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Prospero
Prospero ( ) is a fictional character and the protagonist of William Shakespeare's play '' The Tempest''. Prospero is the rightful Duke of Milan, whose usurping brother, Antonio, had put him (with his three-year-old daughter, Miranda) to sea on a "rotten carcass" of a boat to die, twelve years before the play begins. Prospero and Miranda had survived and found exile on a small island. He has learned sorcery from books, and uses it while on the island to protect Miranda and control the other characters. Before the play has begun, Prospero has freed the magical spirit Ariel from entrapment within "a cloven pine". Ariel is beholden to Prospero after he is freed from his imprisonment inside the pine tree. Prospero then takes Ariel as a slave. Prospero's sorcery is sufficiently powerful to control Ariel and other spirits, as well as to alter weather and even raise the dead: "Graves at my command have waked their sleepers, oped, and let 'em forth, by my so potent Art." - Act V, ...
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Sycorax
Sycorax is an unseen character in William Shakespeare's play '' The Tempest'' (1611). She is a vicious and powerful witch and the mother of Caliban, one of the few native inhabitants of the island on which Prospero, the hero of the play, is stranded. According to the history provided by the play, Sycorax, while pregnant with Caliban, was banished from her home in Algiers to the island on which the play takes place. Memories of Sycorax, who dies several years before the main action of the play begins, define several of the relationships in the play. Relying on his filial connection to Sycorax, Caliban claims ownership of the island. Prospero constantly reminds Ariel of Sycorax's cruel treatment to maintain the sprite's service. Scholars generally agree that Sycorax, a foil for Prospero, is closely related to the Medea of Ovid's ''Metamorphoses''. Postcolonialist writers and critics see Sycorax as giving voice to peoples, particularly women, recovering from the effects of c ...
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Ariel (The Tempest)
Ariel is a spirit who appears in William Shakespeare's play '' The Tempest''. Ariel is bound to serve the magician Prospero, who rescued him from the tree in which he was imprisoned by Sycorax, the witch who previously inhabited the island. Prospero greets disobedience with a reminder that he saved Ariel from Sycorax's spell, and with promises to grant Ariel his freedom. Ariel is Prospero's eyes and ears throughout the play, using his magical abilities to cause the tempest in Act One which gives the play its name, and to foil other characters' plots to bring down their master. Ariel means "Lion of God" in the Hebrew language. Ariel may also be a simple play on the word "aerial". Scholars have compared Ariel to spirits depicted in other Elizabethan plays, and have managed to find several similarities between them, but one thing which makes Ariel unique is the human edge and personality given to Ariel by Shakespeare. The name is also phonetically similar to the word "areal", me ...
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Miranda (The Tempest)
Miranda is one of the principal characters of William Shakespeare's '' The Tempest''. She is the only female character to appear on stage. Miranda is the daughter of Prospero, another of the main characters of ''The Tempest''. She was banished to the Island along with her father at the age of three, and in the subsequent twelve years has lived with her father and their slave, Caliban, as her only company. She is openly compassionate and unaware of the evils of the world that surrounds her, learning of her father's fate only as the play begins. Origins There is some speculation that Miranda, along with her husband, Ferdinand, may be intended to represent Elizabeth Stuart and her new spouse, Elector Frederick V, as ''The Tempest'' was originally performed for the court of Elizabeth's father, King James, in celebration of the marriage. Role in the play ''The Tempest's'' second scene begins with Miranda, begging her father to spare the lives of the men at sea. She's fully aw ...
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Caliban (character)
Caliban ( ), son of the witch Sycorax, is an important character in William Shakespeare's play '' The Tempest''. His character is one of the few Shakespearean figures to take on a life of its own "outside" Shakespeare's own work: as Russell Hoban put it, "Caliban is one of the hungry ideas, he's always looking for someone to word him into being ... Caliban is a necessary idea". Character Caliban is half human, half monster. After his island becomes occupied by Prospero and his daughter Miranda, Caliban is forced into slavery. While he is referred to as a calvaluna or mooncalf, a freckled monster, he is the only human inhabitant of the island that is otherwise "not honour'd with a human shape" (Prospero, I.2.283). In some traditions, he is depicted as a wild man, or a deformed man, or a beast man, or sometimes a mix of fish and man, a dwarf or even a tortoise. Banished from Algiers, Sycorax was left on the isle, pregnant with Caliban, and died before Prospero's arrival. C ...
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John Gielgud
Sir Arthur John Gielgud, (; 14 April 1904 – 21 May 2000) was an English actor and theatre director whose career spanned eight decades. With Ralph Richardson and Laurence Olivier, he was one of the trinity of actors who dominated the British stage for much of the 20th century. A member of the Terry family theatrical dynasty, he gained his first paid acting work as a junior member of his cousin Phyllis Neilson-Terry's company in 1922. After studying at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art he worked in repertory theatre and in the West End before establishing himself at the Old Vic as an exponent of Shakespeare in 1929–31. During the 1930s Gielgud was a stage star in the West End and on Broadway, appearing in new works and classics. He began a parallel career as a director, and set up his own company at the Queen's Theatre, London. He was regarded by many as the finest Hamlet of his era, and was also known for high comedy roles such as John Worthing in '' The Importance ...
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William Maw Egley
William Maw Egley (1826 in London – 20 February 1916) was an English artist of the Victorian era. The son of the miniaturist William Egley, he studied under his father. His early works were illustrations of literary subjects typical of the period, such as ''Prospero and Miranda'' from '' The Tempest.'' These were similar to the work of The Clique. William Powell Frith, one of The Clique, hired Egley to add backgrounds to his own work. Egley soon developed a style influenced by Frith, including domestic and childhood subjects. Most of his paintings were humorous or "feelgood" genre scenes of urban and rural life, depicting such subjects as harvest festivals and contemporary fashions. His best-known painting, '' Omnibus Life in London'' (Tate Gallery Tate is an institution that houses, in a network of four art galleries, the United Kingdom's national collection of British art, and international modern and contemporary art. It is not a government institution, but its m ...
