delayed in port with all passengers and stores aboard for 7 weeks because the revised Virginia Company charter needed signing and because Spain and Netherlands sign a treaty that affects Spain and Great Britain. Large numbers of returning British soldiers fill the lacking personal quota for the expedition. A fleet of eight ships traveled together with one ship not up to the crossing turns back.

Upon his return to London Strachey sees the play - Fresh from a successful performance in the Masquing House the play is opened at Blackfriars Theater. Two years earlier Shakespeare, at age 45 began contemplating The Tempest. The closing of the theaters during the plague cost him dearly, delaying his retirement. He waited out the plaque in the safety of Stratford-upon-Avon looking for a subject for a new play.

Searching for a theme he may have read William Thomas's 1549 Historye of Italye - about a deposed duke who marries and abdicates in favor of his son - seems Shakespeare used ancient texts as a reliable source of ideas - Among theater goers it was considered a point of pride to identify his sources.

His patron is Henry Wriothesley, the Earl of Southampton, who was the most prominent official of the Virginia Company - Strachey's letter to the "Excellent Lady" is probably to the Countess of Bedford, who was the patron to John Donne and who Strachey hoped would become his patron - She received the letter and map of Bermuda drawn by Somers because she was a prominent stockholder of the Virgina Company. He hoped the letter would circulate among company officials to better establish himself as a chronicler of Virgina.

The ultimate patron of the arts is King James. Shakespeare's troupe performed at court thirty-seven times in 1610 and 1611 during the plague epidemic. They cooperate with royal directives offering little resistance to attempts to shape his plays to the tastes of the kings and queens. The approval of the royal Office of the Revels was required before any play was permitted to appear in court. Royal censors made sure the plays were 'rehearsed, perfected and corrected' - giving up some creative control proved lucrative since a show that does well in court plays to larger public audiences.

There is so much more but hopefully those reading the book The Brave Vessel will share the bits that has their jaw dropping open as they read.

[JoanP]

Just plain fun, Deb - just as school should have been, could have been in a more perfect world.

With so many of us reading Brave Vessel - see what you've started, Jonathan - it may be time to talk about how we go about these discussions - especially for newcomers to the group.  A few weeks ago someone asked if the whole play should be read by Oct. 1.  The answer is no - not necessary.  
We take one section at a time for discussion - and don't go beyond the scheduled reading during the period in which that section is in the spotlight.  The schedule is posted in the heading - the first post at the top of every page.  If you look up there now, you'll see that we will be discussing ACT I during the first week of October. The heading will contain questions relevant to the section.  These questions are prepared by the DLs  for discussion purposes only.  It is not necessary to stick to these questions in your comments.
The one thing we ask is that you don't respond to the questions all at once as if taking an essay test.  They are only there to stimulate conversation going.

With so many reading Brave Vessel, let's stick to the same plan - let's share nuggets from that book and from Strachey's letter as they relate to the act in the play we are discussing.  Maybe we'll start a page of specific examples of phrases Shakespeare included in The Tempest.
Just plain fun!

[JoanP]

Isn't it amazing the way references to The Tempest begin to appear just as we are beginning our focus on this play written four hundred years ago?  Is there a word to describe this phenomenon?

The opening ceremony of the Olympics included the line from The Tempest so well presented by Kenneth Branagh - (speak of someone popping up all over the place these days.  Are you watching the PBS Wallender series?  Doesn't it seem that Branagh has lost a lot of weight since last year's series?)

I was able to locate the lines from the closing ceremony- presented by Timothy Spall - dressed as Winston Churchill but pronouncing Shakespeare's lines from The Tempest -

"I dreamed of clouds opening up and dropping such riches on me that when I woke up, I cried because I wanted to dream again."  
  It will be interesting to see which character says these words - Your guess?

