What gives Setebos power,
If not the ability to inflict pain?
I, Caliban,
Native creature of the island,
Have never been king of this land.
The god, Setebos,
Has always eclipsed me in his power.
Creator, and destroyer…
How does he gain control?
What is a God?
A ruler?
What force distributes power?
I see.
Sitting here, in the mud,
Through forced labor, I see.
As a slave, I see.
For what authority is not built on others’ pain?
Living creatures, all kin,
Their pain elevates their leaders.
Here on the island, while I toil away,
He benefits off of me.
Prosper, my human master,
And Setebos, my Creator,
One in the same.
For they are the beings that kill or hurt other creatures,
For what?
For amusement.
They are the humans who hunt their kin,
The Gods who demand sacrifice.
What am I?
Not human,
Not beast.
Might I be ruler to something?
Slave, yes.
But powerful creature, still.
May I elevate myself?
On who shall I step to do so?
See the crabs, marching by.
Lowly creatures.
Beings yes, but defenseless.
My targets feel pain.
But they are different from me.
I will demonstrate that I am superior.
I choose at random who I will kill.
I throw the stone with intention.
Now I am above this dead creature,
And the species he represents.
Prosper and Miranda will wake,
And come to find me.
They will assign back-breaking labor.
Setebos will punish me,
With the arrival of more brutish humans,
Who wish to harm me.
But I am more like them now.
A beast of a new kind.
No longer a wild creature,
But like the humans and Gods,
With their power built on pain.
Analysis:
The poem “Caliban upon Setebos” was one of my favorite texts that we read last semester, and I repeatedly came back to it in homework assignments, in-class discussions, and essays. I feel that there were many concepts hidden in this poem that can be taken out of the context of The Tempest and applied to our world. As someone who is very interested in the intelligence and emotional lives of other species, I find the ideas related to Prospero and Miranda inflicting pain on Caliban very interesting. Lines 100-102 were especially interesting to me. Caliban attempts to be like Setebos by killing a crab for his own amusement. To me, this poem is a reflection on the defining characteristics of both humanity and religion. As Caliban strives to be more human or god-like, he inflicts pain on other beings. Because he is killing crabs, rather than humans, the pain he is enforcing may not seem significant to some readers. However, crabs have been proven to feel extreme pain, often to a degree higher than what humans may feel in the same situation. Caliban is attempting to elevate himself by harming another being, as many people do in our world today.
In my poem, I adapted Caliban in a new way by making him aware of the pain he was inflicting. I thought that his character in “Caliban upon Setebos” could be altered to reflect on the meaning of power and how one gains it. To me, Caliban in The Tempestis a character obsessed with power. I attempted to articulate this in my poem, expanding on lines 100-102 to follow Caliban’s thought process. In the original poem, the reason for Caliban’s violent actions is not fully explained, but it is left to the reader to interpret his murder and its significance. My poem interprets it in a way that relates it to people. To me, a characteristic of humanity that separates us from other species is our desire to harm other sentient living beings. We are violent not out of necessity, but simply because we can be. Throughout history, we have exploited countless individuals. By examining Caliban’s actions from a new angle, I think that my poem shows a new side of the character and offers a connection to the real world. Its purpose is to inspire readers to now only examine power dynamics in the original poem or The Tempest, but also to reflect on their own sense of superiority due to their species, and what pain they feel entitled to inflict because of this.
Image:
I am including a drawing I did of the crab as well to accompany the poem. I chose to focus on this image from "Caliban upon Setebos" in my art because I think that it is representative of major themes of the poem.