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Ralph Richardson
Sir Ralph David Richardson (19 December 1902 – 10 October 1983) was an English actor who, with John Gielgud and Laurence Olivier, was one of the trinity of male actors who dominated the British stage for much of the 20th century. He worked in films throughout most of his career, and played more than sixty cinema roles. From an artistic but not theatrical background, Richardson had no thought of a stage career until a production of ''Hamlet'' in Brighton inspired him to become an actor. He learned his craft in the 1920s with a touring company and later the Birmingham Repertory Theatre. In 1931 he joined the Old Vic, playing mostly Shakespearean roles. He led the company the following season, succeeding Gielgud, who had taught him much about stage technique. After he left the company, a series of leading roles took him to stardom in the West End and on Broadway. In the 1940s, together with Olivier and John Burrell, Richardson was the co-director of the Old Vic compa ...
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List Of Rulers Of Milan
The following is a list of rulers of Milan from the 13th century to 1814, after which it was incorporated into the Kingdom of Lombardy–Venetia by the Congress of Vienna. Before elevation to duchy Until 1259, Milan was a free commune that elected its own ''podestà''. The Torriani family gained sustained power in 1240, when Pagano Della Torre was elected ''podestà''. After Pagano's death, Baldo Ghiringhelli was elected ''podestà'' in 1259, but at the end of his tenure Martino della Torre, Pagano's nephew, perpetrated a coup d'état, seizing of power of his family over the commune, establishing the first ''Signoria'' (Italian for "Lordship") of Milan. During their tenure, the Torriani family, aligned with French Charles of Anjou, started a strong rivality with Visconti family, loyal to the German Hohenstaufen. In 1262, Pope Urban IV appointed Ottone Visconti as Archbishop of Milan, to Martino della Torre's disappointment. In 1273, a civil war started between the two familie ...
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John Wood (English Actor)
John Wood (5 July 1930 – 6 August 2011) was an English actor, known for his performances in Shakespeare and his lasting association with Tom Stoppard. In 1976, he received a Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play for his performance in Stoppard's '' Travesties''. He was nominated for two other Tony Awards for his roles in ''Sherlock Holmes'' (1975) and ''Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead'' (1968). In 2007, Wood was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the Queen's New Year Honours List. Wood also appeared in '' WarGames'', '' The Purple Rose of Cairo'', ''Orlando'', '' Shadowlands'', '' The Madness of King George'', ''Richard III'', '' Sabrina'', and '' Chocolat''. Early life Wood was born on 5 July 1930 in Derbyshire. He was educated at Bedford School. He did his national service as a lieutenant with the Royal Artillery. During his time of service, he was invalided out after being accidentally shot in the back. Later during his service, he was ...
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Michael Hordern
Sir Michael Murray Hordern Commander of the Order of the British Empire, CBE (3 October 19112 May 1995)Morley, Sheridan"Hordern, Michael Murray (1911–1995)" ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'', Oxford University Press, 2004, online edition, May 2009, accessed 22 July 2015 was an English actor whose career spanned nearly 60 years. He is best known for his Shakespeare's plays, Shakespearean roles, especially that of King Lear, which he played to much acclaim on stage in Stratford-upon-Avon in 1969 and London in 1970. He then successfully assumed the role on television five years later. He often appeared in film, rising from a bit part actor in the late 1930s to a member of the main cast; by the time of his death he had appeared in nearly 140 cinema roles. His later work was predominantly in television and radio. Born in Berkhamsted, Hertfordshire, into a family with no theatrical connections, Hordern was educated at Windlesham House School in Pulborough, West Sussex, w ...
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Patrick Stewart
Sir Patrick Stewart (born 13 July 1940) is an English actor who has a career spanning seven decades in various stage productions, television, film and video games. He has been nominated for Olivier, Tony, Golden Globe, Emmy, and Screen Actors Guild Awards. He received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on 16 December 1996. In 2010, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II for services to drama. In 1966, Stewart became a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company. Stewart made his Broadway theatre debut in 1971 in a production of ''A Midsummer Night's Dream''. In 1979, he received the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for his performance in ''Antony and Cleopatra'' in the West End. His first television role was in the ITV series ''Coronation Street'' in 1967. His first major screen roles were in BBC-broadcast television productions '' Fall of Eagles'' (1974), '' I, Claudius'' (1976), and '' Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy'' (1979). In 2008 he played King Cla ...
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Malcolm Storry
Malcolm Storry (born 13 January 1948) is an English actor with extensive experience on stage, television, and film. Amongst many roles, he is perhaps best known for 'Yellin' in ''The Princess Bride'', HM Customs Chief Bill Adams on '' The Knock'', and Clive Tishell in '' Doc Martin''. Storry was born in Hull, East Riding of Yorkshire. He has had an extensive career in theatre, TV, and film, including such roles as Sir Francis Drake in '' Elizabeth: The Golden Age'', Bottom in ''A Midsummer Night's Dream'' for the National Theatre, and many roles for the Royal Shakespeare Company including Prospero and Caliban in '' The Tempest'' and Macduff and Banquo in ''Macbeth ''Macbeth'' (, full title ''The Tragedie of Macbeth'') is a tragedy by William Shakespeare. It is thought to have been first performed in 1606. It dramatises the damaging physical and psychological effects of political ambition on those w ...''. Selected Filmography References External links * {{D ...
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