And another reference from this morning's Washington Post - in  a review of Bob Dylan's 35th album - "Tempest" `

"But before Dylanologists had heard a bloody note of it, it was the album's title that made them gasp, "The Tempest is considered William Shakespeare's swan song, which might mean that...
No, no.  Dylan pointed out to Rolling stone that Shakespeare's "Tempest" was preceded by the word "the."  Dylan's "Tempest" was just "Tempest."

Putting Dylan's retirement rumor to rest.  Do you think Shakespeare's audience heard rumbles of his retirement in the lines of this play?
 

[Art Hippy]

A possible word, besides coincidental, might be serendipitous,...finding valuable or agreeable things not sought for (Webster's).

[BarbStAubrey]

The Tempest
          ~ James T. Fields  (1817-1881)

We were crowded in the cabin;
Not a soul would dare to sleep:
It was midnight on the waters,
And a storm was on the deep.

’Tis a fearful thing in winter
To be shattered by the blast,
And to hear the rattling trumpet
Thunder, “Cut away the mast!”

So we shuddered there in silence,
For the stoutest held his breath,
While the hungry sea was roaring,
And the breakers threatened death.

And as thus we sat in darkness,
Each one busy in his prayers,
“We are lost!” the captain shouted,
As he staggered down the stairs.

But his little daughter whispered,
As she took his icy hand,
“Isn’t God upon the ocean,
Just the same as on the land?”

Then we kissed the little maiden,
And we spoke in better cheer;
And we anchored safe in harbor
When the morn was shining clear.

[BarbStAubrey]

Tempest tossed and sore afflicted
          ~ Robert Louis Stevenson

TEMPEST tossed and sore afflicted, sin defiled and care oppressed,
Come to me, all ye that labour; come, and I will give ye rest.
Fear no more, O doubting hearted; weep no more, O weeping eye!
Lo, the voice of your redeemer; lo, the songful morning near.

Here one hour you toil and combat, sin and suffer, bleed and die;
In my father's quiet mansion soon to lay your burden by.
Bear a moment, heavy laden, weary hand and weeping eye.
Lo, the feet of your deliverer; lo, the hour of freedom here.

[Jonathan]

Were Stevenson's tempestuous lines ever set to music? They would have gone over wonderfully well at revival meetings. I remember one we used to sing at camp meetings: 'Ive anchored my soul in the haven of rest...I'll sail the wild seas no more'...etc. Never having seen, nor having come within a thousand miles of a stormy sea.

The hurricane the Sea Venture encountered would have to be experienced to appreciate the terror of it all. There are many poignant moments in BRAVE VESSEL story. The small boat being towed across the ocean is cut loose with its passengers and never heard from again. The passengers and crew on the Sea Venture going below decks, closing the hatches, and awaiting their watery doom.

But fate intervenes, or serendipity, or Prospero's magic wand is waved, and everyone is saved, to enjoy the magical Bermudas. Some want to stay. The Governor is determined to go on to Virginia, and they do. Then follows a beautiful scene in which Bermuda is claimed for England:

'(Governor) Gates ordered a memorial set up near the camp to record the presence of the castaways and leave evidence of an English claim to the island. A cedar was selected near the place (Admiral) George Somers had planted his garden. The top of the tree was lopped off to make it less  vulnerable to toppling in the wind. A wooden cross was pegged to the tree. At he center a twelve-penny coin with a portrait of King James was attached, and near that a copper plate with an engraved message in Latin and English:

In memory of our great deliverance, both from a mighty storm and leak...etc.' page 95

Caliban yet again, at the closing of the Olympic Games! I can't wait to make his acquaintance. What a dreamer!

[Dixie]

Barb:
The name "Dixie" comes from my home state - Louisiana.

[Frybabe]

Just picked up A Brave Vessel from the library.

[marcie]

Me too, Frybabe. I've only read the back cover and book jacket but it seems very interesting!

[JoanP]

All right, you don't have to tempt me any  further- Just contacted my library and there are TWO copies of A Brave Vessel available - I put a hold on  one of them.  
The whole idea of this play based on history is irresistable, isn't it?  I read a review - can't tell if this is the author's imagination or if it really happened, but the whole idea really fascinates me...

