''Caliban upon Setebos'' is a

poem Poetry (derived from the Greek '' poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meaning ...

written by the

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

poet

Robert Browning Robert Browning (7 May 1812 – 12 December 1889) was an English poet and playwright whose dramatic monologues put him high among the Victorian poets. He was noted for irony, characterization, dark humour, social commentary, historical sett ...

and published in his 1864 ''

Dramatis Personae Dramatis personae (Latin: 'persons of the drama') are the main characters in a dramatic work written in a list. Such lists are commonly employed in various forms of theatre, and also on screen. Typically, off-stage characters are not considere ...

'' collection. It deals with Caliban, a character from Shakespeare's '' The Tempest'', and his reflections on Setebos, the brutal god believed in by himself and his late mother

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 ...

. Some scholars see Browning as being of the belief that

God In monotheistic thought, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. Swinburne, R.G. "God" in Honderich, Ted. (ed)''The Oxford Companion to Philosophy'', Oxford University Press, 1995. God is typically ...

is in the eye of the beholder, and this is emphasized by a barbaric character believing in a barbaric god. An offshoot of this interpretation is the argument that Browning is applying evolutionary theory to religious development.Tebbetts, 367 Others feel that he was

satirizing Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming or e ...

theologians Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the s ...

of his time, who attempted to understand God as a reflection of themselves; this theory is supported by the epigraph,

Psalm The Book of Psalms ( or ; he, תְּהִלִּים, , lit. "praises"), also known as the Psalms, or the Psalter, is the first book of the ("Writings"), the third section of the Tanakh, and a book of the Old Testament. The title is derived f ...

50:21, "Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such a one as thyself." This could be taken as God mocking Caliban (and Browning's contemporaries) for their methods of attempting to understand Him (see note at the bottom of ).

Excerpt

The poem begins (text in

rackets Racket may refer to: * Racket (crime), a systematised element of organized crime ** Protection racket, a scheme whereby a group provides protection to businesses or other groups through violence outside the sanction of the law * Racket (sports equ ...

with a brief narration, but quickly moves to Caliban's monologue, in which he contemplates his god:

Citations

References

*Tracy, C.R. (1938). "Caliban Upon Setebos". Studies in Philology 35 (3): 487–499. *Tebbetts, T.L. (1984). "The Question of Satire in 'Caliban Upon Setebos". Victorian Poetry 22 (4): 365–381.

External links

Sparknote's study guide of the poem

The text of the poem at Representative Poetry Online
{{Authority control Poetry by Robert Browning 1864 poems Works based on The Tempest