"The story goes that when  Strachey left Jamestown he attends one of the very earliest performances of "The Tempest" at the Blackfriars Theatre - a place he knew well, having been a part owner of the theater earlier in his life. There he is stunned to see his own experiences and those of the other Sea Venture castaways played back, transformed, before his eyes."

It sounds a bit fanciful to be true, doesn't it? The whole idea has its appeal, you must admit...

Here's a link to BOOK TV's revealing presentation by Hobson Woodard himself on the background for his A Brave Vessel.    We'll keep it in the heading at the top of this page.

[Frybabe]

Yes, I am intrigued. I had no idea that The Tempest was connected to any real life events.

So Strachey had a prior connection to the Globe? Wow. In that case, I would tend to doubt that the play was a coincidence. Even if he didn't know the details, Shakespeare most probably had heard or read of the storm and it's aftermath. Like modern writers today, he would have taken a real life event and fashioned it into something his own. Any corresponding details may have been coincidental. My opinion is subject to change once I actually read the book.

[BarbStAubrey]

To me after reading The Brave Vessel there was a bit that stood out how the Reformation represented a sense of freedom from the past, its constrictions and traditions that allowed folks to believe in a 'Golden Age' with the 'New' World representing the secluded, unspoiled place where the Golden Age would flower.  

Jamestown may not have lived up to the fantasy but Bermuda was as close to a crown of gold in anyone's imagination and yet, the events as relayed by Strachey include, dis-harmony, rebellion, folks being called greedy for gathering the riches of the sea rather than joining the larger group - even the quickly planted garden does not grow past seedling stage.

That concept stayed with me and reminded me of the Utopia stories - quick looked because first to my mind came The Isle of Pines but, it was written in the 1660s - where as Sir Francis Bacon's New Atlantis shows what a Golden Age could look like in the New World and is considered key to those ideals of the Virginia Company. Also, Thomas More wrote Utopia in 1516 - (some years ago I started to read it but never finished) - the early part of the story is filled with all the social and political ills of the time that when we read Bleak House, Dickens alluded to some of the same social ills as if the over 300 years did not separate the two authors.

The more I played in my mind with that concept - that there is a Golden Age and if we do this or that or travel to this place or that place we too can experience this life of Utopia. We want it so badly that as Strachey blamed the folks in Jamestown for the starving time because the colonists were lazy "sloth, riot and vanity" and describes events to the Virgina Company he writes about ""bloody issues and mischiefs" arising in the Bermuda camp of Castaways" that we too are often unprepared for the reality that is part of any this or that.

Success in many forms is considered our Utopia - our Golden Age - and I can see how we couple that with a place or person apart - a new, uncharted opportunity, land or person. Songs, Hymns speak of heaven in Utopian forms - and I can see how we attach ourselves to new friends, jobs, even newly weds do it as we imagine the new will be our Utopia.

The Isle of Pines must have benefited from Shakespeare's The Tempest The book has only in the twentieth century been understood - most of the description of vialed words from that time in history are raw sexual inferences that describes this Island several generations later as a result of free sex and the increased population which is meant to show-up freedom in its all its dimensions. Another take, but a Utopia that is totally free that shows each of our ideas of freedom as unrealistic.

It appears the story of Bermuda, more so than even Jamestown and then, one of the motives for Shakespeare writing his play is that concept that, regardless how perfect the surroundings filled with all manner of easy to obtain food, water and shelter, where balmy nights and days far out-way the storms and cold we still need to reign in behavior with laws and to sustain ourselves we need skills and willing hands.

Huh just dawned on me - how often for most of my adult lifetime was retirement advertised as the Golden Age the Utopia of our lives - hmmm

[Frybabe]

About the seedlings dying: It doesn't surprise me. The seeds (and plants?) they brought would not have been acclimated to Bermuda's climate.

I would think that total freedom would be very close to anarchy and chaos.

[BarbStAubrey]

Interesting Frybabe - two concepts and the first would be so easily translated as anything not local does not take and so marry or befriend your own kind -     I guess we have to be more specific than we are used to when we notice how some differences will not translate. Which makes me wonder, given the news of the day, if the concept of the new Democracies having more freedoms as in a Utopia than is their reality. Where we believe in the freedom of and for opportunity, many other freedoms are corralled through law to allow differences to exist without harming.

hmm come to think of it - we had our document of law started before we had our Independence where as, most of the new Democracies have their war - wrest the power from the dictator but have not established a document of law and only attempt to do that after they have their independence. I am thinking their Utopian Freedom is close to anarchy and chaos.

Another by the way, have you noticed how the idea of retiring to an island of your own is hung out there like a carrot. The idea making any of us whom that is beyond our means and then as we age beyond our health needs feel that we will never gain the aspiration of a Utopia.

I wonder since I have not cracked yet The Tempest what Utopia Shakespeare will paint that he will then proceed to dissect as the work of the play as suggested by the author of The Brave Vessel.

[Jonathan]

Woodward does make a good case of claiming that Shakespeare used these historical accounts for material for THE TEMPEST. But twice Woodward speaks of 'the playwright's literary method', and the 'transformation of narrative' and the 'transformation of the raw material of exploration'. Reading A BRAVE VESSEL does make one eager to see what Shakespeare made of stormy weather and idyllic islands. Fanciful. Utopian. Freedom. Anarchy. Ah, Brave New World. For the young at heart with adequate means. It's Walden Pond for the rest of us, on a tight budget.

[BarbStAubrey]

    

It's Walden Pond for the rest of us, on a tight budget.

[bookad]

What a visual that line is Jonathan
love it

"...our Walden pond....on a tight budget"

Deb

[Babi]

 Not to mention, BARB, that we are bringing to our hopeful Utopia our own flawed selves.
The journey seldom makes us wiser or less selfish and greedy. On the issue of 'freedom',
my father once succinctly explained it to me with the statement, 'Your freedom to swing
you arms ends at my nose."

 Ah, JONATHAN, how beautifully you have summed up our condition! 

[adichie]

Hi!  I have been a member of SeniorLearn for several years but have never had the time to actually participate in a discussion - just "lurking" around.  However, I am now ready to jump in - I cannot pass up The Tempest.  I am already so impressed and excited by all the great information posted on this site pre-discussion.  I will try to keep up.  I live in Laguna Woods, CA.  Anybody else from thereabouts? :

[Art Hippy]

Welcome adichie...I too am new as a contributor to this site, but was drawn by the idea of reading The Tempest together with others.
I'm sure that I am much closer to you than most, but still in a different part of California.
I live in Sonora, Ca. near Yosemite Natl. Park.  We're part of the Mother Lode, where gold was discovered in 1849, and enjoy our share of tourists seeking out the eccentricities of a small gold rush town.
Anxious for October 1^st...Ciao, Linda.

[BarbStAubrey]

wow Glad you decided to land adichie    and so you and Linda (ArtHippy) are from the Golden State - just hit me as I was writing - I guess California was another Utopia (Golden State where they even picked Gold from the ground - Awesome Linda, Sonora near Yosemite Natl. Park) where after folks moved into the land of Golden resources they too found folks bring with them their virtues and their vices and 'things' happen.

Glad adichie you will be adding to our discussion - sounds like you are either re-arranging your time to include this discussion or your life changed and there is time to do other things like join us - either way it will be such a pleasure to have your voice added to this discussion.

JoanP thank goodness I came into the discussion scrolling down from the top post or I would have missed the great link you shared of Woodward speaking about his book - started to listen but need to pick up tomorrow - it is a full length talk - what a coup - thanks for finding it and sharing it - and Jonathan I cannot thank you enough - even if we weren't reading Shakespeare's The Tempest I was so glad to read The Brave Vessel - fabulous sea story and again, so few books ever describe the earliest American settlements from Europe's viewpoint offering us a picture of the life the colonists left behind. And then the insights into how Shakespeare wrote and prepared his plays to assure himself a large paying public was priceless.

Priceless also was your quip about Waldon's Pond for those of us with no Golden Isle in our portfolio - but gosh I couldn't help it - Waldon's Pond is really a nice alternative - One of the books we discussed a few years ago with such joy, reading about the sound of ponds breaking up after winter and birds on window sills and yes, even ants - made me realize we are all living in our Utopia with many wonders that I know I too easily take for granted. it is too easy to focus on the physical and emotional storms, winds, losses and even the need or lack of law. Yep, just spent a day listing gratitudes...  

One more tidbit before I call it a night - did you know - Shakespeare's patron, the Earl of Southampton, organized with Shakespeare's brother-in-law a voyage to the Virginia coast in 1605 and again in 1608 to help devise the drawing up of 'plantations' and stock investments for the Virgina Company. From the book, Shakespeare's The Tempest its Political Implications and the First Colonists of Virginia.

[Babi]

  Isn't it wonderful how many new people have been attracted by a discussion of "The Tempest".  I feel as though we have
found a gold mine of our own!

[marcie]

Babi, I agree with you!

 We're very glad to welcome you, adichie, to this discussion.

[JoanP]

Adichie!  Welcome!  As you can see, we are all delighted that you can  join us!  As you can see in the heading, (scroll up to the first post at the top of each page,) we've included a DISCUSSION SCHEDULE and will provide some topics for discussion as well as relevant links -

You'll find a link to a BookTV video on CSPAN in which Hodson Woodard describes his book, A Brave Vessel.  This book contains a letter written by one William Strachey who survived a tempest on a journey to the new world in the early seventeenth century.  Shakespeare used this description of the storm and the passengers' struggle for survival in his The Tempest.

Strachey's letter was well known back in Shakespeare's time.  It was included in a five volume travel book -  published in 1625 under the title Purchas His Pilgrims.  The Folger Library possesses a copy of this rare book.  http://www.folger.edu/eduPrimSrcDtl.cfm?psid=167

Though Woodward was not the first to discover this letter, scholars have studied it for centuries, he certainly captures the reader's attention with this readable account in A Brave Vessel.

Barbara...that is an eye-opener!  If Shakespeare's own brother-in-law voyaged to the Virginia coast in 1605 and 1608, he had more than a passing interest in these settlements and the struggles involved!  

[BarbStAubrey]

Ever wonder how we got the word plantation to describe a parcel of land that became a identifying word for so much of our sad history - well it started out innocuous enough - as we say colonize they said plantation - in other words Englishmen planting themselves on an agreed parcel of land as payment to extend a share of the profits to the investment by the Virgina Company and add to the resources of the crown.

Only 12 more days - hope everyone has their book or knows it will be available on October 1 which this year is on a Monday - talk about timing so that we can start the beginning of the week.

I guess if we were traveling with Strachey we would be packing - our linen and silk shirts, silk gowns, cloaks, leather shoes, Castile soap. Imagine that, we can still buy Castile soap, not as popular now but it was still quite popular when I was a child and deodorant, a combo of orrisroot and alum. It is hard to find orrisroot but it is added to dried flower petals to create a scented Pot Pourri. It seems to me men used to have alum to dab the spots their razor nicked while shaving. And Rosemary wood for brushing your teeth - well I have heard of using the end stems of Dogwood but this is the first I heard of Rosemary and I have tons of it growing around my house since it is one of the few plants the deer do not eat. I may just try it and see what it is like to use a branch to brush my teeth.

OK folks have any of you ever used for any reason orrisroot or alum and what about did any of you grow up using Castile soap?

Oh for heaven's sake I never knew Castile soap is named for Castile Spain  

This from Wikipedia

Castile soap is a name used in English-speaking countries for olive oil based soap made in a style similar to that originating in the Castile region of Spain.

The origins of Castile Soap can be traced back to The Levant where Aleppo soap makers have been making olive and laurel oil based hard soaps for millennia.

It is commonly believed that the Crusaders brought Aleppo soap back to Europe with them in the 11th century. Following the Crusades, production of this soap was extended to the whole Mediterranean area. The first European soap-making factories were created in the 12th century in Spain (Alicante, Malaga, Carthagene and Castile) and in Italy (Naples, Savone, Genoa, Bologna and Venice) and then, in the middle of the 15th century, in Marseille France, giving birth to Marseille soap. [1]

However, early soap makers in Europe did not have easy access to laurel oil and therefore dropped it from their formulations thereby creating an olive oil soap now known as Castile soap.

[BarbStAubrey]

Ha well there is a stark difference in 400 years - BBC news has an article that middle age starts now at age 55 and old age does not start to begin till you are in your 70s - seems to me Shakespeare was writing about being married at age 14 and 16 and we know he was planning his own retirement in his late 40s -

[Art Hippy]

I remember that Castile Soap was so pure that you, besides your body, could wash your hair with it as well...no sediment remained afterwards!

In Honduras in the 70's we used a giant bar soap for everything from laundry to body...it was very effective, yet gentle.  Now, the soap aisle is a conglomerate of special use items that forces us to buy multiple items...that would never have fit onto a small caravel traveling to the colonies!!!

[Babi]

 I do hope the women packed something sturdier than silk dresses for establishing a 'plantation'.  I do remember Castile
soap, though none of the other items BARB mentions.  It would be interesting to read the manifest of that ship.  Surely
it would have included farming and building tools, seeds, and of course quantities of food and some farm animals. Goats?
Pigs? Chickens?

[Jonathan]

That Castile soap. Could you blow bubbles with it? Yesterday I looked up to see the sunny sky filled with a cloud of iridescent bubbles. An amazing sight. I got up to see where they were coming from. My young 3.1/2-year-old neighbor had acquired an amazing bubble gun and couldn't or wouldn't take his little finger off the trigger. It made me laugh. For the last two summers his Mom has been blowing them for him, many times, one by one, while he chased them. It must have become too much for her.

Eleven more days, and we'll be sailing off to goodness knows what adventure. Shakespeare's theatrical retirement party according to some interpretations. And he does make it good. I don't know if it has ever been suggested. Could it be that he was planning to ship out along with the other plantation wannabes to seek a newer world.

Why did they go? The author of A BRAVE VESSEL suggest several reasons. 'The voyage was enticing to fortune hunters.' 'It promised to be a lucrative venture.' With the plague breakout in England 'the Jamestown  expedition offered an escape.' Financial promise seems to have been the greatest incentive. Everyone knew about the enormous quantities of gold that Spain was bringing back to Europe and underwriting her Empire with it.

And then there was William Strachey. He saw 'the chance to become a chronicler of England's exploration of the New World....The immediate value of the expedition would be exciting  experiences to write about.

Perhaps Shakespeare  wanted to go out himself to look for new ideas. Mid-life crisis sort of thing.

[Jonathan]

Perhaps it was all soap bubbles for Shakespeare.

[JudeS]

Jonathan

Perhaps it WASN'T all soap bubbles for Shakespeare.
And if it was, do you know how long a soap bubble really lasts?

Thanks for the suggestion of A Brave Vessel.
 Wonderful background info.

[bookad]

hello there

just a quick input to check if my picture downloaded so I could introduce you to myself, my husband Glenn & Billy our wonderful fur-kid
almost finished `A Brave Vessel`--would Shakespeare`s using another`s written word for his play be known as plagiarism or infringement on copyright; though must look up when copyright  became a necessity to protect people`s creations
it didn`t appear that S while sitting in the audience was overly upset by seeing what appeared to be his written information being played in front of him in the theatre

Deb

[Babi]

JONATHAN, I can remember my mother showing us how to make soap bubbles using a bar of
soap and an empty thread spool. It was fascinating to us children and the bubbles were
a delight. And a splendid way to keep children happily occupied for a while.

  I can't imagine Shakespeare considering 'colonizing'.  He has comfort, he has prestige, and he
is well past what would have been 'mid-life' in those days.  He still knew a good story when he
found one, tho'. 

[JoanP]

Cute family group picture, Deb!

I'm on my way over to the Library to pick up my copy of Brave Vessel.  Can't wait to read it, after reading all of the comments here.  You're right - there were no copyright laws...no such crime as plagarism back in Shakespeare's time either.  He wouldn't be censured for plagarism anyway.  Here are some comments I noted from other websites on the subject -

During the time that Shakespeare was writing plays in England, there were no such laws deeming a play protected by copyright laws. Today, plays are usually published and distributed but in the Elizabethan era, plays were only written enough for the actors to learn their lines. When plays were put on there was usually a large audience. This audience could have included other playwrights and actors who would then remember pieces of what they saw and use them later in their own productions. How could this be copyrighted?


Back then, actors were lucky if they did not get stopped by the police while performing a play why would the ideas of a playwright be protected by law? I do not think anyone even cared if the plays were used as resources for other plays. If Shakespeare used a part from one of Marlowe's plays, then Marlowe could take some ideas from Shakespeare. Since most of the ideas for plays came from famous works anyway, who's to say that Shakespeare's idea was even his own?

No one seems to be accusing the playwrights of plagiarizing these sources. When they were cited it was just a way for the playwright to add more meaning to the play for the audience. All the stories were well known to the visitors of the theatre so they would understand the references that may have been used for comedic purposes or as a sort of explanation of what has happened.

Another source for playwrights is history. As G.B. Harrison points out in his book, England in Shakespeare's Day, the plays provide a good place for teaching history. He says: "First for the subject of them...our forefathers are revived and they themselves raised from the grave of oblivion, and brought to plead their aged honours in open presence: than which, what can be a sharper reproof to these degenerate days of ours?" So, if the subjects of plays are taken from history, like the choler Sr. Hugh Evans and the shipwreck of Sr. George Somers in The Tempest, then again, how could it be wrong to use these stories? (Rowse 348)

I think we're going to recognize Shakespeare's use of Virgil's Anneid in the Tempest too.  Are you familiar with that one?  Your question makes me think of the difficulty teachers today must have when assigning research papers.  Of course they can find material lifted from other sites as a result of students' research - but oh my, how do you explain the difference between research and plagiarism to students?  Very carefully, I would imagine.

[Lorac625]

I am hoping to join this discussion...wow,it's going like gangbusters already!  I feel totally out of my depth.  Which is a good feeling; means I will learn a lot!  My most interesting experience with The Tempest was when we read it in college.  We divided into small groups to do readings for the class,and as my group was 3 girls and one guy,and the play has mostly male characters,I surprised my class by appearing as Prospero in a "beard" made of flour and water paste and cotton balls!  Since that was before cell phones and YouTube,no one got photos or video(lucky me!)

[JoanP]

Lorac - not to worry, you aren't behind at all!  We won't start discussing THE TEMPEST until October 1.  We're just here choosing seats, marking time, filling in background information - which you should enjoy reading.  A lot of interesting information regarding Shakespeare's sources and the period in which he lived.  
Wish someone had a camera the day you came in as Prospero.  I'll bet you got an A in that class?  That gives me an idea...but will save it for later.
 
We're so glad you are joining us - Welcome!  

[Lorac625]

Thanks! Glad to join!
     And yes, I did get an A, but that was during my 'Oh,I MUSTbe PERFECT phase,so I was working myself to death getting all A's.
     Someone mentioned the entire Shakespeare play library on Kindle; I found it for $2.99, with illustartions and the Yale commentary.  Will that be an acceptable version?

[Jonathan]

Lorac, playing Prospero puts you into distinguished company. Helen Mirren and Vanessa Redgrave have also played the role.

Surely there must be something original in Shakespeare. Not everything has been sourced, has it? Is it just the beautiful style? I believe all writers steal from each other.